Grand Prize: Squire Telecaster
Deadline: Jul 18, 2009
One lucky winner will get a new shiny Fender Squire Telecaster and War Tapes’ new album “The Continental Divide”!
“We call it heart-quaking doom pop,” says Neil Popkin of the sound of WAR TAPES' first full length album, THE CONTINENTAL DIVIDE, set for release on May 26, 2009, by Seattle-based indie Sarathan Records.
The foursome includes Neil Popkin (singer/rhythm guitarist, from Boston), his sister Becca Popkin (bassist, also from Boston), Matt Bennett (lead guitar, from Hawaii) and William Mohler (drummer, from SoCal). They've been raking in rave reviews since their 2006 live debut, and the early buzz on War Tapes earned airplay on such tastemaker radio stations as BBC Radio 1 and Live 105 in San Francisco, while “Dreaming of You” was aired on NBC’s New Year’s Eve with Carson Daly (and "The Night Unfolds" for a week in March). The band has also already played shows and/or toured across the US and in the UK with The Smashing Pumpkins, Tiger Army, Shiny Toy Guns, Moving Units, The Bravery, Longwave, VNV Nation and The Unseen--even before releasing their first retail EP in Oct 2008.
Written in a bleak rehearsal space overlooking the downtown-LA skyline, THE CONTINENTAL DIVIDE distills the simultaneous gloom and beauty of midnight skyscrapers, crumbling train yards, abandoned warehouses, and feral animals. Guitars stab, assault and shimmer; industrial effects and ambience co-mingle like lost strangers; unexpected bass lines and harmonies rumble propulsively; incessant drum rhythms pulse like LA's writhing freeways; and the always passionate vocals range from apocalyptic to triumphant to tauntingly seductive.
The LA influence is a purely physical affair, not social: William points out that they’re “not looking to be lumped into anyone’s idea of what an LA band sounds like.” Matt continues that “there is some great music coming out of LA right now --music that is relevant, creative, beautiful, and unique. In this way, we feel we fit in, but we were never part of any scene even though we have the utmost respect for the bands and the people involved.” They classify themselves as “on the outside looking in” and writing music purely for themselves: "and if other people like it, then that’s the best feeling ever.”
But the end result is far from self-indulgent navel-gazing. The band has an innate knack for crafting timeless sing-along melodies, anthemic choruses, and an arena-ready sound that has already erupted from the stages of both Fillmores, The Bowery Ballroom, The Warfield, and The Wiltern--and, of course, epic shows at dangerously overcrowded warehouse parties and punk clubs that have become legendary for the passion of the band and their audiences.
Nor is this solely urban music. Although songs like "The Night Unfolds" and "Mind is Ugly" are tailor-made for the 1:30 AM Saturday night mosh pit, songs like "All the World's a Stage,” "Dreaming of You,” and "Use Me" beg to be sung cinematically from a majestic peak or at Red Rocks. Like the cover art (a photo of the continental divide in Colorado taken by Becca while criss-crossing the U.S. on one of their national tours), the music also conveys the expansive openness and hope of the empty but majestic American west. And yes, there is love too: "For Eternity" and the beginning of "Fast Lane" swoon like young lovers in a summer meadow.
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