Saturna

Artist/Band Profile: Saturna is the rock ‘n’ roll band you want to listen to before, during, and after the party. Their debut EP …All Night serves up a tantalizing cocktail of ethereal guitars and riveting drums, tender harmonies and heart-ripping hooks.

With a swirl of melody and a pulsing drift of guitar, the wordless beauty of “Springboard” launches your night. You sip a vodka tonic, and you’re off. You plunge straight into the city blasting “Pop Rocks.” The tick-tock drums and fuzzed-out Love & Rockets-style vocals spark something ferocious inside you. You finish another drink and drop your glass. You lose your friends, your money, and half your senses, but the sexy bassline keeps looping through your brain. It’s not enough. You want more. More. So the night gets nastier: “Just for Thrills” slashes you with dirty riffs. You sneer and smile, blurring through bars and parties. Streets and cars and clubs and shows. The song drags you snarling through an underworld of twisted love, but then the harmonic chorus shimmers above the rumble. For a moment you can think. Where are you? What did you just do with who? Forget it. Too late. You’ve passed the turning point and begun the long glide toward dawn with “Blanket of Stars.” Finally, in the melancholic “Chasing the Unpredictable,” you face the sun and try to figure out what it all meant. One thing is certain: you want Saturna’s …All Night again.

Charismatic Ryan Carroll graces lead vocals and rhythm guitar; while Eric Block, the most unassuming rock god in America, manhandles lead guitar; and Steve Anderson, detail-crazed genius inventor, takes on drums, bass, and backup vocals.

Mixing swagger and sweetness, Saturna soundtracks your whole night—from sundown to downtown to dawn.

—Kirk Perry

Similar Artists: Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, Silversun Pickups, Spiritualized, Catherine Wheel

Music Style: Saturna is an indie rock band that plays fuzzy, dirty, driving, psychedelic bliss pop.

Reviews: By Thomas Bell (The Spacelab)
http://www.thespacelab.tv/spaceLAB/2006/08August/MusicReview-02-Saturna.htm

Saturna are a space-rock trio from Portland, Oregon. Unless you live in the Pacific Northwest or have made the pilgrimage to the Shoegazer’s Ball it is unlikely you have had a chance to see or hear them. All Night, their new EP, is an accomplished record that portents to wider exposure for this promising band. Fans of their first release, the Gamma Ray Afterglow single, will find this new release to have been well worth the wait.

The song-building is remarkably sure as they patiently wait to pull all the stops out till they’ve got you right where they want you. The first song, Springboard, features understated, dissonant coils of space guitar effects and reverb laden vocal harmonies that would make Robin Guthrie and Elizabeth Fraser proud. If Ride and Slowdive got together to make a record it would sound something pleasantly like this. Hazy, gauzy, atmospheric, or as Spiritualized® once said, “Ladies and gentlemen, we are floating in space.”

The balance of lush harmonies, ambient interludes, straight up rockers and subtle washes and waves of guitar noise is just right, reflecting an uncanny musical intelligence and discipline. Even the vocals, as good as they are, are not allowed to dominate at any point. Instead the vocals are an equal part, with the other instruments, of the ensemble, creating an organic fabric of sound that is somehow both constant and varied.

The arrangements are intelligently and intricately done, demonstrating the impressive range of skills this band possesses. On All Night this band shows the ability to do many things well, from creating evocative moods and atmospheres in their soundscapes to vocal harmonies that are achingly beautiful. Their songs utilize effects and techniques of great shoegazer bands before them, (especially The Jesus and Mary Chain), but each track is their own, somehow both composed and spontaneous. Certainly Saturna are still in the process of discovering their identity and sound as any band at this early stage should be. But they’re off to a great start.

Saturna is, Steve Anderson, Ryan Carroll, and Eric Block. Call it shoegazer, call it dream pop, call it space-rock. These guys know exactly what they’re doing on this record. The result is five tracks that take you to bliss-rock planet Saturna and you’ll want to return there again and again.

Influences: My Bloody Valentine, Lush, Ride, Stone Roses