Following the success of their third, critically acclaimed album ‘Simple Math’ out earlier this year, Manchester Orchestra return to the UK for a headline UK tour. Kicking off in Bristol on October 2ndand ending with a triumphant appearance at Camden’s KoKo on October 7th *. This is the band’s first ever UK Headline Tour, after opening for the likes of Kings of Leon and Biffy Clyro, as well as performing twice at the Reading and Leeds Festivals and Latitude.

“Grandiose, utterly lovely”

NME

“Simple Math is intimate and massive”

Rolling Stone

Simple Math-a concept record, comes on the heels of 2009’s acclaimed Mean Everything to Nothing. From this platform, some bands might dive into the world of fantasy; front man Andy Hull instead presents his own reality, holding back nothing. It’s a story about a 23-year old who questions everything from marriage to love to religion to sex. It’s chock full of monster riffs, vigorous string arrangements, deep hooks and has miles of melodies that encase a compelling coming-of-age story told in the first person, intimately written and sung by Hull.

“This record is two duelling conversations between me and my wife, and me and my God,” says Hull. “Sometimes even for myself, it’s difficult to decipher which one I’m actually talking to. Everything I’ve written in the past has been about those things. This album is the most realized form of my questioning.”

Manchester Orchestra was formed in 2004 when Hull was 16. The band includes lifelong friends Jonathan Corley on bass, keyboardist Chris Freeman, guitarist Robert McDowell and drummer Tim Very.Not even near drinking age, Manchester Orchestra left the comforts of their suburban childhood in 2005, put over 200 shows under their belt and started to build the ever-growing and rabid fan base that follows them to this day. In 2007, their explosive first record, I’m Like a Virgin Losing A Child, quickly became a critical favourite as they toured the country many times over.

Manchester Orchestra have earned two nominations at this year’s MTV Video Music Awards which include Best Editing and Best Special Effects for their fantastic ”Simple Math” video.

Sunday 2nd October – Bristol – Thekla –www.alt-tickets.co.uk (0845 413 444)

Monday 3rd October – Glasgow – Oran Mor – www.pclpresents.com (0844 847 2487)

Tuesday 4th October – Birmingham – HMV Institute Library – www.gigsandtours.com- (0844 2485037)

Wednesday 5th October – Manchester – Academy 2- www.gigsandtours.com- (0161 8321111)

Friday 7th October – London – Koko- www.gigsandtours.com- (0844 8472258)

Words by Brendan Monteiro

It is with sheer hesitance that I write this review, it’s not often that I have been so moved by a record and the weight of trying to truly express my feelings for this album is a little daunting. Add to this the height at which Andy Hulls’ level of writing is at and I find myself slightly intimidated to say the least.

Simple Math is the genius follow up to 2009′s Mean Everything To Nothing. This 10 song collective houses some of the greatest songs the band has ever birthed and as a whole, is a finely tuned masterpiece. The album slowly unfurls itself with Deer, a slow touching track ridiculously packed with the most beautifully appealing tone know to man. The guitars make love to your ears as Andy’s lamenting sounds soothes your soul. Mighty follows suit with a little more of a brash but equally as brilliant tone, it also is the first time you really feel the drums and is almost like the record coming alive. The feeling is heightened as the young frontman yelp’s and soothes, shrieks and pacifies the listener.

Only three tracks in and this record is already on fire, Pensacola brings an upbeat tempo with that trademark Hull lyrical riddling, he really has such a vibrant style of writing and has an astonishing way of taking what seems to be non-sense and then unfolding it to a level of intellect that I maybe am unable to fully comprehend just yet. Take for instance Leave It Alone or the chilling Apprehension or the hauntingly alluring title track. This album is packed with lyrical artistry that can and will keep me enthralled for years to come. I would also like to point out my affection for how Andy can bend a song lyrically like I have never seen before. April Fool is a perfect example of this, the whole song is wrapped up with this dark element to it but then he ends it with a romantic gesture.

And I don’t care if you and I will take the rest of our entire lives
I’m patient here for you

It’s sharply contrasting having a steady hard hitting track like this ending in such a way. It’s little things like this that make you fall in love with this album, and it’s packed with them. It’s no rocket science that Simple Math is this year’s essential buy!

