The minus 5

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The minus 5
The Minus 5.png
General information
Genre (s) skirt
founding 1993
Website http://www.minus5.com/
Founding members
Scott McCaughey
Guitar, bass
 Peter Buck
Guitar, bass
 Ken Stringfellow
guitar
 Jon Auer
former members
guitar
 John Ramberg
Drums
 Bill Rieflin

The Minus 5 is an American music group whose permanent members are Scott McCaughey and REM guitarist Peter Buck , who are supported by alternating guest musicians. Overall, it is a pop collective that has been configured differently again and again, so that each album has a different line-up.

history

Scott "McCoy" McCaughey wrote songs in the summer of 1992, when his colleagues from the alternative rock band The Young Fresh Fellows from Seattle were involved in other projects, songs that did not fit the chosen concept of his band. He described them as "strange, folky, doomer songs" consisting of admiration for the album Third / Sister Lovers of Big Star was created from 1975 out. He knew that he would have to start a new band for that. In 1993 he had them together. Besides himself, you included: REM guitarist Peter Buck, who had just moved to Seattle, and the two The Posies musicians Ken Stringfellow and Jon Auer . Terry Adams and Tom Ardolino from NRBQ and Chris Eckman and Carla Torgerson from Walkabouts were guests . Buck developed into a constant in the course of the band's history, Stringfellow and Auer also reappeared later, otherwise various musicians from not so well-known but established bands made themselves available for guest appearances, so that the weekly newspaper Die Zeit from a “B -Supergroup “spoke. In laut.de you to this as chose "Patchwork Band". McCaughey himself has been helping out in the studio and live at REM since 1994.

The debut EP The Minus 5 (also known as The Hello EP ) was released in 1993 under the label Hello Recording Club . It was followed in 1995 by the album Old Liquidator on East Side Digital. This was announced and promoted in Germany under the title Last Call, Corporal by Glitterhouse Records, but then also published under Old Liquidator . The material could not be performed live, however, because McCaughey went on an extensive tour with REM. The successor The Lonesome Death of Buck McCoy , which was created in close collaboration with Buck, was recorded in late 1996 and released in spring 1997 by Hollywood Records. In addition to the Peter Buck / Scott McCaughey team, Ken Stringfellow was again involved, Barrett Martin ( Screaming Trees , Mad Season ) and Mike McCready ( Pearl Jam ) added them. Buck composed mostly the music and McCaughey wrote the lyrics, but everyone was involved in the creation process via tape shipping . In the same year McCaughey's solo album ( My Chartreuse Opinion ) was re-released on Hollywood Records, but this time as a minus 5 album. Next, a CD production of The Minus 5 (12 tracks) was combined with one of the Young Fresh Fellows (14 tracks) to create a split double CD. Its full name is therefore Let the War Against Music Begin / Because We Hate You . The minus 5 recordings were created by joining together instrumental tracks made at widely spaced locations of those involved . Ex- Mott-the-Hoople Morgan Fisher recorded the keyboards in Japan, for example. The Smithereens member Dennis Diken, an old friend of McCaughey's and can be heard on his solo album, played the drums in New Jersey . Much of the soundtrack was made in London . Other contributions come from the guitarist Sean O'Hagen ( The High Llamas ), the saxophonist Steve Berlin ( Los Lobos ), a spoken passage by Robyn Hitchcock , and McCaughey's little daughter was immortalized vocally. The Minus 5 could actually have filled the double CD on its own, because there were enough songs to choose from. After pressure from the record company, the happier, more poppy numbers were ultimately selected. In between the album In Rock , recorded in March 2000, was released, which McCaughey had written only with Peter Buck and which - before it was included in the program by the Book Records label - had been sold outside of the record trade via the merchandise channel. In 2004 it was re-released by Yep Roc Records. During this longer phase, McCaughey's band was represented by Peter Buck (here on bass), Ken Stringfellow (guitar), John Ramberg (guitar) and Bill Rieflin (ex- Ministry , drums).

In spring 2003 three musicians from the Minus-5-staff together with the REM-Trio prepared the bonus tracks for a best-of -REM-album as well as an upcoming tour (in a sense there were even four with Buck). In December 2003 the label Return to Sender released the other songs from the Let-the-War-Against-Music-Begin production under the title I Don't Know Who I Am . Among the guests this time is, for example, Jason Finn from the Presidents of the United States of America . Then they signed a contract with Yep Roc Records and began a collaboration with Jeff Tweedy (ex- Uncle-Tupelo , then Wilco ). Down with Wilco (A Tragedy in Three Halfs) is the title of the resulting work. Again there were a number of unused songs that were combined into the EP At the Organ (2004). Scott McCaughey, Peter Buck, the three Wilco actors Jeff Tweedy, John Stirratt and Glen Kotche, the two Decemberists , play on the 2006 album called The Minus 5 , which is mostly cited as The Gun Album because of its cover motif -Members Colin Meloy and John Moen, plus again Ken Stringfellow of the Posies and Bill Rieflin.

