Blow Up Hollywood
Encyclopedia
Blow Up Hollywood is an underground American rock band. Their eclectic sound, built over a decade of recording, incorporates many different styles, diverse as progressive rock, post-rock, experimental, pop, classical, jazz and ambient soundscapes. Founded by Steve Messina and Nik Chinboukas in 2001, the group has evolved into more of a collective than a band, as some of their members have changed over the years.
Their sophomore CD, Fake, was released in 2004, and garnished critical acclaim.
In September 2004, John Diliberto
, the host of the radio show Echoes
, ran a feature on the band and had them perform live on air, bringing them national attention. That same year their live version of the song "beyond the stars" was included on the Echo's compilation CD, along side artists Yo-Yo Ma
, Kai King, and Will Ackerman.
Stars End - A one track ambient improvisation, was recorded live on November 14, 2004, at WXPN
in Philadelphia. The CD is titled after Chuck Van Zyl's show Star's End
which has aired every Saturday night since 1976. "We asked Chuck what we should play, and he gave us . So we improvised for an hour", one of the band members has stated.
In 2006 the band released what would become their most popular CD, both nationally and internationally. With the debate over the war in Iraq raging, the band released another concept album, The Diaries of Private Henry Hill. Based on the journal entries of a young, deceased soldier from the Iraq war, Blow Up Hollywood takes us on Private Henry Hills surreal journey as he joins the army out of necessity rather than patriotism.
That same year the album was released, Amy Goodman
, the host of the news show Democracy Now!
(a daily TV/radio news program, airing on over 900 stations, pioneering the largest community media collaboration in the United States) championed the band and the video for the song WMD playing it repeatedly on her show for weeks.
Rachael Maddow, the then host of The Rachael Maddow show on Air America Radio
, also invited the band to perform live and discuss the CD. And many other songs from the Diaries record were featured on NPR's program All Things Considered
.
In 2008, the band was invited by Tomas Young (an injured American soldier from the Iraq war ) and Eddie Vedder
(the lead vocalist of the American rock band Pearl Jam
) to have WMD included on the compilation soundtrack to the documentary film Body of War, alongside Bruce Springsteen
, Neil Young
, Tori Amos
, Tom Waits
, Roger Waters
(founding member of Pink Floyd
), and Eddie Vedder and Pearl Jam.
Body of War, directed by Ellen Spiro
and Phil Donahue
, is a 2007 documentary
following Tomas Young, an Iraq War veteran paralyzed from a bullet to the spine, on a physical and emotional journey as he adapts to his new body and begins to question the decision to go to war in Iraq
.
As Tomas's journey unfolds, the film cuts back and forth to Congressional proceedings in Washington, D.C.
Footage includes passionate speeches by Senator Robert Byrd
as well as a running tally of how each U.S. Senate member voted on the resolution to authorize President George W. Bush
to war in Iraq.
The National Board of Review named Body of War Best Documentary of 2007.
Phil Donahue and Ellen Spiro appeared on Bill Moyers Journal for a one hour special about Body of War.
Body of War: Songs that Inspired an Iraq War Veteran
, a double-CD compilation of songs curated by Iraq war veteran Tomas Young, was released by Sire Records on March 18, 2008 — two days before the fifth anniversary of the United States’ invasion of Iraq.
Young personally selected each of the tracks that appear on Body of War: Songs that Inspired an Iraq War Veteran, including Eddie Vedder's previously unreleased, live version of "No More," which was written specifically for the Body of War documentary and performed with Ben Harper at Lollapalooza 2007 in Chicago's Grant Park. The double-CD set also features incisive songs from John Lennon
, Bruce Springsteen
, Bright Eyes, Neil Young
, Lupe Fiasco
and Serj Tankian
.
The Body of War music site enables visitors to order the Body of War double CD set or buy the iTunes version of the album, view the video for “No More” by Ellen Spiro and special bonus footage with Tomas Young and Eddie Vedder, as well as link to sites and a forum where users can take action based on their feelings about the Iraq war.