11/10

Words by Jamie Reynolds

If your still getting confused at why Manchester Orchestra don’t have a violinist, harp or tuba it’s because they aren’t an Orchestra at all. On the other hand this 5 piece make enough noise to warrant you thinking they had an entire orchestra behind them. Just before their third album was released we managed to track down Chris Freeman and find out a little more about the masterpiece that is Simple Math.

You’re gearing up for the release of Simple Math. How was the writing and recording process?

Writing and recording this record was a really natural process. Once we felt like something sounded great, we just sort of moved on to writing the next song. We got into the studio with a pretty solid sense of confidence. We were going into a studio that we were familiar with, in a town that we were comfortable in, with a producer that we trusted. It was a tedious but fun process overall.

As a fan, one thing that has always stood out for me is the tone of your instruments and, once again, this album has WOWED me. How important is the right tone for the band?

I think that tones are very important to this band. You can have a great guitar part or a great drum part, but if it sounds like hell then there’s no point in recording it. Our drummer, Tim, spent hours on getting drum sounds for this album, which left me and the other guys plenty of downtime to play way too much pinball in the lounge.

I’ve seen a lot of comments already that throw around the phrase “concept album”. Is Simple Math a concept album and if so, what is the concept?

The record is a concept album in that it has a story. But I still don’t look at it as a concept record because usually concept records don’t come out sounding so crazy. A lot of the lyrics in this record are sodetailed and specific that I don’t think that any fan is going to listen to the record and be able to immediately see any sort of story line. This record is about what Andy went through in his first two years of marriage, being on tour, being home, being in his early twenties…etc. It’s about pretty much everything that happens from the point at which you start to grow up and that continuous process of growing up.

Lyrically I think this the boldest record you have put out. How personal is this record to you and how proud are you of it?

This record is very personal to all of us. We are all very close friends and go through things together. When Andy was going through some of the harder points in the early stages of marriage, we were all seeing that and experiencing those things with him. Most of what he talks about on the record are things we were all there for.
Secondly, we are wildly proud of this album. I think we’ve all pushed ourselves on this one and we’ve definitely been able to branch out in new ways with new drummers and new inspirations.

This will be the first time your record comes out in the UK at roughly the same time as the US. How excited are you about that?

Very? Haha. Honestly, I just wish the thing could come out everywhere tomorrow so I can stop feeling guilty about not sending my mom acopy (I just don’t want it to be me who leaks the record). Honestly though, I just wish everyone could hear it right now so that we can talk about it.

Is Woody Allen still your guys’ biggest influence in comparison to any specific band or artist?

Woody will always be around. I’d say Mr. Neil Young took the spotlight on this record though.

You have toured the UK 10 times now and you play lovely intimate venues. What is the one UK venue that you would most like to play?

I just want to do what Foo Fighters did and build that huge runway through Wembley and just take off running through the crowd whenever I wanted to, possibly while shredding on a key-tar.

The single Simple Math is an amazing song that can be in some ways questioning everything about life, how much time do you spend thinking in the same mindset as the way the song depicts?

First, thank you. Second, I think that the lyrics in that song depict the root of all anxiety. Imagining that, on any level, you were wrong and you had no idea. I think Andy was speaking, in that song, from a spiritual perspective. But I think he tapped into something much bigger with that one.

When playing live you seem to lose yourself in the music and go mental on the percussions. Have you ever incurred any injuries from this?

Oh yeah. On the UK Biffy Clyro tour, I couldn’t really hold or move the drumstick with my right hand. I had to get the paramedics on hand to tape my hand up every night. The amount of times I smash my knuckles on the rims of my kit is atrocious. They usually swell to twice the normal size on my pointer fingers. I get bruises on my thighs from going for the snare and mainly hitting my leg. I’ve hit myself in the face numerous times. I hit my head on my microphone all of the time. My back and neck are usually stiff as rocks when I wake up in the morning. And my left arm is usually bruised and swollen from the tambourine. That’s about as badass as it gets: Tambourine wounds.

