BB’s Progressive Concept 2LP “Scenes From The Flood” Now Available In Limited BLUE SWIRL VINYL
BB Tour Schedule: The Aristocrats’ DUCK World Tour continues in Australia and Japan in early 2025! For the rest of 2024, he’s home working on remote sessions, as well as resting from 9 months on the road. For remote recording sessions, you can reach Bryan using the CONTACT page.
BB’s double progressive concept album “Scenes From The Flood” featuring Joe Satriani, John Petrucci, Guthrie Govan. Mike Keneally, Ray Hearne (Haken), Gene Hoglan (Dethklok) and more – available in the Shop!
ARISTOCRATS USA TOUR 2025 ANNOUNCEMENT: The big news just dropped - The Aristocrats are coming back to the USA in 2025 for an extension of the DUCK tour! We'll be visiting some favorite places missed on the first leg as well as some brand new cities. Tickets go on sale Friday December 6th at 12PM (venue local time). Really hope to see you there! THE ARISTOCRATS DUCK TOUR USA 2025Friday, April 11, 2025 Orlando, FL The AbbeySunday, April 13, 2025 Charleston, SC Music FarmMonday, April 14, 2025 Athens, GA 40 WattTuesday, April 15, 2025 Nashville, TN City WineryThursday, April 17, 2025 Alexandria, VA BirchmereFriday, April 18, 2025 Amityville, NY Amityville Music HallSaturday, April 19, 2025 Fairfield, CT The WarehouseTuesday, April 22, 2025 Red Bank, NJ The VogelWednesday, April 23, 2025 Homer, NY Homer PACFriday, April 25, 2025 Pittsburgh, PA JergelsSaturday, April 26, 2025 Cincinatti, OH Ludlow GarageSunday, April 27, 2025 Detroit, MI Magic BagTuesday, April 29, 2025 Columbus, OH Skully'sWednesday, April 30, 2025 Indianapolis, IN Hi-FiThursday, May 1, 2025 Milwaukee, WI VivariumSaturday, May 3, 2025 St. Paul, MN Amsterdam Music HallSunday, May 4, 2025 Omaha, NE SlowdownTuesday, May 6, 2025 Boulder, CO Fox TheatreWednesday, May 7, 2025 Fort Collins, CO The Aggie
HANOI ROCK CITY: Specially timed post for our Aristocratic friends in Vietnam - can't wait to come back to Hanoi once again in March!The Aristocrats
*MOBSTER VOICE* Hey Paulie, this jamoke over here sez I’m fuckin 58, I don’t think he understands math too good, maybe his fuckin abacus needs a manual adjustment *SCUFFLING SOUNDS*Hey, while we take care of the jamoke who made this graphic and I've got your attention, I know this is the day that everyone one in the world is selling their Black Friday shit, so let me just say that half the BLUE SWIRL VINYL first-100-signed/numbered run of "Scenes From The Flood" is now gone. ("Like, gone gone?" "Oh yeah, you won't see them around no more.") Less than 50 left. Pics and links to the special store in the comments. There has never been any shame in my merch pimping game and this is definitely not the week I'm gonna start being shy about it. 😉 (But seriously it *is* really nice!)Now everybody be careful out there ("really, I just tripped and fell") getting home for Thanksgiving, ok people? 😘
SFTF BLUE VINYL SIGNING SESSION: In case you missed it yesterday, I re-pressed “Scenes From The Flood” on Blue Swirl 180-gram vinyl for a limited run, and I’m signing/numbering the first 100 units. That happened yesterday and I got to hold one for the first time. Look how pretty it is! Now that’s a little bundle of joy. 😉 The store link is in the first comment, or you can visit ye olde Bryan Beller Dot Com and see the obvious front page link. For the full story and lots of special details, check yesterday’s post. For today I’ll summarize by using the Official Promotional Sales Text, straight from the Onion Boy Records Home Office in Omaha, Nebraska. (If you know, you know.)Initial response has been great - thank you so much to those who ordered on day one! More updates on various topics to follow in the coming days.********Bryan Beller’s epic progressive double concept album “Scenes From The Flood” limited run of BLUE SWIRL 180-gram vinyl, with first 100 signed and numbered as “BBB #—” (for “Bryan Beller Blue”). Gatefold jacket features a URL link to a deluxe 28-page digital booklet, as well as links to never-before-released DEMOS of six songs from the album. Only this special USA webstore will have signed/numbered units, but this SHIPS WORLDWIDE to many countries for under $20 USD shipping cost (UK, FR, DE, Australia). An instant classic when it dropped in 2019, “Scenes” features a massive group of guest stars including Joe Satriani, John Petrucci (Dream Theater), Guthrie Govan (The Aristocrats), Mike Keneally (Frank Zappa), Gene Hoglan (Dethklok, Testament, Strapping Young Lad), Joe Travers (Joe Satriani, Zappa Plays Zappa), Ray Hearne (Haken), Nili Brosh (Danny Elfman, Dethklok), Janet Feder, Mike Dawes, and more. The album’s prescient 2019 topic - when the storm comes for us, the big one after which things will not be the same, what do we keep, and what do we let go? - became strikingly relevant in the intense years that followed, and its themes of ambition and loss, intentionality and reality, hope and disillusionment remain ever more relevant today. With the original black and purple vinyl runs having sold out years ago, this new limited pressing provides true fans of the work with a collector’s item, and an opportunity for those who missed the initial run to have a deluxe hardcopy vinyl edition.
