RADICAL FACE: Indie Pop-Folk Artist’s ‘The Family Tree: The Roots’ Hits #20 on Billboard Top New Artist Chart; Heads To East Coast After Sold Out Shows in Los Angeles and San Francisco

DT:      OCTOBER 19, 2011
 
 

RADICAL FACE:
INDIE POP-FOLK ARTIST’s SOPHOMORE ALBUM
‘THE FAMILY TREE: THE ROOTS’
HITS #20 ON BILLBOARD TOP NEW ARTIST CHART
 
SET TO HIT THE EAST COAST
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 22 IN ARLINGTON, VA AND
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 25 IN NEW YORK CITY AT WEBSTER HALL STUDIO
AFTER  SOLD-OUT SHOWS IN SAN FRANCISCO AND LOS ANGELES LAST WEEK
 
PERFORMANCE AND INTERVIEW
SET TO AIR ON NBC TV’s “LAST CALL WITH CARSON DALY”
LATER THIS MONTH
 
“GHOST TOWNS” NAMED TOP DOWNLOAD THIS WEEK BY
NYLON MAGAZINE

Indie pop-folk artist RADICAL FACE’s sophomore album THE FAMILY TREE:THE ROOTS (Bear Machine) has garnered a series of impressive chart debuts, entering at #20 on the Billboard New Artist Chart, #90 on the iTunes overall chart, #3 on the iTunes Singer-Songwriter chart and #2 on the Amazon Folk Chart. NYLON magazine has already named RADICAL FACE’s new song “Ghost Towns” off of THE ROOTS… a Top Download, http://www.nylonmag.com/?section=article&parid=7045. 
 
After sold-out shows in Los Angeles (Bootleg Theater) and San Francisco (Brick & Mortar) last week, RADICAL FACE is poised to hit the east coast this Saturday, October 22 in Arlington, VA (Rock Spring Church) and on Tuesday, October 25 at New York City’s Studio at Webster Hall. RADICAL FACE–who has generally shied away from traditional live performances–is giving U.S. fans a rare concert experience with his unique live show encompassing a full backing choir accompanying him on his fall trek. West coast fans were wowed with the intimate yet animated set that transcended the usual boundaries. Fans that could not make one of BEN’s select gigs this fall will catch a glimpse of this uncommon artist  later this month when an intimate performance and interview is set to air on NBC TV’s “Last Call With Carson Daly,” date TBA.
 
Hauntingly beautiful and glimmering with folk pop, THE FAMILY TREE: THE ROOTS is gaining critical praise.  NPR Austin said the “Songs are lyrically heavy, dealing with life, death, murder, love, and everything in between. Cooper makes it all fit together with melodies that straddle the line between pop and folk. It’s those blurred boundaries between old and new that make Radical Face worth listening to. The album’s first single, ‘A Pound of Flesh,’ is a dark cut that nevertheless bounces along on a bed of acoustic guitars and Cooper’s intimate voice. The lyrics are characteristically descriptive, but it’s the song’s wordless chorus that’s truly the highpoint.” –Art Levy (9/29/11).

 
After four years of honing the album concept, which depicts the life and tribulations of a family from the 1800’s, BEN recorded THE FAMILY TREE: THE ROOTS alone in a tool shed and limited the songwriting to instruments that would have been accessible in the 1800’s. Incorporating piano, acoustic guitar, a floor tom, and voices, he only brought in additional instruments of the era during tracking when needed. From soaring tracks like “A Pound of Flesh” and “Severus and Stone,” to eerily dark pieces like “Black Eyes” and “Kin,” to warm, enlightening gems like “Always Gold” and “Mountains,” the songs flow together with mindful artistic clarity, allowing the listener to fully escape into the album as the stories unravel.

Here’s more critical acclaim for RADICAL FACE:

 “While the assorted hand-claps, tinkling of the ivories and strums from the guitar create a lush landscape, front and center is Cooper’s vocals, sweet and pure on ‘Black Eyes,’ soaring on ‘Severus and Stone’ and hauntingly beautiful ‘Ghost Towns.’ The Roots is the first in a three-piece installment that focuses on the ‘Family Tree’ theme. I can’t wait to get my hands on the next two!”

–Sarah Benzuly, Mix, 10/2011

“With storytelling at the core of this beautifully crafted and sonically haunting collection, this record has all the makings of an indie classic, in the best way. Think Band Of Horses meets The Shins circa Garden State, with the depth and imagination of a talented raconteur.”

— Hits Magazine, 9/2011

“As one-half of the Morr Music duo Electric President, Ben Cooper traded in the kind of electro-pop melancholy that made the spines of Postal Service fans tingle. But his diet is more organic when he works alone as Radical Face, whose rapturous folk music is as stirring as it is conceptual. His 2007 album Ghost was based on the idea that houses are inhabited by the events that have taken place in them, and the songs on his forthcoming second record “The Family Tree: the Roots” (out Oct. 4 on his own Bear Machine Records) — recorded in a toolshed behind his mother’s house in Jacksonville, Fla.–revolve around a strange, fictitious family from the 1800s. Guitar, piano, simple percussion–and ideas…”

–Kevin Bronson, BuzzBands.LA 8/5/11

 “With both buzzy feedback in ‘All is Well (It’s Only Blood)’ and simple, un-experimental, folky harmonies in the final track, ‘We’re on Our Way’, Cooper illustrates his evolution as a musician and grasp on quite a few genres as well. A surprising and exciting change, in fact, as it is one of the first times a more folk-inspired, almost back-country Cooper has peeked from behind a curtain of distortion. Awesome.”

  –Abby Ross, Knox Road, 9/2011

Catch RADICAL FACE on tour across the globe:

 
www.radicalface.com
www.facebook.com/RadicalFace

RADICAL FACE
“Pound of Flesh” video on American Songwriter: http://www.americansongwriter.com/2011/09/video-premiere-radical-face-pound-of-flesh/

For RADICAL FACE publicity, contact MSO:
 
Libby Coffey: 818-380-0400 ext 224 LCoffey@msopr.com
 
Michele Stephens: 818-380-0400 ext 227 MStephens@msopr.com