Listen/purchase: Underneath The Spell by CAGED ANIMALS
I'm happy to announce that our musical family has brought two new lives to the world: a baby boy named Casper Lou & a new Caged Animals record called Underneath The Spell which we have released today digitally as well as on limited translucent gold vinyl!
I’m so proud to share these songs with you. They were created during a very tender moment in my life, watching our daughter Alaska bloom into a person, and sharing our creative world with her.
We wrote and recorded it in Brooklyn, in a tiny street-facing room in Bushwick, and meticulously arranged every song in a windowless warehouse with our full band. It was started just before lockdown and completed in a backyard shed in Sackville, NB during the winter of 2021. It features the core Caged Animals lineup with the addition of Dane Zarra on guitar, Jeff Tobias on saxophone (Sunwatchers, Modern Nature), and Jon “Catfish” DeLorme on pedal steel (Psychic Ills). During the least band friendly moment, we somehow made our best band album.
Alaska was our spiritual advisor crouched on the grimy, concrete floor with the noise-cancelling headphones Larry "Ratso" Sloman bought her at birth. Alaska sat and colored or rattled a shaker and soaked it all in, as we honored our commitment, week after week and continued to make music.
It was scrambling from work, racing to eat, packing our instruments and getting to the space and back with enough time for Alaska to get a good night’s sleep. It was Magali singing into a mic with Alaska in a Baby Bjorn. It was Talya braving the terrifying highways of the tristate area as her driver’s anxiety waxed and waned. It was Pat taking a huge risk to build a worker-run cafe on the most expensive block in America and still keeping our hours in that room sacred.
There is something very beautiful about a band that doesn’t earn its whole living from music, continuing to make music. It’s a different kind of commitment. It’s a different kind of faith. And it’s my religion.
In light of this last year, I look back at the time where we honored that commitment and made this album with incredible gratitude.
I’ve loved music since I was a kid and I’ve never had another vision for my life beyond trying to add back some of what music has given me in my own work. I’m honored to be a part of this conversation on any level and I’m in debt to Talya, Magali, Pat, Dane, and Jeff for helping me articulate it.
Although these songs were written before the pandemic, they feel oddly tuned to our shared, strange moment, building a cinematic world out of contemplative moods and isolated characters. From the foxhole spirituality of “The Ghost Of Jesus” to the mournful solitude of “The Coldest Place On Earth,” the album weaves its narrative on a thread of alienation and yearning; each character and melody pushing for renewal.
Thanks for your support throughout these years. We are so happy to share this music. If you'd like to order a copy please visit our Bandcamp.
Our new album Escape is available for purchase on Bandcamp and streaming on Spotify or wherever you stream music!
Brooklyn’s Caged Animals are an indie-pop quartet led by singer-songwriter Vincent Cacchione. Vin emerged from his roll fronting Soft Black (where he shared the stage with DIIV’s Zachary Cole Smith) to form Caged Animals in 2011, alongside his sister Talya, partner Magali Charron, and childhood friend Patrick Curry.
Promptly signing to London’s Lucky Number Music, Caged Animals delivered two LP’s of their noir-tinged, pop music. Described by The New Yorker as a “hip-hop influenced Velvet Underground” and The Guardian as the perfect band to re-soundtrack Blue Velvet, Caged Animals defend the line between the timeless and cutting edge, while remaining direct, soulful, and uniquely unguarded.
On their forthcoming album, Escape Artist, Caged Animals have created a record reincarnated from a series of spiritually trying events. On a go-for-broke US tour, the band’s van was robbed, and the only copy of the album’s original recordings vanished (along with the laptop it was recorded on). Only days before, Vin had learned his wife was pregnant with their first child and days later he would turn 30, entering a new phase of adulthood, flat-broke, and without his band’s new music.
Vin turned 30 onstage at Brooklyn’s Knitting Factory. Playing music in front of their friends, family, and fans, he and the rest of Caged Animals summoned the courage to prevail. They might be on a losing streak, but they would not lose their souls in the process. The music began and new wounds began to fuse. At home, Cacchione got back to work with a passionate fervor. New songs flowed and a much stronger concept began to emerge: what do we call upon when we’re backed into a corner?
