The World Is A Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid To Die
Bio
The World Is a Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid to Die speak to a universal experience: of home, of suburbia, of community, of nostalgia for a time not so long ago after all. Atmospheric and breathy, emotionally raw and heavy, The World Is’ reputation as one of today’s seminal “second-waver“ emo bands precedes them.
The World Is experience is a rich one. This is in part due to the varied history of the six people in the band, a Connecticut-bred lineup finalized as recently as 2011 despite their 2009 formation. Greg Horbal (also an agent with Hope This Helps Booking), Chris Teti (also an engineer at Connecticut’s Silver Bullet Studios) and Steven K. Buttery (also in the band Ferocious Fucking Teeth, runs a screenprinting operation of his own) were all formerly in a similarly significant Connecticut band, My Heart to Joy. Shanholtzer is a working visual artist, has operated a popular Connecticut house venue (The Handsome Woman) for years as well as contributed to bands like One Hundred Year Ocean, SOFX and
The band has three releases under their belt with the Topshelf family including their debut EP 7“ Formlessness, Josh Is Dead 7“ (also released as a cassette through Ice Age Records) and most recently a split with New Hampshire’s Deer Leap entitled ...Are Here to Help. Their highly anticipated full-length will released in the spring.
(Bio by Elise Granata.)
Press
“In just four songs, The World is a Beautiful Place and I Am No Longer Afraid to Die capture what it is to be in a band. They capture what it is to just create music for the sake of creation.”
-AbsolutePunk (On Formlessness)
“You should not let the ridiculous band name put you off (for the record, I actually quite like it, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t think it was a bit much) because in ‘Formlessness’ The World Is A Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid To Die have created one of the most gorgeously beautiful EPs in recent memory.'”
-Sputnik Music
“With such emo revival bands like Prawn, The World Is A Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid to Die, empire! empire! (i was a lonely estate) and Driving On City Sidewalks, it easily confirms that indeed, emo and post-rock, can possibly be the perfect couple.”
-Aiko Ilagan
Music
Video
Recent Tumblr Mentions
William goes to space. Wed, Jun 19, 2013
William goes to space.
The World Is A Beautiful Place, our Artist Of The Week, released their fantastic new record, Whenever, If Ever, yesterday via Topshelf Records. We enlisted the band to do a Track-By-Track feature for PropertyOfZack to take fans behind the scenes on the writing and creation of each song off of the record. Pick up Whenever, If Ever here and check out the Track-By-Track below!
We started writing Whenever, If Ever in the summer of 2011 shortly after we had finished recording our side of the ??Are Here to Help You? split LP with Deer Leap. We didn?t finish writing the record until the weekend before we began tracking at Format Audio Recording in Haverhill MA with Ryan Stack in June of 2012. We spent short bursts of time over the next six months finishing the LP. We continued doing most of the tracking at Format Audio but ended up tracking portions with our guitarist Chris Teti at Silver Bullet Studios, The Handsome Woman and the Horse?s Mouth in Connecticut. We finished the LP in February and per usual started writing for our next records shortly after.
BLANK #9
The driving cello part throughout Blank #9 was originally written by Josh to be played on Synth. We hadn?t originally written cello into the LP but had asked our friend Julia Peters to come up to the studio to add parts throughout the record before she joined the band anyway. She and I (Greg) had a really awkward car drive up to Haverhill MA from Connecticut because we had never met prior. We got stuck in a lot of traffic and didn?t get to start tracking until 9 PM at night or something. We talked with Ryan about a lot of the parts we wanted to add the instrument to, and saw the opening of the record come together with it?s inclusion.If you listen close enough you can hear us setting up our gear / walking around / throwing keys during the beginning of the track.
HEARTBEAT IN THE BRAIN
Part of the reason it took so long to put this record together was the fact that there are so many of us. We began with 6 musicians and ended up including 10 on the LP. We often wrote and hashed out songs with only a few people. The early version of Heartbeat in the brain included only three guitars and drums. We couldn?t get through the song live originally while writing it but I pasted a bunch of the early demos together so we could listen to a ?complete? version of the song. We were all really stoked on the head-bang part at the end. I think even then we knew that this song would ?open? the record.
FIGHTBOAT
Fightboat was the first song to be finished and came together in about an hour. It was probably one of the first few practices where Chris Teti had been writing with us and he was forced to play the trumpet the entire song. I still don?t think he likes when he has to play the trumpet so we haven?t really gotten this one tight enough to play live yet.
