Kelley Stoltz / To Dreamers - SP890

Kelley Stoltz, now a veritable godfather to the burgeoning San Francisco under/over-ground (folks like Thee Oh Sees, Sonny & the Sunsets, The Fresh & Onlys), has blazed a path since the late ‘90s as a home-recording guru and multi-instrumentalist. And, while Stoltz’s nigh-religious reverence for all things Beatles, Beach Boys and Kinks has been at the fore on recent albums Below the Branches, Sub Pop) and Circular Sounds, Sub Pop), his new album, To Dreamers, blends a bit more post-punk abandon into its layered everyman pop. This new album maintains the kaleidoscopic core of sounds heard on Kelley’s previous records, while making inroads into new sonic terrains.

No slouch on the live front, he was asked to open the Raconteurs first US tour in 2006, toured the USA and Europe with the Dirtbombs in 2008, and through a twist of volcano ash-cloud karma, was the support act to childhood heroes Echo and the Bunnymen, in 2010.

It’s not unreasonable to suggest that the entire reason behind music itself is to dream. From the young kid strumming a tennis racket along with the Ramones, to the box seats at the opera, the goal is the same. What music does and should do is allow us to lose ourselves and be transported, to find the mystical land where milk and honey meets Xanadu. See where you go with this new Kelley Stoltz record—an album of tunes oddly familiar and yet surprising, like a dream itself.

If you pre-order To Dreamers by October 12th, you’ll receive a limited edition CDR featuring 5 new Kelley Stoltz songs currently unavailable anywhere else!

Released: October 12, 2010

Kelley Stoltz / In a Cloud New Sounds From San Francisco - 4067493

Side One: Sonny & The Sunsets – ‘Heart Of Sadness’ / Fresh & Onlys – ‘You Owe Your Life To The Streets’ / Donovan Quinn & The 13th Month – ‘Mysteries’ / Sandwitches – ‘Grey Wizard’ / Thee Oh Sees – ‘Contraption’ / Dylan Shearer – ‘4 In The Morning House’ / Jacques Butters – ‘Baby Held’

Side Two: Kelley Stoltz – ‘Pinecone’ / Paula Frazer – ‘What Does It Take’ / Trainwreck Riders – ‘World Got Round’ / Tim Cohen –‘I Come Alive’ / Hannah & Raven (of Grass Widow) – ‘Beehive’ / Exray’s – ‘Everything Goes’ / Ty Segall – ‘Hey Big Mouth’

Released: May 25, 2010

Kelley Stoltz / Baby I've Got News For You - 4067494

Baby I’ve Got News For You b/w Fire Escape — On Chuffed Records

Released: March 12, 2010

Kelley Stoltz / Your Reverie - SP764

We’re releasing a new Kelley Stoltz album February 5, 2008. The a-side of this single will be on that album, the b-side will not. We are very excited about Kelley’s follow-up to 2006’s Below the Branches LP and hope that you are, too.

Released: November 6, 2007

Kelley Stoltz / Circular Sounds - SP748

Circular Sounds is the fourth LP from San Francisco’s home recording auteur Kelley Stoltz. Its 14 songs are a stereophonic advance on the lo-fidelity psych-fuzz of Antique Glow (Beautiful Happiness, 2004) and the mid-fi piano-rock of Below the Branches (Sub Pop, 2006): two modest masterpieces which, by a curious coincidence, both made #24 in MOJO magazine’s “Best Albums” list for their respective years. Kelley has also been praised by such esteemed publications as Uncut, Rolling Stone, Q, The New York Times, Entertainment Weekly, Time Out London, The Independent, and Ptolemaic Terrascope. In Australia he is a bona fide cult sensation, having scored a radio hit with “Underwater’s Where the Action Is” (off Antique Glow), while “Birdies Singing” (off Below the Branches) established him in Sweden after it was used to soundtrack a TV commercial for Volvo.

Circular Sounds is very much a pop record, in the classic ’60s mold. The horn-and-harmony-soaked romance suggesting Love covering “Good Day Sunshine” of “Everything Begins,” and the glorious, garage-psych dilation of “Your Reverie” are amongst the album’s 14 highlights. And these tracks boast Kelley’s fullest production to date: radio-ready yet retaining the organic warmth that gave his earlier work its character. He is no longer a marginal, ‘lo-fi’ artist: “I work in a second-hand record store and that’s made me more of a hi-fi advocate. It’s hard for me to listen to stuff that was recorded on a cassette player nowadays. By the last record I was mid-fi. I think I’m mid-hi now!”

