FRIENDSHIP COMMANDERS are not just any band within the wider musical cosmos of heavy rock and stoner metal. Artistic excellence, reflected in the two Grammy wins of singer, songwriter, and guitarist Buick Audra as well as the status of drummer and bass player Jerry Roe as one of the world's most sought after studio percussionists, paired with outstanding lyrical intelligence have once again flown together organically to shape their forthcoming album "BEAR".
"BEAR" was written around the realization that Buick Audra had essentially been kicked out of womanhood. This album is a documentation of her awareness also while cataloguing other areas of human connection: art, outsider culture, and dark rock venues – all places where empathy and creativity grow wild. Audra and Jerry Roe arranged the fourth FRIENDSHIP COMMANDERS album to have two distinct sides, musically: heavy and light, salt and sugar, fire and air, lost and found.
Although hailing from Nashville, Tennessee these denizens of the 'Music City' kindly beg to differ. FRIENDSHIP COMMANDERS' sound draws from sludge, doom, heavy metal, and grunge with roots in punk and hardcore, among other guitar driven styles.
"BEAR", like its predecessor "MASS", was co-produced by band members Buick Audra and Jerry Roe. The duo returned to Salem once more to work alongside longtime collaborator, Kurt Ballou, who also tracked the instrumental performances and mixed the record. As a result, the songs' huge range of musical ideas and expressions are unified in sound as well as in theme, which runs throughout the record in various ways: the ever-elusive idea of belonging, where it occurs, and where it absolutely does not.
With "BEAR", FRIENDSHIP COMMANDERS present a rare sparkling gem of an album, heavy yet captivating, shiny yet dark, and songs that brim with meaning. "BEAR" is easy to get into, but beware, this album will draw its listeners into fascinating and thought-provoking depths!
