From the Ames/Des Moines/Iowa state capital corridor, there’s been a rattling for what seems to be decades, a great disturbance that became a lesser disturbance, that became a puzzlement, that was fleshed out, that was refined, that was commandeered by four principal songwriters all of distinguishably different persuasions, that was made into an operable quartet that has come to this day embracing all of its idiosyncrasies in a more controlled environment. The Poison Control Center, if it’s appropriate in its syntax to claim the multi-headed project as a single being, was a madman in its earlier days of playing in green jump suits a la the yellow ones Dignan wore in “Bottle Rocket.” It was an unhinged variation on the simple pop structure that spawned all of the Beatles crazies who made all of the fuzzed out, drugged up psychedelic indie rock for The Elephant Six Collective and Kindercore Records. They were and still are a group that bows to hermetic Jeff Mangum, hyper-kinetic Robert Schneider of The Apples in Stereo (lead singer Patrick Fleming would probably list being an invited guest to the Apples front man’s wedding as a life highlight), Elf Power, Masters of the Hemisphere and all of the other various off-shoots and denominations of these incestuous bands. They’ve helmed in their more reckless leanings and stand before us with the tassel flipped over to the left side of their caps, signifying a graduation of sorts into the kind of rock and roll world that they always knew was out there waiting for them if they could just get there – surviving personal losses and creative differences and growing up (the biggest detriment to a band that lives and dines on doing things the hard and ambitious way). The PCC now – with its forthcoming new record A Collage of Impressions — is going after legitimacy. It already has legacy and relative longevity, as well as experience playing ice cream parlors and Patrick Fleming and Devin Frank staging live battles with their bodies and guitars, like two feral bighorns clacking their bones together for the appealing hand of the lady bighorn. The record makes the most of their multi-dimensions and individual voices and egos. All four voices get their crack and the barnburning, waylaying is an attractive version of the closest this band will get to giving us a straight answer. It’s still pop, via the weirder, non-cerebral form of the word, but it’s an expansion of on the many years of trying and a testament to what plugging away at a sound burning a hole in your head can lead to. Poison Control Center sings that love is the answer, but the reason they’re even able to repeat what was just said is by way of supreme companionship – which gets a lot of face time on the new album. It’s a full developed friendship of mostly brothers that has taken their love of weird but simple music courting.

First song
Magic Circle Symphony (Poison Control Center) [4.61MB] [1501 downloads]


– original version appears on the forthcoming album A Collage of Impressions
I guess we are the type of band that always likes to keep things fresh, for example we have been playing this song for about two years live, but we have never played it with this arrangement and maybe will never ever play it like this again. If we had a few PCC-Deadheads following us around taping every show I bet they would have at least 30 different versions of this song. My original idea, when asked to do the Daytrotter session was to hire the Rock Island Children’s Choir to join us and sing the group vocals, but the lady never called me back. She probably did not want to introduce the kids to a bunch of smelly guys drinking Busch Light. It’s kinda a sad song, about love and dying. There’s not that much else is there?

Second song
Thrill (Poison Control Center) [3.81MB] [1294 downloads]


– original version appears on the forthcoming album A Collage of Impressions
Pat Stolley kept saying this is a hard one to record for Daytrotter, since Ephraim our drummer — who wrote the song — sings lead while smashing around on the kit. Some people will think this song is about our current President, some will think it’s about Roy Hobbs and Wonderboy. Some might think it has to do with another 80’s movie… I wish I knew. Either way I like how the lead and background vocals came out and love the end of the song where Devin and I always fight to see who has the loudest raunchiest guitar sound.

Third song
Don't Go (Poison Control Center) [2.52MB] [1201 downloads]


– original version appears on the forthcoming album A Collage of Impressions
This is another song we have been playing for a long time that has seen many incarnations, but we have always played it pretty straight. We actually recorded a couple different versions of it for our album. Neither of which came out like we were playing it in hyper drive like this take. A couple days after we got home from our last tour, Joe was getting ready to take a long road trip and I didn’t really want him to go so I contemplated singing his own song to him. It’s a really sad song actually.

Fourth song
Losing to Living (Poison Control Center) [2.14MB] [1250 downloads]


– original version appears on the forthcoming album A Collage of Impressions
Well, we wanted to do one song at Daytrotter that each of us wrote, since all four of us are the main songwriters for the band. We were going to try and do Devin’s song, “Ride the Thunder,” but Pat Stolley said, “You’re fucking joking right? That song’s like 10 minutes long.” And I was like, “Yeah it will be fucking awesome, it will be Daytrotter History!” But I think we got out voted or something cause we ended up doing another Ephraim song called, “Losing to Living.” I don’t quite know why we choose this one, probably cause it’s a little more laidback then the others and we probably needed to practice it since we didn’t play it much on tour. But I like the way it ended up. I love the sound of a real piano going to tape. One of the most beautiful things in the world seriously!