Brick + Mortar is an

indie rock Indie rock is a Music subgenre, subgenre of rock music that originated in the United States, United Kingdom and New Zealand from the 1970s to the 1980s. Originally used to describe independent record labels, the term became associated with the mu ...

duo founded in

Toms River, New Jersey Toms River is a township in Ocean County, New Jersey, United States. Its mainland portion is also a census-designated place of the same name, which serves as the county seat of Ocean County. They were signed to

Photo Finish Records Photo Finish Records is an American independent record label founded in 2006 in New York City by Matt Galle, listed as one of Billboard’s “40 Under 40” in 2013 and 2015 as well as named a 2020 Billboard Indie Power Player and cited twice o ...

Island Def Jam Records The Island Def Jam Music Group (IDJMG) was an American recording music unit, formed on New Year's Eve 1998 by the Universal Music Group. It consists of labels devised and consisted under the basic operations of Island Records and Def Jam Recordi ...

, and then Merovee Records /

ADA Ada may refer to: Places Africa * Ada Foah, a town in Ghana * Ada (Ghana parliament constituency) * Ada, Osun, a town in Nigeria Asia * Ada, Urmia, a village in West Azerbaijan Province, Iran * Ada, Karaman, a village in Karaman Province, Tur ...

, but now currently have distribution through Believe Recordings.

History

Early years

Asraf and Tacon began playing music together when they were in middle school, initially as a drum and bass improvisational duo. The two bonded further over their shared interest in songwriting. They made many attempts at playing music with other people but "it never worked. It always ended up with Brandon srafand I", according to John Tacon. Their first band together was called Black Rhythm. Both members took private lessons for their respective instruments at a young age, but were largely self-taught in their knowledge of theory and performance.

Asbury Park and ''7 Years in the Mystic Room''

In 2008, Asraf and Tacon renamed their project Brick + Mortar, and began focusing more heavily on the use of electronic samples in their music as well as relying less on improvisation and more on structured pop songs. With the promising rise of the Asbury Park musical scene, the duo began performing regularly up and down the New Jersey coast and building a reputation as one of the strongest live acts to come out of the state. Brick + Mortar's consistent performances quickly gained them a strong following as one of the best live bands in the Asbury Park music scene, eventually rewarding them with opening spots for larger national acts such a
River City Extension
and

Jimmy Eat World Jimmy Eat World is an American rock band formed in 1993 in Mesa, Arizona. The band is composed of lead vocalist and lead guitarist Jim Adkins, rhythm guitarist and backing vocalist Tom Linton, bassist Rick Burch, and drummer Zach Lind. They h ...

at such well-known venues as th
Starland Ballroom
and

the Stone Pony The Stone Pony is a New Jersey music venue in Asbury Park, New Jersey known for launching the careers of many New Jersey music legends, including Bruce Springsteen, Jon Bon Jovi, and Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes.Sony , commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professional ...

Jive Records Jive Records was an American independent record label founded by Clive Calder in 1981 as a subsidiary to the Zomba Group. In the US, the label had offices in New York City and Chicago. Jive was best known for its successes with hip hop, R&B, an ...

showcase the performance venue

Le Poisson Rouge (Le) Poisson Rouge (often referred to as LPR) is a music venue and multimedia art cabaret in New York City founded in 2008 by Justin Kantor and David Handler on the former site of the Village Gate at 158 Bleecker Street. The performance space was ...

in New York City. After a sing-off with a heckler in the audience, the duo won an award presented to them by Senior V.P. of the label.

2011–2015: ''Dropped EP''

Brick + Mortar continue to build their fanbase as well as showcase for additional labels. During the later part of 2011, the duo released a number of new singles as well as performance videos after partnering with video artist/media grou
Humble Humans
They released their first album: 7 Years in the Mystic Room. In January 2012, Brick + Mortar announced on their Facebook page that they had "officially been invited" to perform at the 2012

South by Southwest South by Southwest, abbreviated as SXSW and colloquially referred to as South By, is an annual conglomeration of parallel film, interactive media, and music festivals and Convention (meeting), conferences organized jointly that take place in m ...

Music Conference at the "House of Creatives" showcase. In 2013, Brick + Mortar announced that they had signed to Photo Finish Records and would release an EP titled ''Bangs''. In 2014, Brick + Mortar was dropped by their record label, but continued to produce music. They released two singles, "Hollow Tune" and a rerecording of "Move to the Ocean". In 2015, the band released a remixed cover of "Voodoo Child" by Jimi Hendrix that was used in the trailer for the movie '' Hitman: Agent 47''. Later that year they released the album ''Dropped EP'' and went on a subsequent tour. Late in the year the single "Train" was used in a trailer for the TV series Elementary.

