Band of the Week: Spindrift

As Thomas was wandering his way through the museum's John Lennon exhibit, he bumped into Brian Jonestown Massacre guitarist Frankie "Teardrop" Emerson, who was pushing frontman Anton Newcombe through the building in a wheelchair. Newcombe, an infamous instigator whose antics were immortalized in the 2004 documentary Dig!, had broken his foot in a fight at a gig the previous night. A BJM fan, Thomas hit it off with Emerson and they exchanged contact info. Thomas ended up joining the band on a subsequent tour, working the merch table and later playing guitar.

It was on tour with BJM that Thomas began to share with members of the band some demos he'd been working on for the West Coast incarnation of Spindrift. He'd seen Sergio Leone's Spaghetti Western classic Once Upon a Time in the West a year earlier, and was blown away by composer Ennio Morricone's haunting score. "I just became obsessed with that sound, and wanted to see if I could take it somewhere," Thomas says.

Thomas was also inspired by the Doors' cinematic sound, and had a vision for Spindrift as a Doors-meets-Morricone kind of band. Emerson was sold on the demos Thomas made, as were fellow BJM mates Dan Allaire and Dave Koenig. But Thomas had to fit Spindrift work in between BJM recording and tours. In the meantime, he took his vision even further by crafting a concept for The Legend of God's Gun, a feature film about a preacher-turned-gunslinger, and wrote an entire soundtrack of prairie-scorching originals for a movie that didn't yet have a script, director or any actors.

Jump ahead three years, and Thomas' years-long pursuit is a reality. Filmmaker Mike Bruce and Thomas brought The Legend of God's Gun to fruition, with band members and friends serving as cast and crew. The tripped-out Western is out on DVD and hitting the festival circuit now. Quentin Tarantino liked the sound so much that he put the Spindrift track "Indian Ride" on the soundtrack for his forthcoming movie, Hell Ride.

Meanwhile, Spindrift has followed up the God's Gun soundtrack with a new album, The West, in stores this week via the Dandy Warhols' imprint, Beat the World Records. The 13-track album features three songs from the soundtrack, and is rife with Morricone staples like surf guitar, haunting organ and loads of hi-hats. Not surprisingly, many of the instrumentals have a cinematic tone, undulating between spastic blasts and haunting interludes. There is also blues- and booze-fueled psychedelic rock (the harmonica-laced "The Wind"), and a few shots from leftfield, such as "The Klezmer Song," which conjures a drunken Eastern European bar, and "If You Don't Like It… (Get the Fuck Out)," which sounds like a TV on the Radio b-side.

"I'm thrilled to have been able to make this happen, and now I just want to see it through and keep it going," Thomas says. And to think, all it took was a swift kick to the sternum by a chance encounter with an angry singer in a wheelchair.

Download Spindrift's "Ace Coltrane" here.