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Sep 12, 2018 ShadowParty By Tom Chapman

What’s in a Name? is our recurring guest blog series where an artist writes about how they came up their band name. For this edition we hear from Tom Chapman of ShadowParty.

ShadowParty is a new band that features members of New Order and Devo, among other bands. Their self-titled debut album is out now via Mute. The band features Chapman (former Bad Lieutenant bassist and a member of New Order since 2011), former Rentals member and current Devo guitarist/keyboardist Josh Hager, Phil Cunningham (co-founder of 1990s Britpop band Marion and New Order’s guitarist since 2002), and Jeff Friedl (who drummed with Devo from 2008 to 2014). The album features various special guests, including The Verve’s founding guitarist Nick McCabe, Denise Johnson (who was in Primal Scream from 1990 to 1995), LA-based DJ Whitney Fierce, and Manchester-based arranger Joe Duddell (who has worked with Elbow and New Order).

Read on as Chapman explains how ShadowParty consisting of members from so many other notable bands actually inspired their name.

Shortly after Josh Hager and I met in 2014 and started working together, Josh joined the band Devo. We used to compare stories and notes about our experiences in both New Order and Devo. Eventually, Phil Cunningham and Jeff Friedl would join in. We had a good laugh or two talking about meet and greets after the shows. We would all be sitting at a long table with our respective bands and, sure enough, fans would come along and skip over us for autographs. Usually with a “no offense, man” to which the automatic reply was always “none taken.” This was the nucleus for coming up with a band name! What if we could create our own party, our own sound?!

The process of finding a band name wasn’t an easy one!

A long list of name ideas was drawn out. Each week we would discuss it and try to agree on a name.

Josh particularly liked the name “Kunst” which means “Art” in German. I liked it too, but didn’t think the band would get any airplay with a name like that!

“Stars of Suburbia” was another suggestion as a working title. But-since we were all standing in the shadows of such iconic giants-we settled on ShadowParty. It was supposed to be an anti-supergroup-our own music, our own voice. In devotion we eventually found order.

www.twitter.com/shadowparty_

www.facebook.com/shadowpartymusic/

www.mute.com/artists/shadowparty

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