tND is back. Check out an exclusive SBD recording of our second set from The Fillmore in Silver Spring, MD, recorded on July 12th, 2014. Subscribe to our podcast/soundcloud for more exclusive looks at #tnd2014!

Setlist: Jam > Gone, Gone, Gone

theNEWDEAL Podcast Series 001 - tND is Back!

tND's podcast series rolls on!

Check out an exclusive SBD recording of the second set from tND's late night throwdown in Chicago 8.31.14, post North Coast Music Festival at Concord Music Hall.

Subscribe to our podcast/soundcloud for more exclusive looks at #tnd2014!

Setlist: 
Jam, Glide>Jam>Glide, Jam>Octobong>Jam>Octobong

Tourdates+Tickets+more: www.thenewdeal.com

theNEWDEAL Podcast Series 002 - Live in Chicago (Late Night 8.31.14)

new music from theNEWDEAL, recorded fall 2014, mixed by Davey Badiuk

Sabotage the System

#TDIH Live in Osaka, Japan 6/07/2009

#ThisDealInHistory Live recording from Ann Arbor, MI 10/15/2010!

#TDIH Ann Arbor, MI 10/15/2010

#TDIH Davenport IA 03/08/2008

#ThisDealInHistory - Mr.Small's in Pittsburgh, PA from 11/3/2010

#TDIH Pittsburgh PA 11/3/2010

Mercury Switch

"This week's #ThisDealInHistory is pulled from our show in Kingston, Ontario on 10/05/2002. This time period finds the band exploring more of an aggressive feel to its jams in terms of approach and rhythm. We weren't quite at the spot where we turned up the overdrive on our sounds yet, but this show definitely showcases our desire to turn up the intensity in both our playing style and our rhythmic style. The straight-up house music jams were becoming less frequent (although they never totally disappeared) and, while house music was still definitely important to us, it was now starting to be performed with more fire and drive.  The clip also includes "Self Orbit" from our self-titled record. As was our intent at the time, we elongated the intro, pulling more tension out of the song before we went into the main section. We then segue into "G-nome" which most definitely highlights the rhythmic intensity and drive mentioned above - the bit from 11:30 to the end being a good example of that." - Jamie

#TDIH Kingston ON 10/5/2002

This week's #TDIH is a 31-minute segment pulled from our 11/18/2004 concert in Ithaca, NY and is definitely an interesting listen.

Ithaca was one of the first places that tND started playing regularly - the fans took to us early on and it quickly became a preferred stop on our tour routing between 2000 and 2006. In fact, it's an Ithaca audience that can be heard singing me "Happy Birthday" (but we reversed the audio) in the background of "Ray Parker, Jr Pt 1" on our 2000 self-titled release.

This cut starts out dark and stays dark for a while. A lot of our show-starting jams often begin in minor keys but the sound, vibe and energy of this opening is somewhat spooky, IMO. Might have something to do with the Moog sounding like a perimeter alarm going off.

The section at 1:50 does nothing to dispel the darkness, courtesy of the bass explosions/sparse repetition of the synth coupled with Darren's intense jackhammer groove.

An abupt gear change at 4:30, always one of my favourite things to do. In this case, we slow it down and Dan's awesome fuzz bass finds its way in.

Pretty good example of 2004-era New Deal - the moody, somewhat heavy repetition that is moving away from House Music and into more intense grooves and sounds. There was never a conscious decision to keep things sparse and grey  - we just sort of fell into those types of nights.

"Jagoff" gets cued around 9:30 and its jam from 12:55 to 17:30 maintains a similar vibe with some spooky keys work by Yours Truly. The heavier sounds are definitely finding their way into my solo...

