Stick Against Stone’s domestic US PR
provided by the good people at
Rock Paper Scissors PR
EPK for:
INSTANT
Stick Against Stone
(US digital release – 6 Nov. 2015, US physical release – 6 May, 2016. Germany & UK physical release – September / October 2016)
US REVIEWS
Pop Matters: “The cult faves have finished their debut album, which has been only 30 years in the making.” “… an astonishing mix of taut [post]-punk rock and loose, groovy funk.”
REVIEWS FROM GERMANY
“A sound of the Bahamas Compass Point productions of the era of Grace Jones, Talking Heads, Sly & Robbie, Tom Tom Club … Soul, funk, pop and avant-garde, disco, rock, jazz, reggae and dub, Afro in all its shades, Latin and Oceanic Exotica sounds … Stick Against Stone have clearly something that the music of today too often lacks: a unique selling point, which one can hear clearly and thankfully, that the songs were conceived three decades ago … Stick Against Stone and “Instant” are not just the rebirth of Compass Point post-punk attitude — they are the reflection of an entire (even if on the basis of numbers alone, very limited) generation of music fans whose hyperlink between soul and punk definitely a desirable, not dispensible, element of their own cultural socialisation of their Sturm und Drang period — myself included. Soul Train advises: an individual-dream, with high potential for addiction.”
“Nothing is impossible — but it’s astonishing that an album like “Instant”, with all its stylistic facets, can appear nowadays. It’s as if all the punk energy of the 70s, after a long journey through dark channels was suddenly washed up on the surface of the ’80s and [once] there – poached from every conceivable genre. Authentic post-punk romanticism breathes exuberant energy into angular Afrobeat, edgy funk, continental reggae, propulsive samba and dub pearls. And the whole thing sounds as if the last 30 years hadn’t happened — just as at that time. That only works with songs that were written more than three decades ago and are only now making their way onto the shelves. Why this is so, will not occupy us further at this point. Boldly put your finger on play and off you go. … Nothing is impossible.”
EPK for:
THE OREGON BOOTLEG TAPES – LIVE
Stick Against Stone (released 20 May, 2014)
REVIEWS
Robert Christgau – Expert Witness / Cuepoint – “As if by magic…a fine old time…horny punk polyrhythms and a brave female singer.”
New York Magazine – Weekly Top 25 Pick – “Wildly Danceable”
Wax Poetics #60 – “..Like a wooly mammoth…a wild amalgam of hippie ideas, punk aesthetics, African percussion and Harmolodic underpinnings…”
Pitchfork – 7.3 rating – “Brutally obscure... not only deserves to be listened to, but nearly demands it.” “They had their eyes on the there and then, but they were playing 20 years into the future.”
Vibe Magazine“For a band pounding out such dissonant funk, Stick Against Stone sounds pretty tight. SAS may not get name-checked as often as their peers, but this live recording and the way they play on it should go a long way to changing that.”
Wondering Sound “As music history goes, Stick Against Stone are a footnote to a footnote, but [the band] displays the same tense energy as many of their more popular musical peers.”
Splinters and Candy“One of the greatest joys any music fan can experience is when they stumble upon a group they’re unfamiliar with who challenge the assumptions of genres. Stick Against Stone is one of these bands. The Oregon Bootleg Tapes showcase aband that was at the forefront of a new kind of musical exploration, not locked down by the confines of punk or funk. Stick Against Stone mix it all together and give the people something to think about while they dance uncontrollably.”
KLCC Eugene Public Radio interview by ERIC ALAN – “The Pittsburgh band Stick Against Stone merged punk with global rhythms. They moved to Eugene in the mid-1980s, and recorded a show at Eugene’s Saturday Market in 1985 just now being released on CD as The Oregon Bootleg Tapes.”
