Splashdown (band)
Encyclopedia
Splashdown, formed in Allston
, Massachusetts
, in 1996, was an American pop rock
band. The group disbanded in 2001; their last show was at the release party for the debut CD of Freezepop
on February 2 of that year. Splashdown gained a small but extremely loyal following in the Northeast United States
for their combination of electronica
, rock, jazz
, and Middle-Eastern influences. The band is sometimes described as a trip hop
act.
, and guitarist/bassist Adam Buhler. The trio increased in size to a five- or six-piece group for live shows; these line-ups frequently included drummer Jason Sakos and guitarist Trevor Shand. Buhler and Crooker were in another female-fronted band in the mid-1990s, Sirensong. After the demise of this band, Buhler's then-wife Cynthia von Buhler
(née Carrozza), with whom Adam co-owned Castle von Buhler Records, introduced him and Crooker to singer Kaplan, who had previously been a back-up singer for Cynthia's band Women of Sodom. With Cynthia as their manager, Splashdown was formed in 1996, playing their first live show on March 29, and their 7-inch Pandora / Deserter was released the same year.
Their first full-length album, Stars and Garters, came in 1997, featuring nine tracks, including "Pandora" and "Deserter". That same year, the track "50%" appeared on Nigh, a compilation album released by Castle von Buhler. This was followed by the Halfworld EP in 1998, which contained four new songs and a reworked version of the Stars and Garters track "Beguiled", entitled "Beguiled Mark II". After their initial studio and tour success, Splashdown was signed to Glen Ballard
's Java Records, an imprint of Capitol Records
, which released a five-track EP in 1999, Redshift, that quickly sold out. Yet for reasons largely unknown, although troubles between Ballard and Capitol are partially to blame, Capitol never released their next full-length album, Blueshift. This album, co-produced by the band and engineer Bryan Carrigan and featuring two songs co-written by Ballard, included the five songs on Redshift, five old songs with new mixes that did not appear on Redshift (including "Games You Play", a reworking of the Stars and Garters song "Paradox"), and six all-new songs. The problems Splashdown endured with Capitol prompted the band to independently compile another full-length album, Possibilities, which included demos and previously-released work that was not owned by Capitol. Blueshift and Possibilities are now widely available from numerous download sites. Unfortunately, fearing Capitol would own any future songs and lacking energy after their fight with their label, the band members announced in 2001 that they were on an "indefinite hiatus" and later stated that their time as Splashdown had ended.
While they were together, the band played on the second stage at many shows on the East Coast leg of the Lilith Fair
tour in 1999. One of their songs, "Karma Slave," was featured on the soundtrack
to the film Titan AE. Many of Splashdown's fans credit the Lilith Fair gigs and "Karma Slave" for helping them discover the band. In addition, the song "A Charming Spell" was featured on an episode of the TV show Charmed
, and "Games You Play" was heard in an episode of Angel
. The band's music also appeared in Ballard's movie Clubland.
Splashdown gained some fame from airplay on a number of college and alternative radio station
s, including WBCN in Boston
(in 1997, the band participated in the WBCN Rock & Roll Rumble
) and WOXY in Cincinnati. However, they were most popular on WBER in Rochester, New York
; on that station's year-end countdowns of top songs as voted on by listeners, "Ironspy" was ranked fifth in 1999, while "Mayan Pilot" was fourth and "A Charming Spell" tied for eighteenth in 2000. In addition, Splashdown once headlined the city's Lilac Festival, and when the band held a contest in 1999 to see who could sell the most Splashdown albums to their friends, all three of the top finishers were from Rochester.
, which in 2004 released its first album, Mercury, and a six-song EP, entitled Subtle Things, in the last week of 2006. Kaplan is technically the only member of UHP. The first live Universal Hall Pass performance, on March 13, 2006, consisted solely of Kaplan and a piano. She has also sung on many film soundtracks, including K-PAX
, Pretty Persuasion
, The Chronicles of Riddick
, The Skeleton Key
, and Red Planet
, among others. Many of the movies in which her voice is heard were scored by Graeme Revell
.
