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Candy Butchers
Worry My Dome
RPM Records
JK 86347
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1. Worry My Dome
2. My Monkey Made A Man Out Of Me
3. You Belong To Me Now
4. Ruby's Got A Big Idea
5. Tough Hang
6. Baby, It's A Long Way Down
7. It's A Line
8. I Let Her Get Away
9. My Heart Isn't In It
10. Make No Mistake
11. Call Off The Dogs
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Written and Produced by Mike Viola
Mixed by Bob Clearmountain
www.candybutchers.com
All Songs (C) 2001 Suburban Birdsongs (ASCAP)
All Rights Reserved. Used by Permission.
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It was a summer night in New York City and I was present at a ritual, an almost nightly get-together in the garden behind Mike's apartment. It was hot and the backyard smelled like flowers and garbage - that particular scent of New York's East Village in August. Torches were lit, the barbecue was burning down, tequila and white wine flowed.
It was getting late and, as these parties often did, this one moved into Mike's bedroom recording studio. Mike wanted to make some music. It didn't matter that he was the only musician among us, or that we were all pretty wasted. He was locked onto the idea that we could channel our drunken energy into a spontaneous creation, something to remember the night by.
Tonight's big innovation was a harmonica quartet and he passed each of us a rusty instrument. Mike played keyboards with one hand and conducted the band with the other, coaching us through a cacophony that must have sounded to the neighbors like raccoons digging through the trash. But Mike took it all seriously, and we played until sunlight crept into the room.
Truth be told, none of us really wanted to hear that tape again; except Mike, who insisted on finishing what we'd started. During the next week, he mixed and re-mixed it until he'd created something called "Harmonic Convergence" - not beautiful by any stretch but, amazingly, a song.
Mike loves to create, and his joy of constructing and deconstructing is what gives these eleven songs their glow. The elements of each combine improvisation, melody, dissonance and spontaneous magic punctuated by Mike's voice, one of the most expressive and exuberant in pop music.
The songs unfold in shades and textures, turning classic pop themes - lust, nostalgia, loyalty, addiction and disillusionment - into a personal vision that's all at once funny, perverse, sentimental, imperfect, fragile but always hopeful.
The spirit behind that summer experiment is at the heart of all the music on Play With Your Head; Mike has an uncanny ability to find beauty even in life's messiest details.
Jason Fine - Rolling Stone
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Written and Produced by Mike Viola at home in New York City
Mixed by Bob Clearmountain at Mix This! - Los Angeles, California
Assisted by David Boucher
Recorded by Dae Bennett at Bennett Studios, Englewood, New Jersey
Mastered by Bob Ludwig at Gateway Mastering - Portland, Maine
Additional Vocals on My Monkey's Made A Man Out Of Me, Ruby's Got A Big Idea and My Heart Isn't In It - Melora Creager
Management: Danny Bennett
RPM Music Productions - New York City
Photography: Barbel Schmidt
Art Direction and Design: Frank Lango
Also available:
Mike Viola and The Candy Butchers: Falling Into Place CK 69861
Arranged and Performed by Candy Butchers:
Mike Viola - Vocals, Guitars
Pete Donnelly - Bass, Hey Heys, La Las, Whoahs
Mike Levesque - Drums, Hey Heys, La Las, Whoahs
Mike Viola - Any and every other element of sound in the audible spectrum between 20 and 20,000 cycles per second.
