Esquela

Esquela recorded "Are We Rolling" live over the course of three days in a Tijuana brothel, once occupied by Charles Bukowski and Jack Kerouac, along with Eric 'Roscoe' Ambel, a Tascam 8 track recorder, the Bovina Rock Primer, 11 bottles of tequila and an ounce of pure Columbian "mother of pearl" shale. Well, actually none of that is even remotely true, (except for the Eric 'Roscoe' Ambel part), but this album is so cool it deserves a story that resists the every day mundane description of recorded at blah-blah studios, by a guy that recorded with so and so...you get the picture. Actually I have no idea what the specifics were that went into the recording of "Are We Rolling" but the end result cries out for something bigger than the typical "one-sheet" shuffle.

Truth be told, a lot of what's going on today in the "Americana" world is pretty contrived. When something appears to be gaining ground on the commercial front the "shape shifters" line up and mold themselves into the "flavor and sons" of the month. Problem is, even the biggest Americana records aren't leading to guitar shaped pools and tour buses full of groupies yet, so for god's sake people, be yourselves and just make music that's real or at least really yours. That is right in 'Roscoe' Ambel's wheelhouse. Come ready to play, be yourself and he'll twist the right knobs to make sure you don't leave with something that feels like you picked it out of a magazine in the waiting room and said "make me that."

So, back to Esquela. "Are We Rolling" is the sophomore effort from the Binghamton, NY based band and it teams up the same basic cast of lead characters as the debut "The Owls Have Landed." Ex Georgia Satellite Keith Christopher (guitars) and Esquela founder John "Chico" Finn (bass, vocals) once again brew up a mix of honky-tonk melody laced with truck stop diesel energy and Gypsy-punk harmonies that all wrap very neatly around Rebecca Frame's "cooler than snake oil" sales pitch. Rebecca Frame makes me wonder what an early Grace Slick might have sounded like through a cow-punk filter. Like all the old time Gypsy wagons, Esquela opens the doors to stragglers found along the way and newcomers to the show this time around are drummer Todd Russell and guitarist Brian Shafer with twang provided by Ira MacIntosh (guitar and banjo) and Matt Woodin (guitar and mandolin). All of that and the keen guidance once again by one of the truly original and honest production voices out there, Eric Ambel, and the second helping of Esquela is just as tasty and goes down just as easy as the first.
That said, this is a serious album from a band that comes out swinging on subjects ranging from politics and labor to war and religion with lyrical sting and roundhouse punches at both the left and right side of greed, hypocricy and immorality. They aren't marching in lock step with anyone but themselves and their own drum beat and you have to love that about any artist. Is this "every-note-is-perfect,"" overdubbed-to-infinitum,"" cookie-cutter-Americana-bullshit?" Um, no...it's more say, let's write a bunch of cool songs about the world around us and record an album like we play live; raw, full of emotion, human imperfection and most of all "don't-take-yourself-so-fucking-serious," like music is supposed to be. Bottom line, this is how to make an album folks. Be real, be honest, say something substantial and don't pretend to be something you're not. Now if the Americana music scene at large would only take notice. - The Alternate Root

This had the look and initial sound of being a good bar band, maybe a really good bar band. But after a few songs went by, it is clear that Esquela has a firm grasp of the sound of the American heartland and can play roots rock with the best of them. Rebecca Frame’s lead vocals stand out nicely as her strength is not as overt as a Joplin (whose is?), but she has a quiet power that resonates with the crisp attack of the guitar work on top of the punch rhythm section. This music goes down smoothly and satisfyingly without a lot of frills. This is rock music of any age and it would be hard not enjoy this band on a stage in a club near you. Being that they are not too terribly far away from me, I hope that happens for me some day soon. - Folk World

Esquela, a band who members say are “a proud purveyor of Bovina Rock sound.” The band sings about topics we can all relate to; war, politics, relationships and everyone’s everyday life. Esquela is amazingly long in talent with original songwriting pushing forth a passionate rock sound with masterful lyrics that draws listeners in with a classic raw Americana Rock Sound.