Words by Brendan Monteiro / photos by Marcus Maschwitz

Small club night’s will never be the same again after Manchester Orchestra‘s blistering performance at Proud Camden.

It’s an unusual setting for band on the rise but the Atlanta 5 piece have made a habit of playing unorthodox venues like this. They make a very humble entry before gently easing the audience in with Pride. Andy is the personification of what every front man should aspire to be, he has this charismatic charm about him and his distinct vocals slowly permeates around to a very welcoming crowd.

The true colours of Manchester Orchestra‘s live set starts showing through as Andy gets more and more impassioned as the song progresses. He has a miraculous way of teetering his vocals on the edge of fervency and angst and tonight is nothing short of brilliant on his part.

An intimate setting like Proud Camden can only be fully utilised by an intimate band and that is exactly what they are. Every stroke of a chord and and every beat of a drum is felt by the crowd as much as Andy’s vocal prowess. I think this can be attributed to the tone of the instrumentation, guitars specifically. They somehow manage to encompass a retro tone reminiscent of 70’s stuff like Tom Petty (for me at least) while still bringing in a freshness and modern swing on it. Songs like In My Teeth definitely have a Nirvana feel but it’s that rich tone that stands out most.

Now That You’re Home is the first taste from their debut album tonight and even though there are some new fans about tonight, the flair of it soon has them hooked too. Tonight the band also give London it’s first taste of new material from the upcoming album Simple Math. April Fool once again unfolds with that Manc signature tone, it’s a riff laden overdose of pure awesomeness and by the time it ends Andy has the line

I’ve got that rock and that roll, I come around this time to set fire to your bones

engraved in my brain. Other stand out tracks tonight are Shake It Out, which literally has every one in attendance fervently screaming along with the front man and I Can Barely Breathe which personally is pretty much a masterpiece in it’s own right. On an ending note I guess I am pretty biased when it comes to reviewing this band, they are one of my favourite bands of all time and I think it would be impossible for me to write a bad thing about them. In saying that I think the security guard in front of me gave the best review; I firmly believe that any band that can get security (who had never heard of the band prior to the night) loving the show as much as the fans then they have done a damn good job.

Simple Math is a concept record. From this platform, some bands might dive into the world of fantasy; front man Andy Hull instead presents his own reality, holding back nothing. It’s a story about a 23-year old who questions everything from marriage to love to religion to sex. It’s chock full of monster riffs, vigorous string arrangements, deep hooks and has miles of melodies that encase a compelling coming-of-age story told in the first person, intimately written and sung by Hull.

“This record is two duelling conversations between me and my wife, and me and my God,” says Hull. “Sometimes even for myself, it’s difficult to decipher which one I’m actually talking to. Everything I’ve written in the past has been about those things. This album is the most realized form of my questioning.”

Manchester Orchestra was formed in 2004 when Hull was 16. The band includes lifelong friends Jonathan Corley on bass, keyboardist Chris Freeman, guitarist Robert McDowell and drummer Tim Very.

Not even near drinking age, Manchester Orchestra left the comforts of their suburban childhood in 2005, put over 200 shows under their belt and started to build the ever-growing and rabid fan base that follows them to this day. In 2007, their explosive first record, I’m Like a Virgin Losing A Child, quickly became a critical favourite as they toured the country many times over. As a result, Mean Everything to Nothing, released early in 2009, was highly anticipated, but the band was not phased and made one of the best records of that year. Soon after its release, Absolute Punk hailed: “Quick note to the rest of the albums coming out this year: The bar has just been set.”

It’s no secret that life on the road is tough. It requires extended periods of time without having a permanent home and limited, if any, time with loved ones.
In a heartfelt plea to fans, Manchester Orchestra is asking you to help the guys feel a little more at home. Bring Your Own Bitch, and make tomorrow a brighter day for a band on the road.

Simply go to www.themanchesterorchestra.com/byob to enter.

Upload a photo of your dog (male and female dogs welcome) along with his/her name and the city in which you would like to see Manchester Orchestra. The band will be selecting their favorite submissions. Winning dogs (and their owner) will get to meet up with the band on the afternoon of the show. The owner will also win a pair of tickets to the show that night.

Don’t enter because you want to win, enter because you want to make a difference.