All proceeds from Body of War: Songs That Inspired an Iraq War Veteran, which features original cover art designed and donated by acclaimed political artist Shepard Fairey
, go to benefit the non-profit organization Iraq Veterans Against the War
(IVAW), as chosen by Young. Founded in 2004 by Iraq War Veterans, IVAW’s goal is to give voice to the large number of active-duty service people and veterans who are against the war, but are under various pressures to remain silent. In September, Sire Records donated $100,000 to IVAW in the name of Young, who is a spokesperson for the organization.
"Blow Up Hollywood is an intriguing, intelligent progressive pop masterpiece, as good as any you will hear this year or any year." - Jedd Beaudoin
Musician, Singer and Composer Steve Messina goes onlinewithandrea to share the music of his group Blow Up Hollywood. Hosted by Andrea R. Garrison.
History
Their debut, self-titled CD, is a concept album about death and the afterlife. The CD was recorded in a beach house in West Hampton, New York, over the course of three weeks in March 2001, and was released the following year. Originally the recording was intended to be just a "musical vacation" amongst friends who had performed and recorded together in various groups and projects throughout the years. But after hearing the results, and enjoying the collaboration, they decided to release it, with Blow Up Hollywood as their moniker.Their sophomore CD, Fake, was released in 2004, and garnished critical acclaim.
In September 2004, John Diliberto
John Diliberto
John Diliberto is an award-winning radio producer, music writer, and host of Echoes, a radio program on Public Radio International featuring ambient, downtempo music "soundscapes"....
, the host of the radio show Echoes
Echoes (radio program)
Echoes is a daily two-hour music radio program hosted by John Diliberto featuring a soundscape of ambient, space, electronica, and New Age music. The program features in-depth artist interviews and intimate "living room" performances. Interview subjects have included Brian Eno, Peter Gabriel,...
, ran a feature on the band and had them perform live on air, bringing them national attention. That same year their live version of the song "beyond the stars" was included on the Echo's compilation CD, along side artists Yo-Yo Ma
Yo-Yo Ma
Yo-Yo Ma is an American cellist, virtuoso, and orchestral composer. He has received multiple Grammy Awards, the National Medal of Arts in 2001 and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2011...
, Kai King, and Will Ackerman.
Stars End - A one track ambient improvisation, was recorded live on November 14, 2004, at WXPN
WXPN
WXPN is a non-commercial, public radio station operated by the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia that broadcasts a music radio format called adult album alternative , along with many other format shows supported all with an indie slant...
in Philadelphia. The CD is titled after Chuck Van Zyl's show Star's End
Star's End
Star's End is a weekly, five-hour-long New Age music radio show broadcast by 88.5 WXPN, the University of Pennsylvania's radio station, in Philadelphia. It is the second longest-running show of its type in the world, after Hearts of Space.-History:...
which has aired every Saturday night since 1976. "We asked Chuck what we should play, and he gave us . So we improvised for an hour", one of the band members has stated.
In 2006 the band released what would become their most popular CD, both nationally and internationally. With the debate over the war in Iraq raging, the band released another concept album, The Diaries of Private Henry Hill. Based on the journal entries of a young, deceased soldier from the Iraq war, Blow Up Hollywood takes us on Private Henry Hills surreal journey as he joins the army out of necessity rather than patriotism.
That same year the album was released, Amy Goodman
Amy Goodman
Amy Goodman is an American progressive broadcast journalist, syndicated columnist, investigative reporter and author. Goodman is the host of Democracy Now!, an independent global news program broadcast daily on radio, television and the internet.-Early life:Goodman was born in Bay Shore, New York...
, the host of the news show Democracy Now!
Democracy Now!
Democracy Now! and its staff have received several journalism awards, including the Gracie Award from American Women in Radio & Television; the George Polk Award for its 1998 radio documentary Drilling and Killing: Chevron and Nigeria's Oil Dictatorship, on the Chevron Corporation and the deaths of...
(a daily TV/radio news program, airing on over 900 stations, pioneering the largest community media collaboration in the United States) championed the band and the video for the song WMD playing it repeatedly on her show for weeks.
Rachael Maddow, the then host of The Rachael Maddow show on Air America Radio
Air America Radio
Air America was an American radio network specializing in progressive talk programming...
, also invited the band to perform live and discuss the CD. And many other songs from the Diaries record were featured on NPR's program All Things Considered
All Things Considered
All Things Considered is the flagship news program on the American network National Public Radio. It was the first news program on NPR, and is broadcast live worldwide through several outlets...
