Mocha Bovine
BOTH MOCHA BOVINE ALBUMS ARE NOW AVAILABLE ON CD!
I finally transferred all of the old, scratchy tapes to mp3 format, and now you can have Workin' on the FBI and A Boy Named Padre on your car stereo, iPod, or stack of dusty CDs that you never listen to!
Please contact me if you want a CD copy of either or both albums, and in the meantime, please visit Mocha Bovine's Official Site.
Mocha Bovine is the name of the musical outfit that primarily consists of Joe Madera,
Shawn Hildonen, and me. Mocha Bovine makes Concept Albums exclusively. Other collaborators are Tom Jones, Matt Abbott, Jake Eberly, Alex Dejong.
The History of Mocha Bovine:
The group came about long before it was named. This, you will learn, is the opposite of the way in which
MB usually creates its material. Joe and Roy and I were throwing a disc at the beach one day back in 1999,
and Joe and I decided it would be
great fun to go home and make a concept album. We started laying down tracks for what became a
source for unending humor and creative distraction. That's where all the idiocy was born.
The name was conceived by David "Chip" Amero in the Summer of 2002, a.k.a.
The Summer of No Regrets. This was a perfect name for the amorphous group, whose tendencies are heavily
absurd, often resonating influences such as The Mothers of Invention, The Rutles and Ween.
Discography:
WORKIN' ON THE FBI
1999-2002
We named this album after one of Joe's many malapropisms. Workin' On the FBI
tells a story of a guy named Kyle who can't find this girl, Margaret. His seach brings him into
a crime ring involving the mysterious Abbott Hogan and an overlord named Lou Sac. When he finally
finds Margaret, Kyle finds out she is having his child. The story goes nowhere and really has
nothing to do with the FBI at all.
The best part is the songwriting process. We began by deciding it would have 22 tracks, and then
we came up with song titles. We wrote the songs based on the titles, and laid down the music on
my four track. We recruited Shawn early on, and got help from Matt Abbott and company for a couple
songs. Most of the songs have no hint of plot, but the album features many different styles of
music, including rock, hip-hop, a capella, techno, experimental, progressive, latin, do-wop, chant,
metal, and spoken word. The album was finally finished in early Summer of 2002, after three summers
of toil and "brilliance."
The hit single from WOTFBI would definitely be "Midnight Train," the funniest song is "Champagne,"
and the worst song by a long shot is "Circles of Aurora." Some of the songs are in fact so scary
that Joe can't listen to them.
Joe Madera : Vocals, Guitar, Keyboards, Percussion
Shawn Hildonen : Vocals, Guitar, Keyboards, Percussion
Chip Means : Vocals, Guitar, Keyboards, Percussion, Harmonica, Nose Flute
Matt Abbott : Vocals, Guitar on "Abbott Hogan"
Alex Dejong : Vocals
Tom Jones : Vocals
----TRACK LISTING----
1. FBI Holiday
2. Where is Margaret?
3. Time's Infection
4. Light of Death
5. Midnight Train
6. Sad Porridge (Kyle's Theme)
7. Lou Sac
8. Secrets of Demeanor
9. Abbott Hogan Theme
10. Greasy Beer Gas
11. I Need a Way Out
12. FBI (Reprise)
13. Kyle Finds Margaret
14. Black Jack Magic
15. The Cradle
16. Somewhere, Somewhere
17. Been Lookin'
18. Champagne
19. Circles of Aurora
20. Margaret's Letter
21. How Did He Know?
22. Workin' On
A BOY NAMED PADRE
2003-2004
This one is a "Nautical-themed British folk album" at heart. It reeks of
faux-Belle and Sebastian and Donovan-esque styles. Was that Rush I just heard? No, but
Geddy Lee's voice is mimicked on some tracks, making this epic journey truly a trans-Atlantic forge under
the crown of Britannia.
A Boy Named Padre is about a young man's quest for identity and other crappy themes that we
threw together on the spot. Tom was more present on this album than previously. Highlights include
Jake Eberly's joining in an all-Fadeouts lineup on the salty chanty "To Be Safe."
Shawn's guitar work on "Books By Wed" compliments
my lead part so fittingly that I'm willing to say that "Books By Wed" is a legitimately impressive
piece of music. Join Padre as he begins confidently and eventually runs into trouble, leading
up to a crash-and-burn echoed in the album's wholly lacklaster finish. By the time the wheels come off,
you'll be wondering, "What, did these guys just give up?" Yes, they did.
Chip Means: Vocals, Guitar, Autoharp, Ukelele, Keyboard, Flute, Nose Flute
Joe Madera: Vocals, Guitar, Snare Drum, Rain Stick, Keyboard
Shawn Hildonen: Vocals, Guitar, Mini-Guitar, Claps, Whammy Box
Tom Jones: Vocals, Keyboard, Sound Effects
Jake Eberly: Vocals on "To Be Safe"
----TRACK LISTING----
1. Springtime on the Harbour
2. Magazine Voodoo
3. Sun and Moon
4. Books by Wed
5. Soft
6. Has Gertrude Had Enough?
7. I Figured
8. Small Crawl
9. 9:41
10. Only These Me
11. To Be Safe
12. Fit Dreams, Shucked, Blend
13. Marooned Padre
14. Moonlight Adrift
by Chip Means 2005