Montreal music whiz Garrett Johnson has spent nearly a decade crafting off-kilter pop tunes under the name Brazilian Money, including last year's underrated Fly Free Rock Angel. Before he releases his next LP, however, the performer has announced that he's switching up monikers.
In an email to Exclaim!, Johnson said he has decided to retire Brazilian Money and release his next LP under the name Gary's House. The decision came after he had an illuminating conversation with a person of Brazilian descent.
Here's Johnson's statement in full:
I decided to change the band name after a Brazilian person contacted me and talked about how it wasn't cool for a North American person with no connection to the country to use references to an extremely tumultuous Brazilian economy that has led to a huge amount of personal struggle for a lot of people. I was claiming the name within the context of South American struggles being historically overlooked and ignored by North Americans.
On top of this right now is a particularly troubled time in Brazil as it's going through one of it's worst recessions in almost a century and is now being led by a non-democratically elected president after ousting the previously democratically elected president on corruption allegations many people are interpreting as veiled coup. I always imagined playing in Brazil and feeling totally unable to justify the naively named band which I hadn't put too much thought into, but also thought I'd probably never play there. However, it's still ignorant and insensitive, and accepted that fact after talking to this person.
Gary's House will debut a new album called Staircase of Wild Introspection on June 9.
Before then, Johnson has revisited Fly Free Rock Angel with a hilarious video for the album's "Rock Angel." The music video sees the performer don angel wings and ride a motorcycle through the wilderness like a true badass.
Watch the video for "Rock Angel" below.
In an email to Exclaim!, Johnson said he has decided to retire Brazilian Money and release his next LP under the name Gary's House. The decision came after he had an illuminating conversation with a person of Brazilian descent.
Here's Johnson's statement in full:
I decided to change the band name after a Brazilian person contacted me and talked about how it wasn't cool for a North American person with no connection to the country to use references to an extremely tumultuous Brazilian economy that has led to a huge amount of personal struggle for a lot of people. I was claiming the name within the context of South American struggles being historically overlooked and ignored by North Americans.
On top of this right now is a particularly troubled time in Brazil as it's going through one of it's worst recessions in almost a century and is now being led by a non-democratically elected president after ousting the previously democratically elected president on corruption allegations many people are interpreting as veiled coup. I always imagined playing in Brazil and feeling totally unable to justify the naively named band which I hadn't put too much thought into, but also thought I'd probably never play there. However, it's still ignorant and insensitive, and accepted that fact after talking to this person.
Gary's House will debut a new album called Staircase of Wild Introspection on June 9.
Before then, Johnson has revisited Fly Free Rock Angel with a hilarious video for the album's "Rock Angel." The music video sees the performer don angel wings and ride a motorcycle through the wilderness like a true badass.
Watch the video for "Rock Angel" below.