The Sunparlour Players

The Sunparlour Players aren't as refined or archaic sounding as their name would have you believe. The word 'sunparlour' conjures images of old ladies drinking tea while sitting in stiff floral wingback chairs draped in antique doilies. This is not how this three piece band sounds, not one bit. The S.P.P. are organic, they've got dirt under their nails, sweat soaked into their collars, these are heavy metal dreams (they cover AC/DC in their set and list Pantera as an influence) channeled through acoustic instuments by the will of singer and songwriter Andrew Penner. The band's shoutin' and stompin' is aided and abetted by addtional members Dennis Van Dine (bass, piano, clarinet, banjo, percussion, vocals) and Michael "Rosie" Rosenthal (drums, glockenspiel, bass, shouting).

Their first full length offering Hymns For The Happy was self-released last year, but the band was recently signed by Toronto indie label, Baudelaire, which has re-released the record after some sonic tweaking by the band. Give a listen and please, if you can, get out and see these guys, you won't be disappointed.

Here's a couple of mp3s from the new record:
dyin' today [mp3]
if the creeks don't rise [mp3] - i love this song

You'll find a few links to BUY the record on their myspace page.

An earlier post on the band can be found here.