{"id":1124,"date":"2011-06-23T08:56:19","date_gmt":"2011-06-23T14:56:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/downthelinezine.com\/reviews\/?p=1124"},"modified":"2011-06-23T08:56:19","modified_gmt":"2011-06-23T14:56:19","slug":"peanut-gallery-ep-by-jeff-elbel-ping","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/downthelinezine.com\/reviews\/peanut-gallery-ep-by-jeff-elbel-ping\/","title":{"rendered":"Peanut Gallery EP by Jeff Elbel + Ping"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Just in time for the Cornerstone Festival, Ping drops an EP that finds Jeff Elbel and Co. laying down four tracks that are probably the best work that they have ever done! I know that is saying a lot because Jeff has been making music for years as Ping (prior to that he was in the alternative act Farewell to Juliet and has played on more songs from other artists than I can count). There is something about Peanut Gallery<\/em> that just sounds remarkably full and solid and like they are just having fun!<\/p>\n

The EP gallops out of the gate with \u201cI Can Change\u201d – an awesome fusion of doo-wop infused Americana that sounds like the Jesus Music of yesteryear, but so much more streamlined and fluid. It is the fastest track on the disc and sets the pace. Up next is \u201cIn A Place Where Shadows Grow\u201d with a melancholic tinged guitar and violin work. It sounds beautifully desperate and emotionally driven as the music builds into a fairly intense plea about learning lessons relationally and becoming a better person through what we have experienced. \u201cYour Wicked Mirror\u201d picks it up again with lead vocals being handled by Maron Gaffron \u2013 whose vocal style reminds me of Maria McKee. This track is bluesy roots music that is spiced up by the stellar percussion, the thumping bass line, the soulful howl of the organ and what I think is the best lyric on the whole record: \u201cEve may have pulled the fruit from the tree, but Adam took the biggest bite.\u201d The disc is rounded out by \u201cComfort Me\u201d which achieves a worshipful tone that is carried along by a great drum rhythm punctuated by violin. The track builds and flows effortlessly until the end when Elbel\u2019s vocals hit the high end in a prayer and petition to our Father for comfort along the road.<\/p>\n

This is a great release that finds Jeff getting better and better at what he does. There is a total of somewhere around nine players on this EP – so it sounds like a full recording with plenty of sounds to beef up the songs. I said earlier that there are 4 songs on this EP\u2026technically that is true, BUT, the instrumental version of each track is also provided so that actually rounds Peanut Gallery out to 8 tracks total. The cool thing about this disc is that once you get to the instrumental tracks it reminds me of how jam bands like the Grateful Dead would play and record their \u2018space jams\u2019. It\u2019s like the music just keeps on giving and trucking along, definitely a cool feature. Swing by the Ping booth at Cornerstone where you can lay your paws on this release quickly!<\/p>\n[2011\u00a0Marathon Records | Purchase:\u00a0MarathonRecords.com<\/a>]\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Just in time for the Cornerstone Festival, Ping drops an EP that finds Jeff Elbel and Co. laying down four tracks that are probably the best work that they have ever done! I know that is saying a lot because … Continued<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1125,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[24,215],"tags":[222,136],"class_list":["post-1124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music-review","category-september-2011","tag-jeff-elbel-ping","tag-marathon-records"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/downthelinezine.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1124","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/downthelinezine.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/downthelinezine.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downthelinezine.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downthelinezine.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1124"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/downthelinezine.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1124\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1126,"href":"https:\/\/downthelinezine.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1124\/revisions\/1126"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downthelinezine.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1125"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/downthelinezine.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1124"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downthelinezine.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1124"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downthelinezine.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1124"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}