Featuring John “Chico” Finn on vocals and bass, Rebecca Frame on vocals, amazing Brian Shafer on lead guitar, Todd Russell on vocals and drums, Matt Woodin playing mandolin and guitar, Ira McIntosh-Guitar, mandolin and banjo, and Keith Christopher on guitar and the music director, these guys rock the Deleware Valley. - 99.1 FM WAAL, Binghamton, NY (Townsquare Media)

Wow! Now this is what I call a voice! The ESQUELA BAND is coming out of Bovina, New York and they feature an amazing female singer called Rebecca Frame. She sounds magical and possesses a voice which you do not hear very often. BETH HART and DANA FUCHS might be good comparisons, but actually Rebecca has an own identity and while listening you might really think she’s a black Gospel singer from the 1960s or something! Anyway, thankfully the music is also quite good, rocking harder than expected, this Americana/Bluesy rootsy rock and roll band offers some serious high quality rock and roll, with great guitarwork by lead guitarist Brian Shafer. The first 3 songs are very strong uptempo pieces, while the following pieces are slightly calmer, but “Out of sight” picks up the uptempo style again. That is one of the strongest songs by the way, even musically it reminds me a bit of 1970s HEART with vocals that sound like JANIS JOPLIN and GRACE SLICK. I have absolutely no idea why this band has not been discovered yet, because they would definitely do well across the European Summer Music Festival scene. Check them out for yourself at: http://www.esquelatheband.com/ - Strutterzine

The sextet Esquela is a six-member band from sunny California after "The Owl Has Landed" from the year 2010 a few months before her second album "Rolling Are We?" has published. Involved in the band is the Georgia Satellites founding member Keith Christopher, who was not involved in the recording of ten tracks, along with John 'Chico' Finn but nine of the ten songs collected here wrote. Featured is really good roots rock with great melodies and catchy choruses.
Can make immediately feel the front lady Rebecca frame that features a super strong, sometimes even soulful voice. It would have been a shame if a number like "Free Beer" would not go immediately into the legs. But does it naturally and the listener gets right at the start before offered a cool mid-tempo rocker that is not necessarily profound, but makes a hell of fun.
Speaking of profound: So it's done, however, immediately in the form of anti-war number "No Questions" section. "Take us to war, add 'just no questions and do what you are commanded. If you follow this simple rule, you will then also guaranteed to go to heaven! "In a nutshell here a damn devilish game is brought to the point at which a human life is not so much times more valuable as an empty department store for a kleptomaniac ... great song!
However, the Californians have a lot of fun in the cheeks, as the only one of 'Chico' Finn brought to the Lead Vocals Track "phone home" proves. Rebecca frame is here only to hear with their backing vocals, but what they also solves really good. "My Friend" has completely removed Neil Young bonds when "'In A Free World Rockin' thinks of pieces such as. But the mere song and the arrangement of the track make this Chose then back to a pure Esquela piece.
One of my favorites is "Free Bird" (not the Skynyrd song), while the band and show off especially Rebecca frame again quite large. Quite apart from the obvious live atmosphere in the studio, this song is not only in the legs, but primarily in the stomach. On top of that the track is still an absolute catchy tune that would have been my first choice for a single (the band decided, probably because of the message, for "No Questions").
In the single cover of the disc is "Tossin 'And Turnin'", which originally released in 1961 by Bobby Lewis classic, which has since been covered many times over. From Esquela the number gets a fine rock painting representing a successful completion of this album.
"Are We rolling?" is a plate that you listen to how much fun the band had in the studio. And this joy as well as ease automatically transmitted to the receiver. First, because this really good song material is present, further because we are dealing with great musicians and to a really hot singer. Actually, there is only one drawback, and that means the season of just a little over half an hour. Otherwise you get really strong material offered here.
Who the term does not necessarily interfere (and appreciate the skills of the former Steve Earle & The Dukes member Eric 'Roscoe' Ambel as producer knows) or if the part is available at a fair price, then you should definitely strike if you stands on really great homemade American Roots Rock!
Line-up:
John 'Chico' Finn (bass, background vocals, lead vocals - # 4)
Rebecca frame (lead vocals)
Todd Russell (drums, background vocals)
Brian Shafer (lead guitars, background vocals)
Matt Woodin (guitars, mandolin, background vocals)
Ira McIntosh (guitars, mandolin, banjo, background vocals)

With:
Eric 'Roscoe' Ambel (guitars, background vocals) - Rock Times

Singer-songwriter John "Chico" Finn and guitarist Keith Christopher decided in 2009 to join forces. Supplemented with singer Rebecca Frame, who has a reputation locally with her band (Rebecca Frame and The Honest Mistakes) and a number of renowned musicians, the album "The Owl Has Landed" recorded with producer Eric Ambel. John makes no secret and the fact that he was inspired by the Nigerian master Fela Kuti, who is best known for his swinging afrobeat. The album features tracks from the band Esquela like African Civil War, Whose Land Is It Anyway and to Fela Kuti Country entrusted with a distinct African atmosphere. The musical setting of these songs is fascinating and swings, but in a subdued and sultry way. Multiple spins are needed to discover its beauty.

