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Sometimes humility just isn’t enough, so here goes: Dublin-based STAND is Ireland’s best rock band. As well as best kept secret, did we hear you ask? Well, perhaps in Ireland, where STAND have a rabidly loyal following (although not among the so-called rock cognoscenti). But a secret in Northeast America? Definitely not. Point of fact: hardly any other Irish act of their stature is able to pre sell almost 700 tickets at the Bowery Ballroom, New York’s premier venue. Indeed, the Bowery Ballroom bookers handpicked STAND to headline at the opening night of industry shindig CMJ 2009.

How did that happen? Dublin mid-late 1990s. Lifelong friends Neil Eurelle (vocals/bass), David Walsh (guitar/keyboards), Carl Dowling (drums/percussion) and Alan Doyle (vocals/guitar) didn’t have a collective arse in their collective jeans, but they had ambition and talent to burn, and in an industry that far too often hosts wasters with little artistry yet loads of luck, that was as good a start as any. STAND played wherever and whenever they could in Ireland; through performing in more bars, pubs and small music venues than they care to remember they accrued a small but fervent fan base. In 1998, STAND released their debut album, ‘Correspondent’, from which ‘Questions’ became the band’s first Top 10 hit single.

As David Walsh recalls, underneath the growing excitement lay a nagging doubt that Dublin wasn’t the place from which to launch an international career. “At that time we thought we were going to be rock gods! Things were going well, but we felt we had to go somewhere outside the country. We felt England was essentially the backyard, so we decided to go to America and start again from scratch.”

For many millions of people, New York is the multi-cultural place where dreams are realised, fulfilled, built and broken. For STAND, NYC simply became a lifestyle of hard work and no small success. Starting from square one again, the quartet bought a van, began searching for gigs, secured the gigs, were paid for their gigs, and moved up a step or four. Behind the white-knuckle grips and the squeals of delight, however, lay the working class aesthetics and ideals of four Dublin lads. “We always put a lot of pressure on ourselves to make sure that the income was there through music,” asserts David. “We did a fairly decent job - we self-financed all our living expenses and our first two records.”

Dependability isn’t a word that raises its head very often in the all-too rarefied world of rock’n’roll, but in STAND’s universe it is more reality than abstract notion. “We were born that way,” says Neil Eurelle. Adds David, “It was more a rock’n’roll lifestyle with relatively early nights. We were all enjoying it, but we were always the band that packed our gear away early at the end of a festival. The gig money went to rent, not beer.”

“The bottom line was that we were on our own,” explains Neil, “and we needed to generate money to live and to fund the vehicle we were running – which included sound equipment, recording studio, mixing, mastering and working on getting the next record out. We had no record deal. We were selling our goods – posters, tee-shirts, albums – from the back of the van. The record execs that followed us were all in hiding, watching their business vaporise as ours took steps forward.”

“What we loved more than anything else was our independence,” emphasizes David. “We were always a good live band, we always got people’s attention that way. Any excess money we earned went straight back into the band. Occasionally pig-headed? Yes, but self-funding bought us that level of independence.”

Such independence comes at a price, however. There are few buffer zones when you are self-employed, and so what started in Dublin and continued in New York comes back full circle to Dublin again. The way Neil tells it, personal and family matters had to be sorted out. “We felt that New York had run its course for what we were trying to do.” According to David, New York “had become a way of life for us, rather than us being there to do a job. So we came back to Dublin and saw to important things. We took care of those, and now we are out to expand the footprint we left over there.”

No truer words have been spoken. Families have been lived with, words have been said, and new songs have been written. “A couple of really good songs just popped out,” enthuses Neil, “and as momentum gathered, we got excited again. The fire had come back.”

Cue a surge of songwriting last year, demoing in the prestigious Irish studio Grouse Lodge, as well as a return to America, where, in the Buffalo, NY studio of the Goo Goo Dolls, who befriended the band on a trip through that town in 2006, they recorded their forthcoming album, 100,000 Ways To Harvest Hope. “There’s energy on it,” claims David, “and I’m not sure that we’ve ever captured that energy before on a recording.”

Such energy and confidence is borne out by the fact that within the parameters of their creative reboot/relaunch, STAND have on their behind-the-scenes team Rick Goetz (former Head of A&R, Atlantic and Lava Records). The band is also on the client list of a prestigious booking agent and have M:MMusic (arguably the best radio promotions unit in the US; (http://www.mmmusicsite.com/) looking after their interests.

