Tuesday, April 2, 2013

Rodan's Fifteen Quiet Years to be released


QUARTERSTICK/TOUCH AND GO ANNOUNCES RELEASE OF RODAN'S FIFTEEN QUIET YEARS 6/11/13

Fifteen Quiet Years is a celebratory document four years in the making; a repository for all the important Rodan recordings that fans of Rusty have long wished they could unearth. The collection includes the 1994 BBC Peel session, together with all of Rodan's long-out-of-print 7"s and compilation tracks. In 2009, Bob Weston, Jeff Mueller and Jason Noble lovingly re-mastered the tracks at Chicago Mastering Service. All formats of the album will include a digital download of 10 bonus live recordings selected by Jason Noble, Jeff Mueller, Tara Jane O'Neil and Kevin Coultas. The packaging for the vinyl album and CD was designed by Jason Noble and Jeff Mueller, and has been letterpress printed by Jeff Mueller at his own Dexterity Press studio.

Despite the brief time span of their existence (1992-1994), Rodan appeared on a surprising number of records. Aside from their classic (and only) full length album Rusty(1994 on Quarterstick Records), the band released the Aviary demo cassette, and the "How The Winter Was Passed" single. They also contributed tracks to the Compulsiv For Two, Inclined Plane, and Merry Christmas Is For Rockers compilations as well as released a song on the soundtrack to the film Half Cocked (in which they also acted), and recorded a brilliant session at the BBC studios in London for the John Peel show (unreleased until now).

Many artists make their mark in the world while writing and performing in their first or second band, and they never again reach or exceed the high water mark of their earliest artistic output. The members of Rodan are an unusual exception to this all-too-common artistic struggle. Jeff Mueller went on to play guitar and sing in the highly influential and well loved group June Of 44, and subsequently in the very heavy group The Shipping News. Jason Noble played bass in the modern classical, indie-phenomena outfit Rachel's, as well as in The Shipping News (with Jeff Mueller). Tara Jane O'Neil contributed her lovely voice and distinct guitar playing to the newly formed The Sonora Pine (together with Kevin Coultas), as well as the duo Retsin. Subsequent to the breakup of The Sonora Pine in 1998, Tara Jane began a solo career as TJO. Kevin Coultas continued to collaborate with Jason Noble (playing drums in Rachel's), and with Tara Jane O'Neil as the drummer for The Sonora Pine.

On August 4, 2012, Jason Noble lost a three year battle with cancer and passed away at the all-too-young age of 40. On February 9, 2013, Jon Cook also passed away. After 20+ years of continuous involvement in the Louisville music scene, both Jason and Jon will be greatly missed.

Jeff Mueller - Guitar, Vocals Jason Noble - Guitar, Vocals Tara Jane O'Neil - Bass, Guitar, Vocals  Jon Cook / John Weiss / Kevin Coultas - Drums

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