l A T E S T ... n E W S

The Expose Review

Gravity Tree is one of the more interesting progressive bands around, a duo who covers all the instruments of a four piece band, plus vocals; and they do this live too. Guitarist Linc plays a combo-guitar that has both bass and guitar strings, and separate pickups for each, allowing him to play both parts simultaneously. Drummer Alan Nu handles a keyboard with his right hand and drums with the others, as well as using various drum controlled triggers. The result is an amazing full band sound from just two players. Both provide the vocals. Some readers may remember "Aim to Please," their contribution to the Bay Prog Sampler disc that was included with issue #24; in fact that song has gone through further refinement in the years since and appears here on this, their second album, along with nine other original compositions. Their material bears a stamp of currency, yet also features the conceptual ideals of classic progressive rock. Their influences likely include Zappa, Happy The Man, Van der Graaf, and Gentle Giant, which they assimilate well as they explore new musical territory; most of the songs are long and labyrinthine, and rarely settle down into a pattern for very long. In that respect, I am reminded of another current band, The Underground Railroad. Familiarity with Ultimate Backward will require a few repeated plays, but over the haul the listener will be rewarded. This is a solid second effort.

Dead is now Hi-Res

*10/12/11 - A Special Edition of our song Conversing with the Dead is now available.

The newly remastered song is available as a higher resolution download in several formats including FLAC, AAC, and even Ogg Vorbis. Depending on your format choice, you can enjoy the song at up to 24bit / 48k, or just get a better-than-online-music-shop fidelity MP3 at 320bps.

This is our first offering of a song at a quality similar to what you'd hear if we had you over to our studio, and queued up our master for you.

http://gravitytree.bandcamp.com

Originally appearing on Ultimate Backward, Conversing with the Dead is a punk-flavored progressive piece of noise. You can hear the song at full-length at its BandCamp page.

Wait...
We'll Trade You

*06/11/11 - The song is Wait, an instrumental from the album "Ultimate Backward". And we're making a trade for it. Fill in your email address on the linked page, or in the box to the left, and we'll give you "Wait" for free.

Just sign up at this link to get it (and our latest updates):

http://signup.gravitytree.com

You'll also get infrequent email updates from us, and more free stuff as the year progresses. Cancel anytime and keep the song. Stay with us, get more free music, updates and goodies. Your choice.

In case you're checking us out for the first time, here's some perspective: Others have compared our sound to King Crimson, Frank Zappa, Rush, Glass Hammer, Procol Harum, and the Flower Kings. Does that sound as messed up to you as it does to us? Draw your own conclusions, with a free song.

btw Wait won't stay free forever, so if you're interested, grab it soon.

http://signup.gravitytree.com

Motion Sickness...
the missing song from Gravity Tree

*05/08/11 - Now on MySpace, the missing song from Gravity Tree: Motion Sickness.

It fell between the MySpace cracks for many months, misplaced and overlooked.

Ending Ultimate Backward in CD form and never ready for airplay, it is at last available for full-length stream or download.

From its teetering, oscillating vocals to its ripping organ solo, it is a piece of progressive rock madness that deserves its title; certainly not for those with a weak constitution.

Hear it now:

http://bit.ly/eAojDz

...and thanks for listening...

Aim to Please, Wait Web Pages

*02/24/11 - We always thought it would be cool if select Gravity Tree songs had their own websites. Thanks to viinyl.com, now they do. You can find dedicated web pages for Ultimate Backward songs Aim to Please and Wait on viinyl.com. Here are the links:

Aim to Please: aimtoplease.viinyl.com

Wait: wait.viinyl.com

You'll also find links to our pages on Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter, plus a brief bio, and lyrics for the song. We'll be adding more info to the pages, as well as working to post more songs on viinyl.com.

Aim to Please on AiiRadio.net

*12/28/10 -Beginning this week (the last week of December), you'll be able to hear Aim to Please by tuning in to web radio www.aiiradio.net.

Aiiradio is a web site/station that serves up a lot of tasty independent progressive music (as well as a bit of comedy). We've been giving it a listen of late and liked what we heard, so we were pretty excited when they approached us to put our songs in rotation.

Aim to Please is the first song of ours to be featured on aiiradio.net, but we're sure it won't be the last, and we hope to have more songs from Ultimate Backward included in their prog rock programming. They also have a chatroom and forums, as well as the live streaming. Make sure you tune in and check out all the cool prog rock tuneage...head over to their site for all the details.

