Ivan & Alyosha’s new album It’s All Just Pretend will be released May 5th. This collection includes their brand new single “All This Wandering Around” plus their entire acclaimed 2013 debut album, All The Times We Had.
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Seattle-based five-piece rock combo Ivan & Alyosha are finally complete, having organically grown from the original
duo of Tim Wilson and Ryan Carbary, adding Tim’s brother Pete and Tim Kim, then
drummer Cole Mauro as a full-time member for their sophomore Dualtone Records
album, It’s All Just Pretend, an
uplifting exploration of the things that fuel their classic sound, steeped in
the verities of family, faith and existential doubt.
Their critically praised debut album, All the Times We Had was a perennial on
several NPR tastemaker stations with an iTunes “Song of the Week” for “Running
for Cover.” Paste called their music
“luscious, enjoyable folk-pop” and NPR Music praised their “Beatles-esque pop
harmonies and sweet melodies,” while Rolling
Stone raved about their “smooth, soaring guitar pop” and American Songwriter said the band
“achieve a polished west coast soul-folk sound that draws on the poppier
sensibilities of McCartney songwriting.”
Ivan & Alyosha woodshedded for
close to a year in making the new album in a variety of locations, from
Carbary’s own Seattle area condo home studio to first-album producer Chad
Coplein’s Black Watch Studios in Norman, Oklahoma and L.A.’s famed Sunset Sound
with mixer/co-producer Joe Chiccarelli, who has worked with U2, My Morning
Jacket, Elton John, The Shins, Etta James and The Strokes.
The band, which originally took its
name from two characters in Dostoevsky’s The
Brothers Karamazov, has developed into a three-headed songwriting beast,
with the Wilson brothers and Carbary carrying virtually an equal load on the
new album. The eclectic 11-song effort takes
off with the pure adrenaline of Pete’s contributions, “Something Is Wrong” and
“Bury Me Deep,” highlighted by jangling guitars and pointed observations about
freedom and personal responsibility in today’s society. "As a songwriter, I feel a
huge responsibility to be honest,"says Pete Wilson. “And most of the time,
that honesty comes at a price of digging down deep into my own faults,
frustrations, and doubts. I've tried to write the protest song where I
point the finger and place the blame elsewhere, but it never works out.” He
adds, “The goal is to hold up the mirror to our own shortcomings, and
start asking, "how do I get out of the mess I've put myself in?"
Tim’s “All This Wandering Around,” the
first single, offers a haunted Roy Orbison-like croon featuring Tim Kim’s swampy
delta blues guitar break wrapped around a song of the search for a power
greater than oneself, and the stumbles in finding it along the way.
“There has to be honesty,” says Tim.
“Lyrically and thematically, our songs connect with people, no matter what they
believe. We hopefully provide some sort of light, whenever – and wherever –
they listen to them.”
According to Tim, the album title (which
comes from Pete’s song) depicts a modern world where reality is hidden behind materialistic
illusions, illustrated in songs like his “Modern Man,” a funky, ‘80s Bowie-meets-Hall
& Oates R&B number that takes aim on our fetish for technology and outward
appearances.
“Somewhere on the journey long ago,” he
sings. “You lost your place,” adding that we’re “drowning in the ocean of your
lowered expectations.”
Carbary’s aching, self-lacerating songs
explore harsh truths about relationships and domesticity with an eye towards
traditional roots rock, evoking the piano balladry of Paul McCartney (“Tears In
Your Eyes”), a bluesy four-on-the-floor shuffle punctuated with poppy “Penny
Lane” horns (“Oh This Love”) and a country gospel lament about relationships –
one with a fellow human, the other a higher spiritual power -- featuring his
own twangy slide guitar (“Drifting Away”). “I’ve always been a sucker for a
heartbreak song,” admits Ryan. “I’m mostly expressing my failures as a human
being, and striving to become a better person. It’s true emotion.”
That rawness and vulnerability can be
heard on Tim’s “Come Rain, Come Shine,” a song that evokes one of George
Harrison’s blissful Buddhist mantras, a glimpse of our own communal nature,
that we all occupy this earth together.
“We wanted to come up with something
that was universal,” explains Tim, who co-penned the song with Nashville
songwriter Dave Berg. “We wanted to bring things into perspective, with all of
the nonsense going on in America and the world, that we’re all part of this
global community.
All may be meaningless, but there are
still things in the world that are meaningful. As a band, we try to err on the
light, rather than the dark, side. We admit there are things we have yet to
figure out, but instead of falling into easy cynicism, or self-absorption,
though, we try to dig deeper.”
With four of the five band members
married, and two of them with kids, family is an important consideration for
Ivan & Alyosha. Tim deals with the topic openly on the closing lullaby to
his then two-year-old son Henry, “Don’t Lose Your Love,” a wise counsel from a
father to his child and wife, his fingers squeaking on the fret like a literal
tug on the heartstrings. For all the
members of I&A, as they pursue their musical ambitions, it is important
that their personal lives remain grounded. “It can be difficult when we're on the
road,” says Ryan. “We're very
grateful to have the kind of support we do from the loved ones back home"
“Family informs just about everything
we do creatively,” nods Tim, a devoted father and husband who manages to keep
the home fires burning whether on tour or recording. “It’s an inspiring thing,
for sure. We’re all just trying to take care of each other. Rock bands don’t
usually deal with topics like family and spirituality, but these subjects are
universal.”
On It’s
All Just Pretend, Ivan & Alyosha continue to make timeless music that
shows that rock and domestic bliss can indeed co-exist, as they overcome any
obstacles by the sheer joy of their roles -- not only as performers, but
brothers, husbands, fathers and sons.