EPK for:
GET IT ALL OUT – Stick Against Stone Orchestra
(released 22 January, 2013)
REVIEWS
Stick Against Stone is Resurrected To Explore Legacy
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
March 7, 2013
By Manny Theiner
“But there was one other band whose geographical reach and genre-busting proclivities outstripped all others, yet was forgotten due to a dearth of documentation: Stick Against Stone. Founded by Indiana, Pa., natives Richard Vitale and Brook Duer in 1981, the group commanded a stunning depth of influences, from Afrobeat, reggae and two-tone ska to punk, art-funk and avant-garde jazz, along with a distinctly sociopolitical bent to its lyrics.
The seven-piece bouillabaisse became an eminently danceable force with a horn section in the neighborhood of similarly motivated groups in New York (Liquid Liquid, The Dance, Defunkt, ESG, Konk) and the U.K. (Pigbag, Rip Rig & Panic, The Slits, Scritti Politti, A Certain Ratio).”
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Stick Against Stone Orchestra: Get It All Out
The Pittsburgh group reunites to record their three-decade-old repertoire
Financial Times (UK)
January 18, 2013
By David Honigmann
“Pittsburgh in 1981 had the same vibe as Bristol: a melting pot of influences from free jazz to gamelan to Afrobeat. The city’s short-lived Stick Against Stone Orchestra reunite here to record their three-decade-old repertoire, and it sounds decidedly contemporary, like Fela Kuti refracted through Rip Rig and Panic via Ornette Coleman. “Private Sector”, with its honeyed corporatisms, could be a lost David Byrne song about buildings and food.”
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Stick Against Stone Orchestra ‘Get It All Out’: Album Review
Exclaim! Magazine (Canada)
January 22, 2013
By Ryan B. Patrick
“With Get It All Out, cult collective Stick Against Stone Orchestra continue their unapologetic Pittsburgh post-punk exploration on all things funk, jazz and Afrobeat — to better than average results. Currently functioning as a 12-person ensemble, the current incarnation of Stick Against Stone Orchestra are determined to live up to the legacy of deceased ex-frontman John Creighton, right down to the album title (taken from one of the last songs penned by Creighton prior to his departure from the group). Get It All Out exists as an attempt to capture and distil the band’s live show legacy into a satisfactory studio album effort. On various tracks, they’ve been successful: album opener “Everybody’s Song (the Music Business)” sees veteran bandmate Geraldine Murray set a feverish pace; “Wasted Lives” is wholly reverent to Afrobeat rhythms; “Face Down” hits the ground running, with brassy ska elements; and the Creighton-penned “Moonlight Finds a Face” leverages samba-jazz to a satisfactory conclusion. Get It All Out respects the Stick Against Stone Orchestra brand, blending disparate elements to feel frenetic and fleeting all at once”
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Concert Preview
NY1 “Sound Advice”
January 29, 2013
“The Stick Against Stone Orchestra are an Afrobeat-inspired outfit that formed in Pittsburgh around 1981. They wrote some dynamite songs and attracted a cult following before splintering apart and joining other groups.
Now they are back, breathing life into the old material and expanding it. SASO’s new album “Get It All Out” shares a name with a documentary about them due next year. They are at Joe’s Pub on Tuesday night.”
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‘Get It All Out’ by Stick Against Stone Orchestra: Album Review
Ground Control Magazine (Canada)
January 19, 2013
by Bill Adams
“Remember the first time you heard Was (Not Was)? It was weird, right? Here was this band who could knock out awesome rhythm tracks – great beats, good guitars and a kind of worldly spice – and it had some totally oddball vocal track on top of it which was (probably) screaming out some unusual one-man vignette about calling your father to tell him you were prison bound and excited about it. Listening came with an awkward sensation; that killer musical composition made you want to dance, but the vocals made you feel weird about trying to dance because there was no hook and no descernable meter to it; it was a bit overwhelming, so you probably just stood, appreciating what you were hearing. You still liked the music – may have even liked the fact that it felt a little willfully awkward – but there was no way to dance to it, and no easy way to explain the group’s appeal.”
