Best known for his bands Craig’s Brother, This Legend and Brookhurst, Californian singer & songwriter Steven Neufeld is thrilled to announce the release of his new solo album, Craig’s OTHER Brother. Out today via all major platforms, the album is also getting the vinyl treatment courtesy of Thousand Islands Records (North America) and White Russian Records (Europe). Pre-orders are live now with a release date set to June 25th. You can stream the album in full and pre-order the vinyl HERE.

Craig’s OTHER Brother is a self-made album.. born out of an era where it felt appropriate to ditch the bandmates/baggage and to record all the instruments myself, much like I used to back in the late 90’s in a crude bedroom studio setup. Thanks to some better gear at hand at age 37 than I had access to as a teenager (nicer instruments, pro mics, and caring about room quality/levels), I was able to have some peace of mind while diving ambitiously into a batch of my song ideas, which were plucked at random from the oceans of ideas available to me.. saved up from years of sitting down and singing/writing with my acoustic guitar, whenever I felt particularly inspired. Additionally, I must add that the creation of this material was certainly energized by anxiety and isolation during the global pandemic.

Staying true to a self-taught recording method I adopted in the 90’s, I started by sitting down at my drums without a click/scratch track, only the prospective song freshly in my head, and kept tracking until I got a full take without any glaring mistakes. Next, I miked my guitar amp, and just went forward into the process as organically as possible, obsessing over being quick about it while not ignoring the details. Then onto bass, followed by vocals. It was mostly a blur, to be honest, as the outpouring of emotions involved in the making of this solo album was clearly long overdue for me as a musician. A lot of spontaneous choices were made.. laying down whatever felt right in the moment. A lot of the lyrics on these songs are somewhat of an obscure poetry-flow from my subconscious mind.. an angle I like to write from sometimes, allowing the listener to make their own meanings to the phrases as they see fit.

I must say, it was a new and pleasant experience to have had 100% creative control of every single second of all 10 of these songs, production-wise. And diving into mixing my own music was a fun task, as well.

Craig’s OTHER Brother represents an exciting new era.. one in which I will be focusing on hatching out more melodic punk records under my own artist name.. and COB is just the tip of the iceberg. Please enjoy this musical snapshot in time. – Steven Neufeld