Nine months later, Cacchione was a father twice over, and viewed his prior twist of bad luck as a blessing in disguise. With his daughter Alaska in their railroad apartment, Vin, his wife Magali, and the rest of Caged Animals set out to record Escape Artist with as much grandeur as the home-studio could hold. Alaska proved a faithful supporter, smiling joyously, and silently encouraging her parent’s music as it weaved it’s way to a brand new, used laptop.
Escape Artists’ 13 songs are built from these events, but draw musically from the character-driven narratives of Folk Music and the sonic exploration of contemporary Indie. The album offers a literate, layered sound that plays like a small-screen Arcade Fire got stuck in a Bushwick bedroom with a miraculously upbeat Father John Misty. The result is artful, adult pop music that is both vulnerable and sonically detailed. Its frame is timeless but its exterior is colorful and modern.
Lead single “Wildflowers” has already created a stir on streaming services and its follow up “These Dark Times” is currently serving as the theme music to Webby-Award winning podcast Conversations With People Who Hate Me.
Escape Artist features the bands original lineup but benefits from the addition of avant-alto-saxophonist Chris Aiello (WFMU’s Prove It All Night), a ghostly, singing saw appearance by Julian Koster (The Orbiting Human Circus, Neutral Milk Hotel), beautiful choir direction by Andrew Hoepfner (Houseworld), and the haunting pedal steel of Jon “Catfish” DeLorme (Psychic Ills).
On Escape Artist Caged Animals have distilled their music into it’s most focused form. Balancing their intimate, emotional songs with a musical journey that is both exploratory and engaging. They are grateful and humbled to share this album with you.
Our latest single “Ghost Riding” features our dear friends Julian Koster (Neutral Milk Hotel, The Orbiting Human Circus) on singing saw and Andrew Hoepfner (Creaky Boards, Houseworld, Darwin Deez) on piano! The photograph and costume were made by my ever-talented partner, Magali Charron. <3
Listen/purchase: These Dark Times by CAGED ANIMALS
These Dark Times is a song I wrote after the police murder of Philando Castile.
Philando’s death hit me hard. It drove home, in a very personal way, what it means to live in America with white privilege. Philando was my age when he was shot by a police officer, in front of his partner and child, during what should’ve been a normal traffic stop.
Witnessing the viral Facebook video of his bloody final breaths, I was appalled by the obvious disparity between his reality and mine. Under no circumstance could I picture an outcome like this if I were the one being pulled over. Philando’s crime: an alleged cracked tail-light. Philando’s fate: an unholy death in front of the whole world. To make this even starker, I spent the majority of 2015/2016 driving around NYC with my wife and daughter in a car with a broken tail-light. I was never once pulled over.
In the days following Mr. Castile’s death I was moved and inspired by the outpouring of support from the community he had served, so I started writing a song. What I came up with is a meditation on what it means to desire something more for yourself, to push past your prescribed boundaries, and remain hopeful in the face of overwhelming obstacles. I channeled Philando for the lyric “I want to make it out alive from my hometown.”
In some ways I thought this song didn't deserve to be heard. Maybe my voice wasn’t the right one to give these emotions expression. I sat on it for a few months and searched my heart. After the result’s of our presidential election I even thought about quitting music all together. “In times as disturbing as these,” I thought, “what good am I offering the world with music?”
Thankfully a turning point came in my way of thinking. Instead of defeatism I became filled with a sense of urgency. This new motivation has given me the inspiration to carry on and a renewed confidence in creating music.
Attending The Women’s March with my wife and two-year old daughter reinforced this new outlook. I began to believe more and more that we must remain engaged with a political struggle while also channeling our hearts and minds toward a cultural one. I got straight to work recording my new song.
Throughout history, artists have been tasked with the responsibility of holding a mirror to society but they have also been given the privilege to shape it. We each need to use this opportunity now, more than ever, to engage emotionally with other people. To change hearts while we change minds. In that spirit, and in my small way, I hope to contribute to this turning of the tides.
Here is a song called These Dark Times. It is delivered with hope that we will transcend this moment and it is dedicated to the memory of Philando Castile, his family members, and the millions of Americans shouting “Not My President!”
