About Me
With a recording career spanning 30 years, their own fabulous
studio housed in a barn on their spread in rural Indiana, and impeccable indie
creds, (including thousands of hours of their own material, recording and
playing on Jack Logan's debut, Bulk, as well as his 1996 masterpiece, Mood
Elevator, extensive touring, and numerous radio themes and jingles) Indiana farmboys/rockers The Roach Brothers are way past due for the recent exposure they've been receiving from The Today Show, college radio, music journalists, and industry insiders. Lead singer Terry Rouch recalls recording his first few
songs "through an empty paper towel roll" just to get "that freaky sound, man!" and being inspired to learn to play guitar after hearing the first cranky riffs
of The Kinks' "You Really Got Me" on a crackly AM radio station. Younger Roach
Jamie mastered the board and began recording as soon as he could see over the
controls, and together the two have amassed an amazing cache of honest, home-spun
rock and roll songs.Boasting an astonishingly eclectic array of influences, including The
Stooges, James Brown, The Kinks, The Stones, Hank Williams, and Frank Zappa, the Roach Brothers confound any stereotypes or preconceptions of what music made on a farm hundreds of miles from major radio stations or rock clubs might sound like. Though they labored in relative obscurity until Logan and Twin/Tone Records co-founder Peter Jesperson (The Replacements, Soul Asylum, Logan, etc.) began touting their work in the mid-90's, the brothers did manage to release one impossible to find slab of vinyl, The Atomic Bums - Zero degrees (with their other brothers, Tim and Steve), which featured Jack, Kelly Keniepp, and showcased some early Roach-Logan collaborations, including "Gimme A Room." 1999 saw the release of their first official album, Big Load, on Kelly, Nikki, and Jack's
freshly formed baby indie label, Backburner. The album became an instant college radio fave, with the track "Small Suitcase" hitting the CMJ charts and garnering them fans across the Midwest. A brief tour that summer saw the band playing stages from Indiana to Minnesota, including the infamous Seventh Street Entry room at Minneapolis' First Avenue, the world-reknowned stage of The Turf Club in St. Paul, and several live acoustic performances on radio.This year, The Roaches have expanded ranks (as roaches are wont to
do) and are working with axeman extraordinaire Karl Corts (whose incredible
background includes stints with Bo Diddley, Betty Wright, John Lee Hooker,
Harry Casey of KC And The Sunshine Band, and The Fabulous Thunderbirds) and twenty year veteran bassist Rick Maxwell. Their latest offering, Take Flight, is one both the band and Backburner are especially proud of. Consisting of a few older tunes and a healthy dose of new ones, the album boasts some of the strongest material the siblings have written to date. Songs about cars, girls, bad cars, bad luck, bad girls, love, hot cars, and good girls gone bad are nothing new, but Terry and the boys put their own special, commercially untainted spin on the subjects, creating a wonderful potpourri of rough-hewn pop riffs, booty-bumpin' bottom ends, sublime harmonies, and witty wordplay. The post-ironic musings of "Together Or Alone" and the heartbreaking, age-ist ballad "Laughin' Out Loud" are already making inroads on college radio, and The Roach Brothers are set to embark on their second mini-tour in support of the record. Take a minute out of your busy, modern-day stress-fest, crack the top on your favorite beverage, and slap this disc in. Now close your eyes and imagine you're sitting alone in the warm sun on a rocker outside a rustic barn in the middle of nowhere. Hear those fuzzy guitars, down-to-earth vocals, and soul-soothing grooves?Ahhh....that's The Roach Brothers, baby.Tom HallettDISCOGRAPHY:
1986: The Atomic Bums - Zero Degrees - Vinyl only. OOP. Mile 9 Records
1994: Jack Logan - Bulk - Medium Cool Records
1996: Jack Logan & Liquor Cabinet - Mood Elevator - Medium Cool Records
1999: The Roach Brothers - Big Load - Backburner Records
2000: The Roach Brothers - Take Flight - Backburner Records
2001: The Roach Brothers - Pure and Simple - Backburner records
2004: The Roach Brothers - Complicated Country Boys
2004: The Roach Brothers - Hit Me
2006: The Roach Brothers - Far Fetched
2006: The Roach Brothers - So Be It Union
2007: The Roach Brothers - The Bungalow Set
