Cool Ghouls

Cool Ghouls

At George's Zoo

Empty Cellar

Cool Ghouls—a band fledged in San Francisco on house shows, minimum wage jobs, BBQs in Golden Gate Park and the romance of a city’s psychedelic history turns ten this year. What better a decennial celebration than the release of their fourth album, At George’s Zoo! Fortunately for everyone, the Ghouls got an album in before everything went to shit, and they made it count. This release includes fifteen of the twenty-seven tunes they managed to eke out while simultaneously working through major life moves. It was a five-month, all out, final sprint down the homestretch with affable engineer Robby Joseph, at his makeshift garage studio in the Outer Sunset (pictured on the cover).  This is a fully realized Cool Ghouls album. It paints a remarkable portrait of these SF homegrown heroes and the many corners they’ve explored over the last decade. The songwriting, harmony and playing are solid and the lyrics are keen. Joseph’s recording and mixing sound great start to finish and even better after mastering by Mikey Young. It’s a triumphant addition to their catalogue. Recommended for Stooges and Beach Boys fans alike. Listen and see!

Cool Ghouls

Live '19

Empty Cellar

Recorded live in 2019 by Robby Joseph at The Chapel in San Francisco.

Cool Ghouls

Gord's Horse

Empty Cellar

Self-released Spring 2017 tour-only cassette by Cool Ghouls. Includes 8 new self-produced tracks recorded in March and April of this year at the band's practice space in San Francisco's decommissioned naval shipyard. Features some new instrumentation like acoustic guitar, mellotron, a drum loop, and other shit. Forays into Baskersfield honky tonky and a bit that quotes "My Favorite Things." And the horse of course. Gord's horse. Mastered by Mikey Young.

Cool Ghouls

Animal Races

Empty Cellar

Empty Cellar Records is stoked to announce the third full-length by San Francisco’s Cool Ghouls. Fans of their self-titled release and 2014’s A Swirling Fire Burning Through the Rye will be similarly stoked to hear how this band continues to evolve. If the first album was a celebratory debut and the second an earnest venture into deeper waters, Animal Races is like the crystal born of the murky womb that was its predecessor, fertilized by the initial intention of the first. Not only have the Ghouls reaped the crop they sowed, they’ve baked it into some new kind of bread. For the uninitiated: Cool Ghouls play rock ’n’ roll. That’s about all there is to it. They’re California natives. They try to do a good job. They like to elevate and to get far out. They also like to keep it real. They like to make friends and have a good time. They don’t like bullshit. They want to keep growing and learning how to become more powerful musicians. This record reflects the discoveries they’ve made over the last five years. The eleven tracks, recorded to tape by Kelley Stoltz in his backyard studio, are first and foremost documents of the four-piece’s live performance of the tunes. Many of the songs were road-tested, but—unlike prior records—a few of them were not. This opened the door for some new looks: acoustic guitar, synth, upright piano, a little pedal steel wizardry from Tom Heyman, etc. It’s Cool Ghouls doing what they’ve always...

Cool Ghouls

A Swirling Fire Burning Through The Rye

Empty Cellar

“San Francisco’s Doomed” ... or so they say. There are, however, four Cool Ghouls who will have none of that. Born and raised in Fog Nation’s strip-mall suburbs, these boys dreamed of the day when they would move to Shaky City. San Francisco was their destiny—the town their electric heroes Creedence, Thee Oh Sees, Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Moby Grape, Flamin’ Groovies, etc. call(ed) home. Thank the gods their dreams came true! Their loud guitars, acid riffs, party screams, and stacked-as-fuck three-part vocal harmonies are echoing down the alleys and shaking foundations.  A Swirling Fire Burning Through the Rye is Cool Ghouls’ sophomore full-length album, and it rules. Recorded live to tape by San Francisco’s Sonny Smith (Sonny and the Sunsets) and mixed and mastered by Mikey Young (Total Control, Eddy Current Suppression Ring), this record elevates the band’s psychedelic garage jams to a whole new level. Empty Cellar Records is very stoked to present ten new, delectable Cool Ghouls songs brimming with infectious, creative energy. This record is an excellent complement to the never-ending nights of a never-ending summer.  San Francisco is still doomed... it always has been and always will be. At least these Cool Ghouls are here to help it go down with just a little bit of true class.

Cool Ghouls

Cool Ghouls

Empty Cellar

***“First things first: COOL GHOULS are not a retro act. If you seek musical salvation in the form of mop-topped mannequins with vintage riffs and hand-me-down rags, please stop reading. Yes, the Cool Ghouls borrowed their name from George Clinton's Funkadelic-era pre-show banter. Yes, they dwell penniless in the storied hills of culturally resurgent San Francisco. But these boys have their feet firmly planted in the soil of the now. They look not backwards for approving nods of hipster forebears, but rather skyward, hoping that the ‘supernatural forces’ they yodel for, guide them to all corners of a half-deserving world. Truth be told, this being their first official release, they may even be a bit naïve in their dogged pursuit of the true-blue, home-spun, rock and roll lifestyle. If one were to ascribe to them a 60's-reverent description, as one often does in the case of San Francisco bands, one would most likely find an artistic kinship with some the most inimitable, idiosyncratic, yet unmistakably influential bands of the retro-fitting oeuvre. The Troggs, The Monks, Sir Douglas Quintet come to mind immediately. (Save your Kinks and Rolling Stones references.) Like the aforementioned, the Ghouls are natural heirs to the folkloric lineage which precedes them, adding dashes of weirdness where needed. And despite their mid-fi leanings and natural fit within the current pantheon of San Francisco rock ‘n roll bands (Thee Oh Sees, Ty Segall), theirs is a timeless record, which will hopefully transcend the descriptors (garage, psych, etc.) that will...