In 2008, the Minus 5 duo McCaughin / Buck merged with the Wynn / Pitman couple to form the side project The Baseball Project, which set out to set events relating to the national sport of the Americans to music . Scott McCaughey contributed vocals, bass, guitar, keyboards and percussion to the album, subtitled Vol. 1: Frozen Ropes and Dying Quails , which was released in July . Steve Wynn was also involved in vocals, guitar playing and keyboard operation. Peter Buck took over the guitar and bass he was familiar with, along with other stringed instruments . Linda Pitman also sang, but was mainly responsible for drums and percussion. The sequels of The Baseball Project followed every three years. Exactly one year later after The Baseball Project Vol. 1 , the regular The Minus 5 album Killingsworth was released .

After REM's dissolution in 2011, Buck brought the REM-experienced McCaughey and other Minus-5 people such as guitarist Kurt Bloch and drummer Bill Rieflin into the studio for his three solo albums. For Record Store Day on April 19, 2014, McCaughey put together a limited edition, a box set with vinyl records on which there is rare and unreleased minus 5 material. It was titled Scott the Hoople in the Dungeon of Horror . In March 2015, Yep Roc Records released Dungeon Golds , a twelve-song selection from this vinyl release. The sound document contains recordings with the Small Faces keyboarder Ian McLagan , who died soon afterwards.

style

The industry magazine MusikWoche classified Old Liquidator or Last Call, Corporal as alternative rock and wrote: “This team cleverly combines catchy melodies in the tradition of the Beatles and Byrds with attack-like atonal noise attacks à la Giant Sand .” The Musikexpress characterized the repertoire of the debut album as "Songs like XTC on country , folk and blues ." The intro reviewer experienced a "ride through rock history" with a stay in the " Swingin 'Sixties " . He added: "Memories of REM are rumbling latently in the room, the 'rest' is a kind of cooperation of Beatles music (including their harmony songs ), Flaming Lips riot and / or Kinks pop songs."

The Lonesome Death of Buck McCoy is back in the tradition of the Beatles and Byrds, sometimes folky, sometimes ballad-like , sometimes powerful, sometimes flower-pop, said MusikWoche . In the German Rolling Stone , Jörg Feyer saw stylistic parallels to the Beatles, Small Faces, Turtles , Beach Boys and Big Star in the album material . It is about "anglophile [n] US folk pop" and " easy listening for slightly higher demands". The lyrics are about the life of a disgruntled hobo . The Minus 5 plays on the album "postmodern, guitar-focused folk rock ", based on the Beatles (era Revolver / Rubber Soul ), Byrds, Small Faces, Turtles and Buffalo Springfield , it said in the Musikexpress .

With regard to Let the War Against Music Begin , the American music magazine CMJ New Music Monthly said that there were arrangements based on the 1960s with thoughtful but not pretentious lyrics.

The Eclipsed reviewer was of the opinion that Down with Wilco was “pomp-pop” and reminded of the Beatles, the Beach Boys or Supertramp . As dramatic as the subtitle suggests, the album is not, wrote Uwe Schleifenbaum in his review for the Musikexpress . It is "at best elegiac pop". And, given the quality, it is irrelevant to what extent the albums Pet Sounds by the Beach Boys and Abbey Road by the Beatles were copied and given “a pinch of Byrds”. The pop, with its light electronic undertones, reminded the Rolling Stone reviewer of Byrds' album Fifth Dimension and the Beach Boys in the early 1970s.

The internet music magazine gaesteliste.de commented on I Don't Know Who I Am : "Between 60s inspired pop songs and weird circus numbers, there's everything here that a friend of good pop music outside of the mainstream would like to hear."

The associations with The Minus 5 were unanimous . For Die Zeit , the term Americana was obvious, with a Beatles and Byrds influence and punk exclamation marks. The Eclipsed employee also found Americana for the appropriate style specification, with the Beatles' trademarks added, sometimes flower-powered . Sometimes the Beatles, sometimes the Strokes , can be heard, sometimes music for hippies, sometimes for rockers, Laut.de indicated the stylistic route.

While the lyrics were permeated with cynicism and depression , the music would exude "melody bliss" and optimism , the Rolling Stone found . Peter Felkel emphasized the variety in the Musikexpress . Each song is accented differently, with the Beatles appearing in almost every review being named here.

