Kickstarter

Thanks for stopping by the Kickstarter page for Toll Carom's second original album.  For those of you unfamiliar, we're an independent alternative band based out of the nation's capital. Our first album, Night in the Sun (2009), was received well by both the music press and local fans -- The Washington Post did a full feature on us in their Weekend section, and Relix magazine called us one of their five bands "On The Verge" -- and we hope to sustain that momentum heading into this next marathon leg of recording sessions.

Here, in brief, is what what we're doing and why we need your support.

The Project:  The project you're helping to fund is a full-length album of original music called The Word. Where the songs and production on Night in the Sun were somewhat raw and personal, this album will be a substantial evolution in both sound and subject. Inspired by the craft and depth of such long-form "concept" albums as Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon and Tool's Lateralus, this record will be a musical meditation on one of art's biggest (and toughest) themes: Belief. As anyone who's lived through the last few years can attest, this underlying theme (and all its attendant motifs) are even more at the forefront of our global psyche than in years past. And as artists do, we intend to weigh in.

Most of the funding for the album's pre-production and production has already been raised. We're just looking to shore up the final resources required to see the album through production and into post-production, including CD pressing, shipping and marketing costs.

The Video: Some of you may have noticed the short video above. The first half is set to "Dying is an Art," our first single off of Night in the Sun. We never shot a video for it, so we're offering the next best thing here. The second half of the video is from a shoot we did at a local Egyptian place that boasts, as you can see, a beautiful wall mural. The song we're playing is a pared-down instrumental version of a new song called "The Mourner," which will appear -- in its non-karaoke form -- on The Word. We hope you all enjoy the teaser, but just to be clear: The artistic transition from the first album to this one isn't quite as stark as the video implies; for those who appreciate Toll Carom's heavier side, The Word will have plenty of those dynamics and moments as well, despite the intimate acoustic setting of the video. As the project blurb says, this will be the most sonically ambitious project any of us have ever undertaken, involving songs across a wide dynamic range and the use of numerous instruments, both organic and electronic.

Thanks for taking a look, and we hope you'll find just as much reward in supporting our music as we find in creating it.