Posted: by The Alt Editing Staff
All photographs by Gustav Hein
James Palko has been busy launching his new band Pretty Rude—a love letter to AC/DC and The Darkness with two killer tunes out already off their upcoming debut Ripe—but that doesn’t mean his smooth ‘seventies-inspired alter ego Jimmy Montague is dead and buried. In fact, he’s taking a full band on a tour supporting Pet Symmetry and Pony this May (dates below). Palko has led a few full-band performances of the Montague tunes, but given how many people are needed to truly present his vision of precisely arranged horns, backup vocals, strings, and solos overtop of a tight rhythm section, it’s easy to see how difficult it is for an independent musician to bring that vision into fruition.
In an attempt to do just that, Palko released a live session of “Only One For Me” at Two Worlds Studio a few months ago. Today, he’s back with a second live session of a tune off Tomorrow’s Coffee, “All The Same,” with indie superstar Chris Farren joining for vocals and a guitar solo, adding to the session group of Connor Waage on guitar, Dylan Debiase on Bass, Adam Szulczewski on Drums, Andrew Dominello on keys, Matt Schmidt on Alto, Mike Schmidt on Tenor, Ben Barnett on Trombone, Natalia Ice and Jess Hall (of oldsoul) on backing vocals.
On the logistics of the session (which included Farren greenscreening in his performance), Palko said:
“This video was cut together to show a sort of behind the scenes while still being in the scenes, with the handycam DV footage rolling the entire on one screen showing all the movement and the scope of the session. Because Chris couldn’t be there in person, the nature of it being a serious video sort of fell apart in a good way for this song, showing a more raw version of how much work goes into these sorts of things, and how many people get involved. I edited it with this in mind, in contrast to the firsts of the series.”
Check out the video, some photos from the session, and the upcoming Jimmy Montague tour dates below.
Videography by Luke LeCount and Thomas Palko. Additional engineering by Billy Mannino.
Flyer by Connor Waage
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Aaron Eisenreich | @slobboyreject
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