.
In 2008, the band was invited by Tomas Young (an injured American soldier from the Iraq war ) and Eddie Vedder
Eddie Vedder
Eddie Vedder is an American musician and singer-songwriter who is best known for being the lead singer and one of three guitarists of the alternative rock band Pearl Jam. He is widely considered a cultural icon of alternative rock.He is also involved in soundtrack work and contributes to albums...
(the lead vocalist of the American rock band Pearl Jam
Pearl Jam
Pearl Jam is an American rock band that formed in Seattle, Washington, in 1990. Since its inception, the band's line-up has included Eddie Vedder , Jeff Ament , Stone Gossard , and Mike McCready...
) to have WMD included on the compilation soundtrack to the documentary film Body of War, alongside Bruce Springsteen
Bruce Springsteen
Bruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen , nicknamed "The Boss," is an American singer-songwriter who records and tours with the E Street Band...
, Neil Young
Neil Young
Neil Percival Young, OC, OM is a Canadian singer-songwriter who is widely regarded as one of the most influential musicians of his generation...
, Tori Amos
Tori Amos
Tori Amos is an American pianist, singer-songwriter and composer. She was at the forefront of a number of female singer-songwriters in the early 1990s and was noteworthy early in her career as one of the few alternative rock performers to use a piano as her primary instrument...
, Tom Waits
Tom Waits
Thomas Alan "Tom" Waits is an American singer-songwriter, composer, and actor. Waits has a distinctive voice, described by critic Daniel Durchholz as sounding "like it was soaked in a vat of bourbon, left hanging in the smokehouse for a few months, and then taken outside and run over with a car."...
, Roger Waters
Roger Waters
George Roger Waters is an English musician, singer-songwriter and composer. He was a founding member of the progressive rock band Pink Floyd, serving as bassist and co-lead vocalist. Following the departure of bandmate Syd Barrett in 1968, Waters became the band's lyricist, principal songwriter...
(founding member of Pink Floyd
Pink Floyd
Pink Floyd were an English rock band that achieved worldwide success with their progressive and psychedelic rock music. Their work is marked by the use of philosophical lyrics, sonic experimentation, innovative album art, and elaborate live shows. Pink Floyd are one of the most commercially...
), and Eddie Vedder and Pearl Jam.
Body of War, directed by Ellen Spiro
Ellen Spiro
Ellen Spiro is an American documentary filmmaker. Spiro is known for making humorous social issue films for national and international television broadcasts and theatrical release....
and Phil Donahue
Phil Donahue
Phillip John "Phil" Donahue is an American media personality, writer, and film producer best known as the creator and host of The Phil Donahue Show. The television program, also known as Donahue, was the first to use a talk show format. The show had a 26-year run on U.S...
, is a 2007 documentary
Documentary film
Documentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...
following Tomas Young, an Iraq War veteran paralyzed from a bullet to the spine, on a physical and emotional journey as he adapts to his new body and begins to question the decision to go to war in Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....
.
As Tomas's journey unfolds, the film cuts back and forth to Congressional proceedings in Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
Footage includes passionate speeches by Senator Robert Byrd
Robert Byrd
Robert Carlyle Byrd was a United States Senator from West Virginia. A member of the Democratic Party, Byrd served as a U.S. Representative from 1953 until 1959 and as a U.S. Senator from 1959 to 2010...
as well as a running tally of how each U.S. Senate member voted on the resolution to authorize President George W. Bush
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....
to war in Iraq.
The National Board of Review named Body of War Best Documentary of 2007.
Phil Donahue and Ellen Spiro appeared on Bill Moyers Journal for a one hour special about Body of War.
Soundtracks and credits
Body of War - The SoundtrackBody of War: Songs that Inspired an Iraq War Veteran
Body of War: Songs that Inspired an Iraq War Veteran
"Body of War: Songs that Inspired an Iraq War Veteran" is an album produced for the documentary Body of War. It was created to help make profits towards Young's organization, aside from complementing the film...
, a double-CD compilation of songs curated by Iraq war veteran Tomas Young, was released by Sire Records on March 18, 2008 — two days before the fifth anniversary of the United States’ invasion of Iraq.