PICTURE OF A TREE THAT DOESN?T LOOK OK
We hit a lot of road blocks while putting together the vocals for this record and I think there were a few points where we thought we would never finish it. After a long, long static period we began to flesh out of the lyrics for picture of a tree. We were all in the basement of the Handsome Woman as we figured out the overlapping vocals. I think it really got us all excited again and the end became a bit more in sight.
YOU WILL NEVER GO TO SPACE
This song was built off a jam we had one day when Steve couldn?t come to practice. We sat on the demo for a very long time before we learned the song again and surprising not much changed at all. I really like how deep the cello makes the build up. Lyrics for this song were demo?d in our old van, Van Bassini outside the Barbary in Philadelphia. This is my personal favorite song off the LP probably because the lyrics relate a lot to everything that was going on in our lives around then.
THE LAYERS OF SKIN WE DRAG AROUND
Derrick and Josh had recorded an instrumental demo of this song originally for a pop punk band they had been planning to start called ?Layers?. The only other thing they got finished for the band was a t shirt that ripped off the slayer logo by moving the S at the start of their name to the end. I think we were shown this demo one night when everyone was drunk and we all agreed we should finish the song and include it on the LP. We all kind of think this is the better version of the idea we tried to do in ?Be Neon With Me? from Josh is Dead. - Greg (Guitar, Vocals)
ULTIMATE STEVE
I took some adderall and got stoned at practice and we crapped out what would become my favorite song on the record. Steve played a blast beat on an emo song and evolved into Ultimate Steve. The lyrics were written while delivering calzones to shitty college students hoping that the world would end and free me of that hell. - Derrick (guitar, vocals)
GIG LIFE
Tom Diaz wrote this song after our first tour with Deer Leap for his solo project, Sinforiano Diaz. I told him that we needed to make ?Coldplay money? and put this on our record. It took a really long time to arrange it for a full band, keep it true to the frailty of Tom?s original composition, and have it only kind of come out like a total shit rock jam for radio. I want to get rid of my teeth so we need to write our ?The Middle? but I don?t think we totally hit the mark this time. - Derrick (guitar, vocals)
LOW LIGHT ASSEMBLY
We had originally planned to include a track titled ?The Last Clippers Show? which was also co-named ?Chris?s First Day at Pre School? in this spot on the record. As the record began to wrap up it became more clear that we were unsatisfied with the direction of the song and decided to scrap it. Around this same time Josh showed us the skeleton of Low Light Assembly. Theres a really crappy demo of Greg singing the vocal melody and some earlier version of lyrics that was used to show everybody the three voices in the song. For us right now this is probably one of the most fun songs to play live because it?s so different then everything else we usually include in our set.
GETTING SODAS
Getting Sodas was the most difficult song to come together on the entire record. The song had been demo?d out originally in 2011 and we planned to put it on the Run For Cover ?Mixed Signals? comp. As our recording time loomed we all kinda agreed that the song wasn?t ready yet and ended up holding off and including the song on ?Whenever, If Ever.?We seriously had somewhere around 7 different demos of the song, all with vastly different parts and structures. It took forever to get the song to where we wanted it to be, and didn?t actually have the final structure until a week before we began tracking.
Vocally this song was a nightmare too. While the first half of the song came together fairly quickly vocally within a few drafts, we all were at a bit of a loss with how to approach the end. Derrick had written the main set of lyrics that we all liked, but just getting them to fit correctly in the span of the 4 minute build up was difficult.
Video by Geoff Hoskinson (http://vimeo.com/ghoskinson)
The official video for ?Picture of a Tree That Doesn?t Look Okay? from The World Is a Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid to Die?s debut full length album Whenever, If Ever out now through Topshelf Records.
The World is a Beautiful Place & I am No Longer Afraid to Die
2013/05/27 Secret Art Space, Bethlehem, PA
Take some drugs lets go to space
Though long since available to everyone through what I will affectionately refer to as the leak, Whenever, If Ever is technically, officially out today. “What does this mean for me?”, you may ask ? and that’s a perfectly valid question. It means Whenever, If Ever is available to:
- stream on Youtube.
- download on bandcamp immediately.
- listen to on bandcamp.
- listen to on soundcloud.
- pick up on iTunes.
- order easily from Amazon with that gift card you still have from the holidays.
- listen endlessly to your heart’s content with interspersed commercial breaks on Spotify.
- order from your local independent record store.
- and, of course, order physically on CD or vinyl.
