Album Notes

Philadelphia, the city of Brotherly Love, and Brooklyn, the former home of Walt Whitman, provide the cornerstones of Backwords, a collection of socially aware misfits that hail from the various mileposts of what was once Penn's Woods, and once Iroquois tribal hunting grounds long before that. Our Backwords story, though, starts somewhere in the year 2006 of our Lord G.W., on a southbound road trip where Brian Russ and Ryan Belski birthed the band vocally amidst a smoggy gridlock.

Thus came Backwords, a band driven by the many layers of our reality to write songs that represent all the forces at play. American in its mishmash of what was and what will be, of who speaks and who can't, the songs are a translation of the common history we all, inexplicably, are forced to be a part of. Keeping with the melange, each band member has a distinct influence. John Sheldon, drums, is a metal head/spazmaniac; Linh Truong, keys, a classically trained pianist with rich blues-belting singin’ pipes; Ostyn, bass, is a garage rocking neo-political urbanian; Ryan, guitar, is a jazz wanderer; and Brian Russ, guitar and songwriting, is a miniature subdued cowboy who once wooed South Dakota and the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation with his folk and roots sounds.

But the soul of Backwords is more than what it was and what it is. Let's just say, it's hard to put into words the magic of how persons come together and make music. But, since I'm writing, I'll say this: Backwords explores the elimination/culmination of genre in its quest towards the jagged coast of psychedelia, where the water is every color, and all songs swim in a wild ocean.