New Gentle Wolves Track "Follow Me the Master Said"

Even though the next Gentle Wolves’ studio album has been delayed due to the world-wide pandemic, we didn’t want to let the original release date to go by without dropping another track.

We’re proud to share this version of a retuned hymn called Follow Me the Master Said. There have been a few versions/feels of this number over the years, but this upbeat version we have always called the “Paul Simon” version.

This is also the first track from Room for All to feature our v2 Wolf Choir. Kelly Foster did a fantastic job of arranging and organizing some of these songs in a way that several folks could lend their voices to the recording!

Credits:
Dan Wheeler: Drums and Vocals
Paul Price: Bass
Mitch Holt: Guitar
Kyle Robertson: Piano
Diana Rudd: Vocals
Kevin Gibbs: Sax
Richard Kentopp: Vocals and Guitar

Choir:
Arranged and Directed by Kelly Foster
Kelly Shoenfelt
Jarell Wilson
Weber Schulz
Elysia Van Deusen
Chris Van Deusen
Abby Herrera
Greg Smith
Dan Wheeler
Diana Rudd

Enjoy!

"Room for All" Delayed

Richard here, writing to let you know that, obviously, the Gentle Wolves’ CD release party at Hole in the Wall in Austin, TX has been indefinitely postponed.

I’m also writing to let you know that the record, due to be released this Friday, has also been delayed. No release date is set, but it’s almost complete. It should be available on all of the digital outlets by June.
Physical copies might not be available right away, but we’ll worry about that later.

Please stay safe, healthy, and whole until we get to celebrate together in person.

Richard

4/28/20

"Room for All" Release Set, New Gentle Wolves Track "Far Off We See A Goal"

We are living in strange times. As the world teeters on the edge of illness and billions of people huddle in their homes to avoid microscopic organisms, The Gentle Wolves, a church-band without a church, sit poised to release an album of church music. Is this what the world needs right now… another collection of church songs?

Anyone who knows me knows that the way I process things is through music. When times are hard I put my headphones in and blare Mogwai or Mineral. When I feel frustrated, I impose order on my world through kicks and snares, clanging guitars, and out-of-tune crooning. Most importantly, when my friends are hurting I show up with songs to sing.

Room For All Release Date and Release Party

Room for All, the first studio release for The Gentle Wolves in over five years, will be available on all digital platforms on Friday 5/1. Community health permitting, we will be celebrating with a release party/show at the legendary Hole in the Wall in Austin, TX on Friday 4/25. Just as the Church Fathers (and Mothers) adorn the walls of many-a-sanctuary, so the saints of Austin’s rich music pantheon have influenced our renditions. Because of this, it seems fitting that our churchless church band would celebrate the release of our record in a place with such a rich history of its own.

I’m incredibly proud of Room for All. It’s a full-length album featuring 12 original retuned hymns. Taking old hymns and poems and setting them to new music was my favorite part of being a music pastor. I hope this collection of half-original songs will be sung in many-a worships and will bring hope to earbuds, boomboxes, and road trips.

Far Off We See A Goal

It is perhaps fitting that Far Off We See A Goal (click play on the album cover above) is coming out on a Friday the 13th like today. It’s frenetic, pre-apolayptic tones juxtapose nicely against the faithful-uncertainty of Robert Robert’s (!?!) lyrics from the eighteenth century. Dan Wheeler’s drumming on this track is incredibly tight, but feels like it could all fall apart at any moment… which could maybe be said for our faith or our civilization. I almost find the timeless anxiety comforting.

The chord chart for this song can be found here.

New Music: Scenery's "Lady Bird" Cassette Now Available!

I'm very proud to present Scenery's Lady Bird Cassette. It's our first release since 2017's full length Two Stares. While the latter was a sweat-filled summer of partying, love, and loss, Lady Bird is a quieter, more intimate night on the lake. 