Dan can be heard playing the bassline to "Demolition Man" by the Police while i join in with the melody around 15:05 until 16:55.
The "Deep Sun" cue is played at 17:21 but we keep the jam going (transitioning into a pretty ambient section) until the main bit finally kicks in at 21:35 -Jamie

#TDIH Ithaca, NY 11/18/2004

This week's #ThisDealInHistory is from our show in London, ON on Nov 20, 2002.  The cut opens with what sounds like a classic Set 2 opening jam, circa 2002-era New Deal. Uptempo house music with a repeating electric piano lick and some stellar hi-hat work. Playing this style of house music requires a fair bit of restraint and patience in order to let the groove settle in. We seem to be doing a pretty good job of that on this night, throwing in some short Moog blips here and there with the bass providing rhythmic counterpoint underneath it all.  We open it up a little more around 2:40 w some longer synth phrases (still repeated lines, though) while increasing the intensity a shade - the chord changes hint at what will become the first harmonic gear shift at 3:50 which takes us to the intro jam of Deep Sun... 

We heard a 2004 version of Deep Sun in last week's TDIH (Ithaca 11/18/04) and it's fascinating to note the difference in approach within the span of two years. While the song was rarely the same twice (w the exception of the main "chords and melody" section), it's readily apparent that our sound and style evolved dramatically in the time period between 2002 and 2004, and one needs to look no further than these two versions of Deep Sun for proof of that.

Part of the reason for this evolution was our 8-month hiatus at the beginning of 2004 - that decision was based in part on the desire to step back from the style of music that we were most comfortable with at the time and to think about exploring other musical avenues while still maintaining that "New Deal spirit". That's not to say that what we were doing in 2002 wasn't interesting and fun - it definitely was - but we all felt that we could go farther and higher, and the break helped us to do just that when we returned in September, 2004.

I enjoy these types of sets because it appears that we're not trying to throw everything into the mix at all times, preferring to let the groove settle and speak for itself. The rest of this cut unfolds in a similar manner - restrained yet energized with a bunch of interesting ideas that breathe and develop over the course of the jam. -Jamie

#TDIH London, ON 11/20/2002

This week’s #ThisDealInHistory is another look into our 2002 concert in London, Ontario. 

Last week i discussed the restraint and patience displayed in our house grooves. This week’s cut begins with another example of that same restraint and composure, however it’s in a downtempo style.

Slower grooves played a big part in the 1998-2003 shows (they’re heavily featured throughout our first concert/record “This Is Live”) and this opening jam is a good illustration of our early-era downtempo style, albeit with the heavier approach that we began exploring in late 2001/early 2002. This shift stemmed from our desire to inject some heft and body into our sound as well as to veer our tone away from the more delicate rhythms and sounds so prevalent in our first three years.

Around this time these slower pieces began to feature repeated chord progressions and melodic lines, a definite development from our one-chord approach in the early years. This enabled us to further develop our song-creation chops and not simply rely on jamming on the groove for extended periods of time.

Around 3:30 we shift gears and bring up the tempo, following with harmonic changes at both 4:10 and 4:38 to lead us into an early version of “G-nome”.

“G-nome” was written on the fly at one of our 2002 Bowery Ballroom shows in NYC (its creation is documented on our Live: NYC 5/31+6/1 2002 release) and the song was still developing at this time (in fact, it continued to develop its basic body until around 2005!). In this clip you can hear us extending the intro and throwing different concepts into the mix, some of which would return over time in future shows, some of which would be thrown to the side - such is the way we write songs!

After three minutes of exploring the intro we finally hit the main head at 7:00. The astute listener will notice that in these early instances we only play the head once and go to an organ interlude before returning to the main melody for a second time (without the shots and stops that eventually found their way into the melody).

The jam at 9:00 is of a distinctly different nature as well - no key change, the same synth sound - but these ideas changed over time and performances. We would listen back to these shows, pick out bits we liked, discard ones that we didn’t like, and then try to remember them, all the while working on creating new bits to incorporate into the piece. Most tND songs were works in progress for a fairly long period time before they settled into any conceptual consistency.

Shout-out to Dan’s bass tone from 11:21 to the end. It veers from crispy and insect-like to downright dirty!  -Jamie

#TDIH London, ON 11/20/2002 pt 2

This week’s #ThisDealInHistory is from our July 2003 show at Beardslee Castle in upstate NY.  This tour took place during a break from recording “Gone Gone Gone” and definitely displays our pent-up demand to get out of the studio and play music in front of a living, breathing audience.