Starting off from square one yet again would trouble many a band, but STAND have what Neil assuredly terms “a pragmatic sense of expectation”. The solution, he offers, is writing a song people can’t shake from their heads. The new record has ten such tunes, just to be sure.

There is a new paradigm in the music business. Only a fool would bet against STAND succeeding within it.

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Frank De BlaseStand – City news
ROCK

Remember Gang Of Four? No? Well you're gonna remember Stand. The band churns out that type of melodic rock that spans tastes and tolerances. It's nice when a band can effect you emotionally as well as physically. Stand is pensive and thoughtful, but in such a way as not to dull the kick. It's rock 'n' roll, after all. Consider yourself lucky to be able to catch this group from Dublin rock a little joint like Johnny's. Perhaps this is a new era where bands like Stand are able to harness or recreate a wondrously large expanse of music and still have it recline comfortably in venues of various sizes. The show you catch in a pub or club will be the same you catch in the arena. And trust me this is where these Irishmen are headed. In the meanby catch 'em in town when they play Saturday, November 4, at Johnny's, 1382 Culver Road, 224-0990, at 9 p.m., free.
--- Frank De Blase

Irish Voice- New York City- Nov 06
They Stand and Deliver
By Mike Farragher

THERE’S nothing light about Travel Light, the excellent new CD from Stand.A sonically dense record, it is a pitch perfect mélange of tight hooks, engaging studio textures and infectious percussion. “We wanted to create something totally different from what we were in the past,” says Neill Eurelle, one of two lead singers who co-fronts the Manhattan based band, during a recent chat with the Irish Voice. “We wanted to do something fresh. We have two lead singers. We wanted to do a pop alternative eclectic mix, and I think we succeeded.”

I’ll say! Travel Light begins with “Carousel,” a pensive track with fuzzy percussion and tentative piano tinkling that takes the band in darker territory. “We just wanted to please ourselves,” says Eurelle. “We wanted to create new textures with sound, make it more interesting. Rhythm was so important. If people were tapping their feet, that’s all we wanted. We wanted a sound that really grabbed people.” “A hammer on the spine/spinning carousels/ water into wine/waking up the child you tried to hide,” sings Eurelle. The track has the same gloomy atmospherics you’d expect to hear on a Radiohead album. Stand formed on the streets and schoolyards of Dublin in 1998. They spent the first two years together writing songs and performing continuously in clubs throughout Ireland and Europe, and amassed an increasingly devoted following.

Their first release, Correspondent, landed on the Irish charts with two Top 10 songs and garnered sales of over 20,000 copies sold. In mid-1999, having built a loyal fan base in their native Ireland, Stand played a sold-out show to 1,200 fans at Vicar Street in Dublin and departed for America shortly thereafter. “We had a fair amount of success in Ireland when we started in 1998,” explains Eurelle. “We had an opportunity to go to CMJ and SXSW.

“We came over in 1999 and we decided that this was the place to go. We launched in Ireland and then came over again for good. We decided to come over here full time. Any band that wants to be successful needs to be in America. There is music press, people, lawyers, anything to do. We go home two-three times a year and play a lot of Europe festivals to keep our name out overseas, but we really love living here.”

The album is seeing the light of day this week, but there have been tracks released to Irish radio that are amassing a nice buzz for the band. One of them is “Dressed to Kill,” a dance track that is built around a funky bass line and irresistible hook that the Edge would give his eyetooth to create.

“Dressed to Kill” is going over really well in Ireland,” says Eurelle. “We have PR people working for us and they’ve had a lot of success with it. It’s a taste for our Irish audience until the album comes out.” Stand also enjoys the benefit of some nice buzz north of the city, according to Eurelle. “We played in Syracuse and Buffalo and have a fairly decent fan base up there,” he says. “We played some club shows and played in New York City. The stuff is going down phenomenally well. We have some of the old songs that we play if it fits alongside the new stuff we’re playing.”

“Low Culture” is another electro-goth track with a vicious new wave heart pumping behind the drum kit.
“It is a dark lyrical song,” explains Eurelle. “We like that, but we could never come up with the music to suit it. We did a number of demo sessions and every time we went into the studio, we had trouble with it. We did 10 demos, one was poppy, which was ridiculous. “We found this fuzzy sounding keyboard, with this buzzy, fat sound, and our guitarist was working on it. All we used from the original was the lyrics and some chord progressions. We were thrilled when we finally nailed it. It was the first thing we wrote, and everything else followed suit.”

