there is no mountain thanks you by premiering a new song

CONCERT POSTPONED: Due to heavy snowstorms and flight cancellations, There Is No Mountain’s performance will now take place on Thursday, February 6 at 7:30pm.

Formerly the whiskey-stomping five-piece The Ascetic Junkies, the husband-and-wife team of Matt Harmon and Kali Giaritta decided to simplify their musical endeavor just under a year ago. Rechristening themselves There Is No Mountain, the pair has been in a state of movement ever since.

"We played 122 shows in 40 states in 2013 and probably put 40-50,000 miles on our car," Matt recounts. "We got back from the last (and longest) tour in November, and we've just been catching up with friends and writing new songs."

Along the way, they released their self-titled debut, received tons of support from new fans around the nation, and had a noteworthy opportunity cross their path: While touring back east, they were scouted to perform at New York City's Lincoln Center as part of the American Songbook series. It was a little to good to be true because instead of booking the gig outright, TINM were selected to compete against two other artists for the opening date of the series—let the online voting begin!

Suffice to say, they won! And now Kali and Matt are saying thank you to all their fans and voters for giving them to opportunity to open the 2014 American Songbook series, performing in the David Rubenstein Atrium at the Lincoln Center complex on Wednesday, January 22nd. Naturally, that thank you comes in the form of a new song—free for you to download.

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Listen to and download "Hiking" on OMN.

get out! : there is no mountain

My contribution to this week's edition of Get Out!

Formerly The Ascetic Junkies, the husband-and-wife team of Matt Harmon and Kali Giaritta have pared down to a duo and are excited to make their live debut under a new moniker: There Is No Mountain. Kicking off a two-month national tour (their most extensive to date) as well as celebrating an album release, Kali and Matt have chosen an intimate house show, which will feature Q&A sessions between songs (you can submit your own questions!), to modestly introduce their reconfiguration to the world. Space is very limited but anyone who purchases an advance copy of the record is guaranteed entry. The self-titled album will officially release on April 16th—so check Bandcamp and iTunes then to download your own bundle of acoustic-turned-electric guitar, ever-present guy-girl harmonies, and bouncy, African-tinged Americana reminiscent of classic (Paul Simon) and contemporary (Vampire Weekend, Dirty Projectors) influences.

Saturday, April 13, Hippo Campus, 8:30pm, $10 advance (includes new record) / $5 (or more) suggested donation day of show, all ages

Listen to There Is No Mountian’s first single “Owl Hymn” (and right click to download):

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Get the rest of OMN's Get Out! picks for April 11-17.

the original junkies become there is no mountain

There Is No Mountain is Kali Giaritta and Matt Harmon, formerly of The Ascetic Junkies.

The Ascetic Junkies are no more.

The band has been pared down to two, featuring founding Junkies and husband-and-wife duo Matt Harmon and Kali Giaritta in multi-instrumental roles where "I now play percussion and keys in addition to singing, and Matt added in a few carefully chosen effects pedals to bring in some new sounds," Kali says.

Now, there is only There Is No Mountain. Kali and Matt decided to relaunch under a new name chiefly because "our style has changed pretty far away from the AJs stuff, and also, no one in this great country seems to know the word 'ascetic,'" Matt jokes.

The debut song from There Is No Mountain is "one of the first tracks we've recorded just as a duo in a long time," Matt explains. "It's an African highlife-tinged pop song built around vocals, simple percussion and distorted acoustic guitar."

Listen to "Owl Hymn" below, which you might have heard at Fall of the Band this past fall (and right click to download):
There's a familiarity in "Owl Hymn" that's definitely reminiscent of The Ascetic Junkies but also a freshness to the pared down track. Full of stop-and-go buoyancy, the song is as lively as ever but engagingly different with its malleable rhythms—it's a new sound from recognizable voices.

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Read the rest on OMN.

the ascetic junkies mature… into youthfulness

No longer singing about vampires, The Ascetic Junkies are contemplating a move to Canada because neither God nor the Devil nor even the Gov’t can answer their prayers or solve their problems.

Seriously? No, they’re not serious. They’re happy here!

Arriving in Portland in 2008 with an album in hand, the couple of Kali Giaritta and Matt Harmon put out their debut, One Shoe Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, with just two Junkies on board. But the self-proclaimed whiskey stompers quickly grew and are set to release their sophomore album This Cage Has No Bottom, an effort that features five band members and no electric guitar, as co-lead singer and songwriter Harmon likes to point out.

Like the first effort, the duo still wrote the album, but the rest of the band had a much bigger role this time around. “It was much more collaborative in terms of arrangements,” says Harmon plus the group had been playing these songs live for almost a year before recording them. Each band member had the opportunity to add his or her own flourishes, all five contributing their own ideas as the vocals, keys, glockenspiel and percussion of Kali Giaritta and vocals, guitar, keys and percussion of Matt Harmon were combined with Cole Huiskamp on bass, Graham Houser on banjo, and Stephen Colvin on drums. The album even includes contributions from Harmon’s mom and dad, on violin and trombone respectively. You can feel the intricacies. And even a little bit of maturity.

