The Story of "Gracious Living". -Adam MackintoshThis album took me about 5 years to write. I began writing it in San Francisco in 1994 and continued to work on it while I lived in New Orleans from 95' to late 99' finishing it in Portland, Oregon in Early 2001. I put a band together and we played some really great shows, with Concrete Blonde, The Tubes, Fireballs of Freedom, Two Ton Boa, The Dandy Warhols, The Goddamn Gentlemen, and many others. When we were ready to record we bought some 2" tape and hired Rob Bartleson to Produce/Engineer at Supernatural Studios in Oregon City. The recording took 6 days (6 12-15 hour days), I did the vocals in a day and Rob and I mixed the entire thing in the last day as our $8,000 recording budget ran out. Kevin Nettleingham mastered it and we pressed 1000 copies to be distributed by BDC (US) and to take to Europe. Stuffing our suitcases with CD's to get them through customs, I think we smuggled 100-200 copies over to Spain which we mostly gave away to radio stations we played and to Spanish kids who were really cool, some had driven over 300 Kilometers to see us. We went on 4 tours as a full band and I did 2 tours solo acoustic, one with Paula O'Rourke.
Alberto Manzano, who did translations into Catalan for Leonard Cohen, Jeff Buckley and Led Zeppelin booked and managed our first three tours.
The record was picked up by a small label in Southern Spain near Madrid called Alone Records and sent out across Europe with no publicity budget through several retailers and distributors to a naturally underwhelming and minimal response. Alone has grown into a great company and so The Last Dancers will release their new album "Pre-Revolution" with Alone in the coming months. Gracious Living was then picked up by a Los Angeles label called Broken Halo Records affiliated with Long Live Crime Records run by Susan Ferris and Thom King. The release was ill conceived and essentially un-executed, with unpaid publicists and questionable usage of company funds. (Source) Broken Halo dissolved or went bankrupt shortly thereafter. The album was returned by Koch Distribution and never saw a record store shelf. So after three "record deals" across the globe, digital distribution through CD Baby and terrestrial distribution through BDC here in the states...here it is for free. I consider it my American Novel set to music and I hope you find something magical in it as the reviewers below did. If you enjoy it, please post a review either on iTunes or on this site. Thank you for listening. -Adam Mackintosh Reviews of Gracious LivingI got a really cool opportunity to review Adam Mackintosh's new album The Gracious Living of Adam Mackintosh. He was nice enough to send me the album and I listened to it a few times. It is listed on Amazon as Contemporary Folk music, but I think the music seems more like a mix of rock and blues, and it works very well together. I fell in love with every single song, but my absolute favorite is
It's a Crime. I think people would really be able to connect and relate to the songs, and I think they would like this album. I find the music calming and it made me happy to listen to the album. I think it is worth buying. I truly think people would like it. -
Maymay 2015
From the first strum of the acoustic guitar to the final fade of the Hammond B3, this album is a masterpiece. The songs range from jazz to hard rock, from gospel to folk. The arrangement is beautiful, reminiscent of the best progressive rock of the 1970's. with incredible intricacy and unexpectedness in the arrangements. Adam Mackintosh's voice is clear and beautiful throughout, his songwriting masterful, as if he agonized over every chord and phrase.
The album starts simply enough, with acoustic guitar and a toy piano but, by song three ("It's A Crime"), has become something volcanic, brash and beautiful that grabs your attention and doesn't let go. "Black Star Sapphire", had it been published 25 years earlier, would have easily been a mainstay of AOR, as would have "Father Sun", "All Alone" and "Overdosed".
"Mystified", on the other hand, is timeless. If you download only one song from this album, make it Mystified. You will undoubtedly be persuaded into downloading the whole album (recommended).
Perhaps these songs were written too late, perhaps the marketing was insufficient, but whatever the case, they were not appreciated nearly enough. If you enjoy thoughtful, intelligent songwriting and stellar musicianship, you too will consider "The Gracious Living of Adam Mackintosh" a masterpiece.
-Review from iTunes. “I always have a wide open heart for bands that are far away from musical trends, and so it's with Adam Mackintosh, which are led by singer/songwriter Adam Mackintosh. It's not easy to pigeonhole their sound, but while listening to the album names like early David Bowie, Gentle Giant or later Beatles are still on my mind. All songs are very emotional and mostly introspective, but sometimes added with a hard rocking edge. The melancholic resonance of Mackintosh's voice and his crystalline guitar playing are complimented by the well-tempered organ sound of David Graham and a soulful rolling rhythm section.”
Spanish Press (circa 2004)“Opening his debut full-length, Adam Mackintosh, with the line "Everything you'll ever need to know is written in the music" (and repeating it during intermission), Portland, Oregon's Adam Mackintosh testifies to his belief in music and its power to enlighten and guide you through life. Softly sung over an acoustic guitar and light drums and bass, the line is an apt fitting for a record that recalls everything that is good about music.”
“Front man Adam Mackintosh knows how to write a great song, whether it is pop or rock. Putting this statement to the test, Gracious Living manages to offer up eleven solid testimonials to the statement's validity.”
In Music We Trust (circa 2002) 