Elliott Brood

Elliott Brood‘s CD Ambassador is the best CD I’ve heard in years.

It is so good, I’m going to do something completely out of character – I’m going to purchase it! That’s right. I’m going to support a Canadian artist with my precious $$.

The band is Canadian, and I was able to find most of the tracks available on websites to stream in high quality. This makes me buy it more. When a band goes out of their way to make it difficult for their potential new fans to sample their music, I just give up and boycott the thought of ever buying their music.

I first heard of Elliott Brood from all the play they get on CBC radio. Their music is like a drug – I can’t stop listening. It’s loud and full of my favourite instrument – the banjo! It’s a real toe-tapping, head nodding folk album with a modern twist.

Here is the album description from Amazon:

This is not a tale about a gunslinger hero, nor is it meant to cut your heart. It is not the pledge at last year’s meeting of aficionados and it is not the eulogy at a death-country funeral. This is the tale of three storytellers who turned up their collars to the cold night in the dead of winter. Clutching old cases to their coats, they climbed the frozen stairwell to a dusty room in an abandoned abattoir on the edge of the city. Over three long days and nights, they coaxed sounds from the walls, ceiling and floors onto stacks of tape, slowly giving life to what would become the heart of the album. With the aid of basement stairwell echoes and broken down work vans, the album took its initial breath. The stories and sounds that were captured and which you presently hold in your hands, are the tales of AMBASSADOR.

AMBASSADOR is narrated in its entirety by Mark Sasso, Casey Laforet and Stephen Pitkin.

Now this is the part where you ignore that old western flickering on that old black and white in front of you and let your living room be engulfed in the swelling dust storm outside.

For Ambassador is here.

Or as described by weewerk:

Elliott BROOD call their music Death Country – dark, gritty folk music built around whiskey-drenched vocals and lyrics evoking images of love, loss and murder. In their soul-thumping bluegrass songs, banjo keeps time to a strange and chunky angular stomp, with vicious Kentucky-hardcore acoustic guitar and somber, achingly confessional vocal harmonies.

Also of note, Elliott BROOD’s Ambassador was nominated for Best Roots & Traditional Album for the 2006 Juno Awards!

To purchase it from Amazon, look in the right sidebar for the link.

To get a sample of their music, go to http://www.newmusiccanada.com/genres/artist.cfm?Band_Id=11365 and listen to “Second Son” and “The Bridge” to start. You won’t be disappointed.

UPDATE: Hey I see that Elliott Brood is playing here in the Sault!!
Jun 14 Sault Ste. Marie ON @ Downbeat Lounge
Can’t wait!