BILLY HOWERDEL’S ASHES DIVIDE: A PERFECT CIRCLE, HOLD THE MAYNARD

I’ve made it clear before that I’m excited about Ashes Divide, the new Maynard-free project from A Perfect Circle mastermind Billy Howerdel; now that I’ve heard “The Stone,” the first single from their forthcoming debut Keep Telling Myself It’s All Right, my curiosity has peaked.

The song basically sounds like APC with Howerdel on vocals – which isn’t that much of a surprise, given that Howerdel wrote and recorded most of APC’s music, and that APC skinsman Josh Freese is handling drum duties (Maynard’s eleven year old offspring, Devo – I imagine he’s named after one of the approximately 2,436,758 bands with which Freese has played in the past – will play cello on the album).  And that’s just fine with me, ’cause, well, I really liked APC.

Keep will come out in March; in the meantime, if you’ve yet to hear “The Stone,” check it out on Ashes Divide’s MySpace page.

-AR