The concept album The Baseball Project Vol. 1: Frozen Ropes And Dying Quails was assigned to the various styles of indie rock , country, Tex-Mex , glam rock and pop by Rolling Stone .

The album Killingsworth appeared to the Musikexpress as a union of the musical tendencies of the last Minus 5 album and the side project , because the review there speaks of country rock and Americana. Emmylou Harris , Gram Parsons and the Poco early stage were given as approximate equivalents. Killingsworth bow to the Byrds, Buffalo Springfield and The Band , show the charisma of The Mamas and the Papas , the Searchers and the Dixie Chicks and sound like the Traveling Wilburys could have continued, the Rolling Stone speculated .

At Dungeon Gold , the German Press Agency (printed in Focus ) identified “defiance, humor and self-irony”. The indie rock presented results from the “retro rock, country folk and power pop” ingredients. “The folk-rock glamor of the Byrds, the vocal art of Beach Boys or Hollies , the smart pop of Kinks or Bowie ; everything is there ”, summarized the Rolling Stone .

The Internet platform Allmusic applied the stylistic term alternative rock to the entire work and the rock magazine Eclipsed said that one could believe that there are “new incarnations of the Beatles, Beach Boys or Supertramp at work”. Scott McCaughey said in an interview with Rolling Stone in 2003 that he was aiming for Beach Boys standards. And in the same year he gave an insight into the songwriting process to the online music magazine gaesteliste.de : “I mostly write the songs on the acoustic guitar or piano . When it comes to recording, I try randomly with instruments and effects lying around in order to always find something that is unusual or different. Peter's ideas are often more specific, he knows exactly what sounds good on a particular song. The E-Bow guitar in There is No Music, for example, or the organ part in Saturn is a Place on Earth . "

Discography

Albums

  • 1995: Old Liquidator (also udT: Last Call, Corporal , East Side Digital)
  • 1997: The Lonesome Death of Buck McCoy (Hollywood Records)
  • 2000: In Rock (Book Records)
  • 2001: Let the War against Music Begin (split double CD, Mammoth Records)
  • 2003: Down with Wilco: A Tragedy in Three Halfs (Yep Roc)
  • 2003: I Don't Know Who I Am (also with the addition: Let the War against Music Begin Vol. 2 , Return to Sender)
  • 2006: The Minus 5 (Yep Roc Records)
  • 2008: The Baseball Project Vol. 1: Frozen Ropes and Dying Quails (Yep Roc Records)
  • 2009: Killingworth (Yep Roc Records)
  • 2011: The Baseball Project Vol. 2: High and Inside (Yep Roc Records)
  • 2014: Scott the Hoople in the Dungeon of Terror (limited vinyl LP, Yep Roc Records)
  • 2014: The Baseball Project 3rd (Yep Roc Records)
  • 2015: Dungeon Golds (Yep Roc Records)

Singles and EPs

  • 1993: The Minus 5 (also udT: The Hello EP , Hello Recording Club)
  • 1995: Emperor of the Bathroom (East Side Digital)
  • 2000: A Thousand Years Away (7 "single, Houston Party Records)
  • 2003: Retrieval of You (Promo CD single, Cooking Vinyl )
  • 2004: At the Organ (Yep Roc Records)
  • 2009: Sad Hasselhoff (limited 12 "EP, Yep Roc Records)
  • 2015: Redeyed in Austin (Split-12 "-EP as The Baseball Project / The Minus 5, Yep Roc Records)

Compilations

  • 2009: Butcher Covered (cover versions, Book Records)

