John Hogg (vocals)
Sean Genockey (guitar)
Alex Evans (bass)
Johnny Morgan (drums)
“Rude boys keep banging out the same sounds. There’s a killer in the shadows and all I’m talking about is my degeneration.”
A nod to the past with mind-spinning observations of our current culture, “My Degeneration” is the premiere single from Carnival, the second album from South London group MOKE.
Celebrating British rock ‘n’ roll, Carnival revels in shimmering guitars, gut-punching bass, thunderous drums and bluesy vocals. A poignant rocker with a touch of psychedelia, the album takes you on an alluring, enigmatic roller coaster as is rocks you and lures you, and rocks you again.
“One of Britain’s most promising guitar groups” is how The Face (UK publication) heralded the band. Regarded for their explosive and inspired live performances, Carnival was motivated and strengthened by Moke’s extensive tour–four years of life on the road–playing everywhere from Corpus Christi, Texas to Milan. It’s as if years spent banging it out in backwater clubs across several continents forced them to make each song on the new album count.
Producer Paul Stacey (Oasis, Sheryl Crow) and legendary engineer/mixer Bob Clearmountain helped craft Carnival, an album that crackles with energy and sophistication. “A multi-colored, trippy, pleasurable and thrilling experience…a sensory annihilation!” grins bassist Alex Evans about the album.
“For this second album, I wanted it to be more of a personal experience,” says lead singer John Hogg. “If there is a theme, it’s a culmination of the different ups-and-downs and ins-and-outs the band went through in the last years. It’s an expression of spirituality, without all the details.”
Imagined as an anti-war track, the bittersweet acoustic-driven sing-along “Slide” transcends into a blazing rocker with powerful imagery: “Warriors are wagers/Sinners are our saviors/Excuse me while I slip into something more insulting/These are the pleas of the pale in power.”
Handsomely textured and melancholy, “Today” encompasses an internal struggle to make it through the day. “Hanging Around” deals with isolation and the pursuit to stay grounded: “Somebody said to me if he could fly/He’d jump up and peel open the sky/Now I seem to be more concerned with the roof under my feet/Me, myself and I.”
“I wrote ‘Hanging Around’ years ago when I lived in a mess on my own,” reveals Hogg. “Fortunately, things can get better in time.”
Moke’s songs are not just of worldly obsessions and digressions. “¹Magic House’ is a song about flying saucers!” laughs Hogg. In addition, “‘Fluicide’ is about someone either on drugs or ought to be on drugs,” he entertains.
The son of aspiring academics–a Swedish librarian and translator, and his Nigerian wife–Hogg’s first exposure to rock was a bit off-the-wall, or rather through it. His family’s next-door neighbor repeatedly played such classics as The Beatles, Rolling Stones, The Who, Jimi Hendrix, Blondie and Sex Pistols. When Hogg’s mother bought him a guitar at the age of eight, he took to it like a prodigy, playing without a lesson and imitating the chords he had heard. “From that point, really, I was on a mission,” he expresses.
Like so many troubled artists before him, Hogg found himself escaping into music when his parents split up. Attendance at a local art college led Hogg to record a self-made demo tape that he played for guitarist Sean Genockey, who immediately wanted to jam. Drummer Johnny Morgan, formerly of UK techno-rockers Senser, and bassist Alex Evans, an old school chum of Hogg’s who had also played with him in other bands, contributed to songs that later became Moke’s self-titled debut album. The group has remained unified for the collaboration of Carnival.
Heavily touring the States in support of their debut disc, Moke hit the road with diverse artists ranging from The Black Crowes to Goo Goo Dolls and G. Love & Special Sauce, earning fans and garnering critical praise: “An ambitious debut effort!” praised Guitar Player. “Moke forges funk, classic rock and even the ambitious bass patterns of art rock into something new,” commended the New York Daily News.
Moke is actually a word with a few different meanings. Like their name, Moke has constructed a multi-level funhouse with Carnival, an enticing coronation of musical fervor and sheer electricity.
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