Radical Face is a musical act consisting of Ben Cooper (born c. 1982), a resident of Jacksonville, Florida, who also makes up one-half of Electric President and Iron Orchestra and one third of Mother's Basement. He chose the name Radical Face because he "thought it was kinda funny".[1]
On November 16, 2010 Ben released a six-track EP titled Touch The Sky [2] which serves as an appetizer for an announced trilogy of albums called Family Tree. Leading up to the release of The Roots, The Bastards: Volume One EP was released track by track. The first album, titled The Roots was released on October 4, 2011. In August The Roots was accidentally released to users outside of the U.S on Itunes. The Roots will be followed by The Branches and The Relatives'.[3]
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Ben Cooper's first album to be recorded under the Radical Face pseudonym was The Junkyard Chandelier (2003). However, his first release was entitled Ghost.
Ghost, released in March 2007 on Morr Music, is a concept album based on the idea of houses retaining stories of things that have happened in them. Each song is a story and some of the stories are told from the house's point of view. Cooper cited an old house he lived in as one of the inspirations for Ghost. Most of his work on the album was conducted in an old tool shed behind his house. Emeral Cooper, Mark Hubbard and Alex Kane collaborated with Ben Cooper for some tracks on the album.
Ghost has been compared to musical acts such as The Mountain Goats, Sufjan Stevens, The Postal Service,[4] Gorky's Zygotic Mynci, Paul Simon[5] and Animal Collective.[6]
The song Welcome Home has been featured in several advertisements and films, including a Nikon advertisement in several countries of Europe, an advert[7] for the 2011 Chevrolet Volt, as well as an ad for the University of Oregon that aired during the 2011 BCS Championship between Auburn and Oregon. The song appeared in the movie Humboldt County. It is used in the emotional climax of the film The Vicious Kind. It is featured in the film The Swiss Machine as speed alpinist Ueli Steck ascends the Eiger. This film was part of the 2010 Reel Rock Tour and Steck's ascent to the tune of Radical Face's Welcome Home is featured in the Reel Rock Tour trailer. It was also used at the end of UK program Eddie Izzard: Marathon Man and in a mountain bike short movie of freeride pro Andi Wittmann.[8] The song was also featured in the fifth season of the popular British show, Skins and the second season of James May's Man Lab. The song reached number 92 in the UK Singles Chart in August 2010 [9]
Total album length - 48:05
Touch The Sky is an EP released in 2010 to bridge the gap between Ghost and The Family Tree Trilogy.
The EP was released on August 19, 2011, and is the first of a number of free EPs over the course of the Family Tree-project, all of them part of a series called "The Bastards". So this is "The Bastards: Volume One". Available at the official website.
Was released in October 2011. The first album of three in the Family Tree-project that follows the tale of a fictional family, the Northcotes, through its generations. It is dedicated to the first two generations of the Northcotes' family tree and is narratively based in the 1800s.[10]