This is the solo project of Jared Armijo Wardle (vocalist of Marquez). What you'll find in these songs is evidence of a man haunted by memories, his past and probably something he just won't reveal in his lyrics. The story he told me was the during sporadic bouts of insomnia he got up and worked on these songs, night after night, just as a means to pass the time until the sun came up. He documents this in "gospel of the small hours" which documents the distress of not having slept unlike any song I have heard and between the hand claps and pulsing beat it sounds like a celebration for a sunrise. What you hear in the pleading lyrics is an almost religious over tone, "Hey, Let's take this chapter and verse/I'm already on my knees/I'm waiting for your hand to come down and touch me." Though Jared laughs at the religious implications of the lyrics, he won't deny the agony they touched on saying that after that many hours, that many nights of staring at the night sky, "It started to feel I was begging a higher power, any power, to help me sleep. There certainly comes a point of desperation." At those points he heard the church bells in the morning so as a joke he started to refer to the project as the Midnight Gospel. Now uses his own name, hoping to pursue and play with any genre without having to keep a band "identity". But it comes down to the sound: accessible yet experimental indie pop songs, driven by pianos, organs and Jared's dynamic voice, at times whispering and other times wailing. Though he says he has no formal plans to play out, tour, he will make a studio album in summer 2010. I hope that as long as he has the restless nights he'll keep writing really good music. So, get some rest, Jared. (or don't).
-Amber Soler, friend, music lover and mother to Joaquin
2007