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j Stephen Tomas Erlewine: The Minus 5. Artist Biography by Stephen Thomas Erlewine. In: allmusic.com. Retrieved May 6, 2016 .
  2. ↑ a b c d e Peter Blackstock: The New Math. Scott McCaughey Adds the Minus 5 without Subtracting the Young Fresh Fellows . In: New Depression . 32 (March / April), 2001, pp. 64 ff .
  3. ↑ a b Thomas Gross: The team is the star. Pop: The band The Minus 5 is made up of second-tier heroes . In: The time . No. 8/2006 , February 16, 2006, discotheque, p. ? .
  4. ↑ a b The Minus 5. Laut.de biography. In: laut.de. Retrieved May 6, 2016 .
  5. ^ The Minus 5 - Last Call, Corporal. In: discogs.com. Retrieved May 6, 2016 .
  6. ↑ a b c Carsten Wohlfeld: The Minus 5. On the war path. In: gaesteliste.de. 2003, accessed May 6, 2016 .
  7. ↑ The Minus 5 - In Rock. In: discogs.com. Retrieved May 6, 2016 .
  8. ^ Greg Moon: Interview with John Ramberg of The Tripwires! (No longer available online.) In: alottatalk.com. September 26, 2011, archived from the original on May 6, 2016 ; accessed on May 6, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.alottatalk.com
  9. ↑ Birgit Fuß : Three are not enough for anyone. REM have found their fragile balance . In: Rolling Stone . No. 105 , July 2003, Rolling Stone Special, pp. 52 ff .
  10. ↑ a b The Minus 5: Top fit with mid-50s. In: focus.de. dpa , March 24, 2015, accessed on May 6, 2016 .
  11. ^ The Minus 5. Last Call, Corporal . In: MusikWoche . The news magazine for the music industry. No. 50/1994 , December 12, 1994, news. Recommended, p. 14 .
  12. ^ F [rank] Sa [watzki]: The Minus 5. Last Call, Corporal . In: Musikexpress / Sounds . No. 467 , December 1994, panels from A – Z, p. 73 f .
  13. ^ Ralf Poppe: The Minus 5. Last Call, Corporal . In: Intro . No. November 19 , 1994, pp. 45 ( online [accessed May 6, 2016]). online ( Memento of the original from May 6, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.intro.de
  14. ^ The Minus 5. The Lonesome Death of Buck McCoy . In: MusikWoche . The news magazine for the music industry. No. 33/1997 , August 11, 1997, news. Recommended, p. 24 .
  15. ^ Jörg Feyer: The Minus 5. The Lonesome Death of Buck McCoy . In: Rolling Stone . No. 34 , August 1997, audio carrier in August, p. 93 f .
  16. ↑ hake: The Minus 5. The Lonesome Death of Buck McCoy . In: Musikexpress / Sounds . No. 500 , September 1997, panels from A – Z, p. 58 f .
  17. ^ Franklin Bruno: The Young Fresh Fellows. Because we hate you. The Minus 5. Let the War Against Music begin . In: CMJ New Music Monthly . The Best Magazine You Ever Heard. March 2001, Reviews, p. 70 .
  18. ↑ C [arsten] A [gthe]: The Minus 5 "Down with Wilco" . In: Eclipsed . Rock magazine. No. 50 , March 2003, CD Reviews, pp. 43 .
  19. ↑ Uwe Schleifenbaum: The Minus 5. Down with Wilco. Americana: This time Scott McCaughey caught a full band for his project: Jeff Tweedy's Wilco . In: Musikexpress . No. 566 , March 2003, plates, p. 75 .
  20. ^ Maik Brüggemeyer: The Minus 5. Down with Wilco . In: Rolling Stone . No. 101 , March 2003, sound carrier, p. 96 f .
  21. ↑ C [arsten] A [gthe]: The Minus 5. "The Minus 5" . In: Eclipsed . Rock magazine. No. 80 , March 2006, CD reviews, p. 50 .
  22. ^ Bine Jankowski: The Minus 5. The Gun Album. All you need is butts, coffee and a schnapps. In: laut.de. February 3, 2006, accessed May 6, 2016 .
  23. ↑ Birgit Fuss: Multitasking? No problem! Scott McCaughey can really let off steam at The Minus 5 - with a little help from dear colleagues . In: Rolling Stone . No. 136 , February 2006, R & R, p. 29 .
  24. ↑ Peter Felkel: The Minus 5. The Minus 5 (The Gun Album) . In: Musikexpress . No. 602 , March 2006, plates, p. 89 .
  25. ^ Günther Reinhardt: Hero epics and tragedies. Baseball fans Steve Wynn and Scott McCaughy share their favorite sport with Peter Buck . In: Rolling Stone . No. 162 , September 2008, Rock & Roll, pp. 13 .
  26. ^ Peter Felkel: The Minus 5. Killingworth. A dignified country rock album from the man who is in the second row at REM, but who is himself a songwriter of great grace . In: Musikexpress . No. 643 , August 2009, plates, p. 83 .
  27. ^ Rüdiger Knopf: The Minus 5. Killingsworth. Scott McCaughey has made an album that is as smart as it is inspired . In: Rolling Stone . No. 178 , August 2009, sound carrier, p. 86 .
  28. ↑ Rüdiger Knopf: The Minus 5. Dungeon Gold. Scott McCaughey distills treasures from the reception basement . In: Rolling Stone . No. 246 , April 2015, Reviews Tonträger, p. 103 .
  29. ↑ C [arsten] A [gthe]: The Minus 5. "Down With Wilco" . In: Eclipsed . Rock magazine. No. 50 , March 2003, CD Reviews, pp. 43 .
  30. ↑ Birgit Fuss: Restless in Seattle. Scott McCaughey has so much to do with The Minus 5 and REM that vacation is canceled . In: Rolling Stone . No. 102 , April 2003, Rock & Roll, pp. 19 .

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