The Leaves Turn Upside Down by Jeffrey Dean Foster

This acoustic live EP is a solo stop-gap between studio records; as such the low-fi, clinking-beer-bottle ambiance conveys pleasures of the fleetingly intimate, rather than the ornately crafted, sense.

The charm of new compositions (the strummy, jangly "Lover True", which neatly plays with the phrasings of "lover" and "love her") and Pinetops material (the beautiful spectral drone of the aptly titled "So Lonesome I Could Fly") gets cemented by Foster's keening upper register, a satisfying cross between Roger McGuinn and Alex Chilton. There's left-field artistry afoot as well: Looped in short-wave and electronic sounds and brief keyboard segments serves as segues, lending the set a spooky but appropriate autumnal vibe.

- FRED MILLS

"an Andy-Warhol-goes-techno/acoustic-in-the-predawn-hours feel that is quite ingenious."

- William Michael Smith-Rockzilla.net

"It's a work that is at once primitive as a field recording; punk-like in attitude, and wholly futuristic. It is a fascinating concept and one that, in Foster's hands, works like a charm.

- Ed Bumgardner WS Journal

Stay tuned for a brand new studio album soon and check out JEFFREY DEAN FOSTER'S previous record, The Pinetops, ABOVE GROUND AND VERTICAL.(also available from CDBABY)

Foster is one of North Carolina's finest songwriters, possessing a talent on par with such celebrated homeboys as Ryan Adams and Ben Folds. Foster is idiosyncratic yet accessible, a product of a classic-rock upbringing (peak years, in his estimation: 1972-78) who exhibits a quietly stubborn, do-it-yourself streak.

He has come close to tasting fame but is disinclined to compromise himself to make it. After all, it was Foster, as a co-leader of the Right Profile, who walked away from a deal with Arista Records, not the other way around. The Right Profile left behind the better part of an album at Arista when it split in 1988. His next band, the Carneys, tried to cut an organic rock record at a time when computers, producers and technology ruled. That, too, went unreleased. Foster was simply in the right place at the wrong time and was not about to bend in the absurd directions that the music industry demanded. Had they come along a few years later, the Carneys and the Right Profile might now be hailed, along with Uncle Tupelo, as cornerstones of the back-to-basics Americana movement.

Parke Puterbaugh(WS Journal)

After performing solo from Atlanta to Buffalo in the '90s, Foster teamed up with old pal and legendary producer Don Dixon. They took a batch of songs and a floating group of musicians and started recording. Out of these sessions came a new band, The Pinetops, and an highly acclaimed new record, Above Ground and Vertical.

Released in the states by Soundproof/Monolyth (www.monolyth.com) and in Europe by Bluerose Records (www.bluerose-records.com) the recording drew praise from all corners.

After some brief touring in support of Above Ground and Vertical, including a spectacular appearance at SXSW in Austin, Foster began work on what would be the follow-up to AGAV. More of a solo effort (with a little help from some friends), it promises to be a more left-of-center record, both emotionally and musically and both harder rocking and more atmospheric than previous recordings.

Over the past year or so, Foster recorded a handful of solo acoustic live shows and a new live ep, "the leaves turn upside down", is the result. Leaves combines 6 live-performance tracks with other studio and found sounds. It's been said that the leaves turn upside down sounds more like a foreign short-wave radio transmission than a traditional live record.

Stay tuned for a brand new studio album soon and check out JEFFREY DEAN FOSTER'S previous record, The Pinetops, ABOVE GROUND AND VERTICAL.(also available from CDBABY)

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