About Little Pieces
Little Pieces is Sunset Valley frontman Herman Jolly and the bang-up rhythm section of Grant Badger and Rob Lloyd—a partnership that was a long time coming, indeed. Here's the story: Bassist Badger and drummer Lloyd hail from Illinois, where both grew up in rival towns near St. Louis. They met and began playing together while at U of I in Champaign, where their band, Bantha, was a fearsome battering ram of rock. An unbreakable connection was formed in their bass-drum interplay, and after the Champaign years, they hit Seattle via Chicago, backing Lanterna and Chris Mills along the way. In Seattle they played as a two-piece, appropriately named Guitar Defamation League. While playing with Chris Mills, Badger and Lloyd occasionally crossed paths with labelmates Sunset Valley at SXSW, CMJ, and around the Pacific Northwest. (Mills was actually covering a Herman Jolly tune, "Crooked Veinâ€, at the time.) Even then, Herman, Grant and Rob seemed to have some connection that went beyond intermittent partying, and the instant friends stayed in loose touch over the years. Flash forward to 2006. Herman Jolly moves out of Montana to Seattle. After four lionized Sunset Valley records, he was set to release his third solo album and needed a band--it took about five seconds for the natural solution to surface, and after one rehearsal, the equation became obvious: Jolly + Badger + Lloyd = SUPERGROUP. For a few months, they played under Herman's name, supporting Jolly’s album, Bunker Life. After a west coast tour supporting Grandaddy's Jason Lytle, the trio went straight into the studio and recorded a magical collection of new songs mixed in with a couple of Jolly's finest oldies. The album was recorded in Portland at Jackpot Studio, and was produced by Sunset Valley's Eric Furlong with help from Tony Lash (he's done work with Elliott Smith and the Dandy Warhols). After recording, it was clear that this was no longer a solo project, and that the band had taken on a life of its own. Released on June 3rd, 2008 on One Eleven Records, Little Pieces' self-titled debut is a diamond in the rough, a jewel of the Nile, and a silver lining in the mediocre cloud of today's oversaturated music scene."Like Robyn Hitchcock, former Sunset Valley frontman (and current Seattle resident) Herman Jolly has a knack for writing wonderfully off-kilter yet oddly beautiful pop songs—the kind that are so distinctive they'd sound strange and slightly forced coming from anyone else, but fit his faintly cracked voice and tilted worldview to a T. ." BARBARA MITCHELL -The Stranger
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