Rolling Stone review of Circular Sounds
The Independent (UK) review of Circular Sounds

Released: February 5, 2008

Kelley Stoltz / Below the Branches - SP674

San Francisco home-recording multi- instrumentalist Kelley Stoltz spent the better part of the past three years promoting and distributing his last album himself. “I finished Antique Glow in 2001, but found myself without a label when it was ready for release. So, being a vinyl nut, I decided to press up a couple hundred and, to save some money, painted all the covers myself. I sold them at shows and stores all around San Francisco. After that the record took on a life of its own.” And, this life of its own involved an eventual domestic CD release on San Francisco’s Jackpine Social Club, as well as considerable UK press attention. Antique Glow garnered a 4-star review and a “Mojo Rising” feature in MOJO magazine, as well as critical praise in Ptolemaic Terrascope, Uncut, Record Collector, and on BBC6 radio. At year’s end Antique Glow was ranked #24 in MOJO‘s “40 Best Albums of 2004,” described as, "a time capsule only recently discovered…a jamboree grab-bag of delights filled with everything from psychedelic folk and cosmic troubadour pop to garage-rock and lysergic r&b…one of the year’s major finds." Kelley’s new album, Below the Branches, picks up where Antique Glow left off, combining psych rock, folk, blues and pop in its 13 tracks, exploring new, piano-driven directions as well. It’s an album of improvisational pop, alchemically blending influences with results that are both timeless and new. Kelley and his band (Sean Coleman, Kevin Ink, Shayde Sartin, and John Hofer) will tour extensively with the release of Below the Branches.

Released: 2006-01-24 (CD), 2006-02-07 (LP), 2006-02-07 (MP3s)

Kelley Stoltz / Antique Glow - JSC004

Originally a self–released, vinyl-only album with hand-painted sleeves, this, Kelley’s second album, was released on the Jackpine Social Club label. Antique Glow is a stunner, blending folkish panache with an alt.country aesthetic that at times sounds like Will Oldham, at others like early Pavement, yet able to dip into instrumental droplets of tinkling piano and untreated found sounds. Varied and hugely engaging, the album traipses from a motoric Velvets chug, some sublime Nick Drake-esque folk, a spaced-out psychedelic wash and a British post-everything slant… all melded together by an 8-track mind and Spector-esque vision. It’s simply a killer.

Released: December 18, 2006

Kelley Stoltz / Crockodials - HAPP004CD

From Kelley: My version of an all-time personal favorite, Crocodiles by Echo & The Bunnymen. I recorded it the last week of 2001 – playing all of the instruments myself, and mostly from memory… I had air-drummed-air-guitar-lip-synched-long-enough…

Recorded to 8-track the last week of 2001.
Based upon Echo and the Bunnymen Crocodiles released July 1980. All instruments by Kelley Stoltz.
Released in 2005 by Beautiful Happiness Records.

Released: December 18, 2006

Kelley Stoltz / The Sun Comes Through EP - SP694

Kelley Stoltz is originally from Detroit, but he lives in San Francisco now. He’s put out a couple of records: 1999’s The Past Was Faster (The Telegraph Company), 2003’s Antique Glow (Jackpine Social Club), and, most recently, his own version of Echo and the Bunnymen’s Crocodiles entitled Crock-O-Dials. We at Sub Pop are putting out his brand new album in early 2006 and so excited are we about Kelley (and so prolific is he…) that we couldn’t wait ‘til then. So, here’s a song from the forthcoming album (“The Sun Comes Through”) and four more exclusive, unreleased songs. Everybody: meet Kelley.

Released: October 11, 2005

Kelley Stoltz / Discount City b/w '84 Tigers - MAMA021

Cass Records just pumped out this Killer Kelley Stoltz seven incher in a limited quantity of 500. We managed to charm our way into a very limited number of these, so you probably want to get them while they\‘re hot. Two amazing tracks not on Stoltz’s upcoming Sub Pop full length Below the Branches. “Discount” is all kinds of Lou Reed narrative with funky breakbeats while “84 Tigers” is dedicated to the best sports team in Detroit history and name-checks the entire starting line-up. Check it.

Released: December 1, 2005