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New
Ruins
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 Photo
above: Cody Bralts
Shadowbox:
Elzie Sexton |
Elzie
Sexton and J. Caleb Means grew up in rural Southern Illinois,
fortified by punk rock and recording songs on boomboxes,
lower than lo-fi. After high school they went their separate
ways to attend colleges and universities around the Midwest;
J. Caleb north to film school, while Elzie went South
to study fine arts. In 2004, they formed New Ruins as
a long-distance recording project, trading songs in the
mail, with the result being a couple self-released EPs
and a full-length “collection”, mixed and
matched from songs created with plenty of first class
postage. In August of 2005, Elzie and J. Caleb moved to
Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, to work on the live representation.
After a year of playing shows as a duo, the band ran across
likeminded souls and have welcomed aboard the rhythm section
of multi-instrumentalist Paul Chastain (Velvet Crush,
Matthew Sweet) and percussion stylist Roy Ewing (Braid,
Very Secretary). After a year of experimenting with different
recording and mixing situations in various living rooms
and basements, and with the recruitment of 5th member
Andrew Davidson, We Make Our Own Bad Luck was
released in 2009. New
Ruins are hard at work on album #3. |
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New
Ruins - We Make Our Own Bad Luck
(AHA!092)
CD Nationwide
Release: April 28, 2009
LPNationwide
Release: March 31, 2009
CD+LP PackageExclusive to Parasol
2009
album from East Central Illinois paranormal rock act
finds the duo of Elzie Sexton and Caleb Means joined
by drummer Roy Ewing (Braid, Very Secretary) and multi-instrumentalists
Paul Chastain (Velvet Crush, Matthew Sweet) and Andrew
Davidson (Tractor Kings, Chemicals). LP pressed on brick
red vinyl, with poster insert, limited to 500 copies.
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New
Ruins - The Sound They Make
(AHA!087)
CDNationwide
Release: October 2007
Debut album from East Central Illinois duo New
Ruins, file under: Small Town Midwestern Gothic. Folk-rock
guitar-mantras tinted with martial snares and cooing organs.
New Ruins architects Elzie Sexton and J.Caleb have been
making music together for a decade and there is an intimacy
between the two here that rivals friendship and brotherhood.
Compared to: Ugly Casanova, Iron & Wine, Talk Talk,
Mojave 3, Silver Jews, and John Fahey.
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