Album Notes

Disheveled and anonymous, a shadow of a man makes his way through the mosaic of landscapes, heading West-always West-across the land. Weary and gritty from his journey, which is a pilgrimage of sorts, he rides alone away from his past, into a vague and distant future. Guitar in one hand, six-shooter in the other, he is the cosmic cowboy-the ghost rider on his dogged and hunted trek, seeking freedom from the bonds of the world-a rock’n'roll Western archetype founded in the psychedelia of the ’60s, and most recently resurrected from the dead with a vengeance by a posse of local musicians and filmmakers.

Kirpatrick Thomas, the founding member of Spindrift, a self-dubbed “psychedelic Spaghetti Western” band, made just such a journey-in true cosmic cowboy fashion-from Delaware to Southern California in late 2001. He was already heading up the experimental post-punk incarnation of a band called Spindrift when he took off. His fuel: fragrant dreams of the Western mystique rooted in the stylized ’60s cowboy movies of Italian filmmaker Sergio Leone …

Like any self-respecting musician on the road, Thomas stopped by the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio, on his way. It was on this fateful day, in front of the John Lennon exhibit, that he literally ran into the Brian Jonestown Massacre guitarist Frankie Emerson pushing singer/guitarist Anton Newcombe around in a wheelchair. The latter, whose rowdy antics were made public in the 2004 rockumenary Dig, had broken his leg in a fight during a riot at a gig the previous night.

Thomas-who sings, composes, plays guitar and keyboards-got to know the BJM guys very well. He credits them as a source of inspiration, collaboration and assistance in Spindrift’s California reinvention and activation as a spaghetti Western band. He later ended up playing guitar on tour with the band. That
was when the Western bug first bit him hard. Thomas fondly recalls listening and jamming to the music of Ennio Morricone-the prolific composer who pioneered
the haunting surf-guitar soundtracks on Leone’s ‘Spaghetti Westerns’-while driving cross country in the tour RV through the deserts.


From the Los Angeles
Alternative article
“Guns, Spurs, And Shrooms”
by Shana Ting Lipton

Spindrift's current line-up features past and present members of Brian Jonestown Massacre and other L.A. psychedelic veterans. The band has just released the soundtrack to their revisionist western film "The Legend of God's Gun." The full length feature, which stars the band themselves, is now being shown at Spindrift's live shows and at independent film festivals. In addition to the soundtrack, Spindrift has also re-released the full length LP recorded in 2002 entitled "Songs From the Ancient Age." Both are now available on CD. Spindrift's latest project, the forthcoming album tentatively titled "The West" is set for release early in the new year.

Visit Spindrift at:

http://www.myspace.com/thewest
http://www.spindriftwest.com