ALO - Man of the World

Even if ALO keyboardist Zach Gill hadn't gone to college with Jack Johnson, the band's improvisational jam/pop would be a comfortable fit on Johnson's own laidback Brushfire label -- an overview that comes into even tighter focus with the forthcoming Johnson-produced ALO project Man of the World (February 9). Building on a sound that is part Dead-ish doodling atmospherics, part center-line groove driven, melodic pop/rock, ALO (or Animal Liberation Orchestra) decided to go for what they call "their most natural, their most organic and their most pure" collection of songs yet. The easy camaraderie and skilled intuitive interplay of the band's excellent players may serve as their internal nerve system but, as Johnson points out, "they've got these songs that really stick in your head as well."

 To capture the band's live prowess on disc, ALO headed to the balmy confines of Johnson's Oahu, Hawaii studio and laid down World's tracks in what guitarist Dan Lebowitz calls a "workshop" environment: building and then tearing down arrangements and then rebuilding them again. "In a really great way, Jack shook things up for us," he adds. "(He) got us to rethink how we do things." The end product is an album that is both sophisticated and basic with a range of styles and moods that easily drift from rambunctious, hip-shaking rock (the galloping title track) to dreamy, stretched out improv passages that seem to have an ever-evolving direction (the mindbending, aptly titled "Suspended." Notes Gill: "You actually get to hear the sound of people in a room making something together. Not an artificial simulation. This was really amazing for all of us."

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ALO - "Man of the World" (from the album Man of the World)

ALO - "Suspended" (from the album Man of the World)