Presidents Ahoy!
Men in white wigs are back in a big way.
The project started as part of February Writing Month, a website that challenges musicians to write fourteen songs in twenty-eight days and then chooses the best of the best for a compilation disc. Songwriters J. Matthew Gerken, Christian Kiefer and Jefferson Pitcher - all musicians themselves - decided to participate together and ended up recording forty-two rough demos centered on U.S. presidents for the 2006 edition, only omitting a song about George W. Bush. Seeing the potential for greatness, they decided to expand upon their initial idea and make a true album. The motley crew of writers gathered their musician friends and started collaborating and ended up with an entire collection of president-themed songs entitled Of Great and Mortal Men: 43 Songs for 43 U.S. Presidencies. Artists like Califone, Xiu Xiu, Alan Sparhawk of Low and These United States participated in the recording process, enhancing songs already written by Gerken, Kiefer and Pitcher.
The first track “George Washington (Washington Dreams of the Hippopotamus)” features trumpeter and percussionist Vince DiFiore of the band Cake. Each track tries to keep in style with the current music of the time period, and “Washing Dreams of the Hippopotamus” opens with tin whistles and snare drums a plenty. The track is pretty epic and makes you feel proud about our nation’s founding father and all the “dumb-asses” he had to deal with when forming our country. A song about Obama is set to be released on Inauguration Day.
The three-disc box set, released in September, includes a 100+ page book with forty-three renditions of our patriotic papas by forty-three different artists. Of Great and Mortal Men isn’t badly priced either so if you know any history buffs with a pension for indie music, look no further for that perfect gift (http://ofgreatandmortalmen.wordpress.com/). Band for Lands, a non-profit organization in Colorado that promotes sustainability and conservation through the visual arts, is sponsoring a show in Washington D.C. on January 17th with artists from the Of Great and Mortal Men project in celebration of Obama’s inauguration.
Posted by Amy Dittmeier on Jan 05, 2009 @ 12:00 am