Amazing Ghost on Electric Cowbell Records

This single came in with a batch from Electric Cowbell, purveyors of all the uncategorizable music on the outskirts....is there a jazz/funk underground? Of course. EC is here to document it...I mean honestly before 6 months ago I couldn't have named a single local band in these styles and the whole time there was a homegrown industry with Electric Cowbell at the center. Kind of like Helvete in Norway, just a different jam.
Amazing Ghost is the latest project from New Haven native Eddie Pren, formerly of Pencilgrass and if there's one thing you can consistently bet on, this is going to be more of the same kind of genre-bending dance-electronic soul that sounds like was going on in his previous project.

The A-Side cuts loose with 'I gettupa', an uber produced, layered, dance track with Eddie's laid back straight ahead vocal style, a stark contrast to the handclap dense, swirling pop synth percussion instrumentation. It's a deadpan style vocal repeating 'When I fall down, I gettupa', like any successful dance track it proves you can repeat almost anything over a catchy beat and get away with it. The style is a weird, sincere homage to rock-pop, like some kind of B-52's/Les Savy Fav hybrid. I'm even thinking of Why?, the borderline shimmery electro-pop excited to show you it's homemade hand. Completely orchestral in arrangement, it takes crazy talent to wrangle the whole thing into this rainbow, unicorn highway crime scene.
There's even a 'CD finished burning' ding in there somewhere because I half looked around for a second...who the hell is burning a CD?

The B-Side 'Tiny little raindrops', like the Flaming Lips they have the skill and experimental drive to pull off passionately singing about tiny raindrops and snowflakes over a basic synth melody. The horns come in to give it that dose of smooth soul just like sexy Sax man
busting out Careless Whisper in a mall food court, Amazing Ghost is playing with conventions, keeping it lighthearted in everything but delivery.
Check out a digital 5 song EP on their bandcamp page or press play on the video for a visual taste of their special brand of insanity. Very close to something on Tim & Eric's awesome show. Flying carpets, pegasi, lazers, like the tracks: throw it in the pot, make it catchy deliberately dance-y and the rest will take care of itself.

amazing ghost's 'i getuppa' from Amazing Ghost on Vimeo.

Get it from Electric Cowbell who says:

Amazing Ghost from the fertile music scene of Richmond, Virginia includes members of Bio Ritmo, Fight the Big Bull (David Karsten) and The Great White Jenkins which is a strong testament to their impressive musical backgrounds. They sound like an assimilation of Gary Numan/Ultravox/Flying Lizard's swirling keyboard embellishments, "nothing but a party y'all" late70's/early 80's hip hop sensibilities, and 21st century lido shuffling. They are downright impossible to resist--as evidenced by their catchy-as-fuck debut 45-RPM single on Electric Cowbell Records. On the A-side, "I Gettupa", vocalist/bassist/bandleader Eddie Prendergast employs the everyman spoken/sung dynamics of punk poet John Cooper Clarke, channeling "Million Dollar Legs" by the Outlaw Four as keyboardists Bob Miller and Toby Whitaker prolong the unbridled party anthem with looping, non-linear sonic support. "Tiny Raindroz" ventures into the usually insipid realm of 1980's balladry and ever-so-subtly turns John Hughes's cinematic heartstring pulling into a slightly funky, tongue-firmly-planted-in-cheek homage to tender moments. As with virtually everything they do, these tunes haunt you long after the record has ended.