Buhler produced and played bass on Boston band Sparkola's self-titled 2002 debut album and 2003 EP Handclaps & Slapbacks (both released on the Castle von Buhler label). Buhler, who at one point recorded with the darkwave band Black Tape for a Blue Girl
before Splashdown's formation, is now half of the hard-rock duo Anarchy Club
with Keith Smith, previously the lead singer of fellow Boston-area band C60. Their first album, The Way And Its Power, was released in 2005, and an EP followed in 2007, called "A Single Drop of Red." In late 2009, they released another full-length CD, "The Art of War." Anarchy Club's music has been featured as playable tracks in the best-selling games Guitar Hero, Guitar Hero 2, Rock Band, and Rock Band 2. In late 2010, he released a new CD under the name Map & Key, with music by Adam and singing by Scottish singer Alice Ishbel Watson. Their collaboration was conducted via Internet between America and Scotland.
Crooker went on to co-found Freezepop
(who, as noted above, released their first album while Splashdown was still technically together) and continues to do solo work as Symbion Project, a moniker under which he has recorded since 1992. He and Kaplan recently worked together on Universal Hall Pass's "Subtle Things" EP. Crooker is also the Audio Director at Harmonix, makers of such hit music-heavy video games as FreQuency
, Amplitude
, and the Guitar Hero series. As most Harmonix-developed games are published by Konami
, Crooker has also worked on some North American entries in that company's Dance Dance Revolution
series. In addition to many Symbion Project and Freezepop songs being placed in these games (with many of Crooker's songs being attributed to aliases), Kaplan was heard in both Frequency and Amplitude.
at the height of the popularity of file-sharing programs such as Napster
, they discouraged online sharing of their songs. After the band's break-up, however, Splashdown and their fans made efforts to ensure their music was available for free online. The band's entire catalog is still available for download for free on the web, though remastered versions of their first two (pre-Capitol) releases are also available on iTunes
.
Allston
-People:* Aaron Allston , an American novelist* Johanna Allston , an Australian orienteer* Robert Francis Withers Allston , a Governor of South Carolina...
, Massachusetts
Massachusetts
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...
, in 1996, was an American pop rock
Pop rock
Pop rock is a music genre which mixes a catchy pop style and light lyrics in its guitar-based rock songs. There are varying definitions of the term, ranging from a slower and mellower form of rock music to a subgenre of pop music...
band. The group disbanded in 2001; their last show was at the release party for the debut CD of Freezepop
Freezepop (band)
Freezepop is an American electronic band from Boston, Massachusetts. They formed in 1999 with Liz Enthusiasm, Sean T. Drinkwater, and The Duke of Pannekoeken, an alias for composer Kasson Crooker. As of December 2009, the current lineup includes Enthusiasm, Drinkwater, Robert John "Bananas" Foster...
on February 2 of that year. Splashdown gained a small but extremely loyal following in the Northeast United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
for their combination of electronica
Electronica
Electronica includes a wide range of contemporary electronic music designed for a wide range of uses, including foreground listening, some forms of dancing, and background music for other activities; however, unlike electronic dance music, it is not specifically made for dancing...
, rock, jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
, and Middle-Eastern influences. The band is sometimes described as a trip hop
Trip hop
Trip hop is a music genre consisting of downtempo electronic music which originated in the early 1990s in England, especially Bristol. Deriving from "post"-acid house, the term was first used by the British music media and press as a way to describe the more experimental variant of breakbeat which...
act.
Splashdown's rise and fall
Splashdown consisted of singer/pianist Melissa Kaplan, electronic programmer Kasson CrookerKasson Crooker
Kasson Crooker is an American electronic musician, composer, and the artist behind Symbion Project, his solo moniker. He also works collaboratively in The Planets Won't Let You Sleep Tonight and his past bands are Freezepop, Splashdown, Larkspur, and Sirensong...
, and guitarist/bassist Adam Buhler. The trio increased in size to a five- or six-piece group for live shows; these line-ups frequently included drummer Jason Sakos and guitarist Trevor Shand. Buhler and Crooker were in another female-fronted band in the mid-1990s, Sirensong. After the demise of this band, Buhler's then-wife Cynthia von Buhler
Cynthia von Buhler
Cynthia von Buhler a.k.a. Countess von Buhler, is an American artist, performer, and children's book author.-Early life:Von Buhler was raised in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, the middle child in an artistic family with six children...
(née Carrozza), with whom Adam co-owned Castle von Buhler Records, introduced him and Crooker to singer Kaplan, who had previously been a back-up singer for Cynthia's band Women of Sodom. With Cynthia as their manager, Splashdown was formed in 1996, playing their first live show on March 29, and their 7-inch Pandora / Deserter was released the same year.
