RALEIGH, NC /UCWE/ - Patty Hurst Shifter have developed a loyal following in the Southeast for years. Their forthcoming album, "Too Crowded on the Losing End," set for January 24 release on Fontana/Universal-distributed Evo Recordings, finds them ready to show the rest of the world what they’ve been up to.

It’s apparent in every note they play that this young band believes in the enduring virtues of a heart full of longing, a full tank of gas and the shake, rattle and roll of an overdriven tube amp. Remarked Ryan Adams recently, “Really incredible songs. Patty Hurst Shifter rocks ass,” which is a more direct way of saying the same thing.

The album was tracked by Greg Elkins at his Desolation Row studio in Raleigh and mixed at Piety Street Studios in New Orleans by the renowned Trina Shoemaker (Queens of the Stone Age, Sheryl Crow, Whiskeytown). Faces great Ian McLagan plays the Hammond B3 on the rootsy ballad “The Sadder Side,” while Tres Chicas principals Caitlin Cary (drummer Skillet Gilmore’s missus and herself an alumna of Whiskeytown) and Tonya Lamm provide backing vox.

For a band that loves to fire away, Patty Hurst Shifter displays an impressive musical and emotional range on Too Crowded, rolling from jacked-up rockers like “Happy” and “Never Know” and Exile/Burritos-style shitkickers like “When You Lie” and “Shine” to the billowy, bittersweet “Break Everything” and the panoramic, 10-minute epic “Acetylene,” the musical equivalent of watching the autumn sun go down while barreling toward the western horizon on Interstate 40. Echoes of bands from the Stones and Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers to R.E.M. and The Replacements can be picked up, not surprising considering these musicians cut their teeth on all of the above. Fittingly, Neil Young’s Buffalo Springfield classic “Mr. Soul” has become a showstopper in their live sets.

The band—singer/guitarist/songwriter J. Chris Smith, lead guitarist/vocalist Marc E. Smith (no relation), bassist/vocalist Jesse Huebner and drummer Skillet Gilmore—is dedicated to the basics: writing relatable songs, rocking crowds wherever they play and having a blast, onstage and off. While these goals may not sound terribly ambitious, they’re no different from what has driven the Rolling Stones for more than four decades, and what’s good enough for the Stones is good enough for PHS.

Patty Hurst Shifter (the name started as a joke but stuck) has evolved considerably since releasing its 2002 debut, Beestinger Lullabies, an album distinguished by “hard-hitting, textured anthems with plenty of space between the notes for the vivid scenes set by Chris Smith to sink in,” according to No Depression’s Rick Cornell, who added, “The band can bite hard or burn slowly, bringing to mind big-beat outfits like the True Believers and late local heroes the Backsliders.” David Menconi in the Raleigh News Observer made his own Backsliders reference, taking note of “Marc Smith's overdrive buzzsaw guitar, balanced off by the high lonesome vocals of Chris Smith.”

Their surprise will no doubt extend to the current PHS lineup, which is substantially different from the one that recorded the previous album. Whiskeytown alumnus Gilmore joined up as drummer after that LP was completed, whereupon original drummer Johny Williams switched to bass. Along with the personnel changes came a fundamental shift in approach from the bandleader. “I think Chris figured out how to adapt his style to the band as much as the band adapted to him,” Marc explains. “It all became much more collaborative and, in many ways, easier.”

“We’re just good at what we do,” Chris says, his words resonant with hard-earned knowledge. “Sometimes it’s great, and that’s happening more and more often. We’re a band that believes in finding your thing and doing it like you mean it.”

 

Contact:
Cary Baker
CONQUEROO
818 501 2001