Sponsored by 89.3 The Current
Friday, April 26, 2019
7 pm Doors // 8 pm Music
Tickets On Sale 10am Friday, February 8
VIP — Includes digital download 3 weeks prior, signed CD + poster + drink ticket + arcade hang + early seating: $40
General Admission + digital download of the album 3 weeks prior + personalized signed CD + poster: $25
General Admission + digital download of the album 3 weeks prior + CD at the show: $20
General Admission: $15 advance // $20 Door
Chris Koza is a composer and performer based in Minneapolis. Both solo and with his band Rogue Valley, he has supported and shared the stage with artists such as Brandi Carlile, Ingrid Michaelson, The Jayhawks, Neko Case, Kathleen Edwards, Dan Wilson, Stephen Kellogg, This is the Kit, and Tift Merrit, among others. His music appears regularly on ABCʼs General Hospital and 60 Minutes, and his song “Be Wild” will be featured as the soundtrack to an upcoming State of Minnesota tourism campaign. His song (Rogue Valley) “The Wolves and the Ravens” was featured in Ben Stillerʼs film The Secret Life of Walter Mitty.
Sleepwalkers Part 1 is Chrisʼs seventh solo release, following Exit Pesce (2004), Patterns (2006), A Friend of a Friend EP (2006), The Dark Delirious Morning (2008), In Real Time (2014), and Beyond the Divide: A Film Soundtrack (2014). Additionally, Chris has also released 5 albums with his band Rogue Valley and 2017ʼs electro-pop collection Off The Screen under the moniker Nobody Kid.
In addition to releasing and producing his own music, Chris is also involved with other projects including performing with Minnesota-based artists The New Standards and Little Fevers. Chris also records and produces other artists, most recently 2 EPs for buzzworthy rockers Early Eyes.
The music Chris produces is rooted in Americana but heeds its own spirit. Born out of folk, country, storytelling and rock ʼn roll, Chris both honors and builds on Americana traditions by incorporating a unique pop-music sensibility, subtle synthesizers, rich harmonies, and imaginative production choices. But despite late-night deep dives in the studio, Chris never strays from the core of the song itself and isnʼt afraid to let a raw vocal and woodsy acoustic guitar deliver the story. Chris performs solo, as a duo, and with a band of almost any other configuration.
Sleepwalkers Part 1 is at its core Americana music in the city; a collection of ten songs following a transit map of dynamic acoustic guitar, expressive vocals, and poetic lyrics that at once ponder, observe, dismiss and celebrate the awkwardness, curiosity, and clarity of youth. There is the diner you are in, then the diner of your dreams where you see yourself sitting always; constructed of contradictory and corroborating minutia. There is the music over the jukebox; a sound collage of the fleetingly familiar and the unborn. There is the way that the light from a neon sign catches the rainfall and is reflected in wet streets which is both true and transformed. A Sleepwalker is someone who haunts or is haunted by the flux of memory and it's overlay with the physical moment.
Sleepwalkers is a double album released in 2-parts. Strategically, given the evolving nature of attention spans and the sheer volume of artistic output available at any given moment, a 2-part release allows for a longer window of opportunity to reach a greater audience with new music. Artistically, part 1 and part 2 function independently in their production and stylistic choices, though complementary and as singular narrative concept.
Basic tracks were recorded at Wild Sound Studio in NE Minneapolis and engineered by Steve Kaul. Cody McKinney (bass), Richard Medek (drums), and Peter Sieve (electric guitar) along with Chris (acoustic guitar, rhodes, piano) comprised the live band. Additional tracking and overdubs by Chris at Little Radios, also in NE Minneapolis. Guest vocals include Alicia Christenson, Becky Shaheen, and John Munson. Part 1 was mixed by Brad Bivens and mastered by Tom Garneau.
Website // Instagram // Twitter // Facebook // YouTube // Bandcamp
The Twins of Franklin
The Twins of Franklin are not, in fact, twins. They are two dear friends and Minneapolis musicians - Becky Shaheen and Laura Lou. But after being regularly mistaken as twins for years as best friends, roommates, and each other’s solo backup singers, they decided to embrace the label when they formed their new act.
Turns out, a decade of singing together means the pair can do some pretty neat things. Like delivering tight, delicate harmonies that can suddenly become one world conquering belts or even encouraging a group singalong when covering your favorite Goo Goo Dolls song.
To the Twins, nothing is more fun than music-ing together, as a duo or as a full six-piece band. That’s the feeling you’re let in on when experiencing the Twins of Franklin’s delightful ballads and zesty uptempo folk songs live.
The Twins are in the process of recording new original songs in duo form and plan on releasing their first music as The Twins of Franklin in the Spring of 2019!