Thanks to my partner Magali Charron for providing the excellent photograph from the NYC Women’s March that graces the single’s front cover.
We are so excited to share the first of many new recordings with you!
This is a song called Wildflowers. It was written and recorded a couple months after the birth of our daughter Alaska.
Being Alaska’s dad has taught me a lot about love and responsibility but it's also helped me re-establish the connection with what got me interested in making music in the first place.
Watching Alaska make her own creative journey reminds me that it’s all just a different kind of play, even if it feels bloodcurdling serious. That’s part of what inspired me to write this song.
For my favorite wildflower...
Wildflowers
This is your proof of superpowers
My favorite wildflower
Scaling up the towers
My favorite wildflower
You were born into a kingdom
Already conquered
But I can feel you getting stronger
You’re getting stronger now
You got here on your own
And you’re free to face the sun
You got here on your own
Just like everyone
I’ve seen your pedals in the distance
My favorite wildflower
Light up in resistance
My favorite wildflower
You were raised up from a low place
But now you’re floating
High above the showcase
Constantly growing up
You got here on your own
And you’re free to face the sun
You got here on your own
Just like everyone
Wildflower
My Favorite Wildflower
Well I’ve spent time in the market
I’ve seen what they’re hawking
Roses thin and scarlet
So sad with caution
But there’s no space on the shelf dear
To lay you down on
You are free to be yourself here
Nobody owns your song
You got here on your own
And you’re free to face the sun
You got here on your own
Just like everyone
Wildflower
My Favorite Wildflower
Well I'm struggling for some meaning in this quiet little room
And I'm searching for some beauty underneath all this doom
There's too much dark and not enough light
There's too much dark and not enough, not enough light
Well I felt your guiding hand push and pull on my head
So I took a little chance barely knowing how to dance
There's too much dark and not enough light
There's too much dark and not enough, not enough light
I felt so insecure, body tied to the floor
I thought that I was pure, the heart gives up when it's mature
There is too much dark and not enough light for me
There's too much dark and not enough, not enough light to see
I want to run to you
I want to hold you beside me
I want to see through you
I want you to see through me
2) Stop Hurting Each Other
I was lost for a while
Maybe I'm still astray
It takes a wizened soul to one day know the wisest way
I searched my Higher self
But found a primal beast
I opened up his mouth, His blood fell into me
It was real blood
Don't hurt yourself
Don't hurt another
Stop hurting each other
I said my prayers at night to a white-washed ceiling
The years kept passing
The paint kept on peeling
Time has giveaways for its disasters
Nothing of earth will stay
But somethings go faster
Don't hurt yourself
Don't hurt another
Stop hurting each other
I searched for holy men with awkward voices
To show me mysteries the others avoided
But every secret lives in its own suspicion
Sometimes you've gotta go on pure intuition
Don't hurt yourself
Don't hurt another
Stop hurting each other
3) Cindy & Me
If you decide to come back to me
We could live so happily
Cindy
Cindy
We'll break out of calamity
And drive off with the money
Cindy
Cindy
We're on top of the world
(shhhhhh) we're living on the top of the world
I needed you when times were rough
To show me how to mend these cuts
Cindy
Cindy
You fitted me for fancy boots
When you knew I came from dirty roots
Cindy
Cindy
We're on top of the world
(shhhhhh) we're living on the top of the world
Wait a minute, I need to know right now.
Are you in?
Or are you out?
We took our time and planned it out
Stuck a gun in Daddy's mouth
Cindy
Cindy
Before he had the chance to scream
The match! The flame! The gasoline!