It starts with a transition out of what sounds like a 1980’s-style jam with the trigger cue for “Back Off” getting played at 0:22. Dan continues to play the lick w some crazy bass tone until the actual track kicks in via a key change at 1:15.

Around this time i began utilizing a technique called the “Random Patch Generator” - a technique that became (and still is to this day) a major ingredient in tND jams. Basically i pick a random patch on any of my keyboards, start playing it, all the while tweaking the sound to fit whatever mood we happen to be in. The RPG can be heard at at around 2:40 in the “Back Off” jam.
“Ravine” gets cued at 5:22 and we transition into more of a “Ravine” intro, albeit in an ambient style. We eventually land in the key of the tune around 6:15, continuing the ambience until 7:15 when we bash our way into “Ravine”.

This track was named after the hypnotist “Raveen” in honour of the original 1999 downtempo studio recording we had made when we threw some of his slick hypnotist vocals on top. We quickly amped up the sound and speed (and changed the spelling of the title) and never looked back. This was a favourite of ours to play for a long time due to the wide-open nature of the track. “Ravine” prob has the highest number of stylistic and sonic variations out of all the tND songs from that time period.

My guess is that we were in the midst of recording “Episode 7” in the studio and probably wanted to test-drive the track in front of a live audience, hence the mini-version starting around 11:10 and continuing in a loose form until “Back To The Middle” at 16:45.

The BTTM jam takes a big left turn with some downtempo experimentation right out of the main section. As explained in last week’s post, our slower jams were starting to take on greater harmonic and melodic variety in these years. I think i hear myself quoting Jeff Beck’s version of “Goodbye Pork Pie Hat” as well as Herbie Hancock’s “Butterfly”, all within the same eight bars!  -Jamie

#TDIH Beardslee Castle NY 7/23/2003

Quattro

In honour of tND's Halloween throwdown last week at New York's Playstation Theater (available for download HERE: http://bit.ly/1NvAVa0), this week's #ThisDealInHistory is pulled from our 2002 NYC Halloween Special at BB King's.

There's a lot of interesting stuff in this cut, starting with this early take of "Gone Gone Gone". We were just beginning to get the tracks together for the GGG album and the title track was one of the first to develop. 

This initial version isn't fully fleshed out - it's missing the main synth melody (having not been written yet) - but it does feature Dan pitched way up and doublng the intro melody with me. We get into some neat counterpoint around 0:28 until we kick in to the next section at 0:55. It's weird to hear GGG without that signature synth melody, but since we were at our creative best in front of an audience it was never daunting to take a half-finished track and try and develop it live.

We seem to have the middle section worked out just fine, though. This section on the studio record was typical tND - take an idea and just jam it out in various forms while letting the tape run. We'd then pick the best version that we liked and edit it into the rest of the song. 

In my opinion, this whole TDIH excerpt really invites the listener into the tND creative process - at 5:00 we switch gears, move into some Drum+Bass and start working out another future GGG track - in this case it's "A Little While/A Little While Longer". Dan starts playing the "A Little While" chorus at 6:32, mixing in a little "Self Orbit" at the same time. I can be heard working out some early keyboard parts that eventually made it into the finished song, including the electric piano segments from 7:29 - 8:39 and the synth line starting at 8:02.

Settling back into "Gone Gone Gone" at 8:40, we stretch the intro a while with some more high-pitched bass from Dan at 10:28, some serious drumming from Darren at 10:41 and a build back into "Gone Gone Gone v.1.0"

PS: For those keeping score at home, we dressed up as the Dixie Chicks for this gig. -Jamie

#TDIH New York NY 10/31/2002

This week's #ThisDealInHistory is the first of a few clips that I've edited from our Feb 19, 2003 concert in Philadelphia, PA.

Philly is another one of those cities that took to tND very early on in the band's life. Somehow we managed to finagle a gig at the Khyber Pass back in early '99 and i think that was our first Philly show. Fifteen people probably showed up... Aron Magner from The Disco Biscuits being one of them, if i recall correctly. Love those guys...

