Debut Slushy LP “Pastime Gardens” Is Out!

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Slushy is Chris Kramer and Brent Zmrhal. Pastime Gardens is the first album by Slushy. It is the sound of Chris and Brent playing very loudly in the living room of Matt Riley, who was in the bedroom magnetizing the tapes.

We recorded these songs over the course of a few days in December, 2013. Brent was back in town, and he slept on a mattress in the kitchen. It was dangerously cold, and singing songs like “Summertime Girls” and “Fun in the Sun” didn’t make a lot of sense. But now it’s spring and turning into summer, and listening to those songs makes a lot of sense now.

There are 14 songs on Pastime Gardens. Some of them are older ones that we’ve been playing live for years. Some of them are newer and we had to work on the arrangements as we recorded. They’re all my favorites.

We recorded the band how we play live – Chris playing guitar and singing, and Brent playing kick bass drum, kick snare drum and guitar and guitar pedals. Then we overdubbed more vocals, guitar solos, 12 string acoustic guitar, Korg, and tambourines. We only had 8 tracks, so we were very economical. When we were done we took the tapes to Shimby McCreery, who gave it a mix and a master.

Matt Riley also runs Grabbing Clouds Records & Tapes, which released Pastime Gardens on, you guessed it, record and tape. We asked Adam Pezen to do the artwork and just told him the album title. I think he did a very good job. Kriss Stress did artwork as well, for the inner sleeve, and really delivered. Even the vinyl looks nice – a limited run of clear with blue haze, and the remainder on a transparent blue.

We hope you like it. You can download the album on our bandcamp or buy the record from the Grabbing Clouds store. Listen to Pastime Gardens with your friends, it’s even better that way.