Cindy
Cindy
We're on top of the world
(shhhhhh) we're living on the top of the world
4) The Sound Of Thunder
You dream of surrender
You dream of escape
You're looking for the center
Of an empty place
You wander through the woods at night
A maladjusted hunter
The sound of thunder
I think you know
The sound of thunder
You call up your mother
You call up your ex
You pull up the covers
Hoping that the spirits left
But any ghost that comes to you
Has been startled out of slumber by
The sound of thunder
It scares us all
The sound of thunder
I think it's too early
I think it's too soon
I think you're too young
And nothing is opportune
So lay your head
And wait until
You're wakened by the hunger or
The sound of thunder
Will stir us all
The sound of thunder
You build your little army up
There's no way to outnumber
The sound of thunder
The sound of thunder
5) U + Yr Rocketship
I spent my fortune
To find a way of breaking
The laws of physic's
That keep me down here waiting
I look at heaven
And think of ways I'd find it
I look at heaven
I look at heaven blindly
Take me aboard
Your rocket ship
Your rocket
Your rocket
I spent my fortune
To find a way of breaking
The laws of physic's
That keep me Earthly waiting
We all have our own ways of praying
Take me aboard
Your rocket ship
Your rocket
Your rocket
I'll find a neighborhood celestial
I'm making friends with extra-terrestials
They know my name and understand me
We communicate telepathically
Take me aboard
Your rocket ship
Your rocket
Your rocket
Take me aboard
Your rocket ship
Your rocket
Your rocket
6) The Mute + The Mindreader
Your eyes
Your eyes
Speak to me
Speak to me
Your eyes
Your worried eyes
Your lying eyes
Your tired eyes
Your loving eyes
Speak to me
Speak to me
You talk to me in your own special way
You talk to me in your own special way
I understand the things that you say
And I understand the little games you play
Your eyes
Your eyes
Speak to me
Speak to me
Your eyes
Your worried eyes
Your lying eyes
Your tired eyes
Your loving eyes
Speak to me
Speak to me
Share your joys with someone who loves you
Share your joys with someone who loves you
7) Tiny Sounds
I was still awake
You were sleeping
Dreaming of a storm that's passing
Late night movies
The same old re-runs
My head raced violent
My hands were silent
Because tiny sounds carry weight at night
I wrote my thesis
Talked to Jesus
I clipped my nails and burnt the clippings
I made my wishes
Superstitious
A fear of dying that kept me quiet
Tiny sounds carry weight at night
Please please turn on the light
And stay with me tonight
I'm so alone
I'm so alone
God bless computers
Plans for the future
Occasional traffic that fills the space in
The first train at five
The little signs of life
I'd talk for hours if you would listen
But tiny sounds, they carry weight
I'm silent but I'm wide awake
Just waiting for this night to break
Into light
Into light
Into light
8) We're Playing With Fire
The restlessness creeps in and you're out in the cold again
You follow light to the edge of the past tense
But all those things you pretend are hidden at that rainbows end
Only live in your head when you're helpless
Until it boils over I
Until it boils over I
Keep the flame on high
Keep the flame on high
We're playing with fire
You felt your flesh oxidize
Your dreams turned smoky before your eyes
You know the forces of life that had made you
Will one day turn all their warmth
To heat!
To flame!
To fire!
To force!
To put you back on your course and reclaim you
Until it boils over I
Until it boils over I
Keep the flame on high
Keep the flame on high
Until it boils over, I
And even when it boils over I
Keep the flame on high
Keep the flame on high
We're playing with fire
9) A Psychic Lasso
I always knew you were a cowboy
I always knew you played the part
You've got a rope around my feral heart
You've got a rope around my heart
And, me, I always want to play coy
Even when I'm throwing darts
I feel the burn across my neck
I smell the twine around your breath
A psychic lasso
Holds my soul
Steady in your arms
I would fall away if you let go
Holding on my heart
I always knew I'd need a steady hand
Someone to guide me through the dark
I found my way out of a lightless place
And never even saw your face
I got so used to knowing cheap boys
I could've let it fall apart
The loosest noose around my neck
We've gone exploring in the wreck
A psychic lasso
Holds my soul
Steady in your arms
I would fall away if you let go
Holding on my heart
You keep me angled
And barely strangled
A psychic lasso
Holds my soul
You've made possession
A new obsession
A psychic lasso
Holds my soul
10) In The Land Of Giants
I walked up to his boat-sized shoe
It was my greatest stab at defiance
It's hard to tell what's gunna come of you
When you walk in a land of giants
So with my wings taped on and my front tooth gone
I took a shot at self-reliance
But there's no hand to herd a wounded bird
When he's trapped in a land of giants
Their shadows block out the sun
But I don't want to run anymore
So I hid out where the shade grows hair
Where the Earth is mostly silent
But sometimes I can't help but stare
At the folks in the land of giants
11) (you're a giant now)
This one's for the dreams we forgot
The beauty punching in at the used car lot
Take your swing baby take your shot
You've got to hit that wall, hit that wall with all you've got
It's a big thick wall
It's made out of bricks, babe
You used to feel so small
You're a giant today
We're waiting for the night
Falling
So slow
Waiting for the night
Watching
As it goes
This one's for the people asleep
The ruse'd, the refugees, the one's that hit it once too deep
I want to give you one thing you can keep
Don't give it back to me
It's a long dark night
And the spirits all know your name
You opened up your eyes
In a giant's cage
We're waiting for the light
To guide us
Back home
We're waiting for the light
Watching
Where it glows
Your hopes are shiny
They glow when your guard is down
You were so tiny
But you feel like a giant now
12) What You're Looking For
It takes a long time
Maybe your whole life
You'll find what you're looking for
It's going to find you
Been looking for you
The one you're meant to adore
And you'll be complete
You've searched the ether
And sought out teachers
Opened the dustiest doors
Read holy pages
And met with sages
Who couldn't offer you more
You've been so hungry
You've been so hungry
You were born with nothing
You'll leave with nothing
You're going to end up
Inside of heaven
And when you walk in the door
You'll be complete
You've been out searching
For what you're missing
You've been out searching
For what you're missing
To live again
It takes a long time
Maybe your whole life
You'll find what you're looking for
It takes a long time
Maybe your whole life
You'll find what you're looking for
We have a new release called The Overnight Coroner. It's an EP which fuses together a novella I've written and four character songs that tie in with its plot. The story follows a character named Ryan, a 23 year old from New Jersey, who works overnight as a guard at the city morgue.
The recording features these four songs and an audiobook of me reading the story. It can be purchased on iTunes or physically at our Bandcamp. You can also stream the songs and read the story over here.
Caged Animals - The Overnight Coroner Attends A Party (music video)
We are so pleased to share our new video for ‘The Overnight Coroner Attends A Party.’ The song is the lead track from a forthcoming concept EP called The Overnight Coroner.
The EP incorporates four new narrative songs as well as an audiobook of a novella I've written. The title track, novella, and video all follow the same character, a young man who works the graveyard shift at a city morgue.
The video marks the second collaboration with our dear friend Mike McLean and stars Patrick Curry, our drummer, as The Overnight Coroner, my friend and collaborator Larry 'Ratso' Sloman as Intolerant Hippy Father, and reprises the roll of my sister Talya Cacchione as a Goth Teenager from "The Sound Of Thunder" music video.
We were lucky to capture some hilarious cameos from our friends Maura, Chris, and Paul who lent us some genuinely drunken performances. Paul's father, Mr. O'Sullivan was gracious enough to play the roll of the Daytime Coroner after returning to his home in Wayne, NJ and finding a bunch of strange people pretending to be dead in his garage. This video was filmed in the days following Christmas, in the year 2013.
To celebrate the release of our new album "In The Land Of Giants," we will give a special performance of the entire record in order. This will also be our last show with Magali for a few months and also the first time we've played the entire album live. We will also be filming this show as a document of this era of our band!
Come hear these songs as the meticulously arranged and rehearsed symphonies they've become. We will also have a limited supply of the album on vinyl for a special discount just at this show!
We will be joined by a stellar line-up of NYC musicians.
* HOWTH (http://howthhowth.bandcamp.com/)
* * CAGED ANIMALS (http://www.cagedanimals.net/)
* * * JEFFREY LEWIS & THE RAIN (http://www.thejeffreylewissite.com/)
And a DJ performance by our friend Samantha Urbani (of Friends).
8PM
$10
It is with amazing gratitude and joy that we bring live performances of our new album "In The Land Of Giants" to our European friends this Winter 2014. Thanks are due to our label Lucky Number Music for giving us access to this incredible opportunity and to our fans abroad, some of whom will be seeing us for the first time, we cannot wait to meet you and share this music. Tickets may be purchased via the links below...