Young personally selected each of the tracks that appear on Body of War: Songs that Inspired an Iraq War Veteran, including Eddie Vedder's previously unreleased, live version of "No More," which was written specifically for the Body of War documentary and performed with Ben Harper at Lollapalooza 2007 in Chicago's Grant Park. The double-CD set also features incisive songs from John Lennon
John Lennon
John Winston Lennon, MBE was an English musician and singer-songwriter who rose to worldwide fame as one of the founding members of The Beatles, one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music...
, Bruce Springsteen
Bruce Springsteen
Bruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen , nicknamed "The Boss," is an American singer-songwriter who records and tours with the E Street Band...
, Bright Eyes, Neil Young
Neil Young
Neil Percival Young, OC, OM is a Canadian singer-songwriter who is widely regarded as one of the most influential musicians of his generation...
, Lupe Fiasco
Lupe Fiasco
Wasalu Muhammad Jaco , better known by his stage name Lupe Fiasco , is an American rapper, record producer, and entrepreneur. As an entrepreneur, Lupe is the CEO of 1st and 15th Entertainment. He rose to fame in 2006 following the success of his critically acclaimed debut album, Lupe Fiasco's Food...
and Serj Tankian
Serj Tankian
Serj Tankian is a Lebanese-born Armenian-American singer–songwriter, composer, multi-instrumentalist, playwright, record producer, poet, and political activist...
.
The Body of War music site enables visitors to order the Body of War double CD set or buy the iTunes version of the album, view the video for “No More” by Ellen Spiro and special bonus footage with Tomas Young and Eddie Vedder, as well as link to sites and a forum where users can take action based on their feelings about the Iraq war.
All proceeds from Body of War: Songs That Inspired an Iraq War Veteran, which features original cover art designed and donated by acclaimed political artist Shepard Fairey
Shepard Fairey
Frank Shepard Fairey is an American contemporary graphic designer, and illustrator who emerged from the skateboarding scene. He first became known for his "André the Giant Has a Posse" sticker campaign, in which he appropriated images from the comedic supermarket tabloid Weekly World News. His...
, go to benefit the non-profit organization Iraq Veterans Against the War
Iraq Veterans Against the War
Iraq Veterans Against the War is an advocacy group of active-duty United States military personnel, Iraq War veterans, Afghanistan War veterans, and other veterans who have served since the September 11, 2001 attacks who are opposed to the U.S. occupation of Iraq...
(IVAW), as chosen by Young. Founded in 2004 by Iraq War Veterans, IVAW’s goal is to give voice to the large number of active-duty service people and veterans who are against the war, but are under various pressures to remain silent. In September, Sire Records donated $100,000 to IVAW in the name of Young, who is a spokesperson for the organization.
"Blow Up Hollywood is an intriguing, intelligent progressive pop masterpiece, as good as any you will hear this year or any year." - Jedd Beaudoin
Musician, Singer and Composer Steve Messina goes onlinewithandrea to share the music of his group Blow Up Hollywood. Hosted by Andrea R. Garrison.
Songs used in television
- ABC's 20/20
- CBS' CSI- MiamiCSI: MiamiCSI: Miami is an American police procedural television series, which premiered on September 23, 2002 on CBS. The series is a spin-off of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation....
- Harley Davidson CommercialHarley-DavidsonHarley-Davidson , often abbreviated H-D or Harley, is an American motorcycle manufacturer. Founded in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, during the first decade of the 20th century, it was one of two major American motorcycle manufacturers to survive the Great Depression...
Band members
- Nik Chinboukas – electric and acoustic guitar, keys, bass, vocals
- Dave Diamond – drums, piano, keys, bass
- Rich Kern – electric guitar, piano, keys
- Thad Debrock – electric and acoustic guitar, piano, keys
- Daniel Mintseris – piano, keys
- Dave Eggar - cello, piano
- Steven Bonacio – bass
- Andrew Pfaff – bass
- Steve Messina – vocals, electric and acoustic guitar, piano, bass, keys
Discography
- 2002 - Blow Up Hollywood
- 2004 - Fake
- 2005 - Stars End
- 2006 - The Diaries of Private Henry Hill
- 2008 - Body of War
- 2010 - Take Flight
- 2010 - Brutus Faust (alter ego and band of artist Andres Serrano, Blow Up Hollywood as backup band)
- 2011 - Collections