A total miracle session. Plans have a tendency to go awry, even the best laid ones – maybe especially the best laid ones. Here the White Rabbits were booking across the country – speeding from Seattle like a bullet back to their home to hop on a flight to England for some festival appearances and their first UK tour. They didn’t have time to spare. Phone calls back and forth got everything set up despite the slim, slim window of opportunity. They were early arriving, but unfortunately, Bryan Scary and the Shredding Tears were having too much fun and a late arrival put this session in serious jeopardy. The three vocalists and two drum sets to set up made this seem like an idiot’s errand, but the puppy dog faces of the Rabbits and our never-say-die gumption and resiliency prevailed. We said, “Listen, boys, we’re going to do this, but we’ve got to shake a leg! Do you want it bad enough.” We all did. The teamwork was off the charts inspiring and we had our holy shit moment when we polished off the session five minutes before the time constraints would have exploded in our faces. Really, this was as rock and roll as it gets and the results are very becoming. Absolutely, these young and talented fellows used every once of that desperate, nervous energy and channeled it into a performance that sweated on its own and should make Rolling Stone feel like real assholes. So they drove all through the night back to their home, were there for a few days, and they flew across the Atlantic to play shows, including this one in Leeds where NME said this, “Tonight reaches its zenith, thought, with New Yorkers White Rabbits’ debut UK show…we’re smitten from the get-go. Every tune they play tonight, from the Foals-fronted-by-Scarface funk of “Kid On My Shoulders,” right through to a rousing calypso cover of Dylan’s “Maggie’s Farm,” sounds like an instant classic.” That’s right. – Sean Moeller

First song
Untitled (White Rabbits) [3.99MB] [5171 downloads]


– unreleased
A new song we’ve written since Fort Nightly. It’s got a kind of dark, ragtime-y vibe. It usually takes us a long time to name songs.

Second song
Navy Wives (White Rabbits) [4.07MB] [4455 downloads]


– original version appears on Fort Nightly
The only song we did from the record. Kind of a ska song.

Third song
Beehive State (White Rabbits) [2.40MB] [4462 downloads]


– unreleased

Fourth song
Sea of Rum (White Rabbits) [2.39MB] [4698 downloads]


– unreleased
Another new one. We tried to write a song that sounded like “Iko Iko” by the Dixie Cups. It’s about a guy who meets the devil and gets thrown in the drunk tank.