Their first full-length album, Stars and Garters, came in 1997, featuring nine tracks, including "Pandora" and "Deserter". That same year, the track "50%" appeared on Nigh, a compilation album released by Castle von Buhler. This was followed by the Halfworld EP in 1998, which contained four new songs and a reworked version of the Stars and Garters track "Beguiled", entitled "Beguiled Mark II". After their initial studio and tour success, Splashdown was signed to Glen Ballard
Glen Ballard
Glen Ballard is an American songwriter and record producer, best known for co-writing and producing Alanis Morissette's Jagged Little Pill , which won Grammy Award for "Best Rock Album", and "Album of the Year" amongst others, and is ranked by the Rolling Stone amongst The 500 Greatest Albums of...
's Java Records, an imprint of Capitol Records
Capitol Records
Capitol Records is a major United States based record label, formerly located in Los Angeles, but operating in New York City as part of Capitol Music Group. Its former headquarters building, the Capitol Tower, is a major landmark near the corner of Hollywood and Vine...
, which released a five-track EP in 1999, Redshift, that quickly sold out. Yet for reasons largely unknown, although troubles between Ballard and Capitol are partially to blame, Capitol never released their next full-length album, Blueshift. This album, co-produced by the band and engineer Bryan Carrigan and featuring two songs co-written by Ballard, included the five songs on Redshift, five old songs with new mixes that did not appear on Redshift (including "Games You Play", a reworking of the Stars and Garters song "Paradox"), and six all-new songs. The problems Splashdown endured with Capitol prompted the band to independently compile another full-length album, Possibilities, which included demos and previously-released work that was not owned by Capitol. Blueshift and Possibilities are now widely available from numerous download sites. Unfortunately, fearing Capitol would own any future songs and lacking energy after their fight with their label, the band members announced in 2001 that they were on an "indefinite hiatus" and later stated that their time as Splashdown had ended.
While they were together, the band played on the second stage at many shows on the East Coast leg of the Lilith Fair
Lilith Fair
Lilith Fair was a concert tour and travelling music festival, founded by Canadian musician Sarah McLachlan, Nettwerk Music Group's Dan Fraser and Terry McBride, and New York talent agent Marty Diamond. It took place during the summers of 1997 to 1999, and was revived in the summer of 2010. It...
tour in 1999. One of their songs, "Karma Slave," was featured on the soundtrack
Soundtrack
A soundtrack can be recorded music accompanying and synchronized to the images of a motion picture, book, television program or video game; a commercially released soundtrack album of music as featured in the soundtrack of a film or TV show; or the physical area of a film that contains the...
to the film Titan AE. Many of Splashdown's fans credit the Lilith Fair gigs and "Karma Slave" for helping them discover the band. In addition, the song "A Charming Spell" was featured on an episode of the TV show Charmed
Charmed
Charmed is an American television series that originally aired from October 7, 1998, until May 21, 2006, on the now defunct The WB Television Network. The series was created in 1998 by writer Constance M...
, and "Games You Play" was heard in an episode of Angel
Angel (TV series)
Angel is an American television series, a spin-off of the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The series was created by Buffys creator, Joss Whedon, in collaboration with David Greenwalt, and first aired on October 5, 1999...
. The band's music also appeared in Ballard's movie Clubland.
Splashdown gained some fame from airplay on a number of college and alternative radio station
Radio station
Radio broadcasting is a one-way wireless transmission over radio waves intended to reach a wide audience. Stations can be linked in radio networks to broadcast a common radio format, either in broadcast syndication or simulcast or both...
s, including WBCN in Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
(in 1997, the band participated in the WBCN Rock & Roll Rumble
WBCN Rock & Roll Rumble
The WBCN Rock 'n' Roll Rumble, begun in 1979, is a Greater Boston "battle of the bands" competition co-sponsored by WBCN-FM and its local music show Boston Emissions....
) and WOXY in Cincinnati. However, they were most popular on WBER in Rochester, New York
Rochester, New York
Rochester is a city in Monroe County, New York, south of Lake Ontario in the United States. Known as The World's Image Centre, it was also once known as The Flour City, and more recently as The Flower City...
; on that station's year-end countdowns of top songs as voted on by listeners, "Ironspy" was ranked fifth in 1999, while "Mayan Pilot" was fourth and "A Charming Spell" tied for eighteenth in 2000. In addition, Splashdown once headlined the city's Lilac Festival, and when the band held a contest in 1999 to see who could sell the most Splashdown albums to their friends, all three of the top finishers were from Rochester.
