Original Bakery Records CD release from 1999. Out of Print. Very Limited Supply Remaining. This is the US For Promotional Use Only CD which is identical to the original 1999 Camera Obscura Records edition.
Includes unlimited streaming of Whirlaway
via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
Whirlaway (1999) is the fourth and final full length studio album released on CD by Tadpoles and is the first Tadpoles' album to be released by a label other than the band's own Bakery Records. Australian independent label, Camera Obscura Records, licensed and released the album worldwide. As a promotion in 1999, an edited MP3 version of the song "Whirlaway" was given away free from by Camera Obscura Records through their website. Additionally, this was the first studio album by Tadpoles not produced by Mark Kramer (Shimmy Disc) at Noise New Jersey, although Mark Kramer did record the album's final track, Horse and Buggy at New York City's Knitting Factory. The album was recorded by Pete Drivere at Ampreon Recorder in Youngstown, Ohio and features a cover version of Bob Dylan's Basement Tapes classic, You Ain't Goin' Nowhere.
Reviews -Whirlaway
...among the finest realities of last lustres American psychedelia, a solid quartet able to change their expressive valence in the course of a few chords, roaming from the wildest space-rock to the utmost visionary country folk...ROCKERILLA (Italy) on WHIRLAWAY
...not only masters of the pop song idiom, but also willing connoisseurs of the absinthe of psychedelic excess...THE BROKEN FACE (Sweden) on WHIRLAWAY
...undeniably psychedelic...but also unquestioningly fresh and modern, with a full blown-3-dimensional sound filled with swirls and eddies of criss-crossing leads from guitarists Nick Kramer and Todd Parker, brilliant effects, hypnotic rhythms from drummer Adam Boyette, and keening bass lines from David Max...JERSEY BEAT (USA) on WHIRLAWAY
...an altogether solid work, with a scattering of infectious euphoria throughout...PITCHFORK.COM (USA) on WHIRLAWAY
...a candid enunciation of what is universal and eternal about psychedelic music: not the drugs, but the bounded creativity, the flight of the caged soul...SCARUFFI.COM (USA/Italy)
on WHIRLAWAY
...Investigating large expanses of time and sound, they are without a shadow of doubt, the defining psychedelic sounds of now ...ZEITGEIST (Scotland) on WHIRLAWAY
Rating:9...a modern psychedelic masterpiece...ALL MUSIC GUIDE (USA) on WHIRLAWAY
A Day Late: Tadpoles—Whirlaway Tadpoles—Whirlaway
An absolute must have. Beginning with the 1-2 punch of the galloping “Frances the Dancer ” and the heavy “Lyman Bostock” right through to the end, it’s a solid, smoky buffet of sonics. All Tadpoles releases were hazy gems, but on Whirlaway it all comes together to make, for me, their signature disc. If you follow Ptolemaic Terrascope or have yearned to attend Terrastock (like me ...), then this has your name all over it. Comparisons don’t do justice, especially when it’s as fully baked as this, but if you get into, say,
the Bevis Frond, or dreamed about a faster, fuzzier 7% Solution, then grab that dog-eared issue of the Terrascope, get out some snacks and have a seat. It’s time to go for a ride.
Many of the neo-psych groups your assailed with rely on coughing up old touchstones from some simulacrum of pastoral, quirky Englishness. Tadpoles get their cue not from the English fields or their misty woods, but rather from some musty hillock buried in the garage drip fed Nuggets. The Tadpoles are decidely American. And that sets them apart by rooting Whirlaway in good old rock. It smokes. Or rather it’s in a state of perpetual slow-burn. That rough, deceptively shambolic rock base and a firm grasp of melody set them apart from wandering noodling contemporary minstrels. No twee, whispy vocals here either. The often cracking vocals and semi-impenetrable lyrics coupled with the smoky, druggy guitars and bubbling bottom-end give the whole affair a very natural, organic weave. You can digest Whirlaway just as surface candy if you want, but if you go in for the long haul, the payback is far more filling: consumate musicianship, great production and mix, stellar layering of details, good drawn out crunchy rock and a throbbing locomotion gauranteed to see you all the way over to the other side. And they’ll get you there without relying on the ferryman to get you across the river. Tadpoles will drive you there themselves. In a GTO. Even if they promise a “Horse and Buggy” at the finish line.
Kevin McFadin - Mr. Atavist Blog (Sep 29, 2009)
Whirlaway was engineered and mixed by Pete Drivere at Ampreon Recorder in Youngstown, Ohio in 1998 and 1999. Additional overdubs and mixes were done at Jolly Roger Studio in Hoboken, NJ by Gene Holder (the dB's). Album artwork and design was created by Ann Manca. Mastered by Todd Parker at dbs digital in Hoboken, NJ.