3/26 – Water Street Music Hall – Rochester, NY
3/27 – The Phoenix Theatre – Toronto, ON
3/29 – Northern Lights – Clifton Park, NY
3/30 – Paradise Rock Club – Boston, MA
3/31 – Chameleon – Lancaster, PA
4/1 – Toad’s Place – New Haven, CT
4/2 – The Fillmore @ Irving – New York, NY
4/3 – The Trocadero – Philadelphia, PA
4/5 – The Recher Theatre – Townson, MD
4/6 – The Norva – Norfolk, VA
4/7 – Cat’s Cradle – Carrborro, NC
4/8 – The Music Farm – Charleston, SC
4/9 – Jillian’s – Columbia, SC

www.themanchesterorchestra.com
www.myspace.com/manchesterorchestra
www.facebook.com/manchesterorchestra
www.ilike.com/artist/manchester+orchestra
www.youtube.com/manchesterorchestra
www.twitter.com/manchesterOrch

The tracklist for the session is as follows:
1. Pride
2. In My Teeth
3. I’ve Got Friends
4. I Can Barely Breathe
5. Shake It Out
6. Everything To Nothing
7. The River
8. Sleeper 1972

Nearly one year into the Mean Everything To Nothing campaign, the band is showing no signs of slowing down. In fact, it’s quite the opposite: The band has just begun a huge 75-date tour and on Thursday March 11th, they will appear on Jimmy Kimmel Live, Their recently taped performance for the UK’s Live At Abbey Road will air the next day, March 12th, on the Sundance Channel.

Mean Everything To Nothing hit stores last April and led the band into a whirlwind of tour dates throughout the world; including a US headline tour, and supporting slots with Silversun Pickups and Brand New. Manchester Orchestra just kicked off another headlining tour on February 26th in Orlando, FL. This tour will span across many US markets and stem immediately into a co-headlining slot with Thrice throughout May. The band will wrap up their current tour plans with a performance at this year’s Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival.

Manchester Orchestra tour dates:

03.2.10 – House of Blues – Houston, TX
03.3.10 – Emo’s – Austin, TX
03.4.10 – The Palladium Showroom – Dallas, TX
03.6.10 – The Marquee – Tempe, AZ
03.7.10 – House of Blues – San Diego, CA
03.9.10 – Troubadour – West Hollywood, CA
03.10.10 – Troubadour – West Hollywood, CA
03.11.10 – Great American Music Hall – San Francisco, CA
03.12.10 – Hawthorne Theater – Portland, OR
03.13.10 – The Showbox at The Market – Seattle, WA
03.15.10 – The Knitting Factory – Boise, ID
03.16.10 – In The Venue – Salt Lake City, UT
03.18.10 – Gothic Theatre – Denver, CO
03.19.10 – The Beaumont Club – Kansas City, MO
03.20.10 – The Slowdown – Omaha, NE
03.21.10 – The Varsity Theater – Minneapolis, MN
03.23.10 – Metro – Chicago, IL
03.24.10 – St. Andrews Hall – Detroit, MI
03.25.10 – Mr. Small’s Theatre – Pittsburgh, PA
03.26.10 – Water Street Music Hall – Rochester, NY
03.27.10 – Phoenix Theatre – Toronto, ON
03.29.10 – Northern Lights – Clifton Park, NY
03.30.10 – Paradise Rock Club – Boston, MA
03.31.10 – Chameleon – Lancaster, PA
04.01.10 – Toad’s Place – New Haven, CT
04.02.10 – The Fillmore New York @ Irving – New York, NY
04.03.10 – The Trocadero – Philadelphia, PA
04.05.10 – The Recher Theatre – Towson, MD
04.06.10 – The NorVa – Norfolk, VA
04.07.10 – Cat’s Cradle – Carrboro, NC
04.08.10 – The Music Farm – Charleston, SC
04.09.10 – Jillian’s – Columbia, SC

Co- Headline dates with Thrice:

04.14.10 – Variety Playhouse – Atlanta, GA
04.15.10 – Variety Playhouse – Atlanta, GA
04.16.10 – The Howlin Wolf – New Orleans, LA
04.17.10 – The Lyric Oxford – Oxford, MS
04.18.10 – WorkPlay Theatre – Birmingham, AL
04.20.10 – House of Blues – Cleveland, OH
04.21.10 – Bogart’s – Cincinnati, OH
04.22.10 – Newport Music Hall – Columbus, OH
04.23.10 – The Pageant – St. Louis, MO
04.24.10 – The Rave – Milwaukee, WI
04.25.10 – People’s Court – Des Moines, IA
04.27.10 – Eagle’s Club Room – Vermillion, SD
04.29.10 – The Railyard – Billings, MT
04.30.10 – Knitting Factory Concert House – Spokane, WA
05.01.10 – McDonald Theatre – Eugene, OR
05.03.10 – Knitting Factory – Reno, NV
05.04.10 – The Catalyst – Santa Cruz, CA
05.06.10 – Majestic Ventura Theatre – Ventura, CA
05.07.10 – House of Blues – Las Vegas, NV
05.08.10 – Rialto Thatre – Tucson, AZ
05.09.10 – Sunshine Theatre – Albuquerque, NM

June- Bonnaroo – Manchester, TN

On January 19th, the debut album from Gobotron, the solo project of guitarist Robert McDowell of Manchester Orchestra, will be released digitally via Favorite Gentlemen Recordings. A personal pet project two years in the making, ON YOUR MARK, GET SET… is a purposeful blend of blown out distortion mixed with saccharine sweet poppy hooks and choruses that will make fans of bands like The Lemonheads pucker up for joy.

Gobotron started in the summer of 2008 in the basement of Robert McDowell’s parent’s house in Atlanta, Georgia. Manchester Orchestra was off the road and McDowell was anxious to creatively move in a new direction aside from working with the band. “I had been a bit lazy when we got off tour. I wasn’t recording or writing at all then, so I went to Guitar Center and got a little MIDI controller and just started messing around,” he said. “I didn’t even really tell anyone I was doing the album until it was done. It was just me alone in my parent’s basement.”

ON YOUR MARK, GET SET… is a true one-man army of an album with McDowell doing all of the writing, playing and recording himself. Mixed and mastered a full year later in the summer of 2009, he’s been busy circling the world the past year with Manchester Orchestra in support of their critically acclaimed sophomore effort Mean Everything To Nothing. “Once I was done creating the album in 2008, Manchester Orchestra went directly into pre-production for our new album. It wasn’t until the next summer that I was even able to start mixing Gobotron,” McDowell states. “It was nice to be able to work on this solo, because for the past few years everything musically that I was part of was a team of people. I think that’s the way it should be, but it’s also good to occasionally try approaching things the exact opposite way.”

The breakneck pacing of the record kicks off with album opener “Nothing” and blends directly into the first single “Nice Things”, a bittersweet ditty that chronicles the mind rush that comes with travelling the four corners of the country and everything in between. “Never Turn Around” is an infectiously fuelled two and a half minutes of pop goodness. McDowell talks on the sound quest that he had in making Gobotron sparkle: “Sonically, I was going for Neutral Milk Hotel. Especially with vocals. I didn’t want to sing like them, per se, but they have exactly the tone and lo-fi quality I was striving for.”

The Gobotron moniker comes from the initial nickname “Robot” given to McDowell years ago as a play on words with Robert; that evolved into Robo, Robo Cop, Robotron, Robby Robot, Rorby, Gorby, Gorbatraz and many more before ultimately and finally graduating into Gobotron. The album title is inspired from a dream he had after watching The Simpsons one night. “I was falling asleep, drifting in and out. The episode mixed in with one of my dreams and made me think of the title. I woke up laughing and wrote it down. It’s nothing deep, it just made sense for the album title.”

On the creative process for this album, McDowell says “The goal for ON YOUR MARK, GET SET…was to put every song into overdrive right from the start. The writing would begin with a verse, chorus, or just a riff. I’d set up a mic in the middle of the room and build up parts running from one instrument to another. Once I could hear what it was going to sound like, I would write the rest of the song and re-record the entire song. Then when everything was laid out, I started from scratch again and recorded the version that made it on the CD. This is a computer album that could have never been done if it were on tape. It became a science project rather than a band.”

