SHAWN MAFIA & THE TEN CENT THRILLS: Death In 'D' Major

Shawn Mafia & The Ten Cent Thrills

Death In 'D' Major

© 2007 Shawn Mafia (709268900229)

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Shockingly soused tales of defiled redemption based on actual fabricated events. Gritty rock noir.

notes

INCLUDES LEWD AND CRUDE 16 PAGE BOOKLET!!!

Perhaps too much time has passed between the first release and the second. Enough time for the world to forget about the fact that they didn’t really notice Shawn Mafia existed in the first place. The music industry is over-saturated with artists and ready to burst out all over the place. Not like giving birth but more like someone taking a very sharp kitchen knife to it’s bowels and stabbing uneven and cutting crooked … a stinky, foul shit shower of songwriters raining down on everyone.

At least that’s how I see it.

What you will find here is no big-budget recording studios, no slick producers spinning straw into gold, and no high-falutin’ record label willing to pick up the tab. This album was born in the dark belly of a black widow infested garage converted into a dingy recording studio with big aspirations! Down Wind Studios is positioned, as the crow flies, on the wrong side of the tracks in Desert Hot Springs, CA. Each song came out screaming in the 120 degree heat blowing from the box fans on to the reel-to-reel recording tape. Much time was spent laying down the tracks. My backing band, The Ten Cent Thrills, who I have been working with for the past few years arrived bruised but unbroken for each session and played their asses off for no financial compensation. They were the much needed blood transfusion that kept the heart of this thing pumping. Still more countless hours were sacrificed to me attempting to mix all the madness captured on tape. The recording engineer and proprietor, Tom Hagerty, would lean back in his chair, smoke a massive spliff, and chuckle to himself as I manned the mixing board like some bogus surgeon attempting to perform a back-alley abortion. And that’s exactly how these songs came out.

All of this was paid for by the tragedy of others. The money that went into this project swims in bad blood. I have worked at a Funeral Home for the last three years to supplement the limited funds that come in from my fabulous and exciting career in the Music Biz. Each paycheck I received from transporting a murder victim to the County Coroner’s Morgue, embalming a 10 year boy killed playing in the street, or making funeral arrangements for the bereaved got me one step closer to the compact disc you may be holding in your hands right now.

New Moon Records, a daring and innovative small label out of Joshua Tree, CA boldly agreed to release Death In ‘D’ Major in joint conjunction with me. Owner and recording artist, Steve Lester, managed to pull a Houdini with the mixes of the songs I gave him. He mastered, organized, sequenced and often times wrestled this musical beast into a cohesive collection. I am proud to be associated with this label. I don’t know if they can say the same about me.

To me, Death in ‘D’ Major signifies a successful exercise in failure. A collection of songs doomed to depravity. All those tales of three time losers, at the bottom rung of life, out there feverishly wandering the desperate boulevards of this existence unaware that they never really had a chance to begin with. In this collection of musical oddities you will find a pop/rock song about prostitution and suicide, a death dirge, a folk ballad about a Hell’s Angel confessing all in a run down church pew, a tune that dreams of reuniting with one’s high school sweetheart but is too drunk to remember her name, a real to life account of a woman murdered in a dumpster out back of the Humane Society Bingo Hall, a spoken word soliloquy about driving dead bodies around Palms Springs, CA recorded ad-lib into a hand held tape recorder as it happened, a huckster snake oil pitch with all the infomercial majesty of the Prophet Peter Popoff, an off-tempo rockabilly/punk barn blazer about Mojave desert dope fiends, and a sizzling swing number drunk to the tits with Cheap Women and Cheaper Wine.

This album represents my blood, bone, and 100 proof sweat. It tells stories about my own life and other individuals that I have encountered along the way. It was a three year labor of love that eventually turned to passionate hate. In the words of Herman Hesse these songs are “not for everyone!” To the few wayward souls that may get their hands on this recording I implore you to please hide it away from the world … it’s too tragic, too sensitive for the light of day.

Shawn Mafia
June 2007

reviews

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  • Go ahead, take the blood oath!
    author: Susan

    Death in ‘D’ Major, the second CD from Shawn Mafia, shows major growth for this artist. "Fine Poison" opens the disc and is ready for radio. "Snake Oil Instrumental" is a swanky jam that is sure to have you begging for more. Death in 'D' Major is a humble, labor of love for Mr. Mafia, while it is sheer pleasure for those who dare to listen. Buy this CD and enjoy the dark tales from the underground! You won’t regret it.

  • a resounding 5 stars, what else?!
    author: Dana

    shawn mafia is the music world's (what's left of it) best kept secret, a rumor ready to blow up to epic and incriminating proportions! if you've stumbled upon this, well then it's an auspicious moment for you! because while mafia can be likened to waits, to cohen, cave, and all the rest of our lyrical and musical heros, he is a tour-de-force totally unto himself, and one to be reckoned with! coming into his own with 'death in d major' his second full-length album release in an age when originality and creativity in music are what we reach to our tapes and vinyl and maybe a scratched up cd for, mafia fills that little hole in your wanton musical heart when you walk into one of the last standing RIP record stores in your anytown u.s.a. praying for something to sweep you off your feet or knock you down, drag you along for it's hour long at full volume ride or whatever kicking and screaming and laughing and crying, for isn't that what it's all about? prepare for excitement, inspiration, and if you LOVE music, really LOVE it, like i do then you're gonna be thrilled; brace yourselves, folks, shawn mafia is hot, he's ON and you're gonna LOVE this record!

  • Singer-Songwriter of the Year!
    author: Deputy Reynolds

    Shawn Mafia's lyrical and musical soundscapes are a revelation! Shawn Mafia is to songwriting what Christ is to Christianity! A powerful and profund second album.

  • Shawn Mafia is ready for big things!!!!!!!!!
    author: Ryan O'Connor

    I was given a copy of Death in 'D' Major and listened to it as I drove across the country. My otherwise-boring drive through corn fields and flat terrain was a striking contrast to Shawn Mafia's pithy lyrics and well-produced album! I really liked the title song. Shawn Mafia is ready for big things and I look forward to future CD releases...

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