Tadpoles, based in Hoboken, NJ, disbanded in 2000 after releasing 4 critically acclaimed studio albums, 1 live album and 1
E.P. all on their own Bakery Records label (except for their last studio album, Whirlaway, which was released on Australia's Camera Obscura Records.) The group was formed by vocalist/guitarist, Todd Parker and original drummer, Michael Kite Audino in New York City in 1990....more
A see saw lets you float up
The water lets you slide
One after another
Get in line for the other side
And your time is up
Put away your tin cup
Breathe in the sweet air
And take it in and feel it there
It's alien
Good times
Just teach yourself the subjects
The moons are in your reach
Get out your favorite colors
Give all your sands a beach
And your time is up
Put away your tin cup
Breathe in the sweet air
And take it in and feel it there
It's alien
Good times
The ocean's getting deeper
From the drains you had to waste
The desert's just a little colder
From the nights you tried to chase
When you taste the bitter
Taste that they left behind
Sip your favorite water
Refresh whats in your mind
Track Name: Lyman Bostock
Begging with a borrowed hand again
Burning bridges, swimming rivers
Building and breaking and fixing things
You can never run from the devils in you
But you can beat a path to my door
When the running gets the better of you
Rest yourself a while, sit a spell
And you know that tomorrow is a new day
It's all in how you harvest me
It's all in how you harvest me
It's all in how you harvest me
It's up to you, how you harvest me
Betting on a borrowed hand again
Desert sands in your barren palm
Your rivers dried out into the seas
Brother, don't you curse my name
I haven't made peace with parts of my past
Or with those ghosts with halos round their eyes
And you hope that tomorrow is a new day
It's all in how you harvest me
It's all in how you harvest me
It's all in how you harvest me
It's up to you, how you harvest me
It's all in how you harvest me
It's all in how you harvest me
It's all in how you harvest me
It's up to you, how you harvest me
Track Name: Crash Of The Bug
You're driving in your car
Not going very far
A sunday sunny drive
Feels good to be alive
Your friends are in the back
Ask you where you're at
Some take the wrong turn
The moonlight tavern burns
At the bottom of the hill
A wooden house is filled
You've got to climb the stairs
Your friends are unaware
Just make one more call
To the pictures on the wall
This dream will come to pass
You'll sleep in beds of grass
Track Name: Jimmy Colored Glasses
Never thought that you'd feel so sad
Never wanted anything you had
And its time that you learned to see
It's enough to just believe
We all will pass this way
No one makes us stay
If there's any way to make it good
I think that you should
Track Name: Whirlaway
From temperate climes, through rain, set sail
Ribbons of water, they sparkle and spangle
In the coming sun, falling through liquid streets
Into the jungle and out of the rain
Steal into dreamtiger eyes and slowly leave behind
Domino days of time, inches of distance
Slip past the double-edged sword of building
The cost of building more, or of just maintaining
Feel the dreamtigers prowling free and easy
But ribbons of memory still tumble and tangle
And turn into questions, "Can your friends trust you now?"
Only dreamtigers never have a need to change
In time, as night declines, fleeting and fading
Ribbons of laughter, they jingle and jangle
And all the dream-tigers retreat back into the trees
With green, smiling eyes, at the coming of the day
Track Name: Dusty Baker
When you are feeling low
Let the juices flow away
When you are moving slow
Take a ride down the drain
I don't have the time to wait for you
And I don't care if you stay
Just don't hang around and blow my brain
Can't you break the clock today
When you are feeling low
Get down on the grass and lay
The snake is gold and he follows you
The poison takes your cares away
When you are feeling low
Let the juices flow away
When you are moving slow
Take a ride down the drain
Down the drain
Down the drain
Down the drain
Track Name: You Ain't Goin' Nowhere
Clouds so swift
Rain won’t lift
Gate won’t close
Railings froze
Get your mind off wintertime
You ain’t goin’ nowhere
Whoo-ee!
Ride me high
Tomorrow’s the day
My bride’s gonna come
Oh, oh, are we gonna fly
Down in the easy chair!
I don’t care How many letters they sent
Morning came and morning went
Pick up your money
And pack up your tent
You ain’t goin’ nowhere
Whoo-ee!
Ride me high
Tomorrow’s the day
My bride’s gonna come
Oh, oh, are we gonna fly
Down in the easy chair!
Buy me a flute
And a gun that shoots
Tailgates and substitutes
Strap yourself
To the tree with roots
You ain’t goin’ nowhere
Whoo-ee!
Ride me high
Tomorrow’s the day
My bride’s gonna come
Oh, oh, are we gonna fly
Down in the easy chair!
Genghis Khan
He could not keep
All his kings
Supplied with sleep
We’ll climb that hill no matter how steep
When we get up to it
Whoo-ee!
Ride me high
Tomorrow’s the day
My bride’s gonna come
Oh, oh, are we gonna fly
Down in the easy chair!
Track Name: Smile If You've Crossed Over
(Instrumental)
Track Name: Sunrise Ocean Bender
Nothing to believe in
Nothing worth seeing
It's ok
The dunes are frozen
Throw rocks in the ocean
The waves are astounding
The heart keeps on pounding
It's ok
Your arms are golden
Your sunlights are broken
When night is falling
You hear me calling
Can you tell me how to see
Can you tell me how to look
I can't find my way inside
I haven't read the book
It's ok