Sunday, January 8, 2023

Happy New Year (our 23rd)!

 Greetings friends!

Welcome to a whole new year on planet earth and a whole new year for NotRock.  After we spent most of 2020/2021 scouring the depths of our archives to construct the behemoth volumes one and two of our 20th anniversary release we took a nice long breather.  That's not to say we were completely inactive so we're here now to fill you in on what you may have missed in 2022. 


First and foremost this past October saw the highly anticipated debut release of Reynolds 853: John Adam and Dan VS. Jean-Claude Van Damme.  The Reynolds boys are already well on their way to having the songs written for their follow up record and are expected to record sometime this year.  For now though, feast your eardrums on 11 pulse-pounding tracks of pop-punky, indie-rock explosiveness! There's physical, tangible CDs available as well! 


To coincide with their debut released Reynolds 853 also released a kick-ass, X-files inspired music video for their first single, Trust No One.  Directed by John T. Fisher, starring Bryan Kwasnik, Shanna Pollack and Ralph Chudley.  Check it out here! 

Speaking of videos, just before the new year Fallout Chronicles released its latest action-packed episode, Chapter 11: Clash Of Adversaries! It has starring roles from many a NotRock person.  Check it out below! 


In other news Please Exist is still plodding along in the recording process of their massive double album.  Pretty much all the instrumentation is completed and the majority of the vocals.  It's mostly just bells and whistles that need to be added and some fun stuff for in between tracks.  More on that in the future hopefully along with some other updates of NotRock past! That's all for now! We hope all of you are doing well and finding some time to create! 

Take care, be kind, and godspeed!

- J.T.F. 

Sunday, January 2, 2022

Happy New Year! Here's What We Did With The Last One...

 Greetings Everybody! 

As we start our 22nd year we'd like share with you what's been going on with the 21st.  Most notably we spent a large portion of 2021 combing through the archives, going through piles of old CDRs, cassettes and videos in order to bring you the second Volume of our 20th Anniversary Collection.  NotRock was founded in 2000 but our first official release wasn't until 2001 so Volume 2 of our 20th Anniversary compilation celebrates twenty years of NotRock releases from 2001 to 2021. Where our first Volume contained songs from every one of our releases, this volume showcases the steps taken to get to there by featuring rare demos, b-sides, and live tracks.  The audio quality ranges from polished studio tracks to gritty live audio pulled of twenty year old videos. At times we decided the importance of a track/performance being documented here outweighed the quality of the original audio source. This companion volume is a musical journey of musicians and friends whose songs here are full of what ifs and almosts. From Annoying Customer tracks that predate NotRock to Feu De Joie, Entia and Please Exist on the radio! Everything we could find of historical interest/importance in the NotRock archives has been included here. There may even be a secret bonus song if you download the album.  Check it out now: 


This past December, just in time for the 10th anniversary of Disseriph's debut EP, NotRock has put together an Anthology album collecting all of the EPs, Singles, Compilation Tracks, and Live Stuff in on convenient place.  Spanning 2011 to 2017 here's all the brilliance Disseriph created collected finally under the NotRock banner.  
 

In addition to those epic releases, 2021 also saw two classic Lettebox EPs coming home under the NotRock banner for safe keeping.  2004's Your Worst Revenge and the 2005 EP are now available for your listening/downloading pleasure.  The official artwork for the 2005 EP is still being searched for so for now there is a placeholder as the cover image.  Revisit these classic EPs and relive a pop punk era that todays music is missing! 


That's all the news fit to print this month.  Tune in next time where we should have released the debut record from REYNOLDS 853 and have a solid update on Please Exist's forthcoming DOUBLE ALBUM! until then take care, be well, and be kind.  Here's hoping 2022 will let us have safe live music again. 

Best Regards,

- J.T.F.  

Friday, January 1, 2021

20 YEARS BEHIND US! ONWARD TO THE NEXT 20!

 Greetings Friends, Family, and Music Enthusiasts,

Happy holidays to all.  We truly hope the rough year that was 2020 found you and yours as happy, healthy and safe as can be.  As rough as the year was, here at NotRock it has also been a year of celebration! Twenty years have passed since the inception of NotRock and boy has a lot happened in that time.  From our very first shows (under the moniker NotRock Productions), to our first physical music release (the dreaded 4-Band Sampler Cassette), to a slew of compilations (both holiday and regular), to many other releases involving countless hours of cutting, folding, and silk screening.  Although we didn't release much as far as new music this year, we did get to spend a lot of time digging through the archives, unearthing many a treasure and putting together a comprehensive collection of music commemorating our 20th year.  Say hello to the NotRock 20th Anniversary Compilation: Volume 1.  This comp is a deep dive best of, collection of songs taken from every one of our releases. There are 75 songs in all and every one of them are annotated by all the artists that brought them to life! Looking back on all this great art has been nostalgically exciting, inspiring,  and humbling.  It's been an honor to work with so many fantastically creative minds over the years and we want to thank them for allowing us to be the custodians of their great and important art, hopefully documenting and preserving it for many, many many, years to come.  Behold the first in what will be a two volume set: 


The other new release of 2020 was actually the unearthing and proper treatment of record that has long been on the shelf.  Back around 2005 Ralph (of Do Nothing Machine, Feu de Joie, and Please Exist) had planned on releasing music that he had written and performed all himself.  He recorded the drums to 4-Track cassette, transferred them over to James' computer where James mixed them.  Then Ralph recorded and mixed everything else by himself  on his computer ending up with one hell of a debut alum.  For years it sat unreleased because Ralph had always planned to "redo them better" and he even did record a lot of them over with James engineering but they all remained unfinished.  Years passed and every few months John would plead with Ralph to just release the original version, that it was a great sounding record and the world deserved to hear it.  Eventually Ralph caved and we can happily finally say we digitally released his debut CHUDLEY: Sugar And Razorblades this past summer.  It's a record that is not to be missed and one that is more than worthy amongst our NotRock catalog. Here it is finally!   


In other NotRock news:
- Please Exist are done tracking instruments for their forthcoming epic double album "Storytellers In Straightjackets.  
- Hides A Well continues to write music but in limited fashion due to the pandemic.  
- Khantra had plans to record a 6 song EP last spring but pandemic put that on hold until further notice. 
- Reynolds 853 finished writing their debut album "John Adam and Dan Vs. Jean Claude Van Dam" and are slated to record it later this month! 

That's all the fun and exciting news for now.  Until next time, be kind, take care and check out these...
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