Album Notes

"Curiously introspective Rock with a slick, positive spin"
-Cincinnati Citybeat Magazine


July For Kings return with a crisper, modern sound. Eleven carefully crafted songs from relentlessly melodic frontman Joe Hedges are tastefully accompanied by band members Brian Ives (bass), Dan McQuinn (drums), and John McGuire (guitar).

July For Kings walk a tightrope. The songs on Monochrome are at once intimate vignettes of mid-western American life and arena rock singalong anthems. Hedges' lyrics balance angst with introspection; sadness with positivity. Monochrome balances expansive, lush soundscapes with stripped down acoustic guitars; youthful yearning with mature introspection; and rough-at-the-edges grunge rock with perfectly resolving pop melodies. This is an experienced band in their prime.

July For Kings, or "JFK" for short, first achieved success in 2002 with their album "SWIM" released on MCA Records. The first single "Normal Life" received airplay on stations all over the US including #1 most requested on Las Vegas KMBX, garnering national media attention from Billboard Magazine, Rolling Stone, and InStyle and landing the band national tours with Muse, Collective Soul, The Counting Crows, The Calling, etc. In 2005 July For Kings released the seven-song follow-up, Nostalgia. In its first week Nostalgia was the #1 most purchased album at CDbaby.com, the largest online retailer of independent music in the world.

After a break to record and release his solo album "Curvature", singer/songwriter Joe Hedges began working on another July For Kings release. Hedges united new guitarist John McGuire and bassist Brian Ives with July For Kings drummer Dan McQuinn and set out to make Monochrome in 2007. "I had new songs and all these songs that didn't fit on Curvature because I felt they were too rock or too straight forward." Hedges explains, "I needed an outlet for my more accessible stuff, and we had all these JFK songs from over the years that were never properly recorded. All the sudden I was thinking about 18 songs and trying to narrow it down."

Hedges describes the album as more upbeat than their last album, Nostalgia. "This record is really about us trying to carve out a new sound that relates to our past albums but that is more modern and fresh. Overall the mood is more upbeat, more positive, and more mature." Although the album is best described as rock, there are several short detours into pop, blues, and even country, as the band shows off their songwriting and production prowess.