As any fan of the Food Network knows, a few scrapes from an orange peel adds zest to a dish. San Francisco Bay Area indie-popsters the Orange Peels, according to master chef Allen Clapp, reinvented themselves by inviting more cooks into the kitchen. The result, Sun Moon (Minty Fresh), is a fully collaborative and very tasty effort. Last summer, Peels bassist (and Clapp’s wife) Jill Pries asked the other two band members—guitarist John Moremen and drummer Gabriel Coan—to drop by their Sunnyvale, Calif., home/studio. “It didn’t mean I was happy about it,” says Clapp, grown used to demoing the band’s material before presenting it to the others. “I told her I didn’t have any songs ready.” Clapp will also be guest editing magnetmagazine.com all week. Read our new Orange Peels feature.
Clapp: I’ll confess: I’ve wanted to call an album Mixed Greens since 1993. It was actually the title I had wanted to give to my first LP.
When wandering through Redwood City’s thrift shops that year looking for sweaters, vintage hi-fi gear and stripey T-shirts, I saw a set of laminated placemats at Savers.
I don’t know why the heck I didn’t buy them, and I’ve never seen them again since, but they were kinda organic in an early-’70s macramé, Mary Tyler Moore kind of way that reminded me of the kind of thing my mom and older sister used to like when I was a kid.
So these placemats had these illustrated greens and herbs and a fanciful text treatment that read “Mixed Greens.” It struck me that it would be a great name for a collection of songs; especially a collection as varied and random as my first album.
It was around this time my friend Maz came up with the idea of calling it One Hundred Percent Chance Of Rain, which was too good to resist.
In February of 2011, when my insane schedule finally mellowed out, I found myself with some welcome breathing room in my schedule for the first time in two years.
Songs started appearing out of nowhere, new inspirations for recording techniques arrived in the moment, and a few months later, another eclectic collection of songs had arrived—they remind me of the whimsy and energy of something that happened 17 years ago.
It just felt like a natural follow-up to One Hundred Percent Chance Of Rain. So Allen Clapp And His Orchestra finally made its sophomore release, and I finally get to use the title that’s been waiting for this collection of songs to emerge.
Video after the jump.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJbqfjQNU78