17/1/2014 - Antwerp, Belgium @ TRIX
18/1/2014 - Paris, France @ La Fleche d'Or
19/1/2014 - Cologne, Germany @ Studio 672
20/1/2014 - Hamburg, Germany @ Knust
21/1/2014 - Berlin, Germany @ Comet Club
22/1/2014 - Munich, Germany @ Milla Club
23/1/2014 - Salzburg, Austria @ Rockhouse
24/1/2014 - Linz, Austria @ Posthof
25/1/2014 - Vienna, Austria @ FM4 Festival
26/1/2014 - Innsbruck, Austria @ PMK
27/1/2014 - Graz, Austria @ PPC
28/1/2014 - Turin, Italy @ Astoria
29/1/2014 - Rome, Italy @ Circo Degli Artisti
30/1/2014 - Ravenna, Italy @ Bronson
31/1/2014 - Dornbirn, Austria @ Spielboden
1/2/2014 - Baden, Switzerland @ One Of A Million Fest
In The Land Of Giants - Album Stream / Commentary by Vin
In The Land Of Giants
A track by track commentary on our new album.
by Vincent Cacchione
Too Much Dark
Too Much Dark was the first song I wrote for the album. It’s a song that came to me at a vulnerable moment and helped me find my way to a stronger place.
I had just finished writing The Witching Hour, a record I made with Soft Black. This was an album I began writing in 2008 during a period of vagrancy; living, secretly out of my old black Chevy, my friend Shilpa’s rehearsal space in Brooklyn, my girlfriend, Magali’s “no guests allowed” apartment, and my friend Matt’s futon. It was a collection of songs that examined some really dark feelings I was holding onto and the culmination of a worldview that had begun sometime after my father died.
Almost three years went into the writing of that album and by the time it was ready to be recorded a lot had changed. The weight of my past began to feel a little lighter. As I listened to the final recordings of The Witching Hour I couldn’t have felt anymore satisfied. I had made it through this turbulent time and there was beautiful music on the other side. But as the songs played, a certain guilt about the darkness of its emotional content began to nag at me. It was the first time in those three years that I stopped to ask myself, if writing the album was something that needed to be done. There was already so much darkness on this earth, why should I add to it with music? While I’m still not sure what the real answer to that question is, the finished album remains unreleased to this day.
While I was coming to terms with these feelings, I was doing a lot of searching and reflecting. I thought briefly that I wouldn’t write anymore and almost all of that year passed without a single song being written (significant because I am normally an obsessive songwriter, I wrote almost 100 songs before choosing the 10 that would be on The Witching Hour, for instance).
Around this time I was lucky enough to see Jeff Mangum’s return to live performance at a friend’s loft space in Brooklyn. The show was staggering. Each note reverberating off the beautiful old wooden floors, echoing straight through our bodies and hearts. I watched some people around me tear up, other’s looked like a deep chill had entered the room. It was the most emotionally direct show I’d ever seen. When it was over I spoke with Jeff, for the first time, introduced indirectly by our mutual friend, Neil Rough, who wasn’t in attendance, but was the reason why we were able to see this performance.
Jeff was tender and sweet, aware of the power that had just come over him and all in the room, but humble in its presence. I went home inspired and deeply intrigued by what Jeff was capable of doing. I needed to understand why this thing, that felt so pure and selfless, could’ve separated from him for so long. The next night I read an older interview with him that helped me understand it a little better.
In the interview he talked about why he didn’t want to share his post-Aeroplane songs. I felt I could identify in my own way. He’d come to a point where he’d lost a touch of innocence and the sort of pain that was coming through in the music wasn’t something he was hoping to communicate with others. He decided it would be better to remain silent then to let these ideas out, a decision I both admired and feared.
I thought about Jeff’s decision and began to ask myself some serious questions. Why did I want to write songs in the first place? What did I really want to tell people and make them feel? I knew honesty was important to me and didn’t regret the work I’d done but I was hoping there was something more inside of me. Something that could offer some optimism to myself and to my friends.
