by James Ballinger
Few bands take advantage of every opportunity they are given to promote their music, or get help from other outside sources. He Whose Ox is Gored is absolutely not one of those bands (Mmmmm, Popchips). They are shameless self-promoters for sure, doing whatever it takes to get the name out, the music heard, and the band seen. I recently sat down with band members Brian McClelland and Lisa Mungo over high-priced caviar and champagne to talk about all of the work they are doing, and more importantly their Kickstarter campaign to help fund their very first full-length. “We realized that when we were planning the new record we wanted to put out a really great product, realized that it was going to be a chunk of change and this was a great way to get people involved, provide incentives and just try something new” says Brian. And what are these incentives? “Brian for example decided to tattoo the name of any person who donates $100 and it has been hilarious to watch those pledgers dial in for that prize,” Lisa says, but other tiers include everything from a personal thank you on your Facebook page, exclusive merch made for the project, a copy of the record, to having the band play your house, or even having you book their tour, and even getting to go along for the ride.
Pledges start at just a dollar, but go up to a thousand depending on the tier. As for the recording plans, Brian says “We’re still in the the writing process right now, but it should be about 8-10 songs. There will be a couple tracks that we’ve released before and a pile of new songs. We’re all really stoked on the material so far. As for the production plans, we’ll be tracking with the phenomenal Robert Cheek at a few different studios. Drums and basics will be split between Red Room, where we did the Nightshade EP, and Avast. We like to do a lot of the overdubs and final touches at Bob’s ExEx Studios. Randall Dunn will be doing some tracking with us as well. From there, we’ve got Matt Bayles (Isis, Pelican, Minus the Bear) to mix. Mastering is still up in the air, but tracking should start by the end of the summer, and hopefully out by the end of this year”.
The Kickstarter campaign ends Saturday April 28th at Midnight, so head on over to the page and donate a little cash, and help the band get this record out.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mBUdAwRtf2g&w=560&h=315]
