Album Notes

Annie Quick and Jad Mintun first started making music together in Santa Cruz, California. The chemistry was immediate: Stickman Jones took shape and hit the road. The van broke down around Flagstaff, Arizona and so they played their first gig there at Charlie's--a cowboy bar where Jack London used to hang out. They thought maybe they'd stay awhile, play some songs, breathe in some mountain air. They released their first album Ripple in Flagstaff to local venue and radio acclaim.

But New York was calling them onward and eastward. They eventually hit the big city and said it felt like they'd finally come home.

Quick says, "In Santa Cruz I lived beside a redwood forest so tall and canopied that the sky could rarely be seen. You had to wade out into the middle of Bean Creek to see it at all, so that when I moved to Manhattan I didn't feel so out of place in the midst of the tall buildings as you might think. In fact, I was surprised to see so much sky."

So what do we call this sound that is part wild west, part road trip, part Greenwich Village slick? Art-pop comes close. The seduction of tight bass grooves and disarming vocals. The mystery spot where electric guitars meet mandolins and glockenspiels.

Quick's lyrics spin the world into a poetry of joy and longing, sun and shadow, beauty and broken-ness, spin it and send it flying. She aims to break your heart and wash it clean in the space of a song. She does it with grace, and the help.

Luxuria is the band's third and latest album, produced independently and distributed through Columbia House. Blinding Bright , their sophomore effort is released on Rhythm House/True Tunes. Their recordings are backed up by powerful and provocative live shows. Thousands of fans are falling in love.

Stickman Jones headlines at Manhattan clubs like The Bottom Line and The Bitter End, Philadelphia's The Tin Angel and summer music festivals such as the Cornerstone Festival near Chicago-often to a sold-out house, sharing stages with Jefferson Starship, Vigilantes of Love, Charlie Peacock, and Christine Lavin, and involving themselves in projects with Shawn Pelton (Saturday Night Live's drummer) and Burlap to Cashmere.

The band is currently recording a new album, Orange Juice, testing new horizons, enjoying the moment, remembering everything.