Besides intense pressure to "The Owl Has Landed" includes space for heartfelt songs played roots. On beautiful songs such as Here and Now, Richie and Music Is My Mistress's hear why the choice fell on Rebecca as a singer. Where the range is fairly limited John Finn has a powerful and raw voice with arrangements of Janis Joplin, Melissa Etheridge and our own Frederique Spigt. Rebecca knows the raw altcountrysongs to great heights. "The Owl Has Landed" nobody has a little valley (Tin Horns) sung by Keith Christopher. Furthermore, this excellent album with the cover design of the then twelve year old John Finn, a journey full of unpolished energy from Africa to New York. - Alt Country Forum (Netherlands)

John "Chico" Finn is a well known musician in Milwaukee at an early age already fully composed his own songs and simple melodies to funny, ironic and sometimes emotional lyrics to sing.

He is the undisputed leader of "Esquela, originally a duo but a band with three core members:" Chico "Finn, recently polled singer Rebecca Frame, and the musical brains of the group, Keith Christopher, in ancient times ever founding member of the group 'Georgia Satellites'. From 'Esquela' recently published a debut album entitled "The Owl Has Landed". Containing ten original songs which we will need several listenings before they can really convince.

It all sounds a bit messy and almost recorded live, all the carefree style of the seventies. There were many guest musicians in the studio were ordered to their contribution to these recordings to be delivered. The robust vocals of Rebecca Frame in the style of Bonnie Raitt or Janis Joplin betray a fierce rock past and still require some getting here.

Started on this CD is the song "Commies Stink" that "Chico" Finn in the last years of his secondary studies and has written here as a "feel-good sing-along will be charged. Then brings Rebecca Frame "Here And Now" which is followed by a swinging rocker "Jackie" about an American football and star that at incomprehensible manner and with the support of the school board succeeds to a conviction for murder of two people manages to escape.

As sarcastic as charged and appearing first single "Hands On My Jammies" sings "Chico" Finn bizarre sexual preferences with appropriate grains of salt can be seen as a funny song. The banjo played alt.countryballad "Music Is My Mistress" is then brought to us too sloppy to truly captivate. For the committed song "Tin Horns" Christopher Keith takes the same vocals. The powerful soul voice of Rebecca Frame comes after very well accounted for in the song "Richie" in our opinion the best song on "The Owl Has Landed" has become.

As indicated earlier, we had hoped that the production of Eric "Roscoe" Ambel - previously with ao Ryan Adams, Marshall Crenshaw and The Del-Lords has worked - what more could have been polished. But maybe we do it wrong and it was precisely not the intention of Esquela.

(Valsam) - Rootstime Review (Belgium)

Interview with John "Chico" Finn:
1.0 Being an ‘upstate’ NY band, is it easy to identify with, or actually be influenced by, “The Band”? Well, a little of both. I can certainly identify with them as for how they got started – as Ronnie Hawkin’s band The Hawks – where they played all over Canada getting their chops down. That is what Esquela has done over the last year by playing out, doing as many gigs as we could and really getting to know one another and trust our musicianship. As far as The Band locating to Woodstock, I can understand why they did so. It is a beautiful area and fairly close to NYC .

2.0 Is there an ‘upstate’ scene today? I think there is. The farther north you go from NYC, the more affordable it is to reside. I believe you would be hard pressed to find a nice property for less than $1 million in the Woodstock area. As with the East Village now gentrifying and the new East Village becoming Williamsburg & Bushwick, the same is true here in the Catskills. There are more artists of all sorts working their way further north. The Andes Hotel (Andes, NY) is one of my favorite venues up here because they support the local scene, are always busy and they take care of the bands.

