Sideways Orange guitarist Garrett Whitlow discusses new ’90s alt-rock album, ‘We Are the Moon Dogs’

by | Oct 22, 2015 | MUSIC

Get ready to travel back in time back to your childhood ’90s kids because Richmond band Sideways Orange just dropped their new album We Are th

Get ready to travel back in time back to your childhood ’90s kids because Richmond band Sideways Orange just dropped their new album We Are the Moon Dogs Wednesday and it’s reminiscent of all those ’90s-alt tunes that we love and cherish.

The band gave us a little taste of the fuzzy garage rock sound earlier this month when they released the first single off the album, “More or Less (Lucky Guess)”.

Garrett Whitlow, guitarist and vocalist for Sideways Orange, along with bassist Mitchell Latimer and drummer Josh Santamaria worked on the 10-track album over the course of a few months and recorded it at Minimum Wage Recording studio in Oregon Hill with Lance Koehler, the drummer for NO BS Brass Band.

The album is a follow-up to The 302 EP, which the band released in January. Whitlow described the new album as being “a little all over the place with several different styles of music and sounds.”

“It’s all just what we grew up on, what we listen to,” he said. “It’s a rock record, it’s not too serious.”

The single “More or Less (Lucky Guess)” beckons the nostalgic 90s fuzzy pop vibes and the rest of the album feels like a trip down memory lane, but it’s a definitely a feel-good, good time album.

Whitlow said their sound is often compared to that 90’s sound.

“It’s natural, we were all kids when that music was coming up, it’s something we all still enjoy and all still hold dear to us, but it’s not like a conscious effort,” he said.

For We Are the Moon Dogs, Whitlow said the band was listening to a lot of T. Hardy Morris and influenced by local bands like The Milkstains and Sleepwalkers. The band also takes cues from the likes of Pavement, Nirvana, Blind Melon and Pearl Jam, who completely changed the game all in their own way.

“Some of the songs have more of like a Blind Melon kind of vibe to them, they have a southern country undertone to them” he said.

I don’t know that I heard too many southern tones, but it’s definitely a solid album with a mix of punk, pop and grunge to take you back to the good ol’ days.

Sideways Orange doesn’t have any plans for a tour yet, but Whitlow said they are starting to do more out of town gigs and work with another bands.

“We definitely want to start spreading out a little bit,” he said.

The band has a show on Oct. 31 at OUR House and Nov. 15 at The Camel with togetherPANGEA and White Reaper.

Amy David

Amy David

Amy David was the Web Editor for RVAMag.com from May 2015 until September 2018. She covered craft beer, food, music, art and more. She's been a journalist since 2010 and attended Radford University. She enjoys dogs, beer, tacos, and Bob's Burgers references.




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