Bethel Park native’s band to release first Folk Series album
Some Kind of Animal
“Some Kind of Animal” album cover: artwork by Dave Rocco, the band’s drummer
The first release for Get Hip Recordings’ Folk Series doesn’t exactly sound like the stylings of a Woody Guthrie or Pete Seeger.
“It’s not a traditional folk record, really,” Bethel Park native Tim Mulhern said about the debut album by his band. “Some people have been calling it more of a soulful folk kind of thing, because especially Tony seems to do a lot of soul-inspired melodies.”
Tony is Anthony Jardine, Mulhern’s songwriting partner, and they have joined with a rhythm section of Rich Condon and David Rocco to form Some Kind of Animal.
Speaking of which, they often hear the question: “What’s with that name?”
“When I met Tony, he was in a band called These Lions, and that was right around that period where everybody seemed to have an animal in their name,” Mulhern said.
With tongue in cheek, he named the folder on his computer where he stored their musical endeavors “Some Kind of Animal.” So when it came time to give the band a name, they thought: “We have this one. We just might as well go with it.”
Mulhern met Jardine while doing production work for These Lions, and the duo decided to combine musical forces.
“We got together one night and finished one song super quickly,” Mulhern recalled. “It was one of those things where we write very easily together. I’ll have a verse and he’ll have a chorus, and things just kind of happen quickly.”
They ended up composing about 30 tunes, 11 of which are featured on the album, also called “Some Kind of Animal,” which will be released April 7. They actually did the recording for it in 2015 at Postal Recordings, a decommissioned Indianapolis post office put to better use as a studio.
“We really wanted to put it on vinyl,” Mulhern said. “I always thought it would be great someday to actually have something I created on a record.”
Enter Gregg Kostelich, the Mt. Lebanon resident and guitarist for the Cynics who runs Get Hip Recordings with his wife, Barbara Garcia-Bernardo. When they listened to Some Kind of Animal, they were sufficiently impressed to have the band kick off the label’s Folk Series. Kostelich gives some particularly high praise:
Kostelich “Reminds me of The Band, ‘Music from Big Pink’-era.”
Band members cite influences such as Local Natives, Band of Horses, Fleet Foxes and the late Jeff Buckley, and other listeners might hear a bit of the Byrds or Buffalo Springfield, especially when Jardine and Mulhern team up for harmony vocals. At the same time, Jardine’s use of keyboards – he plays a Wurlitzer piano on a good bit of the album – helps create an ethereal atmosphere that places Some Kind of Animal’s music squarely in the 21st century.
Mulhern’s guitar of choice for the recording sessions was a Fender Jaguar, which is best known for its tone switching system that allows players to alternate easily between rhythm and lead. He liked the one he used at Postal so much that he recently purchased his own.
Mulhern, a 2002 Bethel Park High School graduate who has been playing guitar since fifth or sixth grade, is the sole South Hills native among the primarily North Hills-based Some Kind of Animal. He also will admit to being the only thirtysomething.
“I was always the youngest guys in bands for a long time,” he observed, “and then I look around, and I’m the old guy.”
The release party for “Some Kind of Animal” is at 9 p.m. April 1 at Brillobox, 4104 Penn Ave., Lawrenceville. Also on the bill are Caleb Poygor, Brett Staggs and the Daylight Moon.
For more information, visit www.somekindofanimal.com.