2016–2018: ''Meta Meta Etc.''

In 2016, Brick + Mortar announced via Instagram they were working on a new album entitled "Dead Moon" for release in September. The title track first single was released April 22, 2016. On April 6, 2017, Brick + Mortar released a new single entitled "One Little Pill" on YouTube, then on iTunes and Spotify the day after. The song was released in celebration of the band finally receiving ownership of ''Dropped EP'', and with the release of the single they also announced that a remastered version of ''Dropped EP'' entitled ''Dropped Again'' is on its way featuring "One Little Pill", as well as one other brand new song. "Dropped Again" was then released on May 19, 2017 and is available on iTunes and Spotify for streaming. The new album is a series of remastered songs from the EP "Dropped" as well as two other songs, the later of which was unreleased, "One Little Pill" and "Great Escape". The EP also features the Baauer remix of Brick + Mortar's popular song "Move to the Ocean". The group's debut full-length album, ''Meta Meta Etc.'', was released on August 24, 2018.

2019

The group performed at the sea.hear.now festival which was held on 21 and 22 September 2019 at Asbury Park, New Jersey.

Musical style

Brick + Mortar's musical style has been described as

electronic rock Electronic rock is a music genre that involves a combination of rock music and electronic music, featuring instruments typically found within both genres. It originates from the late 1960s, when rock bands began incorporating electronic instrume ...

drum and bass Drum and bass (also written as drum & bass or drum'n'bass and commonly abbreviated as D&B, DnB, or D'n'B) is a genre of electronic dance music characterized by fast breakbeats (typically 165–185 beats per minute) with heavy bass and sub-ba ...

, and

alternative rock Alternative rock, or alt-rock, is a category of rock music that emerged from the independent music underground of the 1970s and became widely popular in the 1990s. "Alternative" refers to the genre's distinction from Popular culture, mainstre ...

Discography

Extended plays

* ''7 Years in the Mystic Room EP'' (Brick + Mortar, LLC) (2010) * ''Bangs EP'' (

) (2013) * ''Dropped EP'' (Merovee Records) (2015) * ''Dropped Again EP'' (Brick + Mortar, LLC) (2017) * ''Meta Meta Etc.'' (Brick + Mortar, LLC) (2018) * ''Melting Up'' (Opposition) (2022)

Singles

*"Heatstroke" (Brick + Mortar, LLC) (2011) *"Move to the Ocean" (Brick + Mortar, LLC) (2013) *"Bangs" (

) (2013) *"Locked in a Cage" (

) (2014) - #36 ''

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertise ...

Alternative Songs Alternative Airplay (formerly known as Modern Rock Tracks (1988–2009) and Alternative Songs (2009–2020)) is a music chart in the United States that has appeared in ''Billboard'' magazine since September 10, 1988. It ranks the 40 most-played ...

*"Move to the Ocean" - Remaster (Merovee/ADA) (2014) *"Hollow Tune" (Merovee/ADA) (2014) *"Voodoo Child" (Merovee/ADA) (2015) *"Train" (Merovee) (2015) *"Dead Moon" (Brick + Mortar, LLC) (2016) *"One Little Pill" (Brick + Mortar, LLC) (2017) *"All Alone" (Brick + Mortar) (2018) *"Fiend" (Brick + Mortar) (2018) *"Question" (Brick + Mortar) (2018) *"Lies of Life" (Brick + Mortar) (2019) *"American reality" (BAMM!) (2020) *"Don’t Panic" (Opposition) (2021) *"Mystery to myself" (Opposition) (2021) *"Glamour of a food stamp" (Opposition) (2022) *"self care (so frustrated)" (Opposition) (2022)

References

External links

* * * *
Brick + Mortar
on

Bandcamp Bandcamp is an American online audio distribution platform founded in 2007 by Oddpost co-founder Ethan Diamond and programmers Shawn Grunberger, Joe Holt and Neal Tucker, with headquarters in Oakland, California, US. On March 2, 2022, Bandcamp ...

{{Authority control American musical duos Jersey Shore musical groups Electronic music groups from New Jersey Indie rock musical groups from New Jersey Rock music duos