Pitchfork

Out of the garage and into the love den: Deadly Snakes frontman Andre Ethier will put out his new solo album, secondathallam, on Paper Bag Records on August 8.

His first solo venture, 2004's Andre Ethier with Christopher Sandes featuring Pickles and Price (Sonic Unyon), contained a handful of raw piano-centric folk tunes-- many of them first takes-- and marked an obvious departure from the Snakes' scrappy garage rock. Picking up where that first un-Deadly solo effort left off, secondanthallam once again features Ethier's Dylanesque vocals, Sandes' piano arrangements, and the horn-and-double bass rhythm section comprised of Pickles and Price. And it's all about love, love, love.

According to a press release, the new album sounds like "an acoustic Sunday afternoon jam session between players who've been around long enough to learn that there's more to love than flowers and sweet nothings." Hmmm, like bluebells and honeybees?

Love tracks, baby, love tracks:

01 Don't Let This Mean Old World Swallow You
02 The Best We Ever Had
03 Always and Forever
04 Honey Bee
05 Didn't I Love You Better Than Him
06 You Can't Be Satisfied
07 Blue Bell
08 You Still Have Me
09 I'm With the Prim
10 Now I Wanna Be Your Dad
11 Blacker Gold

Ethier recently contributed songwriting and vocals to Dear Stranger, the new album by Canadian roots outfit the Silver Hearts. A secondathallam tour has yet to be scheduled but stay tuned.

As for the Deadly Snakes, rumors abound that the band has called it quits, but no confirmations have been made. In happier news, their 2005 album Porcella was recently nominated for Canada's Polaris Music Prize.