Morningwar Covers Grizzly Bear's "Foreground"

​Folky Brooklyn-based crew Grizzly Bear has made quite a name for itself since debuting in 2004 with Horn of Plenty. Meanwhile, our very own Morningwar is also generating some very noteworthy buzz. And only a part of that has anything to do with Grizzly Bear.

After all, Morningwar has spent the last two years, since forming in 2009, working hard and rocking harder. The band released its debut EP The Front Room only nine months later, and has been gigging ever more steadily. And the outfit's latest project, which features a haunting cover of Grizzly Bear's "Foreground," is yet another impressive undertaking.

"We decided to cover this song because we love Grizzly Bear, says drummer/vocalist Edward Diez. "We wanted to cover a song that we could slightly change and put our own sound to it."

The band recorded a video of their cover and put it on YouTube. "The feedback we received was great," he says. "It feels very satisfying, and we are really glad people like it. They posted the cover in a Grizzly Bear blog and it took off from there."



But Morningwar's rendition of "Foreground" was only one part of a bigger undertaking, The Blackstar Studio Sessions, which the band is releasing as an album within the next few weeks, and as a series of videos.

"The live sessions is a project that we've been wanting to do for a while," Diez says, "simply a live performance of our newest material."

"The purpose," he explains, "was to be as comfortable as possible and give a great, honest, and pure performance, without the stress of setting up and playing rushed, like all local musicians go through."

In addition to the Grizzly Bear cover, the sessions consists of 4 new songs. And Morningwar has a full slate of gigs lined up too. For example, you may have caught the band last night at Bardot. But if not, Diez and his fellow bandmates will also play Churchill's on September 10, and then kick off an East Coast tour on September 17 at Eve before taking off to Lakeworth, Jacksonville, Charleston, Charlotte and Orlando.

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