One writer referred to them as "a band whose name does not give us the highest of hopes," but The Henrys might be the best band you have never heard of. Achieving regular critical acclaim since their first release in the early 1990s, they nonetheless remain steadfastly iconoclastic, quirky and uncompromising. But there's more than a name to this acoustic ensemble, and you should raise your hopes and give a listen to their latest project, Quiet Industry. Then subscriben Music of the Month and get Quiet Industry as your first CD. (In fact, subscribe soon and you will also get our July CD by Spiro)

• fRoots calls the band "intelligent and sinuous."
• Richard Williams says, in The Blue Moment, "There�s a special strength, intimacy and sense of proportion to this music, along with great inventiveness. "
• RootsWorld says, "From sly humor to anguished poetry, Rooke and company have produced a gem, an hommage to folk sounds and jazz sensibilities; at times a loving satire of pop music. The Henrys are the tycoons of a Quiet Industry that produces sublime tapestries and sturdy widgets of the most elusive kind."

This CD was donated by the artists. We thank them for their support.

Read the RootsWorld review

Listen:
"A Weaker One "
"Change for Good"
"When That Far Shore Disappears"
"The Almighty Inbox"
"The Dangers of Travel"
"I Kneed You"
 

The band writes:
The Henrys is a Toronto-based �nearly-instrumental� group that performs as a quartet, or quintet, but records with a larger stable of players. Led by Don Rooke, since 1990 the band�s goal has always been to compose, record and perform original music that has no obvious genre, but draws on a variety of styles in an original, identifiable way. In the words of Toronto Star reviewer Greg Quill:

"Toronto kona player Don Rooke and his ensemble of like-minded abstract sound architects stand out on their fourth album as the high-minded intellectuals in their class, the quiet scientists scratching away at the borders of the folk/time continuum. �Old instruments, new sounds� is the way Rooke describes what The Henrys do - they extract from a resonator guitar and other plucked acoustic instruments the harmonics, overtones and oblique noises behind the rustic notes to create landscapes that are astonishingly romantic, frightening, sexual, spiritual - and quite beautiful. Brave new music.�

The music features the sound of an antique slide guitar called the kona (and other slide guitars). Manufactured out of Hawaiian koa wood in California in the 1920s, the kona has a rare tonal purity. It�s played slide style, flat, with a small steel bar. Mixed with vocals, organ, bass and drums - and often unusual elements: conch shell, quarter-tone trumpet, pump organ, chordette, odd percussion pieces, sonar zombie, steel drums - the sound of the band has been defined and refined over the years.

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