"WAIT" available again on "A Very Progressive Christmas Vol.1"

*11/23/10 -A Very Progressive Christmas Vol.1, featuring a remastered version of the ULTIMATE BACKWARD song "Wait", is available once more for the holiday season, from Melodic Revolution Records.

Wait is available for download as part of the complete compilation album, or as a single in several formats, including hi-rez FLAC (audiophiles take note: this FLAC download sounds as close to our original master as we've heard yet).

Ultimate Backward downloads from Zune

*08/09/10 - Zune is now carrying all Gravity Tree albums and songs. We have a shortened url for our Ultimate Backward page there:

http://bit.ly/zuneub

Downloads from our album Ultimate Backward can be found here.

Or, just type Gravity Tree in the search box at:
http://www.zune.net

They now have all 23 songs we've released online.

Ultimate Backward on iLike and last.fm

*06/17/10 - You can now find the 2nd Gravity Tree album, Ultimate Backward, on both iLike and last.fm. The last.fm page allows streaming of individual songs, with a link to Amazon if you want to buy the album. iLike lets you hear clips of each song, and offers song or album downloads, too. (You'll need to be signed up with iLike to buy, but there's also a link to buy from iTunes. Not sure what all that business is about, but at least you have options!)

^{Still available as CD or download from CDBaby}

    

Song "WAIT" remastered for "A Very Progressive Christmas"

*12/09/09 - The Gravity Tree instrumental "WAIT", which appears on the album "Ultimate Backward", has been included on the Melodic Revolution Records release, "A Very Progressive Christmas". The song was remastered especially for the new holiday album, and is also available as a single download in FLAC or OGG formats.

Gravity Tree now at work on the followup CD to Ultimate Backward. Here's a link to the 1st new song from the forthcoming album. Make sure to check back soon for updates...

Quotes from the USA Progressive Music review of ULTIMATE BACKWARD...

"No Rest Part III starts off the album with some beautiful liquid keyboard sounds exploding into an interesting guitar section which glides into the vocals effortlessly...

"Conversing with the Dead is a fantastic Prog classic...some heavy sounding guitar interspersed with an almost Talking Heads approach to the vocals. This is really unexpected but works really well.

"In starts with a beautiful string intro leading into a trance riff which is track 7 Can and a strange vocal then takes you into a new area, almost Funk / Prog but much more interesting...

"Motion Sickness is very clever indeed. A kind of sleasy beat...which then explodes into a fantastic solo piece and a great epic sounding outro.

"This is a very thought provoking album by a duo who definitely punches a hole through the more established forms of Prog and creates their own sound."

Highlights of the Progscape review...

"No Rest Part III opens ULTIMATE BACKWARD with a wash of ambient synth pads. The reverie is quickly dissipated with a burst of fuzzed guitar, organ tones, and skittering drumming. The variety of styles is nice...

"...when Gravity Tree has all their horses pulling in the same direction, the results are very enjoyable...Motion Sickness does exhibit some very hot playing during its instrumental sections. Wind offers up some nice Jethro Tull-like acoustic pastoral moods, which evolve into a slightly more traditional classical feel during the short instrumental interlude. Aim To Please opens with heavy synth organ and powerful drum/bass interplay before pulling back to vocals and acoustic guitar in a comfortable and natural manner. And Interference feels very much like a Flower Kings track, with its mid-tempo groove, prominent keyboards, and anthemic, chiming guitars...

"...obviously incredibly talented players. There is not a single thing I can complain about with regard to their instrumental skills."

Prog website Sea of Tranquility reviews ULTIMATE BACKWARD

"No band other than a progressive-rock outfit would be so bold as to open its second CD with a song called No Rest Part III.

"...This is dense, majestic stuff..."

"Consider Conversing With the Dead Gravity Tree's foray into progressive punk - albeit with a retro, Britsh new-wave vibe and an acoustic-guitar break. It's one of the coolest tracks on a record that also features studio version of live Gravity Tree favorites, including Can (also known as The Funk Tune), Go Away, Motion Sickness and the band's brief live intro piece In"

"...if you're seeking modern, indie prog with traditional influences...you might want to set your ears underneath Gravity Tree and wait for something special to fall."

Pick up the CD at IndieRhythm!

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