Schooner
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Bio
Schooner is from Carrboro, NC. We like water, dogs, and cats. We enjoy experimenting with simple song structures and sounds and aesthetically tend to go for understatement. We play disheveled pop that moves from mellow sad-eyed tunes to erratic rock numbers highlighted by boy-girl harmonies and existential lyrics.
Schooner began in 2003 as a 4-track project by Reid Johnson, and features Johnson’s sister Kathryn on keys, drummer Billy Alphin (Ashley Stove, The Rosebuds), and bassist Maria Albani (Pleasant).
We recently have finished sessions with Jerry Kee at Duck Kee Studios (Superchunk, Kingsbury Manx, Polvo) and will be touring and putting out a new EP soon enough...
About
Our releases:
"You Forget About Your Heart" - 2004 [ Itunes ]-Pox World Empire
“3x4” - 2006-Pox World Empire
“Rocky P.” - 2006 [ Itunes ]-Pox World Empire
"Hold on Too Tight"-2007-54º 40' or Fight! Records.[HERE]
Things that have been said:
If you don't already know Schooner's music, you're missing out on not only a great N.C. band, but a poetically inclined buffet of pop perfection. Reid Johnson's lyrical quality is transporting, and the band's 2004 debut, You Forgot About Your Heart, is an absolute auditory gem.
Blending sweet boy-girl vocals, some '50s doo-wop and '60s baroque pop influences (not heavy, but there) with the college rock skronk of their hometown in the '90s and some timeless power-pop hookery, the five-piece didn't disappoint...
-Frank Yang's take on our Pop Montreal show
Hold on Too Tight reviews:
Americana UK
Think “Fear and loathing in Las Vegas” meets the kitsch of “Back to the Future” mixed in with some Mazzy Star and a whole load of Hammond and you'll be somewhere near to describing this album. What a fucking marvellous band.
Date review added: Thursday, July 12, 2007
Reviewer: Sian Claire Owen
"Carrboro" is like a modern, lo-fi Beach Boys gem sung by Stephin Merritt if he'd grown up below the Mason-Dixon Line. Reid Johnson's deep, deadpan baritone induces a narcotic effect as it pours over his sister Kathryn's antithetically cheery vintage organ line like cough syrup. And when the two siblings sing together in deliciously piquant harmony, the languorous humidity of Reid's jaded croon is made all the more evident as it rubs up against Kathryn's sweet, airy voice. Together they sound like the doomed writer and the southern belle, Tennessee Williams singing with Scarlett O'Hara.
Schooner's disheveled pop is a tricky thing, detouring into bleary-eyed rock and worried country over Hold On Too Tight's 16 tracks. Like fellow North Carolina natives the Comas, the band is glad to follow the erratic moods of its frontman, but Schooner's Reid Johnson exudes angst and charisma with a strangely gentle touch. His sleepy mumble fits his songs' aching sadness and warm coats of reverb. “Hospital Floor” creeps along like Low, “Strange Alibis” jerks and twists as if powered by rubber bands, “Tears in Your Ears” chimes its way steadily to a groggy atmosphere, and “Pray for You to Die” mines black comedy as few pop songs dare. The only complaint would be the listlessness here, but asking Schooner to travel in one direction would diminish the intimate joys to be found as they amble through their best record yet.
Never heard of Schooner? Then, boy, have you been missing out! This Chapel Hill-based five-piece is lead by the brother-sister team of Reid and Kathryn Johnson, but rarely has a sibling relationship created something this harmonious.
On their excellent sophomore effort, they blow through 16 tracks of swooning vintage pop, fuzzy Guided By Voices-ish rock and woozy Sinatra/Hazlewood-like country for an overall effect that's equal parts dreamy, deadpan and doomed.
When it comes down to it, Schooner sound like Schooner. Their songs are beautiful. "Married" is three minutes of country heartbreak and it moves straight into a Pet Soundsy number called "They Always Do!", which builds to a beautiful chorus ending, and gives way to two-and-a-half minutes of fuzz-pop glory called "I Would Tell You That I'm Stuck". Everything they do well (and they do everything well) is put together to create an aching meditation, "Hospital Floor". Lest things get too morose, they follow up that number with a less than two-minute acoustic stomper. The album reprises the do-do-dos and tucks you into bed with a warm blanket called "Ladybug."
Encore Magazine
Schooner is currently one of NC's catchiest, melding an effective compound of conscious pop writing with near-tangible grit. Their third and latest recording, Rocky P, is a work of which they can be truly proud. The backlash-proof sturdiness of Guided By Voices and the upbeat thrill of the Wedding Present are recalled but perhaps not depended upon. They hit all the right chords, sing with pure sincerity and produce the most agreeable ranges of energy.
3x4
"As an Indian sun burns up the past / these ghosts become old hat". Schooner begins the album with the lovely "Indian Sunburn," with soft guitars and organ tones supporting a repeating melody, sung in a hushed but direct voice by singer Reid Johnson. The song circle backs around; when it's on I feel like it could go on forever and I wouldn't care. I get a similar effect from Schooner's more rollicking pop-rock song "Birds and Other Creatures", a looking-back song with nature imagery and rising and falling harmonies which ends on a vaguely lovelorn and bittersweet note: "Have you waited all along for me / well you're free," Johnson sings, accentuating his words with hammering guitars.
You Forget About Your Heart era:
"
tracks like 'Long Long Time' and 'Trains And Parades.'"
-Noel
" I love the organ on this song, which blips dippily and nonchalantly along, even as the vocals make an unexpectedly emotional,
Bees Knees Zine (Athens, GA)
...I witnessed a live show of a man possessed as the lead singer / guitarist Reid Johnson commanded that not only you listen, but that you watch in amazement as his band went from gazing out with effects to spastic acoustic guitar based folk numbers to poppy keyboard driven songs making us all remember how much that first Shins record blew us away, and maybe this might be the next band to blow everyone else away. The record (You Forget About Your Heart) is not just recommended, but I would call it pretty much essential.
Left off The Dial
"The breadth of variety that Schooner offers is mighty impressive....Schooner manages to reinvent its sound over and over again...."
Schooner has mastered an effortlessly catchy, structurally impeccable brand of indie rock that marries mid-'90s angst with updated Shins-ish accessibility...
GQ
"Impressive debut, heavy on the lo-fi melody and bratty thrash..."
Copper Press
"... reminiscent of Guided by Voices, My Bloody Valentine, Archers of Loaf, The Smiths. The quality of frontman Reid Johnson's songwriting is consistently high. No lulls, no hints of attempting to cover a lack of inspiration, no filler, not a single welcome overstayed. Classic stuff, in other words, and that more than compensates for the brevity. And the sequencing is a model of its kind: every song is exactly where it belongs. This is why the Schooner debut entered my stereo two weeks ago and hasn't come out since. I truly relish every listen..." review by Eric Jianelli.
The Philadelphia Weekly
It's been more than a decade since the North Carolina triangle of Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill yielded the nationally known scene that included Superchunk, Polvo and Archers of Loaf, and spawned Merge Records. Lately, though, I've sensed a second coming. Exhibit A) the Raleigh band Schooner, whose You Forget About Your Heart (Pox World Empire) hit me like a ton of bricks and was voted one of 2004's unknown pleasures by GQ. Just eight songs long, it's steeped in the same stumbling, organ-drenched fuzz-pop of the Walkmen and the Rock*A*Teens....
Early 4track recordings:
Independent Weekly
If you ever wished that The Smiths had a Willie Nelson proclivity and that Harry Smith's folk collections--had inspired them to record an album in a
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