New press on “HULL FULL OF OIL & BONE” Sept/Oct 08
Subba-Cultcha http://www.subba-cultcha.com/article_album.php?id=8453
The Bat and the Bird http://www.thebatandthebird.blogspot.com
POP Stereo http://popstereo.blogspot.com/2008/09/were-listing-to-left.html
Toxic Pete http://www.toxicpete.co.uk/listingship.html “A Hull Full Of Oil And Bone' is a massive jingling bag of folk booty,
a treasure from well beyond the form, a splendid gift of joyous music from an innovative band of like-minded
folksters dedicated to revitalising the folk idiom to bring you, at last, proper nu-folk." -Toxic Pete
Villains Always Blink http://thetrainingground.blogspot.com/2008/09/listing-ship-hull-full-of-oil-and-bone.html
Aiding & Abetting http://www.aidabet.com/issues/300/300reviews.html#ALSO
Perfect Porridge http://www.perfectporridge.com/2008/09/26/listing-ship-a-hull-full-of-oil-and-bone/
Largehearted Boy www.largeheartedboy.com/blog/archive/2008/09/daily_downloads_1668.html
ABOUT “TIME TO DREAM”:
www.indieworkshop.com/music.php?id=2406
"There's something about the saccharine female vocals and general sing-along folk weirdness of Listing Ship's 'Time To Dream' that makes me more than a tad uneasy. They sound so sweet but there's something not quite right lurking just below the surface. It's like the pretty, smiling girl I saw the other day handing out her Church of Scientology booklets downtown. Sure, she looks harmless enough. Then before you know it, it's six months later and you're living at the cult's bucolic agrarian compound staring down a national stand-off with armed FBI and ATF agents, drinking funny-tasting Kool-Aid while wearing brand new Nike Heaven's Gate sneakers. What time is the fucking mothership supposed to be here to pick us up anyway Tom?! Tom?
"Ahem..yes. Where was I? Oh yeah, Listing Ship. Time To Dream contains fourteen hallucinations of traditional folk that stroke your hair with one hand while the other is beating you relentlessly about the face and neck area. It's the way folk music should be. The album is creepy and dark and unsettling, but with the right amount of charm and beauty to make it all go down a little easier.
"Take 'Black Eyes Of The Sea' for example, where the sugary vocals of the Lockie sisters deliver lines like 'Death comes as a comfort to the one who is suffering / and she's wiggling in its arms' as innocently as if they were singing a child to sleep. Or on the Cash-like 'Sarah', when male singer Lyman Chaffee takes the vocal reins and coos, 'I held her in my arms and said I loved her/ I kissed her on the lips and said she was mine / she closed her eyes and with her head upon my shoulder / I shot her in the side.'
"'Time To Dream' is obsessed with death imagery, but this eccentric psych-folk ensemble makes death seem almost..inviting. Listing Ship is as deft with a murder ballad as Puerto Muerto is with a sea-shanty, and the two groups share a similarly odd originality. Mike Watt also plays bass on eight songs here, which should be reason enough for you to go out right now and buy this album. Now, who wants to hear more about Dianetics?" - Mark Horan | 2006-04-18
“It might seem appropriate to find Listing Ship's Time to Dream sandwiched right between Belle & Sebastian and Sufjan Stevens on some cutesy woodland creature's iPod. The album's layers of instrumentation are so lush with banjoes, violas, and mandolins they could blanket the driest fauna....With innumerable references to nature – raindrops, sunshine, forests, and banana leaves among them -- it's hard to imagine that there's actually little that is benign about the Los Angeles-based collective's third release..." -Julia Simon
Los Angeles Times:
"With its quavering vocals, gossamer strings and neo-hippie oeuvre, the L.A. seven-piece Listing Ship fashions the kind of edgy but folksy bluegrass you'd hear at a Mensa picnic..." -Kevin Bronson,
"....I’m reminded of the stark black and white images of the bayou in “Down By Law:” the anxiety inducing stillness of the water, a boat cutting through the green surface cautiously, mist and mazes. I’m also reminded of galleys and fires and war in muddy trenches." -Jordan Himelfarb
www.npr.org says of Listing Ship: "The Los Angeles-based, seven-piece band is organic and quirky, with a sound that the L.A. Times once described as 'the kind of edgy but folksy bluegrass you'd hear at a Mensa picnic."