Joe Cassady & The West End Sound

MySpace Icons Icons Collage Photo Collage MySpace Graphics MySpace Editor "Wasn't necessarily expecting good alt-country from a Manhattan band, but got it anyway. The songs' obvious intelligence doesn't get in the way of the solid, often enthralling music." Ken Barnes--Music Editor, USA Today.Well Ken, there is something happening down on the Lower East side of Manhattan that has the NYU intellectual types pushing their horned-rimmed specs back up their noses and the downtown cowboys dancing in the isles (dancing’s illegal in NYC bars though, so please don’t tell!). There’s an Americana scene emerging just blocks away from where Dylan first showed up with his acoustic guitar and where Joey Ramone tore through CBGB’s, that somehow embraces the spirit of both yet has the down-home feel that only the world’s biggest small town can provide.Out of this NYC Americana scene come Joe Cassady & The West End Sound with their Avenue A Records debut release, What’s Your Sign?Raised on Waylon, Willie, Johnny and Kris, schooled by Bob Dylan, and having done some post-grad studies in the Rolling Stones, Tom Petty, and Steve Earle, songwriter Joe Cassady’s musical scholarship leads the listener through the diverse cross-section of the Americana soundscape that is What’s You Sign? All the while, the lyrics draw on historical, religious, literary, folk and pop-culture references to structure a sometimes poignant, sometimes hilarious dreamscape counterpoint to the oft-troubled landscape of our times. While acknowledging and even embracing the uncertainty around us the songs on What’s Your Sign? profess a persistent belief in the presence of good old fashioned hope at the bottom of it all.“I’ve heard this guy lots of times and never realized the wealth within so many of his songs . . . There’s a lot to recommend this. [The songs in What’s Your Sign?] open, yielding further benefit with each subsequent listen.” Urban Folk“Their music delivers what exists now like a mirror reflection . . . It tells it like it is in a folksy/poetic style, baring the wounds in an undisguised, thought provoking oration.” Northeast In Tune"Imagine yourself on the road in an old school Cadillac, your friends by your side with the open road in front of you. It's an image that should make you smile. Now all you need is some Joe Cassady music in the background and you're set. His calm yet upbeat sound made me want to get in a car and drive, and I don't have a license . . . Cassady's lyrics tell stories which made me want to write my own." HOT INDIE NEWS .com