This week is the long overdue celebration for the release of Pony Of Good Tidings’ debut LP,  “Zing Zong”.  ‘What a title!’ is probably what you are saying to yourself right now…’Who came up with that?’.  Unfortunately, no one in the creative forces at Primary Records had the foresight or genius to produce such a phrase, but is a direct product of the album art (which preceded the creation of the record)  and the fine artist who created it, Claire Taylor.  Claire is Natty Green’s cousin.  Natty is the writer, singer and leader of Pony Of Good Tidings.  She has had this image in her home for as long as I can remember, and I always loved it, especially in context of her music.  It is precious, funny, beautiful, slightly apocalyptic…fitting the songs perfectly; which deal with friendship, love, death, Jesus and life’s glories.

I had the pleasure of being called producer for this record, though the end result was a work of everyone involved.  We tracked the record live in two sweltering days in Queens at Florida Keys; a lovely space run by Matt Walsh (who’s band The Forms made one of my all time favorite records).  There were some overdubs, some remote sessions gathering vocals from Sarah and Evan Gregory and Vito and Monique Aiuto.  After all the bells and braids were in place, we returned to Queens to mix with dear friend and frequent collaborator Jon Altschuler.  After all was satisfied we sent the record to Cleveland Ohio to be pressed into multicolored vinyl, so that no two records would be alike.  We hand stuffed all 500 of them at my apartment, including little pieces of nice paper, seed packets, and other personal artifacts.

So, where I’m going with all this is that with the artwork, the recording, and now the physical manifestation of ‘Zing Zong’, we don’t just have a record.  We have worked hard to present a personal sharing.  Something that can bring you into our living room while we rehearse.  Have you over for dinner. Come over at around 7?

-anthony