more from
Green Monkey Records
We’ve updated our Terms of Use to reflect our new entity name and address. You can review the changes here.
We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.

It Was All Once Bright Jewels

by Al Bloch

/
  • Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    This is the Bloch Rock - music by Al, recorded by Kurt, cover by Olivia. Smash-rock to Prog-rock, what could be more fun!

    Includes unlimited streaming of It Was All Once Bright Jewels via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 2 days
    Purchasable with gift card

      $12 USD or more 

     

  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      $9 USD  or more

     

1.
Alpha>Omega 02:23
2.
3.
4.
5.
Fruit Bar 01:46
6.
7.
Amsterdam 02:56
8.
9.
10.
11.
Downtown 01:29
12.
13.
Better Days 08:28

about

“Many of the songs rush by at a quick clip, and it’s charming to hear Al struggle to get the words out at that pace. I suppose that could have been fixed digitally, but they wisely chose to let it stand, and it really enhances the naturalness and honesty of the songs. It Was All Once Bright Jewels is an effective antidote to slickly produced albums that could have been produced by algorithms instead of human musicians. And let’s hope it’s not another 20 years before Al Block sees fit to write some new songs.” Jon Davis Expose’

Wait. This is the True Story of Al Bloch.
First off, let’s just say the evidence is clear. Mr. Al Bloch is b-a-c-k. He has a whole new album of all new Al-tunes - It Was All Once Bright Jewels, all recorded in Seattle, Washington in 2-0-2-0. It has all new songs with Brother Kurt Bloch of ye olde Fastbacks on guitar and knobs. It goes all the way from two-minute smash to sorta prog-rock epics. That is a pretty fine reason to celebrate don’t you think?

However, this is not the only thing done lately. In October 2019 Al snuck out a hip little EP “Fifth Dimensionality”. In December 2019, Al and brother Kurt released a ‘77/’78 love fest as Bad Scene – Hate The World It’s So Romantic, paying tribute to the UK Class Of '78 STYLE. Last January he was the instigator and bass player for his daughter Olivia's debut, Georgy Girl. In May 2019 Al was the wheel-driving curator for Al Bloch's Summer Of Fun Super Party Mixtape. In 2018, he jumped in the wayback machine and surfaced with his teenage pop band, Wenis - The Donut House, Seattle 1980. Delightful! In 2009 we put out his collected My Favorite Martian recordings.

Here's what Al has to say about his new album.

This is an important album. To me at least, that’s all I can say. But I’ll say more.

The songs that appear on the new album of mine, It Was All Once Bright Jewels were written toward the end of 2019 and the first part of 2020, and recorded pretty quickly when I flew out to Seattle from my home in Roanoke, VA in March of this year. I was privileged to have on board my old buddy, Kevin Fitzgerald (Clean Lines) to play drums, and my brother Kurt Bloch to play guitar and produce. I played bass guitar, of course, because that’s what I play.

I was in bands for many years, many years ago, in both my home town of Seattle and then Los Angeles, but had not written a lick of music since I moved to Southwest Virginia in 2001. Then last year, Green Monkey impresario Tom Dyer dared me to write some new songs. He had just put out CD’s from my band from 1980 (WENIS), and my LA band from the 1990’s (MY FAVORITE MARTIAN). I wasn’t interested in writing new songs, but truth be told I didn’t think that I could. Tom said, “Just do it”. I thought, “OK”. So then I did.

Instead of “crafting” “good” songs, I just decided to write bits, and then play them over and over until the bits turned themselves into songs, and then I pulled and bent them a little more until they turned into something interesting. All of a sudden I had a pile of songs. Fast songs, slow songs, long songs and really short songs. Songs full of hope, mischievous songs, and songs transformational to me and hopefully pleasing to other people’s ears. Good songs, I hoped. I like the short songs best, because I have a short attention span. I think most people do these days. What was I talking about? There is a nice slower song, “Better Days”, that clocks in at almost nine minutes, and is presented in three parts. Kurt Bloch played all the keyboards, and he was definitely wearing a cape while recording this song. That’s a Rick Wakeman reference for you young folks, go ahead and Google him.

So now the record comes out, thanks to the fine folks at Green Monkey Records. The first songs I’ve written in over twenty years. If you like the record, it’s because I’m brilliant. If you hate the record, blame Tom Dyer. Because he dared me to write these songs!

credits

released May 15, 2020

After many months of yakking to my brother about the recording of this LP, I finally made it out to Seattle in March 2020 with sheet music for all these songs in my attaché case. After playing for a few moments with Kevin and Kurt, I destroyed all the sheet music and trusted the arrangements to these two high caliber musicians and to the production expertise of Kurt Bloch. They both certainly delivered.

license

all rights reserved

tags

about

Al Bloch Norfolk, Virginia

contact / help

Contact Al Bloch

Streaming and
Download help

Redeem code

Report this album or account

If you like Al Bloch, you may also like: