SongVault Artist Profile

Billy The Mountain - All About The Music

Progressive R&B rock band BILLY THE MOUNTAIN are based in Bangkok. The band - comprising Scot Zander Ran, Dane Nicolai Kehlet, and a team of seasoned session players - has plans to supply three albums over a two-year period and to tour the albums internationally while retaining rights to ticket, merchandise and album sales on the road.

“This band will sell. We reckon they are the Pink Floyd of the new century - and throw in a touch of Little Feat and Steely Dan and you have a very powerful combination of grooves and rock steady tunes supporting cool lyrics and awesome musicianship - no shredders and no predictable cock-rock neither," says band manager Tom Gray.

“To great response, we ran some of the tunes ‘naked’ on the band’s own www.myspace.com/thebillymountain site and then the band - principally Nicolai Kehlet - took over production and the result is an album of eight very special songs. And I have to say the big labels are now desperate to get their hands on this cool new music. But the band wants this to go to market via the Internet and we support that idea…err…given that we have little alternative,” he grinned.

“But the songs are awesome and I predict this album - this breath of musical fresh air - is going to be a classic!”

Producer Kehlet says the first album - Drifting To Valhalla - was written and recorded in Asia and features the songs and vocals of Zander Ran woven into a funky, laid-back fusion of blues and progressive rock ‘remniscent of days gone by but with a modern production feel,’ he says.

“We had a lot fun producing the album at my own studio here in Bangkok and we work well together with Zander’s great lyrics and tunes and dare I say my ear for a good beat and an FM-radio-friendly vibe. The truth is we write interesting stuff together and by that I mean we love our own music and play it all the time on our iPods, or in the car and at home. And if people want to buy it then that’s great too!

"Our fans tease us that we are the Floyd or Steely Dan of the 21st century and that’s crazy and scary…we are all Floyd and Steely Dan fans of course, but they are like gods to us…the idea that we are composers on the same planet is quite ridiculous. But we like the compliment that we might sound a bit like Little Feat and our new stuff is definitely going there - if anywhere at all.”

The band is already working on their second album tentatively titled “Born On Mars” and are again working at Kehlet’s Paradise Productions Studio in Bangkok.

Ran describes the new work as “driven by a desire to not let Lowell George be forgotten and everything we are writing right now is kind of a tribute to him and his gift as a groovemeister, singer and slide god.”

“There’s a bit of Hendrix in there too and if we are exposing our origins and ages then so be it. It’s about time! I grew up listening and playing while those guys…Zappa, Captain Beefheart and Alex Harvey and Jimi and Zepp were changing the world and we're going back consciously or otherwise to a time when music was new and adventurous and worth queuing to see live. I just hope we can do the times justice.”

(c) BILLY THE MOUNTAIN 2008