There's a lot I could say about it, so I'll just say it in bullet form:

• The album cover of this release is very special to me. The photo was taken by my grand-uncle Roland Chatham in 1947. The subject was his girlfriend, my beloved Aunt Catherine, whom we lost in 2016. She was truly a Lady Bird, as she flew airplanes in WWII in an elite women's air group. I love how my talented friend, Bryan Butler, took the photo and brought it together perfectly.
• The title track, Lady Bird, is a story about falling in and out of love in Austin in the late 90s and early 2000s. Back then there used to be impromptu concerts in the middle of the Lamar Street pedestrian bridge. That's what I'm referring to in the chorus when I sing "Meet me on the bridge over Lady Bird and I'll sing you my song." It has since been pointed out to me that Austin's Town Lake wasn't renamed "Lady Bird Lake" until 2007. I think that really just speaks to how our memories and nostalgia can be so wildly approximate, with people, places, and times conflated into a single picture; a single feeling. That's what we tried to do with this song.
• The B-side, Queen of the Night, is also very special to me. When my good friend Elizabeth Lodowski passed away in 2016 her boyfriend gave one of the most moving eulogies I've ever heard. She wrestled with cancer for several years, but they only met a couple of years before she died. This is my best attempt of catching that moment and putting it into a song.
• This is the first album I've put out of my own music that I didn't play a large role in mixing since the passing of my best friend and partner in music, Travis Bannerman. Major props to John Michael Landon at Estuary Studios for mixing the two featured tracks with such skill and care. 
• This was also the first time I've employed anyone for mastering except for Travis or the ever-so-talented Tim Gerron. Big shout out to Kevin Butler at Test Tube Audio for last-second mastering that was perfectly crisp and clean. 

You can listen below or on Spotify and you can purchase a physical cassette on our bandcamp site. 

Announcing Scenery's "Lady Bird" Cassette

I'm excited to announce Scenery's new 4 song cassette entitled Lady Bird will be released on Friday 4/20/18. There will also be an accompanying digital release that same day (Spotify, Apple Music, Bandcamp, etc).

I'm immensely proud of this recording. Where Two Stares was the moody couple sitting on a leather couch in the middle of a raging party, Lady Bird is a quiet moment overlooking the city on Mount Bonnell at sunset. 

We will be celebrating at the Mohawk in Austin, TX on Friday April 20th with our good friends in Black Books, Kay Odyssey, and Ramesh.

The track-listing will be as follows:
1) Lady Bird
2) Near
3) Queen of the Night
4) Smile

Scenery's TWO STARES now available everywhere!

Scenery's first full-length album, Two Stares, is now available everywhere!
You can order a physical CD here for just $10, or check out your favorite digital music service below.

Spotify

Bandcamp

iTunes

Google Play

New Gentle Wolves Track: O Lord Our Words Don't Work Any More

The past week has been a rough one for many of us; the police killings, the police being killed (in my hometown).  

Yesterday while many were posting on social media to process the societal carnage, I wrote and recorded this song. 

"O Lord Our Words Don't Work Anymore" is meant to be sung communally, and so it will be. I'm not exactly sure if I like it or not, but maybe it can be helpful for you to confess with me in these dark days. 

O Lord our words don’t work anymore
We talk and sing till the air is warm
But we can’t convey what needs to be said
We need your Word to cure our dread! 
Yes we need your Word to cure our dread! 

O Lord our ears don’t work anymore
Our neighbors cry but we’re deaf for sure
So we cannot hear what your Spirit says
We need your voice to raise the dead! 
Yes we need your voice to raise the dead! 

O Lord our hands don’t work any more
We thought they did but they’ve grown quite worn
From building shrines to gods unknown
We need you Lord to reclaim your throne! 
Yes we need you Lord to reclaim your throne! 

O Lord our feet don’t work any more
We crawl around in the dirt evermore
We’ve chosen paths that scar and mame
Savior bring healing to the lame! 
Savior bring healing to the lame! 

O Lord our heads don’t work any more
We think we know the truth for sure
But we get so lost in thoughts base and vain
Humble us with wisdom’s reins! 
Yes humble us with wisdom’s reins!

Here is a link to the PDF song sheet.

New Music: Scenery - "For the Record" Single Now Available Online

My newish band Scenery has released our second single, For the Record. It is available on Itunes, Spotify, Amazon Music, Apple Music and anywhere your ears care to consume. You can also listen to it by just clicking on the play button below.

Several folks have asked me about the song's dark nature, and who I might have kissed in 1993 that would be giving me such present-day alcoholism. Well, in a dramatic departure from the overly heady and deeply spiritual music I have become known for, I have let my songwriting for Scenery be fictional, universal, and as sappy as Robert Smiths'. It has been a lot of fun. Seeing as I have never allowed myself to just write songs that weren't part of a concept album or meant to be sung in liturgical worship.... it's very refreshing.
So hopefully you, or anyone, can find something you identify with enough to sing along or get down on the dancefloor.