But maturity doesn’t mean you have to be stern and unsmiling. Even though there are serious themes (like the above “God/Devil/Gov’t”) throughout This Cage Has No Bottom, The Junkies will always retain their playful lyrical content and sound.

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Leave a comment on OMN to win a copy of the new CD, a pint glass and two tickets the Junkies CD release gig at the Doug Fir on October 15th.

the ascetic junkies free february happy hour residency at the laurelthirst

Havin' a hard time making it through Wednesdays?

Then the last bastion of bluegrass stompin', country callin', folky strummin', and poppy shoutin' is offering you a remedy.

Yes ladies and gents, the LaurelThrist Public House is allowing the gal and guys of The Ascetic Junkies to set up shop every Wednesday evening for a few rounds of happy drinks for happy hour and a happy time.

But these kids don't play alone, they've brought friends! Each week they’re collaborating with a new artist displaying honeyed originals, twangy, traditional bluegrass, ramblin' covers, and maybe even a testin' the pluckiness of new some material.

The Junkies are joined this Wednesday by Sam Cooper of Horse Feathers (2/10) and with guests The Glyptodons (2/17) and Leigh Marble and Ezra Carey (2/24) finishing out the month. These sessions guarantee two hours (6 to 8 PM) of dosey doe switching of partners, instruments and banter. And this'll all come to you for free. (Note: The concert is free, not the booze.)

And if that's not enough to get ya in the door, singer/glockenspieler Kali Giaritta is feeling generous and giving away their latest EP Don’t Wait for the Rescue Squad on Bandcamp. “These songs are like gifts to friends, so we felt silly charging for them. Enjoy!” says Kali.

Have happy music and happy friends at 6 PM every Wednesday in February with the Junkies at the LaurelThirst.

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Read this article on The Deli Portland.

the ascetic junkies grow, whiskey stomping their ‘urge to rock’

Matt Harmon and Kali Giaritta are original Junkies. These two Junkies are connected at the hip. They do everything together and now they’re engaged.

But as the two Junkies have grown closer together, they’ve also allowed others to sneak into The Ascetic Junkies–a band that started as two in Boston but has organically swelled to five in Portland.

Matt and Kali arrived in Portland two years ago with an indie-folk album written and recorded in Kali’s bedroom. Two thousand eight’s One Shoe Over the Cuckoo’s Nest was “almost entirely Kali and I,” says Matt, adding that they often had to coax friends to fill in the instrumental gaps on stage as there was no fixed line up for the East Coast Junkies.

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Read the rest on OMN.

the ascetic junkies ep release party at backspace

Oregon loves it's folk, roots, americana... whatever you wanna call it. And now a new generation is embracing some sort of blended indie folk that combines strings and foot stomping with banjos and pow-wows and is sooo poppy you'll jiggle and smile inside and out.

This brand is not better typified than Boston-to-PDX transplants The Ascetic Junkies. Mixing vocals from Kali Giaritta and Matt Harmon make for a melodic hootenanny tingling with folk country and bouncing indie.

Obviously literary nuts, The Junkies took their name from a group of misfits in a Kerouac novel and after moving to Portland in 2008, they broke onto the scene with their self-produced and released debut One Shoe Over the Cuckoo's Nest.

A little older, a little wiser, and a little more mixed-up musically, The Junkies release a glorious new four-track EP, Don't Wait For the Rescue Squad, this Friday at Backspace and everyone who attends gets a free copy of the album.

The band says this: "In an attempt to avoid wasting plastic that we assume you won't use for anything other than ripping the album onto your computer, we're just going to bring a laptop with us that you can feel free to plug your iPod/flash drive/CD-R/etc. into at any point during the show to steal the EP. Or if you want to sign your email address on a piece of paper, we'll email it to you when we get home that night."

So come kick it up and swing around to some pop/bluegrass/folk/indie rock with The Junkies.

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Friday, December 11, 2009
The Ascetic Junkies : EP Release Show
Bark Hide and Horn
St. Frankie Lee
Backspace
9 PM
$6
All ages

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Read this article on The Deli Portland.

playing portland's workshops, retail + grocery outlets

The Penny Jam makes awesome videos of PDX artists playing under bridges and on overpasses, in empty museums and cupcakeries. They've got a whole host of stuff including The Dimes, Explode Into Colors, Mattress, The Ascetic Junkies, Celilo and more.

They're up to 26 videos that you can download while checking out photos from the shoots. (Some of them even did that sweet May Ling video I posted yesterday although it wasn't meant to be that public, yet.)

A year ago, Starfucker (now PYRAMIDDD) performed "Dance Face" at Rudy's Barbershop.