“Too Much Dark” was the musical answer to this spiritual dilemma. Fueled by the inspiration of the previous night’s performance and the intensity of the conclusion I had just come to, I wrote it in a fever in about five-minutes. My entire body was overcome with it and I wept. Its one of the purest feelings I’ve ever been able to put into song and a sentiment that would both renew my excitement in writing and ultimately guide the making of this album.
Stop Hurting Each Other
I have a life-long friend. His name is Bubba and he was born exactly one week before me in 1983. We met in the 6th Grade, two chubby kids with good taste in music. He showed me The Who and Leonard Cohen and in exchange I showed him Nirvana and punk rock. He didn't know it at the time but he was my only friend then.
In High School we started a punk rock band together with our best friends Turi, Curry, and Mclean. We set up an office in the attic of my parent's house, and spent hours together listening to music, making art, writing songs and creating the hybrid theatre-punk of our band Give Us Barabbas. We've always had this type of kinetic relationship when it comes to creativity. Even though its been quite a while since we've done a project together, the conversations I have with Bubba sometimes feel like little epiphanies.
When I'm in our hometown, we have this habit of making mixes of music and driving around the quiet parts of our town, smoking weed in his car, and philosophizing. These circular voyages can get pretty heavy, they sometimes last all night.
I don't remember what was said in Bubba's car the night I wrote, "Stop Hurting Each Other." He dropped me back at mother's apartment around 5 a.m. and while the sun came up, the song was born.
Cindy + Me
I first heard Raymond Scott's music after hours at a DIY venue in Brooklyn called 285 Kent. It was around Christmas time and a couple of friends had congregated there to listen to some music on the big speakers. My pals in the band Friends had just completed their first mix for their album Manifest and we listened and smiled. Matt Molnar reached behind the makeshift bar and handed me a Budweiser, I relaxed and listened.
After we finished listening to Friends, the promoter John Rambo took hold of the iPod and played the song 'Portofino' by Raymond Scott. I was completely transfixed. I picked up "The Manhattan Research, Inc" album the very next day and began my love affair with Raymond's music.
When I came across "Cindy Electronium," I didn't know I'd sample it. I just kept listening to it over and over again. Somewhere in its lush fractal-producing tangles, a melody started playing to me. I cut out a piece of the arpeggiation, loaded it into the computer, and slowed it down to hip-hop tempo. The words, melodies, and beat came intuitively.
In the song, I'm a crazed teenager in love, running away from home with the girl I love and some twisted view of the future. We've got her father tied up in the house, a smoldering corpse, we've got the cash, "We're living on top of the world," and we're going to get away with it.
This is an update on Bonnie & Clyde for the digital generation.
The Sound Of Thunder
This is an uplifting pop song that advises against running away. In the song I made it sound like I was talking to a friend but I think I was talking to myself. Maybe I was talking to you too. I don't think there is any fatalism to this one despite the doom implied by the ever-present "thunder." To me it's the idea that we should savor our lives and not be afraid.
The music was inspired by my friend Cole. A while back he and I played together in Soft Black and now he writes and performs in DIIV. I love how much emotion Cole can create with just a single guitar line. It was his musical-mojo that inspired the searing guitar melody that follows each chorus.
U + Yr Rocketship
Even though this album is a bit more philosophical then its predecessor, I don't think it would be a proper Caged Animals album without at least one genuinely Bubblegum song. I wanted to write at least one song that a little kid could like too, in case any of our fans have them.
No need to read too heavily into this one, it's just to make you smile, and wag your tail. A love song to an unknown alien princess, propelled into life by a droning organ riff and Motorik beat. Bubblegum Motorik, perhaps?
The Mute + The Mindreader
This is a song about understanding and communication. In the song a mute woman and a telepathic man are falling in love, communicating with each other in "their own special way," and learning how to share life together.
Tiny Sounds
For a while I wasn't sleeping and my partner Magali would wake up throughout the night as I laid in bed flopping from side to side, heavy thoughts on my mind. I decided to let her get some rest and began to work at night instead.
"Tiny Sounds" is a song about a spiritual sort of insomnia. The kind that leads you to a higher understanding and appreciation of things like "the first train at five," "the same old re-runs," and how your computer can be your only friend.
