Radio Exile | Pink Mountaintops Give Away “Vampire”

Pink Mountaintops Give Away “Vampire” – Prepare for Outside Love

By Shawn M. Smith - April 14, 2009 | Email the author

According to the new song from Pink Mountaintops [MySpace], you can’t kill the heart of Steve McBean‘s love, but why the hell would you want to? Honestly, you “can’t go wrong with McBean”. If the haunting, acoustic guitar in the lead single, “Vampire,” is a sampling of what is to come on his upcoming LP, Outside Love, you’ll be blown the eff away. Since the album’s release announcement in February (Outside Love is out May 5th!), we’ve waited patiently for more details and now we have some, along with “Vampire,” for your listening pleasure.

Check out the new tune and tour dates “after the jump”

[mp3] Pink Mountaintops – “Vampire”

Tour Dates

6/02/09 – Montreal QC – Sala Rossa
6/03/09 – Portland ME – Space Gallery
6/04/09 – Boston MA – TT the Bears
6/05/09 – Brooklyn NY – Bell House
6/06/09 – New York NY – Mercury Lounge
6/08/09 – Philadelphia PA – Johnny Brendas
6/09/09 – Pontiac MI – The Pike Room at Crofoot
6/10/09 – Chicago IL – Empty Bottle
6/11/09 – Bloomington IN – Russian Recording
6/13/09 – Buffalo – Big Orbit’s Soundlab
6/14/09 – Toronto – Horseshoe Tavern

Pink Mountaintops, AKA Stephen McBean, will be joined on tour by Black Mountain bandmate Matthew Camirand as well as Sophie Trudeau, Sar Friedman, Chad Ross, and Mike Maxymuik.

“Outside Love” is ten songs of love and hate that read like a Danielle Steele romance novel but that would probably make for bad television.

“Outside Love” is the third album by Pink Mountaintops, AKA Stephen McBean, who has slowly emerged as a distinctive voice and a very special contributor to the North American songbook. A veteran of the Vancouver/Victoria punk rock scene, McBean is best known for his contributions to acclaimed rock band Black Mountain, as principal songwriter, guitarist and co-vocalist.

The ten songs on “Outside Love” are about or influenced by weddings in Montreal, winter, Pink Floyd’s The Final Cut, Christmas albums, that one Exile song and that one Echo and the Bunnymen song, the Bermuda Triangle, being depressed in the sunshine, people who haven’t made out yet but will in the future, The Everly Brothers, clowns in the ceilings, and bedrooms where skinheads used to live.

Friends and family who contributed to or appear on “Outside Love”, in no particular order, include Sophie Trudeau (A Silver Mt. Zion, Godspeed You! Black Emperor), Ted Bois (Destroyer), Jesse Sykes (Jesse Sykes and the Sweet Hereafter, sunnO)))), Phil Wandscher (Jesse Sykes and the Sweet Hereafter, Whiskeytown), Josh Stevenson (Jackie O Motherfucker), Ashley Webber (The Organ, Bonnie Prince Billy), Amber Webber (Black Mountain, Lightning Dust), Matthew Camirand (Black Mountain, Blood Meridian), Joshua Wells (Black Mountain, Lightning Dust), Keith Parry (Superconductor, the Gay), and Tolan McNeil (Caroline Mark).

Recorded at multiple studios, “Outside Love” was mixed at Elmwood Studios by John Congleton (Modest Mouse, Black Mountain, Explosions In The Sky, The Mountain Goats).