This cut starts in the middle of an elongated "Moonscraper" intro. It sounds like we're just jamming in G-minor until 0:36 when i play the trigger for Moonscraper (in the key of D-minor, no less - sounds good, though). I start playing the MS chords at 1:08 (also in D-minor haha) and we keep the elongated intro going, slowly moving our tonal centre to F-major with dan playing a descending bass line that eventually lands on our target key of D-minor right on the drop at 2:30.

This intro perfectly demonstrates one of the key tND elements being developed in this time period: the use of shifting basslines over repeated chord progressions as a means to create meaningful harmonic structures and increased melodic tension. As the band developed its sound we slowly moved away from solely utilizing fixed chord progressions over static basslines and started to incorporate varying basslines over fixed chord progressions (as well as varying basslines over varying chord progressions) - all done, of course, without prior planning. Sometimes the random bassline changes clashed with the random keyboard chords, but more often than not the sum of the parts created a fresh musical statement that we never would have arrived at had we kept to some pre-planned agenda. 

With that in mind, listen again to the Moonscraper intro and hear how the bass shifts underneath the familiar (and not-so-familiar) keys lines, thereby creating something that we had probably never played before (and have never played since). It's these types of things that, in my opinion, keep the New Deal musically interesting to both listener and performer.
The jam starts with Dan playing the MS keys rhythm on bass underneath some new blippy chords played on the Juno. Somewhere along the way i turn that Juno patch into a distorted guitar-type sound as we shift keys into a dirtier exploration in A-minor. The chords that start at 8:20 are part of a favoured progression that may or may not have been regularly incorporated into the Moonscraper jams in those years (i can't remember specifically - it's been a few shows since then...).

At 9:13 we double back to the original Moonscraper key with an eye towards returning to the second half of the song, but as is our wont we take our sweet time getting there, preferring to explore the outer limits of the Juno-106's pitch and mod wheels in combination with MSG's effects. A patient but intense build eventually gives way to the Moonscraper reprise at 12:17. Somebody clearly calls the "hard-stop" cue at 12:44, at which point we play out the ending melody. -Jamie

#TDIH 2/19/2003 Philadelphia PA

This week's #ThisDealInHistory is the first of two excerpts from our 08/10/2002 set at The Berkshire Mountain Music Festival (Berkfest) in Great Barrington, MA.

With the possible exception of our very first concert as a band (which begat our This Is Live album) there is no gig more important in the history of theNEWDEAL than our first Berkfest show in 1999.

For starters it was our first real gig in the U.S. as theNEWDEAL - that itself would make it an important venue to us - but it's the circumstances surrounding our set that cement Berkfest near the top of theNEWDEAL gig list.

Rewind to '99 - somehow we had managed to wangle our way on to the Berkfest bill. We had been passing out This Is Live to anyone who would listen and I think that The Wetlands' Chris Zahn had forwarded it to Andrew Stahl, the man behind Berkfest. Andrew decided to give this weird instrumental trio from Canada a chance and offered us an afternoon slot at the festival.

What we didn't know was that our afternoon slot would be INDOORS on one of the sunniest days of the summer, in a lodge tucked away from the main stage and far apart from all the other bands. The chances of people hearing us were slim and, with zero name recognition, we were preparing to play to nobody. We were pretty depressed about that - we knew that all we needed was for people to hear us and they'd be hooked... but with an indoor gig at an outdoor festival, your odds are tough.

Until three minutes before our set when it started to rain.
I mean POUR.
Thunder, lightning - the whole bit.
Huge summer storm.

There were only a few covered venues where all the festival goers could seek shelter - guess where they ended up?

Five minutes into our set the place was jammed with people and every single one of them was still there 90 minutes later when we finished, despite the fact that the rain had stopped 30 minutes earlier. 

If it hadn't been for that rainstorm, who knows what would have happened to tND?

That experience always seemed to give a little boost to our Berkfest sets. This one from 2002 is no exception.

The cut begins with an interesting Drum+Bass version of the "Homewrecker" intro. What I like about Darren's drumming here is that he's managing to play quite minimally in a style (D+B) that usually screams for maniacal drum fills. His tasteful grooves eventually lead us into the regular "Homewrecker" beat at 1:00 or so. Note Dan's meaty stabs throughout the main melody section - he would often combine the main bass part with innovative "soloettes", each one different than the last.

