UNKOOL Music proudly present

A NEW CD WITH

 THE UNKOOL HILLBILLIES

November 2011

”Pause’n’Rewind”

UNKOOL201101

Label: UNKOOL Music

Format: Digipack + 16p booklet

Running time: 42 minutes

A new CD with The Unkool Hillbillies, “Pause’n’Rewind” is on its way to the record shops! “This is the result of one fun rock’n’roll journey! It has been a pleasure to work with great guest musicians and I’m also happy that we once again can present some new terrific songs with Karin Johansson on guest vocals” says pianist Anders Umegård.

The Unkool Hillbillies keeps rockin!

Since the fall of 2002, The Unkool Hillbillies have played at hundreds of venues from coast-to-coast, basically all over Sweden, in Europe and in USA. The group mixes rock’n’roll, rockabilly and jiving rhythm&blues in a characteristic way. The pounding piano is significant for the sound of the band, but it is the swinging entity of blues harp and electric guitar that lift the roofs of music bars and dancehalls all around Sweden – and abroad.

New song from American song-writer

Darrin Mazzilli has written several songs for the band has one new tailor-made on this album: Hangover is fun rock’n’roll-song with just a slight touch of Louisiana, and the humorous lyrics about a crushing break-up is delivered in sweet contrast with cheerful music. The cooperation between Darrin and the band is now taken one step forward as on this CD, as Darrin is also featured on backing vocals on a couple of tracks!

Karin Johansson guest singer!

Karin Johansson sang three songs on the previous CD (EVIL TIMES, 2009) and especially You’re the One was a smash hit accompanied with plenty of radio plays and is the favorite of many. On public request, Karin is back with four new songs on this CD. “It is wonderful to work with Karin”, says pianist Anders Umegård, “she is force of nature and delivers, with the same credibility, both hard rock’n’roll tune like Call Me Up and melancholic story-telling performances like Window View.”

Incredible live act

The Unkool Hillbillies is a much appreciated live band that has played all over Sweden for a number of years. After the previous CD, the band toured around half the globe in 2010 and for 2012 there are new tours abroad planned. There are still loads of energy in this band and they definitely rock hard, which is shown on the bonus track One More Time, recorded live at the jazz club Stampen.

Pause’n’Rewind

Rock’n’roll is what The Unkool Hillbillies are known of and this CD has plenty of it. Along with the rock’n’roll songs in the unkool style there are more actual rock-a-billy numbers like Ding-Ring-A-Ding-Ding, swing-inspired rock’n’roll like Spend Some Time, blues (Bad Investment Blues), surf-inspired (Hillbilly Twist) and even country-flavored tracks (Window View and Everlasting Love). The variety is somewhat impressive, but even more impressive is that The Unkool Hillbillies dig into each style as The Unkool Hillbillies!

Anders has written most of the CD’s 15 tracks. The title track Pause’n’Rewind is a good illustration of the context that fits most of the songs on this CD. The CD is all about rock’n’roll and swinging music, but nevertheless many of the songs also has story to tell. In Window View, for example, Karin sings a story about staying inside and looking at the world through the window instead of going outside, which can be seen as a metaphor for a contemporarily spread lifestyle of today – there’s no condemnation involved though, instead the songs together form comforting message. And overall, the partly melancholic or reflective lyrics give some further nuances to the music, but the main message is still: rock’n’roll!

Along with the new originals, there are also the “unkoolified” songs. Richard Andersson has invented the verb unkoolify: “There are these classics that you have heard countless of times without rally reflecting upon them, and there are these classics that seem to talk to you, the kind of songs that you would like to speak back to. If you’re able to scratch out the identity, the soul, of the an existing song and you from that are able to shape your own version, add a new angle and re-interpret it your own way – to make it sound like a song of The Unkool Hillbillies - that is to unkoolify”. Little Richard (Send Me Some Loving) and Carl Perkins (Gone Gone Gone) are two unkoolified contributions on this CD.

Hillbillies gone surfin’

The Unkool Hillbillies is a rock’n’roll band, al though jive, swing, blues and especially rockabilly are parts of the overall picture – but on this CD is the first time they record a couple of surf oriented songs. Rauchan is named after a fairy princess from Kazakhstan and has a character of its own. It has a distinguished melody, but there is room for several associations. And the beat is something else – it is not 3/4 beat and neither 2/4 nor 4/4 – it is an “odd” rhythm. Anders explains: “If an even rhythm is like perfect circle-shaped wheel, an odd rhythm can be seen like an elliptic-shaped wheel: more difficult to get it rolling, but the more to watch!”

Robert Karlsson is a terrific Swedish rockabilly guitarist, who’s played with the band on many shows, but here on the first time joins them on CD. Robert delivers brilliant guitar work and also gave an ingenious name to the other surf-oriented song: Hillbilly Twist. “On this CD, we have been fortunate to gather most of the great guest musicians that we work with from time to time”, says Richard, “and except for Robert and Karin, the incredible saxophone playing of the Otto Gryting is remarkable”. Remarkable is also a word that’s valid for The Unkool Hillbillies. This new CD should be a must for any rockabilly or 50’s oriented person.

Digital distribution

”Pause’n’Rewind” is also distributed digitally, the entire album as well as specific tracks will be available from on for example ITunes  and Emusic – even roots music have modern listeners, that prefer mp3:s  instead of CD:s.

Remark: The band has three CD:s out since previously: Evil Times (GET 004), Unkool and Proud! (UNKOOL200501) and Right To Rumble (yodeler103). Right To Rumble and Unkool and Proud are out-of-press but Evil Times is still available in stores and from www.unkool.se

More info: info@unkool.se - www.unkool.se, 070-2080928