Ex-members' post-Splashdown work
After Splashdown's break-up, Kaplan formed another band, Universal Hall PassUniversal Hall Pass
Universal Hall Pass is a one-person band based in Los Angeles, California which was first formed in 2001 by Melissa Kaplan, formerly of Splashdown.Universal Hall Pass' first full-length album, Mercury, was released in 2004, featuring eleven songs...
, which in 2004 released its first album, Mercury, and a six-song EP, entitled Subtle Things, in the last week of 2006. Kaplan is technically the only member of UHP. The first live Universal Hall Pass performance, on March 13, 2006, consisted solely of Kaplan and a piano. She has also sung on many film soundtracks, including K-PAX
K-PAX
K-PAX is the name of the first novel in the K-PAX series by Gene Brewer and a film based on the series:*K-PAX **K-PAX – film*K-PAX II: On a Beam of Light *K-PAX III: Worlds of Prot...
, Pretty Persuasion
Pretty Persuasion
Pretty Persuasion is a 2005 American black comedy/satirical film about a 15-year-old schoolgirl who makes an allegation of sexual harassment against her drama teacher. The film's tagline is: "Revenge knows no mercy." It was written by Skander Halim and directed by Marcos Siega...
, The Chronicles of Riddick
The Chronicles of Riddick
The Chronicles of Riddick is a 2004 American science fiction film which follows the adventures of Richard B. Riddick, as he attempts to elude capture after the events depicted in the 2000 film Pitch Black, and details his meeting with Jack and Imam, his escape from the prison planet Crematoria, and...
, The Skeleton Key
The Skeleton Key
The Skeleton Key is a 2005 American supernatural horror film starring Kate Hudson, Gena Rowlands, John Hurt, Peter Sarsgaard, and Joy Bryant. The film focuses on a young hospice nurse who acquires a job at a Terrebonne Parish plantation home, and becomes entangled in a mystery involving the house,...
, and Red Planet
Red Planet (film)
Red Planet is a 2000 Technicolor science fiction film directed by Antony Hoffman, starring Val Kilmer and Carrie-Anne Moss. It was released on November 10, 2000.-Plot:...
, among others. Many of the movies in which her voice is heard were scored by Graeme Revell
Graeme Revell
Graeme Revell is a New Zealand film score composer.Revell attended Auckland Grammar School, where he finished his final year in 7A...
.
Buhler produced and played bass on Boston band Sparkola's self-titled 2002 debut album and 2003 EP Handclaps & Slapbacks (both released on the Castle von Buhler label). Buhler, who at one point recorded with the darkwave band Black Tape for a Blue Girl
Black tape for a blue girl
Black Tape for a Blue Girl is an American Dark Wave band formed in 1986 by Projekt Records' founder Sam Rosenthal. Their music takes on elements of dark cabaret, Dark Wave, ethereal, ambient and neoclassical music. Director David Lynch...
before Splashdown's formation, is now half of the hard-rock duo Anarchy Club
Anarchy Club
Anarchy Club is a hard rock/electronica duo from Boston, Massachusetts. The band consists of vocalist/guitarist Keith Smith, who is a former member of the band C60, and Adam von Buhler, who plays guitar , bass, drums, and other instruments, and is a former member of the band...
with Keith Smith, previously the lead singer of fellow Boston-area band C60. Their first album, The Way And Its Power, was released in 2005, and an EP followed in 2007, called "A Single Drop of Red." In late 2009, they released another full-length CD, "The Art of War." Anarchy Club's music has been featured as playable tracks in the best-selling games Guitar Hero, Guitar Hero 2, Rock Band, and Rock Band 2. In late 2010, he released a new CD under the name Map & Key, with music by Adam and singing by Scottish singer Alice Ishbel Watson. Their collaboration was conducted via Internet between America and Scotland.
Crooker went on to co-found Freezepop
Freezepop (band)
Freezepop is an American electronic band from Boston, Massachusetts. They formed in 1999 with Liz Enthusiasm, Sean T. Drinkwater, and The Duke of Pannekoeken, an alias for composer Kasson Crooker. As of December 2009, the current lineup includes Enthusiasm, Drinkwater, Robert John "Bananas" Foster...
