DRUNKEN PRAYER

“Can you book a band for your own funeral?” - Times-Standard, Humboldt County, CA Morgan Christopher Geer, who performs under the moniker Drunken Prayer, was born a melancholy boy to a New Orleans folk singer and a California mushroom farmer. A tall man with dark, heartbreaker looks, he has a compelling stage presence. His entertaining wit and charismatic delivery à la Warren Zevon come easy, in a swagger of whispers, shouts and sneers. He’s a showman--“a barking ringleader with chops between Tom Waits and the Butthole Surfers’ Gibby Haynes” (Willamette Week, Portland, OR). In a strange turn of events, sometime in 2006 at a fish market in tiny Sebastopol, CA, Morgan found himself in a conversation with one of his heroes, Tom Waits, about life and art. The talk moved Geer to unleash his trademark sound where sin and redemption bleed into each other--the honest place where pool hall gloom and tent revival glory keep one another bona fide. Thus it came to pass that in a fish market between Tom Waits and a bin of dead salmon, Drunken Prayer came to life. What sets Drunken Prayer apart from other neo-Americana artists may be that DP is not trying to be neo or Americana, not trying to do anything but let out a howl formed by life and the history of music. Not representing any one style of music--not representing at all, just being. Making music out of the reservoirs left by living and listening to humanity. Drunken Prayer makes an honest tune, an unironic narrative of the harsh and beautiful harmonies and discords every human faces: a kind of holy blues. There is a unique genuineness here born of pure inspiration. Geer wrote and arranged many of Drunken Prayer’s first compositions while wood-shedding on a farm in Sonoma County, California, before moving to Portland, OR. His songs are a hefty mix of blues, country and alternative, in traditional arrangements, often violently dynamic and always with "an almost inculpable sincerity" (Mountain Xpress, Asheville, NC). His big-shoulders vocals and swampy guitar create a nicely creepy backdrop for rakish, playful stories of eternal themes. Though Drunken Prayer is often Morgan performing solo or with light accompaniment, the bigger group has at different times boasted an impressive roster of members from Beck , The Breeders, She & Him, Eels, The Wipers, The Reigning Sound and the backing bands of John Lee Hooker and Elliot Smith. Geer’s previous band, The Unholy Trio of Asheville, NC, also featured members of The Reigning Sound and Freakwater. On their 5th Year Anniversary compilation Bloodshot Records featured the Trio’s devilish version of Public Enemy's "Bring the Noise". In February, 2012 Drunken Prayer will release its second full-length CD, Into the Missionfield. “Can you book a band for your own funeral?” - Times-Standard, Humboldt County, CA Morgan Christopher Geer, who performs under the moniker Drunken Prayer, was born a melancholy boy to a New Orleans folk singer and a California mushroom farmer. A tall man with dark, heartbreaker looks, he has a compelling stage presence. His entertaining wit and charismatic delivery à la Warren Zevon come easy, in a swagger of whispers, shouts and sneers. He’s a showman--“a barking ringleader with chops between Tom Waits and the Butthole Surfers’ Gibby Haynes” (Willamette Week, Portland, OR). In a strange turn of events, sometime in 2006 at a fish market in tiny Sebastopol, CA, Morgan found himself in a conversation with one of his heroes, Tom Waits, about life and art. The talk moved Geer to unleash his trademark sound where sin and redemption bleed into each other--the honest place where pool hall gloom and tent revival glory keep one another bona fide. Thus it came to pass that in a fish market between Tom Waits and a bin of dead salmon, Drunken Prayer came to life. What sets Drunken Prayer apart from other neo-Americana artists may be that DP is not trying to be neo or Americana, not trying to do anything but let out a howl formed by life and the history of music. Not representing any one style of music--not representing at all, just being. Making music out of the reservoirs left by living and listening to humanity. Drunken Prayer makes an honest tune, an unironic narrative of the harsh and beautiful harmonies and discords every human faces: a kind of holy blues. There is a unique genuineness here born of pure inspiration. Geer wrote and arranged many of Drunken Prayer’s first compositions while wood-shedding on a farm in Sonoma County, California, before moving to Portland, OR. His songs are a hefty mix of blues, country and alternative, in traditional arrangements, often violently dynamic and always with "an almost inculpable sincerity" (Mountain Xpress, Asheville, NC). His big-shoulders vocals and swampy guitar create a nicely creepy backdrop for rakish, playful stories of eternal themes. Though Drunken Prayer is often Morgan performing solo or with light accompaniment, the bigger group has at different times boasted an impressive roster of members from Beck , The Breeders, She & Him, Eels, The Wipers, The Reigning Sound and the backing bands of John Lee Hooker and Elliot Smith. Geer’s previous band, The Unholy Trio of Asheville, NC, also featured members of The Reigning Sound and Freakwater. On their 5th Year Anniversary compilation Bloodshot Records featured the Trio’s devilish version of Public Enemy's "Bring the Noise". In February, 2012 Drunken Prayer will release its second full-length CD, Into the Missionfield.