Following our previous announcement of Tommy Petier‘s forthcoming album, Echo Park, Drag City are sharing 10,000 Greyhounds today. The LA trumpeter-turned-tunesmith turns 91 this week — a fact that makes the sheer kinetic energy of this track all the more extraordinary.
Recorded at Capitol Records in 1971, 10,000 Greyhounds is a frantic jangle-blues workout that puts Tommy’s many dogs firmly on the hellhound trail of lore. A rock ‘n’ rolling rhythm guitar drives the track with Lou Reed-style physicality, propelling Tommy into scats and the band into wide-open jams. What begins in something close to bubblegum pop territory spirals, by the end, into an ebullient pocket epic of blissed self-discovery — Hackamore Brick and Dwight Twilley hovering in the atmosphere throughout.
The track follows the previously announced Flight of the Dancer, tracked in 1976 at Heritage Studios in Hollywood, and offers a different but equally vivid window into what Echo Park has to offer. The album, recorded across sessions between 1970 and 1976, arrives fifty-some years after the fact, mixed and mastered by Jim O’Rourke. Its eleven tracks survey the smooth sounds and free-spirited glamour of life just down the street from Tinseltown in its golden era, with Tommy described as carrying himself in the tuneful tradition of Rupert Holmes, Stephen Bishop, Andrew Gold, David Batteau, and, of course, Captain Fantastic and the Thin White Duke. As Drag City previously shared, the album features contributions from singer/songwriter and (dear friend of Tommy’s) Judee Sill, as well as some of Tommy‘s old bandmates in The Jazz Corps.
To mark the release, Tommy will play a record release show on March 27th at LA’s 2220 Arts + Archives, performing in a trio with Aaron MF Olson on bass and Jude Tedaldi on cello. The night will be opened by Dear Nora and Sophie Appel. Tickets are on sale now.
Pre-Order Echo Park: https://lnk.to/echopark70s