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Legendary Pittsburgh Punk Funk Band Reunites with a New Album
New York Music Daily
Featured Story
January 20, 2013
“Legendary Pittsburgh Punk Funk Band Reunites with a New Album Stick Against Stone Orchestra”s new album Get It All Out has a quaint early 80s charm: it should resonate mightily with people who were there at the time and dancing up a storm at college parties and punk clubs. That because this group was there, a wildly popular Pittsburgh attraction who never managed to catch on outside their local scene. Many of the catchy, simple songs on this album date from from 1983 or before: as early indie funk, this stuff foreshadows the advent of cool bands like D’Tripp and the Family Stand, who were influenced as much by the Talking Heads as James Brown. What’s obvious is that this was a bunch of punks trying their hand at funk and Afrobeat. Like the Gang of Four, their plainspoken, politically-charged lyrics, shouted more often than sung, have the feel of a college term paper, but as early Reagan-era observations, they’re spot-on. Musically, the hooks are simple and catchy, with bright horn charts and incisive bass, and the NYC pros who form the backbone of the newly reassembled band do a good job capturing the music’s irrepressible, subversive spirit”
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Interview: Will Kreth, Get It All Out
Interactive Media Producer and Entrepreneur Will Kreth’s forthcoming transmedia music documentary revitalizes and transforms its subject matter
IFN Film
January 7, 2013
By Jason W. Bunyan
“At the early age of 19, Will Kreth (interactive media producer, entrepreneur, and published author) became the soundman and manager for Stick Against Stone, a band that emerged from Pittsburgh, PA’s underground music scene in the early 1980s. Sonically unconventional for the period in which they came into being and known for their live shows, Stick Against Stone performed alongside bands such as Bad Brains, Minutemen, Dead Kennedys and MDC, but never released an album. In 2005, Kreth rediscovered Stick Against Stone’s earliest, most compelling songs through tapes of the original lineup’s live performances and sought to learn more about its charismatic founder, the late John H. Creighton III. In the process, he began creating Get It All Out, a transmedia music documentary about Creighton’s life and the band’s place in the subculture of Reagan-era post-punk/no wave music.”
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Stick Against Stone Orchestra: Get It All Out Album Release: Event Listing
“All-star lineup of members from Losers Lounge, Burnt Sugar, Dizzy Ventilators and Time of Orchids rehydrate the long-lost songbook of Stick Against Stone as part of the upcoming documentary Get It All Out. “A smorgasbord of solid grooves seasoned with global spices – served in a punk funk setting.” -Liquid Liquid’s Salvatore Principato Thirty-one years ago, a six-piece band/collective called Stick Against Stone started writing songs in a dirt-floor basement of a row house near the University of Pittsburgh. Like a musical cargo cult fed by the global eclecticism of their local freeform community radio station – Wyep-FM – this “horns and percussion” outfit acquired a taste for afrobeat, punk rock, art funk, free jazz and dub reggae. Beyond the moniker of “no wave” – they wrote surprisingly deep melodic hooks amid swirling, ambitious and funky arrangements. Finding themselves with a devoted local following – but without a proper album to their name – it would be several years and cities later that they eventually broke up and their quirky, soulful songbook was lost to time. Until now. Stick Against Stone Orchestra’s new album “Get It All Out” (out January 22nd) shares the same name as a multi-platform documentary about the band and their music (due in 2014). Consisting of a powerhouse nucleus of both original members and an impressive cadre of new players – including keyboardist Joe McGinty and guitarist David Terhune from Loser’s Lounge, Paula Henderson on baritone sax (Burnt Sugar), Jesse Krakow on bass (Shudder to Think, Time of Orchids), percussionist Yusuke Yamamoto (Dizzy Ventilators, Fela! – The Musical) and session-ace drummer Denny McDermott – it’s a veritable cavalcade of talent, but amazingly, everyone sounds fully invested in the “power of the circle” that is the new Stick Against Stone Orchestra.”
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