The record is available in the following record shops & retailers:
- Amazon.com
- Amoeba (San Francisco)
- Amoeba (Hollywood)
- Backside Records
- CD City
- Canterbury Records
- Dearborn Music
- Dimple
- Disc and Dat
- Disc Exchange
- Eckstrom
- Exclusive Company
- Gotham
- Graywhale
- Hastings
- Hot Topic
- Independent Records & Video
- Insound
- Interpunk
- J&R Electronics
- Lou’s Records
- Midnight Starshine
- Midwest Tape
- Music Millennium
- Newbury Comics
- Painted Smiles
- Park Ave/Halfman
- Princeton Record Exchange
- Red Scroll Records
- Revhq.com
- Salzer’s Mercantile
- Shop Radio Cast
- Silver Platters
- Sonic Boom Records
- Transcontinent Records
- Vintage Vinyl
- Zia
Additionally, we’re still running a Whenever, If Ever test press contest. Pick up a copy of the record by the end of the week to be eligible to win!
Lastly, TWIABP is on the road right now with Dads and Pity Sex! Go see them if you can!
Oh, right ? and super lastly, the initial test press was rejected. If you’re waiting on this record to arrive, that’s why. It’s delayed about a week and a half.
Thanks!!
In a about month Denver! Tell yo franz
https://www.facebook.com/events/301505233313048/
https://www.facebook.com/events/301505233313048/
Topshelf Records at Fest 12!
Sunday July 21, 2013
RSVP on Facebook!
Tickets: Etix | Redscroll Records
More info: www.thearcagency.org
go
We leave for our US tour in a week! Oh my god. Excited to get to all the spots we?ve never gone before. I have heard the new Dads & Pity Sex records and am excited to hear those songs for a month. If you have any questions about a show, please email theworldisa [at] gmail.com. People have been asking about presale tickets for a lot of shows. Some shows have them, some do not! The links bellow should be able to help you find all the information available!
- 06/12/2013 - New Brunswick, NJ @ Cooler Ranch (LAST MIN!!!)
- 06/13/2013 - Richmond, VA @ Strange Matter
- 06/14/2013 - Greenville, NC @ Tipsy Teapot
- 06/15/2013 - Charleston, SC @ The Oasis (late)
- 06/15/2013 - Murrells Inlet, SC @ Suck Bang Blow (early)
- 06/16/2013 - Atlanta, GA @ Wonder Root
- 06/17/2013 - Savannah, GA @ Vinyl Vibe Records
- 06/18/2013 - Jacksonville, FL @ Burro Bar
- 06/19/2013 - Orlando, FL @ Wills? Pub
- 06/20/2013 - Pembroke Pines, FL @ The Talent Farm
- 06/21/2013 - Tampa, FL @ Epic Problem
- 06/22/2013 - New Orleans, LA @ Big Top June
- 06/23/2013 - San Antonio, TX @ The Ten Eleven
- 06/24/2013 - Austin, TX @ Mohawk
- 06/25/2013 - Dallas, TX @ Club Dada
- 06/27/2013 - Albuquerque, NM @ The Gasworks
- 06/28/2013 - Meza, AZ @ Nile Underground
- 06/29/2013 - San Diego, CA @ Che Cafe w/ Adventures & Weatherbox
- 06/30/2013 - Highland Park, CA @ Growing Up Is Dumb Fest (SOLD OUT)
- 07/01/2013 - Santa Cruz, CA @ The Ratchet House
- 07/02/2013 - Oakland, CA @ 1234 Go Records
- 07/03/2013 - Eureka, CA @ Placebo
- 07/04/2013 - Portland, OR @ Garfield House
- 07/05/2013 - Seattle, WA @ El Corazon Lounge
- 07/06/2013 - Boise, ID @ The Shredder
- 07/07/2013 - Salt Lake City, UT @ The Shred Sled
- 07/08/2013 - Denver, CO @ Circle Music Collective
- 07/09/2013 - Kansas City, MO @ Art Closet Studio
- 07/10/2013 - St. Louis, MO @ Fubar
- 07/11/2013 - Peoria, IL @ Broken Tree Coffee
- 07/12/2013 - Chicago, IL @ Swerp Mansion
- 07/13/2013 - Grand Rapids, MI @ The Turtle Den
- 07/14/2013 - Ann Arbor, MI @ 907 Lincoln
- 07/15/2013 - Indianapolis, IN @ Hooiser Dome
- 07/16/2013 - Pittsburgh, PA @ The Mr. Roboto Project
- 07/17/2013 - Williamsport, PA @ West 4th
- 07/18/2013 - Philadelphia, PA @ The Fire w/ Daylight
- 07/19/2013 - Alexandria, VA @ The Lab w/ Daylight
- 07/20/2013 - Brooklyn, NY @ Suburbia w/ Daylight
- 07/21/2013 - New Haven, CT @ Bethesda Lutheran Church