Ramona Falls (band)

Ramona Falls is an indie rock project founded by Brent Knopf and based in Portland, Oregon. The band name is taken from a waterfall located near Mount Hood, a place where Knopf used to hike as a child.[1] Brent Knopf co-founded Menomena before departing in 2011, and is also one-half of EL VY, a collaboration with The National's Matt Berninger.

Ramona Falls
Brent Knopf of Ramona Falls Recording Vocals in 2016
Background information
OriginPortland, Oregon, United States
GenresIndie rock Neofolk
Years active2009–present
LabelsBarsuk Records
Souterrain Transmissions
Associated acts
WebsiteRamonaFalls.com
MembersBrent Knopf
Past membersMatt Sheehy, Dave Lowensohn, Paul Alcott

History

Ramona Falls took shape after Menomena's recording process for their third album was delayed.[2] Knopf embarked on the project with songs that were not used for Menomena.[3]

Brent played a handful of his own material at shows around Portland, Oregon sometime in the years prior to the Ramona Falls project, including a performance October 24, 2008 in New York under the name "Dear Everything." Some of this material was further developed for the band's first album Intuit.

Recording Intuit gave Knopf the opportunity to work with 35 colleagues from the Portland and New York areas.[4] The album was recorded in Knopf's own studio and at the homes, practice rooms, churches, and other personal spaces of the featured guests.[5]

Intuit and its songs did not chart, but received positive reviews from Pitchfork[6] and Drowned In Sound[7] and generated a large enough following for Knopf to justify leaving Menomena and release another album.

Prophet was released on May 1, 2012 and reached #28 on Billboard's Heatseaker Albums chart on May 19.[8] Knopf took a direction on Prophet that was less centered on the acoustic guitar and focused on expanding the band's sound.[9]

Prettymuchamazing chose Ramona Falls' drummer Paul Alcott as best drummer of SXSW 2012 for his "insane, massive fills" and stage antics, referencing times when Alcott would "come out from behind his kit, stand on bass amps and yell along, drum on the walls, play cymbals backwards, and shake around his giant red ‘fro."[10]

Other projects

Brent Knopf co-founded EL VY with Matt Berninger (lead singer of The National). The duo released their debut album Return to the Moon October 30, 2015.[11]

Brent Knopf has been creating music since before his inclusion into Menomena. He initially approached Danny Seim and Justin Harris with a demo tape while the duo were in a different band. Knopf is frequently credited as the creator of the Digital Loop Recorder (sometimes referred to as DLR or Deeler) used to help compose creative ideas for inclusion into Menomena's music. The Menomena song "Rose" is believed to be most wholly contributed to by Knopf among other songs.

Knopf also works as an album producer. He is credited as producer of the first two albums by South African band Dear Reader (formally known as Harris Tweed), their debut Replace Why With Funny and sophomore effort Idealistic Animals. Knopf responded to Cherilyn MacNeil's request for a producer via Menomena's Myspace page. The two had not known each other prior but Cherilyn was a fan of Menomena and has since contributed to Intuit. Knopf also produced the first pair of albums by Lost Lander, (DRRT and Medallion), a band fronted by frequent collaborator Matt Sheehy.

Personnel

Guest appearances on the album Intuit

Paul Alcott, Soren Anders, Bryan Arakelian, John Askew, Alva Bostick, Kelly Brickner, Friedrich Brückner, Eric Day, Sayard Egan, Larah Eksteen, Kai Gross, Bonnie Knopf, Sarah Lewis, Loch Lomond (Ritchie Young, Dave Depper, Amanda Lawrence, Jason Leonard, Laurel Simmons, Scott Magee, Jade Eckler), Cherilyn MacNeil, Lisa Molinaro, Stefan Nadelman, Kevin O'Connor, Liam Palmer, Michael Papillo, Mark Shirazi, Colleen Sovory, Matt Sheehy, Amy Smidebush, Mike Visser, Benjamin Weikel, Janet Weiss, Jay Winebrenner, Mirah Y.T. Zeitlyn

Musicians who have performed in Ramona Falls

Brent Knopf (keys/guitar), Dave Lowensohn (bass), Paul Alcott (drums), Matt Sheehy (guitar), Brandon Laws (guitar/bass), Danny Seim (bass), Cheri MacNiel (guitar), Darryl Torr (bass), Michael Wright (drums), Jean-Louise Nel (viola and guitar), Lauren Jacobson (violin), Jerry Joiner (drums), Sean Flinn (guitar), and Patrick Hughes (drums).

Discography

Studio albums

Singles
Year Song Album
2009 "I Say Fever"[15] Intuit
2012 "Spore" Prophet
"Sqworm"
gollark: Actually, possibly not, no idea what you mean.
gollark: It's embedded, actually.
gollark: You can implement functional stuff in it.
gollark: There's a functional scripting language in Rust called Gluon.
gollark: All ultracool people are avoiding Go and running away.

References
  1. "Ramona Falls - Biography | Billboard". www.billboard.com. Retrieved 2016-12-07.
  2. "Interview: Ramona Falls". The Voice of Energy. Retrieved 7 December 2016.
  3. "Menomena's Brent Knopf Is Ramona Falls | Pitchfork". pitchfork.com. Retrieved 2016-12-07.
  4. "Brent Knopf of Ramon Falls and Menomena". Seattle Weekly Q&A. Retrieved 6 December 2016.
  5. Schaaf, Alex (27 May 2009). "Come On Chemicals: [INTERVIEW] Brent Knopf of Menomena/Ramona Falls". comeonchemicalsblog.blogspot.com. Retrieved 7 December 2016.
  6. "Ramona Falls: Intuit Album Review | Pitchfork". pitchfork.com. Retrieved 2016-12-07.
  7. "Intuit by Ramona Falls". metacritic.com. Retrieved 7 December 2016.
  8. "Ramona Falls - Chart history | Billboard". www.billboard.com. Retrieved 2016-12-07.
  9. "Interview with Brent Knopf of Ramona Falls - Arts & Culture - Portland Monthly". portlandmonthlymag.com. Retrieved 7 December 2016.
  10. "SXSW 2 A Lot Like High School". prettymuchamazing.com. Retrieved 7 December 2016.
  11. "The official website for independent record label 4AD". 4AD. Retrieved 2016-12-07.
  12. "Trekking at Ramona Falls -- Obscure Sound". 2009-07-23. Retrieved 2016-12-07.
  13. "Ramona Falls: Prophet Album Review | Pitchfork". pitchfork.com. Retrieved 2016-12-07.
  14. "I'm excited to announce - the new Ramona Falls album "Coils" is now available as a digital download in its entirety". 2017-08-04. Retrieved 2017-08-27.
  15. "Ramona Falls - I Say Fever". discogs.com. Retrieved 7 December 2016.
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