Soldiers of Fortune

So, I’m not the only one around here who likes Oneida, am I?

If not, there’s a sort of side project you should probably know about. Soldiers of Fortune has got Kid Millions and Pat Sullivan (Oneida, but also Oakley Hall), as well as some fellow travelers from Home and other bands…and it’s really good. I’m extracting a bit from my hard-to-condense review from yesterday’s Dusted.


“Sleeping Sentinel” balances the jittery propulsion, the stark, open-chord vocal harmonies of Anthem of the Moon-era Oneida. It is the shortest, most structured, least jammy song on the disc, and also the best. “Worm,” the 17-minute track which takes up the entire second side of the LP, is the other extreme. The song is built around a four-note riff, pushing upward in a short, piston-like motion over a series of half notes, ramming the top one twice, then circling back for another approach. It’s repeated twice a measure over the whole length of the song, a machine-precise foundation over which pianos hammer and basses rumble and guitars execute free-wheeling screeches and nose-dives and someone (possibly Millions in his heavy rock “Did I Die” voice) shouts indecipherable imprecations. It’s also pretty freaking great.

It might make more sense (not promising anything, mind you) if you read the whole thing.

I can't find any audio or video for this, but the record's out on Mexican Summer.

By the way, I was out yesterday watching my son compete in the NH Div. III state championship for XC skiing. They won. Whoo-hoo. Sean threw up all over the place about half an hour before his race and was really sick the Monday before, but still placed third for his team.