Volumen 1 :: Shane Hickey
Volumen 2 :: Doug Smith
Volumen^2 :: Bryan Hickey
bKCAWCK :: Chris Bacon
Volumen Beta :: Bob Marshall


 
Doug Smith Volumen 2
Doug Smith

If Shane is the high school Physics Club treasurer of VOLUMEN, Doug is the affable, popular guy who toes the fine line between band dork and senior class president. Cheerleaders leak the info that they want him to ask them out, but he�s always genuinely nice to the less popular girls and boys, too. In addition to writing most of what doesn�t get written by his longtime friend and musical partner, Shane (in the platonic sense, that is�at least we THINK so), Doug�s signature wikkid lyxx and fine tenor are the yin to Shane�s yang, the butter to Shane�s muffin, the hot dog in Shane�s....well, anyway, the other half of the songwriting equation. Additionally, Doug is a beacon of calm and tranquility in his other bandmates� roiling sea of adolescent squirreliness, and a fine cook to boot. The last male bonding I did with Doug was undertaken when we spent two days in the Montana wilderness picking morel mushrooms. Oh, the magic he worked with those little morsels...


 
 
Here's some articles and other random press for your viewing pleasure.

Missoula Independent 08/23/2001
URL: View Actual Article
Title: A mini rock opera and the whimsically sublime
Author: Andy Smetanka

Super Confident Guy, Volumen

Volumen are just so damned good. It was great to see a crowded house for them at last week�s CD release party�all their friends and fans, as well as a number of people who seemed to be there either accidentally or for the event more than the music, but got a healthy dose of Volumen at their most showmanshippin� into the bargain. A number of people mentioned they�d never heard, only heard of. I think I�m getting to be rather a connoisseur, and I�d say their performance was not only typically good, but one of the better shows of theirs I�ve seen this year. A change of venue certainly added to that feeling, as did the gung-ho crowd.

As for the CD part, Super Confident Guy isn�t really huge news as a release unless you were one of the unfortunate few (quite a few, actually) who caught on to the Volumen phenomenon too late to pick up the first pressing of their sold-out How Do You Spell...? CD, released in June of last year. Which is basically what Super Confident Guy is�a canny move for making the 15-song How Do You Spell...? available again with three new tracks and a remix, packaged backwards as an EP with bonus album included.

As is usually the case with any album or movie or book you�ve loved almost to the point of hating it, I really envy anyone getting to hear these songs for the first time. After someone forwarded me an ambivalent review of How Do You Spell...? in a Spokane weekly a few months ago, a politely dissenting letter to the editor eventually brought it to light that the CD had been making the rounds of the office for almost a year and that everyone who heard it fell in love with it. So much so that no one felt comfortable reviewing it, so the task was given to a freelancer who probably listened to it once before voicing the same conclusion as a lot of other reviewers: silly, undignified, and a trifle distracting.

I generally agree, but I also consider those traits to be strengths as opposed to weaknesses. God, who needs another grimly serious and self-absorbed band? One thing that emerges from reading Volumen reviews by people who have never seen them live is that, for as obviously talented as they are on their recordings, you really need to see them live to appreciate just how talented. And fun. This live-show comeuppance would be especially edifying for the detractors who find them undeniably talented in a throwaway kind of way.

That�s a bonus to living in Missoula. Alas, many would-be converts will never get the chance to see Volumen live. So, for those legions who can be safely counted on to Just Not Get It, Super Confident Guy probably won�t do much to cut through the mumblings of �joke band� touched off by its predecessor. Three new songs�the celebrated title track, �F.O.F.� and �Videogamin�,� plus an interesting but generally inexplicable �S.C.G.� remix by DJ Major Terror (aka Aaron Bolton)�that resemble their current live versions more closely than do most of the songs on the bonus album.

My one complaint is that, of all the songs they could have recorded with electronic drums, they just had to go and do it on �Super Confident Guy.� Why? It trivializes a signature song, and probably the one that would have gone the farthest toward convincing the doubters that Volumen can be serious just long enough to elevate silliness into something really sublime. The electronic drums just don�t jibe.

Bottom line: Super Confident Guy is a useful release but not indispensable if you already own How Do You Spell�?. Hopefully, even as you read this, Volumen will be re-recording the EP tracks along with other new material like �Snakes� and the stellar �Sexy Astronaut� with the Champs� Tim Green at his Louder Studios in San Francisco. In the meantime, a better recorded representation of the direction Volumen are headed can be heard on the four-song W�ntage single: two live tracks culled from a live show on KBGA and two straight-ahead winners, �Erika� and �Face,� recorded earlier this year in Portland with Mike Lastra. They flat-out smoke.

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