THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Swami & The Bed Of Nails — featuring Swami John Reis (Hot Snakes, Drive Like Jehu, Rocket From The Crypt and more) — have just released their debut album All Of This Awaits You. Produced by Reis and mixed by Ben Moore, the album was born out of the final Hot Snakes writing sessions in 2023. After the passing of his longtime friend and bandmate Rick Froberg, the songs on this nine-song album document a challenging time of reflection and redirection.
“We were all very excited about the initial recordings, and the songs set the bar high,” Reis recalls of those 2023 sessions. “As I continued writing, I started to notice some songs would likely have an eventual home on a different record of some kind. This music branched off and I figured I’d revisit it sometime in the years to come, with 2024 being an exciting year for Hot Snakes. Lots of good times planned ahead. When Rick suddenly passed, I was completely heartbroken and shellshocked. The loss continues to be something I have trouble navigating. This record is the songs of that tributary.
“In November 2023, I decided to finish it and turn it into something. At the time I felt paralyzed and confused so I tried to un-paralyze myself by surrounding myself with friends, making something out of nothing, playing music which felt timely to me, and make plans. The best plan seemed to consist of me jumping back on guitar, doing some yelling and singing, getting in the van and visiting the many villages and selling my wares.”
Much like the Swami John Reis LP Ride The Wild Night, All Of This Awaits You features Joe Guevara on piano and synthesizer. Whereas the last record occupies a garage-infused take on rock ’n’ roll, All Of This Awaits You is punk viewed through the lens of rock ”n’ roll. Instead of the organic piano featured prominently on this first record, the sound now is predominantly arpeggiated, buzzsaw synths and reedy organs.
Jason Koukounis of Hot Snakes and Night Marchers is on drums, along with Richard Larson. Koukounis propels the earlier recordings with blown-out 4/4 bombast while Larson offers a loose whip approach and parks it back in the garage. On bass is Tommy Kitsos, also from Night Marchers, CPC Gangbangs and a Hot Snakes fill-in reservist. Kitsos has a sound bigger than all outdoors. On second guitar is Mark Murino, who played in Radio Wendy and Dirty Sweet. He brings a stylistic timelessness, making it hard to date this recording. Also appearing on this record are Rob Crow (who plays with Reis in PLOSIVS as well as his own Pinback), Anthony Anzaldo (Ceremony and Cold Cave) and Jacob Turnbloom (Mrs. Magician).
All Of This Awaits You is an immediate blast of joy intended to celebrate our time on Earth. It is nostalgia for a past that probably never happened. It is the hope that the future will consider embracing the innocence of rock ’n’ roll. It is an idealized pursuit intended to elevate the status of the simplest pleasures and ridicule the unattractive lust of the unhindered ambitious. The music is a reenactment of the past lives of elderly teenagers returning once again to sustain their echo. All Of This Awaits You is punk rock music, but your guess is as good as ours when it comes to the meaning of that.”