“SCENES FROM THE FLOOD” BLUE SWIRL VINYL LIMITED PRESSING - ON SALE NOW, SHIPS DECEMBER 6: Yes, I re-pressed it! Long BB explanation to follow. But for the “shut up and take my money!” folks, the sale link is in the first comment, or you can go to the old Bryan Beller Dot Com and click the obvious link on the front page.Pricing: I’m able to offer it for $40 (lower than the first run). Packaging is color gatefold jacket. There’s a link in the artwork to a whole digital booklet ready to go for full credits, and the link (with special goodies including six DEMOS from the album) is in the album jacket artwork. That's because these units won’t have the 24 page physical booklet (that was just for the initial run that’s now gone).Practical notes: This is a USA webstore sale only, for now. The 100 units at the USA webstore will be signed and numbered. Eventually we’ll have stock in the UK and EU web stores in early February, but those can’t be signed/numbered. (There are only 300 units in this run, total.)But for those interested across the pond, the good news is that shipping rates from the USA webstore are not that bad:UK: $17.70 (pretty good!)France: $17.40 (also pretty good!)Germany: $15.50 (really good!)Australia: $20.25 (also good for being so far away!)Denmark, Finland, Netherlands, Switzerland, Ireland, Italy, Estonia, Austria, Norway: $30.25 (uhhh, wish it was less!)OK, but why am I doing this?It’s been seven years now since I released a massively big 18-song 88-minute double progressive concept album called “Scenes From The Flood”. It featured lots of guests:***Joe Satriani, John Petrucci, Guthrie Govan, Mike Keneally, Gene Hoglan (Dethklok, Testament), Ray Hearne (Haken), Joe Travers (Zappa Plays Zappa, Joe Satriani), Janet Feder, Mike Dawes, Nili Brosh (Danny Elfman, Dethklok)***and was an instrumental concept album about the idea of how we might react to a cataclysmic event in our lives, and how it could change not just our plans for living, but our view of life itself. And how would we feel about that, in the end? That was late 2019. Welp, wouldn’t you know it. We all know what happened since then, but from the standpoint of the album itself, the COVID lockdown and subsequent lack of touring created a kind of slow burn for the album’s potential audience. I’m damned grateful for everyone who picked it up when it came out. And I did my best to publicize it, that’s for sure. But when touring resumed in 2022, and I mentioned it from the stage, I kept running into people who had never heard of it, and wondered how they missed it. Others had heard about it through either word of mouth or press articles but hadn’t actually decided to pick it up until they saw an Aristocrats show, or other reasons. I was on tour pretty constantly from 2022-2024, and people just kept taking a chance on it. Then there were other who *had* heard it, and fell in love with it, but didn’t yet own a physical copy, and wanted vinyl. Meanwhile, the initial vinyl pressing sold out, and I’m on the verge of a third CD pressing selling out as well. I’m ambivalent about another run of CD’s (it’s a really deluxe package and the minimum order is really expensive), and I don’t want the album to suddenly be out of print. Meanwhile there were people as recently as this last tour approaching me asking about vinyl, which has been gone for about a year already now. All of this pointed to a new run of vinyl, but I wanted to change it up. So, I thought the BLUE SWIRL vinyl was a nice touch, evocative of the floodwaters that serve as the allegory for the damage done by the cataclysmic event. I also thought that the massive 12” 24-page booklet was appropriate for the first run only. But here’s the good news: The full SFTF booklet will live in digital PDF form. A link on the album jacket to a special webpage will point you there. That webpage will also contain DEMOS to six of the songs on the album:* Volunteer State (before Joe Satriani essentially produced/arranged it!)* Always Worth It (so many BB guitars, gah)* Lookout Mountain (me playing baritone guitar? Mike Dawes eventually knew what to do with it)* The Flood (the original concept, before Janet Feder transformed it)* World Class (I still can’t believe John Petrucci had to listen to my demo guitar solo on this)* Sweet Water (at least Guthrie Govan is used to hearing my guitar demos by this point)I’m grateful that there is still interest in The Album I Always Wanted To Make. And the album’s overall message and meaning feels more relevant than ever to me.So whether you’re a fan of the album and want a complete collection, or you already have it on CD and wanted a vinyl unit but the last run sold out, or you just heard about it at a show and want a physical copy to support the artist…whatever your reasoning is for picking this up, I support it 100%. 😉 And I thank you humbly!Meanwhile I do have more news to share in subsequent posts, and they won’t all be this long, I promise!