The jam at 2:16 displays some interesting elements - we were, as mentioned in previous #TDIH's, focused at this time on maximizing the hypnotic element of repeated musical lines slowly morphing over time (through tempo or harmony) until they would no longer resemble the original musical statement. I always enjoyed listening to Steve Reich and I was attempting at times to mimic that same slow sonic metamorphosis.

We shift this motif via tempo and tone, eventually landing on a filtered bass/organ/Moog/Hi-NRG drum build that leads us at 5:26 into a super-abrupt shift (have I mentioned before how much I love those?) featuring Rhodes and Moog.

Sounds to me like Dan's playing the trigger cue for "I Feel Love" at 7:56. We might have been heading in that direction but the music took us somewhere else and we never looked back. 

We hit a pretty cool break at 9:48 - me on the Moog Prodigy and Darren and Dan NAILING it at 10:01 with a balls-to-the-wall two-pronged attack. Dan is WAAY up on that neck.

I play the trigger for "Glide" at 10:50 and again at 11:02 (this time w/Dan joining in) but, as is our style, we don't get to the track for another three minutes or so, preferring to let the music breathe a little with a short ambient jam (note the bass providing a repeated muted rhythm underneath). From there it's into "Glide" and the end of this week's #ThisDealInHistory. -Jamie

TDIH Berkfest MA 8/10/2002

This week’s #ThisDealInHistory is taken from our Oct 18, 2002 performance in Whistler, BC.

Nobody in the band fancied themselves much as skiers but we always had a great time in Whistler primarily due to the fun vibe that permeates the town twelve months a year. This gig seems to be infused with some of that good-time energy.

The clip begins with one of our “standing-start” jams - basically a familiar progression that we would pull from our grab-bag and use as a stepping-stone into less-familiar territory. This particular one usually started with electric piano and featured Dan letting loose with some low-end melodic lines. The interesting bass patterns continue when Darren kicks into the main groove at 0:43. I’m holding back for the most part and repeating some short shots while letting Dan lead the way both rhythmically and melodically.

Subtle changes start occurring around 1:11 as I bring the piano chords down an octave and introduce a Moog line while Darren adds some bongo licks at 1:40. The bass shifts into a support role and the Moog starts driving the jam by upping the rhythmic intensity. It’s becoming clear around 1:53 that we’re straightening things out in order to begin transitioning into something else. Darren kicks it up a notch with his hi-hat work while Dan turns to his trusty filter to help change the personality of the jam. Things are now less bouncy/more driving and we’re moving into more of a 16th-note machine-gun groove.

At 2:31 I trigger the cue for “Ravine” and we subsequently shift to the appropriate key at 2:47. However, note that it actually takes until 3:15 for the proper tonal centre to become evident. Until then Dan and I are buzzing around it, referencing the Ravine rhythm but never solidly landing on it. Even when we do get there at 3:15 I’m still jumping around, adding new chords that drift away from the “usual” Ravine harmonic structure (3:58 - 5:07) until we jump in to the main melody at 5:08.

Things get slightly darker at 6:42 with a minor key change and Darren introduces another interesting hi-hat idea that features a neat little stutter.

At 7:52 we start morphing into a new section that includes a new chord structure played on the Nord complemented by a blippy sequence on the Moog. We move along in this style until 9:14 when we drop into a unison 16th-note motif (somebody must have given a hand signal) that builds and develops using the same progression (but now on the organ and Juno). A long-note Moog melody floats above the busy pattern at 10:18 until we start breaking down the structure with a tension-filled development section at 10:51. I like the random computer-style vibe that’s going down here. It’s a bit uncomfortable but still driving. 

