Enjoy.

Why have we merged? Read below. Our apologies to those who preferred the name Biclops, but like in The Highlander: there can be only one.

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So if you read the “official press release” you’ll know that East Of The Wall had a lineup change, but what this essentially means is that East Of The Wall and Biclops are one band. Who didn’t see this coming? Yes, we know this makes the history of our names now a college level class, but that’s kind of the point: we’re done with confusing people. We’re one collective, we have been for a while, and now we have one name.

The long and short of it was that we love Mike to death but he had other obligations, so Seth filled his throne. Chris was already leaning East Of The Wall songs to be the touring guitar player since Matt can’t tour, so when the drummer swap happened East Of The Wall was now in an interesting position. Effectively, the live East lineup was Biclops.

So we’ve thrown up our hands and said screw it. There’s no point in arbitrarily dividing our music into instrumental and vocal bands. We’ll still play instrumental music and music with vocals. The writing and local show lineup will be all five of us, but we’ll tour as a four-piece. We’ll probably have specific focuses for individual records going forward so as not to muddy the waters, but honestly it’s all uncharted territory, which is pretty exciting.

But enough abstraction. What does this mean in the short term? Well first of all we have split ep with Rosetta and Year Of No Light, which was just released by Translation Loss.

Next, you might recall that Biclops has a record fully recorded, which we have titled Ressentiment. This will be the first full-length release by the new East Of The Wall collective, via Translation Loss this summer.

Then in 2011 we’ll be releasing the first record written entirely by the new lineup. We have it almost halfway completed already, and the plan is to not leave any of our fans out to dry. Not to get too specific but we have a pretty big idea for a concept record that’ll span the breadth of everything we’ve done.

We’ll be touring the hell out of 2010, so check back with us soon.

But here’s what you should do: come to a free show at Ace Of Clubs in NYC on Wednesday, November 18th. We’re playing with an amazing band, A Storm Of Light. Their guitarist/vocalist Josh Graham has played in Red Sparrows and Battle Of Mice, and is the visuals guy for Neurosis and Mastodon.

We go on first at 8pm sharp. This show will fill to max capacity, so get there early.

Finally, you may have heard the news about East Of The Wall signing to Translation Loss. You may not of heard that we set up a webstore there. If you want to buy a record from our related bands, you want to go to EastOfTheWall.com.

We are extremely excited to share some news with all of our fans, friends and; family….. East of the Wall has signed to Translation Loss! We are so fortunate to be on a roster full of artists who we respect and appreciate so much, not to mention having this excellent opportunity to do business with such a hard working operation of great people. On the road ahead we will be focusing extensively on writing, recording, touring, touring, touring.

Translation Loss will be releasing an split with Rosetta, Year of No Light & East of the Wall this December which will contain three new tracks from our camp. We have about half of our next full length written, which thus far in content is a bit more technically involved than our last LP. Keep up with us for news on releases and tour at www.eastofthewall.com & myspace.com/eastofthewall.

We want to extend our thanks to all the people who have helped us along the way, most especially Brandon Helms, Dave Grossman, and Dave Witte. Looking so forward to our time ahead with TL.

Cheers,
-East of The Wall

When Matt left Postman Syndrome and Day Without Dawn formed I obviously wanted to still make music with him, because the dude is the bomb. I had also been wanting to try to write music in a very different style, by writing the vocals along with the music, and even choosing chords around melody lines.

So in 2006 Matt and I formed a very short lived project that was going to be called Biclops actually, but since we only got together three times I didn’t want to waste such a good band name, and I posthumously wound up calling the “band” Hanna Barbarian. It turns out there’s a band or two with this name, who I’ll avoid listening to so that I can pretend I’m the only one with good ideas (much like how I pretend that no one else came up with the idea of calling their band, character, or scientific apparatus Biclops).

For years I’ve been wanting to go back and finish these songs, especially Lasso which was basically done, but I’ve had more stuff on my plate. Oh well. Maybe one day if one of our main bands ever slows down.

It was fun though, just writing for the studio and not worrying about a preconceived idea of what our sound should be. I suppose the project was more my thing and I roped Matt into it. I was in a Ween and Beach Boys phase and I wanted to do quirky pop like that, but mixed with some of the, uh, post-prog, sure why not, that we usually play. I think it had potential. I enjoyed writing lyrics that were simultaneously stupid and bleak.

Lasso
Snowman

On Lasso I played drums, guitar, and sang the parts that, well if you remember that Matt can sing well it’s obvious which parts I’m singing on (fortunately I’ve gotten at least a little better since 2006). Matt played guitar, and sang well.

Snowman is much less completed. The guitars were also recorded like ass. Still, I love Matt’s backing harmonies. I can’t believe he agreed to sing those lyrics. His guitar is on the left and mine is on the right. Pretend rocking drums and bass come in with the second riff and that the song doesn’t end lamely like drunk sex after a fifth of jack.

-Chris

-Chris

Sorry for the late update, but I think this one turned out pretty well. It tells the story of our tourmates and buddies, A Fucking Elephant, and their brief foray into a power-trio lineup.

That’s it, nothing else to tell this week. Until the next, then.

But enough excuses. A short, stupid video and the rest of the update will be online late Wednesday night.