Frontman, songwriter, composer, studio owner, multi-instrumentalist, producer, engineer, force of nature – returns with The Brian Jonestown Massacre’s 19th full-length studio album Fire Doesn't Grow On Trees, which will be released on June 24, 2022 on his own label A Recordings.
Today, 30 years since the release of their very first single “"She Made Me/Evergreen" in 1992, The Brian Jonestown Massacre release their new single “The Real,” the first from the band’s forthcoming album Fire Doesn’t Grow On Trees. After a hugely prolific 2010s that saw the release of eight long-players and one mini-album, BJM founder and frontman Anton Newcombe had been going through a period of writer’s block when one day he picked up his 12-string guitar in the studio and album opener “The Real” came out of him. Like the kraken, it was as if he’d summoned it. “All of a sudden, I just heard something,” he says. “And then it just didn’t stop. We tracked a whole song every single day for 70 days in a row.”
BJM’s shoegazing-tinged debut album "Methodrone" was released in 1995, and there have been a further 18 albums under the BJM moniker since then, each embarking on their own mind-expanding adventure and exploring the outer realms of rock’n’roll; psychedelic rock, country-blues, snarling rock’n’roll, blissed-out noise-pop and more.
Along the way, Newcombe has established himself as a once-in-a-lifetime talent who saw the direction in which mainstream indie-rock was heading and opted to take the long way round. He’s emerged as a revolutionary force in modern music, an underground hero. There was no other way, this was how it had to be. “My only option with everything in life has always been that you just jump into the fire,” he declares. “It doesn’t matter what it is.”
It's with that spirit that he’s hopped around the globe, from the West Coast to New York, from Manhattan to Iceland, and then to Berlin, where he’s lived for 14 years and has two flats, one to live in and one that’s been converted into his studio. He goes there six days a week to work and write and record and produce and it’s where the fantastic new BJM album Fire Doesn’t Grow On Trees was made. In an era where one band bleeds into the next and production all seems to be pulling from a similarly beige-y sonic palette, here is a record that crackles with excitement and possibility, the fuzz of those 60s Ampeg amps, the exhilarating swirl of guitars and keyboards and Newcombe in the middle of it all, conducting the chaos.
Four minutes into Fire Doesn’t Grow On Trees, there are two lines that sum up its fearless spirit. “Fight the beast until it dies, raise your sword up to the sky!”, sings Newcombe as an explosion of fuzzy guitars, thrumming organs and rolling drums collide around him. As soon as Newcombe wrote it, he knew “The Real” had to open the new album. “That line is like fantasyland!” he laughs. “It’s the little kid in me, full on St. George shit. It’s as much a declaration of anything that I could ever muster. A lot of the album is about affirmation by just living. Existentially, this time period has felt pretty dark, so it’s about fighting the good fight. I’m singing to empower other people. First of all, I’m getting whatever I need out of it, but I can see it as something other people can identify with.”
Speaking further on “The Real,” Newcombe says, “I'm trying to give comfort and support to the listener in a very matter of fact kind of way, it's a call to arms, the beast can be this overwhelming darkness, the dragon, dickheads telling you that you need to be trans-human, modified to be whole and survive A.I. it's absolute madness... we are in for a tough ride, have no illusions.”
This culture is in full view on the new album, which from start to finish is fueled with the heady feeling of capturing a moment – from the hot-footed country sway of “It's About Being Free Really" to the hazy grooves of “"What's In A Name" from the garage stomp of "Silenced" to the widescreen 60s-pop of “"Wait A Minute (2:30 To Be Exact)," everything was conjured up by where an instrument took Newcombe when he picked it up.
“I could sit at the piano, the organ, any instrument, and get an idea all of a sudden. I would play for one second with the band to get a grasp of the idea, and then we would unplug the amps and put on the headphones, plug in and track it. Then I would go, 'guys leave the room', sing the words in my head and then record them. Everything's off the top of my head, just like one-take Jake. I surprised myself.”
Brian Jonestown Massacre - 2022 Tour Dates
Mar 27 | Philadelphia, PA - Union Transfer w/ Mercury Rev
Mar 28 | Brooklyn, NY - Brooklyn Steel w/ Mercury Rev
Mar 29 | Jersey City, NJ - White Eagle Hall w/ Mercury Rev
Mar 30 | Baltimore, MD - Rams Head Live w/ Mercury Rev
Mar 31 | Providence, RI - Columbus Theatre w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 1 | Boston, MA - Roadrunner w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 2 | Montreal, QC - Le National w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 4 | Toronto, ON - Queen Elizabeth Theatre w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 5 | Detroit, MI - Majestic Theatre w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 6 | Indianapolis, IN - The Vogue w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 7 | Cleveland, OH - Agora Theatre w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 8 | Chicago, IL - The Vic Theatre w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 9 | Milwaukee, WI - Turner Hall Ballroom w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 10 | Minneapolis, MN First Avenue w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 12 | Denver, CO - Ogden Theatre w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 13 | Salt Lake City, UT Metro Music Hall w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 15 | Vancouver, BC - Vogue Theatre w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 16 | Tacoma, WA - McMenamins Elks Temple w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 17 | Seattle, WA - Showbox w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 18 | Portland, OR - Roseland Theatre w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 20 | San Francisco, CA The Fillmore w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 21 | San Francisco, CA The Fillmore w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 22 | Los Angeles, CA - The Wiltern w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 23 | San Diego, CA - The Observatory North Park w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 24 | Santa Ana, CA - The Observatory OC w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 25 | Tucson, AZ - Rialto Theatre w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 27 | San Antonio, TX - Paper Tiger w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 28 | Austin, TX - Stubb's Waller Creek Amphitheater Mercury Rev
Apr 29 | Dallas, TX - Granada Theater w/ Mercury Rev
Apr 30 | Houston, TX - The Heights Theater w/ Mercury Rev
May 2 | Lawrence, KS - The Bottleneck
May 3 | Saint Louis, MO - Delmar Hall
May 5 | Nashville, TN - Brooklyn Bowl
May 6 | Birmingham, AL - Saturn
May 7 | Atlanta, GA - Terminal West
May 8 | Asheville, NC - The Orange Peel
May 10 | Carrboro, NC - Cat's Cradle
May 11 | Washington DC - Black Cat
