Terrorbird

Six years after the release of his previous album Landau, Toronto's Chris A. Cummings, a.k.a. Mantler, is set to release his anticipated fourth album Monody in March 2010. The album will be made available via Tomlab in continental Europe, Japan and the USA, and through Tin Angel in the UK and Ireland, and Blocks Recording Club in Canada.

Continuously pushing the production envelope, each Mantler album has it's own unique sound. Mantler's first album, Doin' It All (2000), was recorded almost entirely with a densely multi-tracked wurlitzer, a Rhythm Ace drum machine, and a primitive 1980s sampler. His second album Sadisfaction (2002) was more expansive, sedate and"rock"-like while the third album, Landau (2004), featured tighter pop structures and brighter production, paying tribute to the R&B sound of the late 1970s and early 1980s (frequently drawing comparisons to Steely Dan).

Mantler's new album, Monody, combines the best elements of the previous albums to create a grander, more epic version of his sound - the density of Doin' It All, the sedate quality of Sadisfaction, and the songwriting focus of Landau. Combining soul, rock, R&B, and jazz, the sound of Monody, which means 'a sad melody' or 'a single melody', is hard to pin down. Mantler explains: "I like it when a 'normal' artist tries to make a 'weird' album, like Fleetwood Mac's Tusk, or when a 'weird' artist tries to make a 'normal' album, like Archie Shepp's Attica Blues. Somewhere between Tusk and Attica Blues, that's the area I'm aiming for, conceptually. Even if the end result sounds nothing like either of those two albums!"

On Monody, Mantler teamed up with a plethora of talented collaborators. Six tracks on the album were produced by longtime Mantler producer Zack G, while Jeremy Greenspan (Junior Boys) and Leon Taheny (Final Fantasy, Bruce Peninsula) each produced 2 tracks and Owen Pallett (Final Fantasy) did brass arrangements on two tracks. The roster of acclaimed guest musicians includes: Constellation artist and Toronto music guru Sandro Perri, ex-Montrealer and Local Rabbit Ben Gunning, the Ohbijou string section (Jennifer Mecija and Anissa Hart), two of the mad geniuses behind The Silt (Ryan Driver and Marcus Quin), Ernest Agbuya and Matias Rozenberg of The Matias Band (of which Mantler is also a member), Sam Allison and Teilhard Frost of Sheesham and Lotus, as well as longtime backing vocalist Dennis Frey.