It's done

With the split done and ready to be unleashed, here is the story of the two bands on it.



Cella Cum Sanus.



Cela Cum Sanus is a lark, a moment of whimsy. The two members (Luke Bergen and myself) are often coming up with strange project ideas that never see the light of day. This one actually did. The original idea was to just do a fun EP of noise-y noise stuff and improvise the whole thing. What we ended up doing was making a noise-y little pop record. Apparently, we can't really get away from melody. The guitar and drums were done live off the floor with no pre-planning. We just threw mics up and hit record. Then, about a week later, I sat down with a bass guitar and having not listened to it since we recorded it, improvised bass parts and kept every first take. No fixing, no overdubing (minus one little backwards part that was done in post-production). This EP is what we played that afternoon, warts and all. I hope you like it.



Hal Johnson & the Joanne McLeods.



Many years ago I was in a punk band called Thee Armada. At one point, all of us developed an interest in grindcore. Not really a serious interest (except for me I actually like it) but everyone found is funny. The other other members at the time started a grindcore band with no name and no real songs, just a few funny titles and a bunch of noise. They did one show like that on whim in the town of Grunthal when one of the other bands on the bill had dropped out last second. Then, I joined as vocalist. We played a handful of shows under different names each time, and by our last show we were Hal Johnson & the Joanne McLeods and was now vocals and electric piano (played through a distorted guitar amp). We played one big show then never found the time to do anything like that again. This was in 2003.

Fast forward to 2010, I still have an interest in grindcore and the related genre of powerviolence and I felt like doing something in that style. When it came time to name the project (which is really just me on all instruments, but do I really want to call it Paul Hodgert?) I decided to throw back to the old group that played maybe 4 shows ever? Thus, Hal Johnson & the Joanne McLeods. These ten songs were written and recorded over about 3 hours and I hope it shows.

Check back tomorrow for a link to download the whole thing for free.

Paul