Darren triggers the “Glide” cue on the hi-hats at 12:23 and we take the trigger and run with it, culminating in the main section of “Glide” from 13:30 until the end of this week’s #TDIH. -Jamie

TDIH Whistler, BC 10/18/2002

#TND3

Jamie Shields - Keyboards
Dan Kurtz - Bass
Davide Di Renzo - Drums

recorded 11/13/2018

Halo Drive

Jamie Shields - Keyboards
Dan Kurtz - Bass
Davide Di Renzo - Drums

Dorado III

Live at Asheville Music Hall, Asheville, NC - 11/10/2019
 📸: Bain Stewart Media

Welcome to the return of This Deal In History (version 3.0)!
In the past, This Deal In History has featured a cut from a long-ago New Deal concert alongside comments and insights from Jamie. This edition will feature a concert from *last week* (11/10/19) in Asheville, NC - the first #TDIH to feature drummer Davide Di Renzo.

—————

Last week’s Asheville concert was an exciting one; it featured a lot of improvisation but it also featured what is quickly becoming a hallmark in TND3.0 - patience. 

One thing that’s different about TND3.0 is our willingness to sit on the groove for a very long time, letting the body of the piece develop and bloom at its own pace. While the TND1.0 and 2.0 iterations had some very strong musical qualities we were never really known as a “patient” band. This has changed with the addition of Davide as our drummer. Davide’s strength behind the kit has contributed to the confidence that we’re showing in letting the music travel to its natural destination. It’s also showcasing the trust between us in allowing the music to get where it's going on its own. 

This Asheville snippet exemplifies that musical trust and patience. It starts with a dark rhythmic mood interspersed with bursts of noise alongside MSG’s delay throws. I introduce a bubbling repeated line (00:18) that sets this cloudy-yet-patient tone before transitioning into a melancholy melody that complements the moodiness we’ve created so far (1:15). All the while Davide slowly, ever slowly builds intensity only to pull back and return to that bedrock groove.

You’ll notice that Dan is playing the same notes over and over - he’s in no hurry to get to the finish line and he’s trusting his bandmates to take the music where we all feel it going. Interesting note - at 1:55 he plays the trigger for “Technobeam” and then incorporates it into his bass groove (almost invisibly). He’s not calling for the song to be played immediately - it’s merely the clarion call to the future.

At 3:33 Davide takes it up a notch with a snare/tom-tom groove (bonus points for his “blink-and-you’ll-miss-it” cowbell bit at 3:56). By 4:08 we’ve somehow managed to take this improvisational piece to a new level of intensity without changing much of anything. I’m still playing that moody lead line and Dan is still playing the same Technobeam-inspired bass line but *something* has brought the jam to a higher level.

4:39 - I join the Technobeam party and start playing the trigger cue. It’s at this exact moment that Dan decides to mess with his T-Beam rhythm. So, we’ve brought it one step closer to playing that song but at the same time we’ve suspended ourselves in the musical ether, comfortable with “letting it all hang out” (a favourite musical phrase of mine to describe TND3.0) and definitely in no hurry to arrive. 

A full 2:30 of tension/build goes by before we finally release into Technobeam at 7:15 - but even then we’re not done. Davide decides to play a teaser-type drum groove over the first part, refusing to give in to the suspension, holding us back until he’s ready to let it all out with the full T-Beam groove at 08:21. 

Just listening to this right now gives me chills. Enjoy.

-Jamie

Twilight Lavender Jam > Technobeam (Live)

GLIDE - ARCADIA

REDISCOVERY

TRIPLE OR NOTHING

HOMEWRECKER

VL TONE PT 2

OUR HOUSE

CHERRY STONE

TECHNOBEAM PT 1

MOONSCRAPER - VERDIGRIS JAM

VENETIAN RED JAM

Composed, performed, arranged, recorded and mixed in isolation 
by The New Deal
Mastered by Phil Demetro

Davide Di Renzo - drums
Dan Kurtz - bass, sax
Jamie Shields - keys

Isolation: Cycles I

Isolation: Cycles II

Isolation: Cycles III

Composed, performed, arranged, recorded and mixed in isolation 
by The New Deal
Mastered by Phil Demetro

Davide Di Renzo - drums
Dan Kurtz - bass, sax
Jamie Shields - keys
Brendan Bayliss - guitar

Isolation: Cycles IV

#TND3

Management
Mike Polans - 7S Management
thenewdeal@7smgmt.com

Booking
Hunter Williams & Logan Handelsman - CAA
booking@thenewdeal.com

theNEWDEAL

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