Gobotron combines delicate and simple phrasings influenced from Ben Kweller to Brian Wilson, processed through pop-friendly static and piped through ear-buds waxed with Pavement.
Start your engines!

http://www.myspace.com/gobotron

Support: Talons

Words and photo’s by Brendan Monteiro

Talon’s break the ice with a really intriguing start, the Hereford six piece are a solely instrumental act but what they might lack in vocals they clearly make up in musicianship. The guitars collide with violins to create an atmosphere within the crowd, as if stunned the people stand in awe of such a different band. They may seem very young but their music wreaks with maturity and technicality and is the perfect way to enliven the multitude of Manc fans.

Andy Hull approaches the stage like a grizzly bear and the voice of the crowd raises to meet his, he sings with tireless emotion and within seconds has the crowd in the palm of his hand. Manchester Orchestra are not just another phase in the times and songs like Wolves At Night and the incredibly effervescent Shake It Out stand as testament to a group of young individuals with a promising future ahead of them. Tonight Andy seems to have a ravenous lust for the audience to really feel what he is singing and the rest of the Orchestra create a tight audio background to his chillingly splendid lyrics. Standout moment of the evening has to be the extended jam-a-thon version of Where Have You Been that has Chris Freeman joining in for a duo of percussion, Robert McDowell toggling away like a mad hatter and Andy tweaking sound waves from his guitar like he’s pinching it and the neck actually has nerve endings. Wait maybe it was the wizardry of I Can Barely Breathe or The Only One that has a semi unplugged feel to it with everyone singing along from the start. Or was it the chilling closer to the set in the form of Sleeper 1972, with it’s ghostly take on a world only Mr Hull could dream of with the darkness of Woody Allen looming all over it.

The reality is the entire set was a standout moment and if you somehow managed to miss this show you need to show your rear and let somebody kick you in the ass.

The powerfully epic ‘Shake It Out,’ the second single from Manchester Orchestra’s sophomore album, Mean Everything To Nothing, has been met with great excitement. ‘I’ve Got Friends,’ the first single from Mean Everything To Nothing spent 26 weeks on the Billboard Modern Rock chart in the US and reached the #8 spot at its peak.

Shake It Out (Music Video)

Manchester Orchestra | MySpace Video

The band will play their biggest UK show to date at London’s Heaven venue on 17th November alongside their support slot on the Biffy Clyro tour this month. These shows follow on from their recent triumphant headline tour & slots at Reading/Leeds & Latitude. As ever with Manchester Orchestra, expect to be blown away in the wake of their immense live show, recently dubbed by Kerrang! Magazine as “one of the best live shows you will see all year.” Their second album Mean Everything To Nothing was released fully on Columbia Records in September having received significant critical acclaim.

Live dates are as follows:

3rd Nov Glasgow, Barrowlands (with Biffy Clyro)
4th Nov Newcastle, Academy (with Biffy Clyro)
6th Nov Leeds, Academy (with Biffy Clyro)
7th Nov Manchester, Apollo (with Biffy Clyro)
8th Nov Nottingham, Rock City (with Biffy Clyro)
9th Nov Birmingham, Academy (with Biffy Clyro)
11th Nov Norwich ,UEA (with Biffy Clyro)
12th Nov London, Brixton Academy (with Biffy Clyro)
17th Nov London, Heaven (Headline)

Inspired by the pounding, primal assault of Weezer’s Pinkerton, Nirvana’s In Utero, and Foo Fighters’ The Colour and the Shape, this young band has created its own version of what a classic rock album should sound like, complete with fiercely beautiful melodies, shifting guitar and keyboard textures, loud/soft dynamics, and an urgency in each band member’s performance, especially Hull’s cathartic vocals.

A fully realized album, Mean Everything To Nothing is the sound of a band coming into its own after spending 300 days on the road in support of their debut album, 2007’s I’m Like A Virgin Losing A Child. After more than a year of touring with such artists as Kings of Leon, Brand New, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Say Anything, and Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, as well as performing their own headlining shows, Manchester Orchestra has become a powerful and well-oiled machine.