I played the original mix of the track for my friend Ratso Sloman, which included some crudely played dissonant saxophone and Ratso gave me a great idea, "invite your sister's boyfriend to play some better sax on top." We sent Chris Aiello the rough track and a few days later his solo came back. It was a hair-raising experience.
We're Playing With Fire
Fearless pop.
A Psychic Lasso
I was in an obsessive phase with The Magnetic Fields' 69 Love Songs and couldn't get over how sympathetically Stephin Merritt could write about his characters regardless of their sexual orientation and with complete respect and humor. I really started to think about how so many of our gay greats, in the world of songwriting, tailored their couplets toward the heterosexual, so I decided I should do the opposite.
The song is about a co-dependent but loving relationship and I made the characters two men, to pay tribute to those songwriters who often sacrificed a lyric that spoke for them, to express something universal.
In The Land Of Giants
In the Summer of 2010 my girlfriend and I got married. Because she is Canadian and I'm American this meant that we had to undergo an immigration process for her to be able to stay in the country.
The year that followed was trying on both of us. She was applying for her green card and wasn't allowed to leave the country. This meant a wicked 18 month phase where she couldn't see her family. We had grown accustomed to traveling up north every couple of months to see them and it was especially painful for her. She'd even missed her mother's wedding and both of her grandparents funerals while she was forced to stay in the US.
After an epic 18 month process of waiting for her green card (they lost her application) we sat outside some Federal building in downtown Manhattan. She was inside getting the card and I sat outside with my notebook. We were just about to leave for our first tour of Europe as Caged Animals. The card couldn't have come any later. But we were so overjoyed that the day was finally here.
I sat down in this park as she finalized the card and a pigeon walked up to my shoe. I tried to imagine what it must feel like to be such a small creature in a land full of giants. I tried to imagine what it must feel like to be illegal in a country like America. The words flowed out of me like water, "I walked up to his boat-sized shoe, it was my greatest stab at defiance, it's hard to tell what's going to come of you, when you walk in a land of giants."
(you're a giant now)
Picks up where "In The Land Of Giants" leaves off. A song that encourages people to do the impossible, to believe in yourself, and move forward. This song was co-written with our drummer Patrick Curry on a THC-fueled journey into our inner-Rocky Balboas. It was fun and intuitive to write a song for the record with Pat. His unique musical sensibility helped guide the soulful drone of this track into it's emotional peak.
What You're Looking For
I always try to close out a record with a particular meaningful song. To end someplace that will leave the listener with something useful. I realize that in today's 140-character music scene most listeners aren't going to get that far but I'm not really making the type of albums that could be absorbed that quickly anyway. If you've made it this far you deserve to hear my favorite song on the album.
It was written in Sackville, New Brunswick. The town where my partner Magali was raised. Her family has become a second family to me and they've always been really nurturing and supportive of my work.
Early in the writing of the album we were in Sackville; I had just finished Too Much Dark and I was focused on cutting a path through the bad feelings and hurt inside looking to find something that was uplifting. This isn't always the easiest task because some of our most surface level and cheesy thoughts reside in this area too.
I had all but given up on "finding what I was looking for" when it dawned it me. The lyrics flowed out of me naturally. This is a song about patience and faith and family. Themes that are very intrinsic to this album and values were reinforced time and time again while we made this album. It asserts, "It takes a long time, maybe your whole life, but you'll find what you're looking for."
May you find what you're looking for as I feel I have.
An unlikely friendship is struck between a disfigured old-man and a little boy in Tobias Stretch's new clip for Caged Animals' "Too Much Dark." Offering an abstract but entirely sympathetic visual harmony with the existential themes of "Too Much Dark," Stretch brings the viewer through a series of mirrored events in two people's lives that lead them together.
While both characters appear to lead lives without companionship, they find solace in each other, as they explore their shared neighborhood in Philadelphia. It's easy for this pair to enjoy each other's company because they are both plagued by the same vision. Chased from scene to scene by a glowing green jellyfish, their affinity for one another grows, as they learn what the jellyfish has come for.
