What happens when the world’s most raucous rock/fusion instrumental power trio decides to make a concept album? You get Duck, the story of a web-footed Antarctic island native fleeing a penguin policeman all the way to New York City…where considerable misadventure and danger await. The Aristocrats – Guthrie Govan/guitar, Bryan Beller/bass, Marco Minnemann/drums – have created a kaleidoscopic musical universe, employing both trademark genre pastiches and inventive new arrangement explorations – some surprisingly emotional and sensitive – to move the story along to its frantic conclusion. And while their obvious virtuosity and inherent absurdity are present as always, it’s now employed in service of the band’s most ambitious compositional and sonic production to date.
“We’ve always been writing with a storytelling aspect in mind, and our live shows always include our stories behind the songs,” says the band, speaking as one. “But the stories had mainly been about us. Then Marco came into the studio with a song about a duck, and we were all looked at each other and said, ‘What if all of stories for the songs on this album…happened to a duck? What’s that story about?’ And suddenly we had a concept album on our hands.”
The wildly diverse music follows the protagonist duck into a big city dance club (“Aristoclub”) to being forcibly ejected from a dive bar (“Hey, Where’s My Drink Package?”) to a dark-riffed theme for his penguin pursuer (“Sgt. Rockhopper”), eventually concluding with the action-packed, Balkan-fusion finale “This Is Not Scrotum”, featuring violinist Rusanda Panfili (Hans Zimmer Live) as a rare Aristocrats album special guest.
Mixed by Australian sonic guru Forrester Savell, and with original character artwork by Lance Myers (Space Jam), Duck is The Aristocrats’ first new studio album in five years. And it’s clear that Guthrie Govan, Bryan Beller and Marco Minnemann have taken their collective artistry to a whole new mindblowing – albeit ridiculous – level.
Duck will be released on February 16th. Pre-order here.
Check out the official visualizer for new single, "Aristoclub", below.
The band comments: "This one’s called 'Aristoclub', and it’s our tongue-in-cheek pastiche of an ultra-mainstream 1990s dance song. Bryan wrote it to be loosely inspired by C & C Music Factory, Marky Mark & The Funky Bunch, and Technotronic - unlikely source material for Aristocrats-style guitar-driven instrumental rock/fusion, to be sure! But Guthrie did some amazing guitar sequencing on this, and Marco put his own spin on some classic dance beats. It hopefully goes to show we can throw just about anything in the blender and have it come out the other side as something fun and wild. In keeping with the concept album’s narrative, the Aristoclub is also one of the first places our Duck protagonist lands upon arriving in the big city, thousands of miles from his Antarctic island home. It’s loud and crazy in there, and he just wants to have a good time after such an arduous journey - but is he being followed?"
