Leaving Eden, CCD's second full-length Nonesuch disc, was produced by Nashville stalwart Buddy Miller, the go-to guy for artists ranging from Solomon Burke to Robert Plant to Emmylou Harris. On this 15-song collection, recorded live in the studio with all the players in a single room, the Carolina Chocolate Drops illustrate their own adaptability to grow and change. Following the amicable departure of founding member Justin Robinson, band mates Rhiannon Giddens and Dom Flemons recruited three exceptional new players for the recording and expanded their repertoire to incorporate more overt blues and jazz elements and straight-up folk balladry alongside brilliantly rendered string-band tunes. Robinson's replacement is Hubby Jenkins, a Brooklyn-bred guitarist, banjo player, and singer who had previously busked his way around the country. Joining the revamped trio in Miller's studio were beat-boxer Adam Matta, introduced to them by the NYC gypsy punk band Luminescent Orchestrii, with whom CCD released a live EP on Nonesuch, and New Orleans-based cellist Leyla McCalla.

The Inner Mystique, the hypnotic second album by the Chocolate Watch Band, takes up exactly where its sacred predecessor left you: looking for your perfect match at the local Love-In. When Watch Band lead singer par excellence Dave Aguilar grabs you by the lapels and tells you "I'm Not Everybody Else," you have no choice but to believe him. He's not. And when he cools down enough to extol the virtues of "Medication," who could doubt his sincerity? Especially when he stokes the fires to the boiling-point where medication may not really make much difference. But the real stunner here is the Watch Band's exhilarating cover of Bobby D's "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue." In typical CWB interpretive bliss, nobody has ever done this hallowed song any better. Not Bob Dylan, not Van Morrison. Nobody.

A San Jose, Calif. band whose reputation has grown exponentially over the decades, the Chocolate Watch Band are now revered as one of the Seven Wonders of the World of garage rock. Spotlighting the classic lineup--the inflammatory vocals of Dave Aguilar and the roof-rattling guitars of Mark Loomis and Sean Tolby, fronting the rock-solid bass of Bill Flores and the letter-perfect drums of Gary Andrijasevich--the Watch Band's first two albums have it all. Stones swagger snake-hips its way through cosmic significance with just a dusting of eye-opening psychedelic legerdemain to make your neck snap backwards in pure joy.

No Way Out, the thrilling debut album by the Chocolate Watch Band, immediately finds that cosmic sweet-spot of perfect garage-rock traction: where the rubber meets the road and the train keeps a-rollin.' Nobody ever did Mick Jagger any better (even Mick, himself) than the Watch Band's frighteningly superb frontman Dave Aguilar. "Are You Gonna Be There (At The Love-In)" and "Let's Talk About Girls" are on everyone's list of Top 20 garage rock anthems of all time. And that's just the tip of the vermillion iceberg for this essential longplayer. "Come On," an early Stones single, gets the perfect Watch Band overhaul, "Hot Dusty Roads" ventures down back alleys that Buffalo Springfield never dreamed about and "No Way Out" dances rings around the outskirts of your nearest Human Be-In.

A San Jose, Calif. band whose reputation has grown exponentially over the decades, the Chocolate Watch Band are now revered as one of the Seven Wonders of the World of garage rock. Spotlighting the classic lineup--the inflammatory vocals of Dave Aguilar and the roof-rattling guitars of Mark Loomis and Sean Tolby, fronting the rock-solid bass of Bill Flores and the letter-perfect drums of Gary Andrijasevich--the Watch Band's first two albums have it all. Stones swagger snake-hips its way through cosmic significance with just a dusting of eye-opening psychedelic legerdemain to make your neck snap backwards in pure joy.

AS HEARD ON NPR!

"Even though the music's being played right in front of you, you expect to hear crackles and hisses as if the sounds were being torn from a salvaged 78." - Independent Weekly

Terrific renditions of old-time classics from the Carolina Chocolate Drops as they reclaim their African American NC Piedmont string band musical traditions! This young group is the hottest thing to hit the old-time music community in decades, and have grabbed the attention of folks like Taj Mahal, Mike Seeger, Alice Gerrard, and John Sebastian.

Da Club by Chocolate

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This mystic combo from San Jose, California has come to be known as the definitive psychedelic punk outfit, a notoriety derived from the handful of rare singles and LPs that they made, balanced between the Watchband's own intense Anglophilic blues wailing, and the mysterioso studio trickery supplied by their producer, Ed Cobb. 2005.

Bric-a-Brac is Death By Chocolate's third full-length release following their eponymous debut and Shortlist Prize nominee Zap the World (confirming Iggy Pop as a fan) in the early 90s. Death By Chocolate's aesthetic foundation corners are firmly planted in an idealized novelty of mid-century modernism, especially early 60s abstract expressionism, definitely swinging 1967 Carnaby Street, a bit of the more fun elements of late 70s new/no wave and the work of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop. There's also more than a hint of foodie-ism. Bric-a-brac is an aural scrapbook written, performed, recorded and produced by Death By Chocolate. Open it up...