The Shanks Release 'Turning Turk,' Working on New Album and North American Tour
By: Emily Bruno Dec. 08, 2017
As it works on a follow-up to 2016's raucous steamroller of an album, Prisons of Ecstasy, Toronto institution The Shanks has blessed us with a banger of a new song. "Turning Turk" debuts today and is available on all DSPs. The Canadian hitmaker Matt DeMatteo (Big Wreck, Danko Jones) produced "Turning Turk" and is fast at work with the hilarious, goofy, serious duo of Pistolwhip von Shankenstein (vocals, bass) and Colonel Crankshaft (drums, vocals) on a new album. The Shanks plan to continue their uphill success in 2018 by touring through Canada and the US; they're also working on a vinyl release of Prisons Of Ecstasy in Spain next fall.
About The Shanks: Hailing from Mono in County Dufferin, Ontario, The Shanks are the rock 'n' roll apocalypse of songwriter/vocalist/bassist Ian Donald Starkey (St. Pistolwhip von Shankenstein), partnered with drummer John David Brumell (Colonel Crankshaft). The two have been creating gritty alternative punk rock together since 2010, although Starkey originally started the band in 2005, with the release of the EP Here Come The Shanks (self-released). Ten years later, with the release of the X EP in October 2015, Starkey set up Here to Everywhere Entertainment Inc. as the new label and publishing home of The Shanks.
With comparisons to the likes of Alice Cooper and The Dead Boys, it's no wonder that the duo were nominated for Album of the Year in 2014 by Exclaim! Magazine for their fourth album, Surfing the Lexicon, produced by Sir Ian Blurton and released in the US via Phratry Records. Their 2016 fifth full-length album (there have been several EPs along the way as well as a compilation album), titled Prisons of Ecstasy, was produced by Nicke Andersson (Entombed, Hellacopters, Imperial State Electric).
The Shanks have undertaken several tours in the US as well as Europe, showcasing at Reeperbahn Festival in Hamburg in 2014, where they secured distribution via Broken Silence Germany; their most recent US tour took place in late 2015, supporting UK's legendary post-punk icons The Membranes.
The Shanks: Website | Facebook | Twitter | YouTube
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