(who, as noted above, released their first album while Splashdown was still technically together) and continues to do solo work as Symbion Project, a moniker under which he has recorded since 1992. He and Kaplan recently worked together on Universal Hall Pass's "Subtle Things" EP. Crooker is also the Audio Director at Harmonix, makers of such hit music-heavy video games as FreQuency
FreQuency
Frequency is a music video game developed by Harmonix Music Systems and published by SCEI. It is the first major release from Harmonix. It was released in November 2001. A sequel titled Amplitude was released in 2003.-Gameplay:...
, Amplitude
Amplitude (game)
Amplitude is a 2003 PlayStation 2 musical video game. It was developed by Harmonix and is the sequel to the game Frequency.-Gameplay:In Amplitude, the player controls a ship moving down a path of varying shapes and lengths, containing up to six tracks...
, and the Guitar Hero series. As most Harmonix-developed games are published by Konami
Konami
is a Japanese leading developer and publisher of numerous popular and strong-selling toys, trading cards, anime, tokusatsu, slot machines, arcade cabinets and video games...
, Crooker has also worked on some North American entries in that company's Dance Dance Revolution
Dance Dance Revolution
Dance Dance Revolution, abbreviated DDR, and previously known as Dancing Stage in Europe and Australasia, is a music video game series produced by Konami. Introduced in Japan in 1998 as part of the Bemani series, and released in North America and Europe in 1999, Dance Dance Revolution is the...
series. In addition to many Symbion Project and Freezepop songs being placed in these games (with many of Crooker's songs being attributed to aliases), Kaplan was heard in both Frequency and Amplitude.
Music distribution
When Splashdown was together in the late nineties1990s
File:1990s decade montage.png|From left, clockwise: The Hubble Space Telescope floats in space after it was taken up in 1990; American F-16s and F-15s fly over burning oil fields and the USA Lexie in Operation Desert Storm, also known as the 1991 Gulf War; The signing of the Oslo Accords on...
at the height of the popularity of file-sharing programs such as Napster
Napster
Napster is an online music store and a Best Buy company. It was originally founded as a pioneering peer-to-peer file sharing Internet service that emphasized sharing audio files that were typically digitally encoded music as MP3 format files...
, they discouraged online sharing of their songs. After the band's break-up, however, Splashdown and their fans made efforts to ensure their music was available for free online. The band's entire catalog is still available for download for free on the web, though remastered versions of their first two (pre-Capitol) releases are also available on iTunes
ITunes
iTunes is a media player computer program, used for playing, downloading, and organizing digital music and video files on desktop computers. It can also manage contents on iPod, iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad....
.
Discography
- Pandora/Deserter (7", 1996)
- Pandora
- Deserter
- Stars and Garters (LP, 1997)
- Thunder
- Pandora
- Presumed Lost
- Beguiled
- So Ha
- Need Versus Want
- Paradox
- Deserter
- Running With Scissors
- Halfworld (EP, 1998)
- Ironspy
- Sugar High
- Halfworld
- Over The Wall
- Beguiled Mark II
- Redshift (EP, 1999)
- A Charming Spell
- The Archer
- Mayan Pilot
- Waterbead
- Ironspy
- Blueshift (LP, unreleased)
- A Charming Spell
- Presumed Lost
- Sugar High
- All Things
- Mayan Pilot
- The Archer
- Elvis Sunday
- Ironspy
- Games You Play
- Dig
- Waterbead
- Procreation Chick
- Lost Frontier
- Halfworld
- I Understand
- Over The Wall
- Possibilities (LP, unreleased)
- Asia At Odd Hours
- A Charming Spell (Symbion remix)
- Trophy Hunter (Demo)
- 50% (Jez Collin remix)
- Lost Frontier (Demo)
- All Things (Symbion remix)
- Karma Slave
- 50% (Jez Collin Dub remix)
- Over The Wall (Demo)
- Sugar High (Doc remix)
- Sugar High (Rhys FulberRhys FulberNowell Rhys Fulber is a Canadian electronic musician and producer. He was a member of Front Line Assembly and Delerium along with Bill Leeb, and now records on his own under the name Conjure One.- Biography :...
remix) - Sugar High (Bill Klatt remix)
- Sugar High (Stryker Bros. remix)
- Sugar High (E.P.)
- A Charming Spell (Redshift version)
- 50%
- You Are (Demo)
- Non-album tracks
- Nomadic (This song was performed many times in concert, and can be heard on some of the web sites above. However, it was the only Splashdown song to never be released on disc.)