3.0 How did Esquela come together? Mainly, because of Keith Christopher, our lead guitar player. I’ve known Keith for close to fifteen years, since he was the bass player in my brother’s band, Disciples of Agriculture, and I was their manager. Soon thereafter, I started taking bass lessons from Keith and we continued this relationship and he and I would regularly team up in various other bands like TCR/Tony Clifton Revival where we only played CCR tunes with a Tony Clifton impersonator! We also played together in The El Mighty Chicos; Fate Denied Us Victory, Future Farmers of America, Pispoure and ultimately in Disciples of Agriculture. In most cases, Keith was playing guitar or drums and I would play bass. In 2008, Keith and I were riding back to the City after a gig and he asked if I wanted to hear a CD of Fela Kuti. I remember him saying “you probably won’t like it”. But he was wrong – it was so good that I think we listened to the record two times through during the trip. Fela’s music was very inspiring. I had just gotten an old version of Protools and I was messing around with it – started dropping down chords and beats and naturally brought Keith up to fill out most of the parts. I had some lyrics that I had been fooling around with…started putting them together with the songs and the next thing you knew we had a bunch of songs. My vocals were the scratch tracks and they just weren’t that good and I knew of this one really great singer in our area, Rebecca Frame. I brought her in to record as many as I could convince her to sing on. She liked some of the ones I sang on, so we left that and of course Keith did a great job on “Tin Horns”, so we left that one alone too. Once the record was coming together and Eric “Roscoe” Ambel was involved, Keith and I put a band together to play out. We knew it would be us two and Rebecca and from there it made sense to add Matt Woodin on mandolin and rhythm guitar, because he plays with Rebecca in their band, The Honest Mistakes. Richie Tousell is an old friend of Keith’s and they’ve played together a bunch over the years and the drummer who plays most of our gigs is Todd Russell who I grew up with.

4.0 How much guitar did Eric Ambel play on “The Owl Has Landed? Roscoe really did a great job at adding subtleties to the recording. I believe he added guitar tracks to most of the songs – but ones that jump out the most are in “Richie” and “Here and Now”. He also added a honky-tonk type piano on “Richie”. He added keys here or there; vocals; accordion; percussion, etc. – whatever he felt the track needed. Keith can play any instrument. He would play the drums and make the drums sound like an instrument. He added keys when needed and played the rhythm tracks as well as the leads. Backing vocals, lead vocals, tambourine; whatever we needed, he did it.

5.0 Are you happy with the way it turned out? Yes, especially after Roscoe finished with it. He took the rough parts and made it all smooth. Having never had done this before, I was very apprehensive and had self-doubt. But by having Roscoe step in and be a part of what Keith and I started, really gave me confidence that this was a nice piece of work. I am proud of it. Granted, it may not be for all or not be the most complicated musical compositions – but it came from the heart and I think that passion can translate.

6.0 What are your favorite tracks on the record? I would say “Here and Now” and “Tin Horns” . “Here and Now” was written as a tribute to my Mother, who died in a one car car accident and it was a tragic and early end to a wonderful life. She was an artist and was very influential to me. In fact, the cover art, I did in 6th grade when she was my art teacher…on the back it says “A+ well drawn and well-placed on pa - No Depression

Here is a disc I had in a stack for a month or so. Frankly, I can’t even recall getting it in the mail and don’t know who sent it. So I pop it in the car cd player and thought, “Wow, what a great sound. Who are these guys?” Turns out the band is a group called Esquela and the disc, their debut, is called The Owl Has Landed.

While the band as a whole are not newcomers, what first caught my ear in their music was a newcomer, vocalist Rebecca Frame. Man, I love her voice. Plenty of power and grit to hold up to the power music the band lays down. She totally had me by the third song on the disc, Jackie, which has now been stuck in my head for over two hours! The band has an edgy sound a bit like mid 70s Stones music.

The band was formed by upstate-NY-native John “Chico” Finn (bass, vocals) and the and veteran Keith Christopher (lead guitar, vocals). Some of the bands energy makes sense seeing that Christopher was a founding member of the not-too-mellow band The Georgia Satellites who has recorded and performed with Kenny Wayne Sheppard, Billy Joe Shaver, Paul Westerberg, and Todd Snyder.

Other standout trackes include the opening cut, Commies Stink, Hand On My Jammies, and Music Is My Mistress (AKA Cheatin’) which starts “You were with her last night at the local bar, night before she was in your car” and features a new percussion instrument, the dropped (beer I hope) can! - Americana Roots

Offering up ten tracks worth of supremely groovy and soul rootsy rock’n’roll done with a certain appealing no-frills immediacy and a winning dearth of high-falutin’ pretense, this album goes down nice and easy. Lead singer Rebecca’s splendidly hoarse and gritty, yet reassuring and captivating voice belts out the smart and thoughtful lyrics with extremely warm and comforting aplomb. The gradual tempos and syncopated beats chug along at a pleasingly relaxed shuffling rhythm. Kudos are also in order for the sweetly harmonic arrangements. Best of all, there’s even an amusingly sweet and folksy low-key humor evident throughout. A total treat. - Jersey Beat