One of the standout tracks on the disc is “Who Made You Jesus,” a cynical look at political theater. “Who made your throne/ who’s writing your speeches/who’s directing your souls/just a smile to the camera/demonstrate control,” they sing. Interspersed with these lyrics are sound bites from “Dubya” saying things like, “You talk about war, you talk about peace,” leaving little guesswork as to where the song is aimed. “(Jesus) for us was the first thing we wrote that is in any way political; it’s our feeling as foreigners,” says Eurelle. “We are looking at America from the outside looking in.

“The media controls this nation so much over here. BBC News was doing far better coverage of 9/11 than the coverage we got here. That was something that affected us—-the difference between living in Europe and living in America. “There are samples and snippets of Bush in there. We’re not doing this to make anyone look stupid, we just wanted to communicate our view of things as outsiders.” Travel Light is available exclusively on the band’s website, www.standland. com, prior to a wider release in record shops next year. You can also check out myspace.com/ standland.

To check out a live airing of the album, catch the band during a pair of gigs at Manhattan’s Mercury Lounge on November 24 and 25.

The Irish Examiner -Los Angeles- Nov 06
James Bartlett
Wednesday November 8, 2006
The New York-Irish band Stand comes to L.A.

Stand have been building a huge base of support in New York and now head for the West Coast. Stand have been building up a huge fan base in New York for years, and now they are finally playing their first concerts in Los Angeles at The Knitting Factory in Hollywood on Nov 14 and in the Afterknit Lounge two days later on Nov 16.

They have just finished their fourth album "Travel Light", and are bringing it to the West Coast to see how it enjoys the sunshine - after all, recording began in a springtime blizzard - prior to it's release. Produced by confessed studio junkie Walsh with help from Hit Factory NY chief engineer Michael McCoy, they started by saying "slan" (goodbye) to layering, and out popped their strongest songs to date.

They're a million miles from being an Irish drinking song band, as Jeff Miers of the Buffalo News noted after seeing them live: "...the shades and drama of the Smiths and the tunefulness of Coldplay run through a decidedly heavy guitar meat grinder. They generate feverish excitement, both on the concert stage and in the recording studio." Imagine the writing of Neil Finn mixed with the wide-open spaces of Pink Floyd, and you have bait that should reel in some new Los Angelinos.

All of the band members are from Tallaght, Dublin: stand up lead singer and bass player Neil Eurelle, lead singer/songwriter and guitarist David Walsh, guitarist Alan Doyle and drummer/songwriter Carl Dowling. We spoke to Eurell and Walsh about their early years and their upcoming trip to California: "Starting out as a band with no instruments, that was pretty funny. Also, it didn't take us long to realize we were not to be the skilled footballers (soccer players) we idolized on TV, so as soon as our hormones started to act up we desperately tried to figure out another way to get attention from the females. "A rock 'n roll band?" "Bingo, Carl!" We started playing together in our parent's garage, and when we got two top 10 hits in Ireland from our second album "Correspondent" it just escalated from there."

They spent the first two years writing songs and performing continuously in clubs throughout Ireland and Europe and in mid-1999, having built a loyal fan base in their native Ireland, Stand played a sold-out show to 1200 fans at Vicar Street in Dublin and departed for America a year or so after. Now, years later, Stand are making their first trip to Los Angeles in the wake of being voted best band on the NACA college circuit once again - but why has it been so long in coming? "We spent our time building a fan base organically, starting from the east coast (which is the closest American soil from home) and slowly but surely working the "westward expansion". We have built a substantial base of friends and fans in L.A., and that sparked the initial demand for Stand on the west coast!"
They have high hopes for L.A., even though it's miles away from their home turf:

"We believe L.A. will have more of an eclectic and mellow atmosphere. NYC is a vortex - you just feel like you're constantly walking at an extremely fast pace, for no reason. We're not sure if that comparison will be deemed true, but we're looking forward to exploring new territory." The boys try to go home to Ireland as often as they can between tours - usually four or five times a year - and they are hoping that the trip to Southern California will bring more fans on board:

"We plan to continue what we've been doing at 110%. We have a great team of people we're surrounded by who support us, whole-heartedly. We will continue to aggressively tour and promote our new album for the next few months, and then begin work on our next one. We are firm believers in building ourselves locally, nationally and internationally as a grass roots band who have, and will strive to maintain, lasting loyal fans. That's our most important goal."