The songs comprising Sunshower—produced by the band and noted engineer Chris Ribando (The Black Crowes, Priestbird, Mary J. Blige)—blend contemporary styles with a myriad of classic influences, from Dylan and The Beatles to Pink Floyd and Fleetwood Mac to The Police and Talking Heads. But you wouldn’t immediately hear them. The band has a knack for combining all of those influences into something utterly vital and wholly their own, as they’ve done on first single “Flaming Arrow,” a shimmering, ringing acoustic folk tune shot through with a bumping bassline and New Orleans inspired drum groove.
Sunshower dazzles on tracks like the dancefloor-friendly “Simple Stones,” filled with handclaps and soulful economic riffing that boasts a bass line for the ages while blending ‘80s Stones and MGMT. The epic opener “Volcano” melds The Beach Boys with The Flaming Lips, while delivering one of the disc’s best choruses. If Ishibashi conjures The Shins on “Find Me a Place,” he drops vintage, finger-picking folk on disc-closer “People in the Mountain.” As guitarist Zac Colwell puts it: “We can sound like Simon & Garfunkel, The Kooks, or even from a webisode of Yacht Rock.”
If they had their way, listeners would ingest each track on Sunshower as they would a new chapter in a never-boring book. Says singer/multi-instrumentalist K Ishibashi, “We approach every song like, ‘Will people be able to listen to this over and over again?’ ”
“Each song is like a little world,” adds Colwell. “We’re the same four guys playing the music on each track, but we just like to get way down in there and explore that little world.”
What K Ishibashi (lead vocals), Zac Colwell (lead guitar), Dave Heilman (drums) and Pat Dougherty (bass) have created as a result is a hook-heavy album tailor-made for our ADD times. And that mix-it-up mentality suits the band, as its songs are written by either Colwell or Ishibashi, each of whom have opposing approaches to lyric and melody.
“K leaves things a little more open for the listener,” says Colwell, who also plays keyboards and flute and adds backing vocals. “I consciously try to have a little narrative, and tell a story.” Counters Ishibashi, who plays guitar and violin in addition to singing lead on Sunshower: “His songs are pretty dark. I write bright, fun stuff, a lot of it stemming from one really big emotional experience. I’m more analytical, more left brain, he’s more right.”
“If there’s a theme to the album, it would definitely be bittersweetness,” Colwell continues.
“There’s definitely some humor, playfulness, but there’s also this twenty-something, we-have-to-temper-our-excitement sort of thing, especially being New Yorkers. Our elation is always checked, and some of the lyrics reflect that.” Bittersweet can be contradictory in terms, but in this case, these four unique personalities colorfully complement one another.
Although officially formed in 2003, the seeds for Jupiter One were planted in 2000 when Austin native Colwell and Ishibashi (raised in Virginia) met while working as touring musicians with a traveling circus, the Barnum Kaleidoscope. Bonding over their love for all music from soul to classical Indian, the duo began performing instrumental music in New York in the early 2000s, gradually working their way toward pop music incorporating vocals, and gigs at Pianos, Arlene’s Grocery and other reputable venues around Manhattan. “We noticed that once we started singing, girls started coming to shows,” laughs Colwell.
A former member of the popular STOMP performance collective, New Jersey-born drummer Heilman, caught an early incarnation of Jupiter One at a now-defunct bar in New York’s Lower East Side. “There was a unique, analog keyboard sound, something you don’t really hear anymore, especially then, in 2004,” he says, “and it just created this incredible sense of nostalgia. It made me feel like the band’s music was already history. It totally felt classic, and it made me sit up on the edge of my seat.” The current incarnation of the band coalesced with the addition of Delaware-raised bassist Pat Dougherty.
Taking its name from the spaceship in the ‘60s television show Lost in Space, Jupiter One made its recorded debut in 2005 with a self-titled EP, three songs from which made the transition—albeit in re-recorded form—to the group’s official self-titled debut album. The songs on Jupiter One scored the band a slew of high-level song-placements in TV and film projects (including the upcoming indie film Broken Windows, MLB Opening Day ‘09, NASCAR Talladega Race ’09 NBC’s Heroes Tribute, and the Sci-Fi channel’s Flash Gordon), as well as a number of video games (Madden NFL ’08, NHL ’08, etc.), and commercials (Payless‘09, Mazda ‘08).
Behind the new wave-inspired Jupiter One, the band members—having quit their day jobs—criss-crossed the States, building a fan base and surviving on Subway’s five-dollar footlong special, laughs Heilman. “We spent 14 months sluggin’ it out in the clubs,” he says. “We did not want to be some sort of boring web sensation. We wanted to meet our fans face to face.” And the work has paid off. “It’s definitely a show we’ve put time into, so it’s not just four guys playing a song, it’s supposed to be a spectacle,” says Colwell.
With producer/engineer Ribando at the controls, Sunshower embraces warmer, analog sounds and vintage recording techniques. “It’s the sound of the four of us playing together, rather than layering in the studio,” says Colwell. “Instead of piecemeal, it’s the way we actually sound live.”
Forgetting the sound for a minute, and thinking about the songs, Ishibashi adds: “We just want people to internalize them. We want Sunshower to be a journey.”
Anna
Jupiter One Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
He had you wondering how a star can burn out
When it's just begun
It may seem like you never learn from your mistakes
But when a heart gets drunk on a face and some words
Then a picture forms, doesn't take too long
Anna you're in love again
Can you remember when you didn't swear it would never last
You told me from time to time
That your lighthouse would sometimes disappear
Now Anna, you're falling in love too fast
Late for work today, you say you walked the wrong way
What are you thinking ‘bout, girl, when a voice breaks through
Clears the daydreams away
A distant light, sometimes a foghorn in the night
Is your reminder you were just a child when you know
That you needed someone to prove you wrong
But you didn't know it would take so long
Anna you're in love again
You saw a lighthouse calling to you
Can you remember when you didn't swear it would never last
You told me from time to time
That your lighthouse would sometimes disappear
Now Anna, you're falling in love too fast
The lyrics of Jupiter One's song "Anna" tell the story of a woman who has once again fallen in love. The first verse describes her previous relationship, which was like a "distant sun" that burned out too quickly. Despite this failed romance, Anna becomes quickly enamored with a new person, someone who is like a lighthouse calling to her. The chorus repeats the phrase "Anna you're in love again," as if the singer is both happy for Anna and concerned that she may be moving too quickly.
The second verse gives a hint as to why Anna may be so quick to jump into new relationships. The singer suggests that Anna is looking for someone to "prove her wrong," implying that she may have a negative view of love or may have been hurt in the past. The final lines of the song reinforce this idea, as the singer notes that Anna is "falling in love too fast" and may not be learning from her mistakes.
Overall, "Anna" is a poignant exploration of love, heartbreak, and the struggles of finding lasting happiness. The imagery of the lighthouse and the distant sun create a sense of longing and uncertainty, and the repetition of "Anna you're in love again" gives the song a melancholy yet hopeful tone.
Line by Line Meaning
The last one was like a distant sun
Your previous lover seemed so far away from you now
He had you wondering how a star can burn out
When it's just begun
Your previous lover left you feeling confused and questioning why things ended so quickly
It may seem like you never learn from your mistakes
But when a heart gets drunk on a face and some words
Then a picture forms, doesn't take too long
You may constantly fall in love and get hurt, but it happens so easily that you can't help it
Anna you're in love again
You saw a lighthouse calling to you
Can you remember when you didn't swear it would never last
You've fallen in love again and it feels like a beacon of hope, despite past hurt and skepticism
You told me from time to time
That your lighthouse would sometimes disappear
Now Anna, you're falling in love too fast
You've mentioned in the past that you have doubts about love, but now you're falling into it too quickly
Late for work today, you say you walked the wrong way
What are you thinking ‘bout, girl, when a voice breaks through
Clears the daydreams away
You've been lost in thought lately, to the point of getting lost on your way to work, but a sudden interruption wakes you up
A distant light, sometimes a foghorn in the night
Is your reminder you were just a child when you know
That you needed someone to prove you wrong
But you didn't know it would take so long
You often look to a distant light or sound to remind you of something you needed as a child - someone to show you that love can last. However, you never expected it to take so long to find.
Contributed by Kaylee I. Suggest a correction in the comments below.