Andrew Low (vocals, guits) of the Jazz June has enjoyed a significant cult following over the last several years in the indie rock community. Now he has embarked on a new project with fellow Jazz June bassist Dan O’Neill, simply called Snakes & Music.

Snakes & Music make their home in Ocean Grove, NJ - which is about a mile south of Asbury Park, birthplace of “the boss”. There is a rock n roll aura to this area where blue-collar conformity collides with the dreamlike intangibility of the ocean and it’s inhabitants. It’s the collision of land and sea that provokes a need for escape.
Snakes & Music started about a year ago when Low started working on some songs he had written after the last Jazz June tour. Originally it was intended to be a recording/solo project for Low, but he became unhappy with it and ultimately decided that the project was weak. Low acquired a bassist to record and play some shows with them. O’Neill turned out to be the piece they were missing, so they started a full time project under the name "Snakes and Music". They played a bunch of shows around Philly and Jersey, plus last spring’s Gainesville Fest. About 6 months later, Low ran into Levy, they had been in a short-lived band together a year before. Ideas were exchanged and Levy was asked to join the band to add his wicked guitar chops + space-age keyboard work.

Dynamic, solid song structure is the key to the Snakes & Music. There is no mass wall of sound blasting in your ears for nine songs straight. They designed the songs so that each section is renescent and no one part is overshadowed by another. Low spent alot of time mapping out the vocals and constructing the lyrics so that they bonded with the instruments instead of blanketing a cool drum fill or keyboard section. Snakes & Music know it’s always more fun to play the same riff for ten minutes then to listen to it, so they tried to anticipate the listeners’ reactions during the writing process. When they were recording Low was breaking up with his girlfriend and Levy was falling in love, so a certain element of uncertain balance shines through.
Low’s capsulated assessment of each song on “Truisms”:
1. take these pills and live forever - amazing musicians burning out/ dying way too young from drugs and excessive living.
2. red and yellow - struggling between what will make you happy and what will help you financially and professionally in music and
in life.
3. mixed up prescription - personal insanity, disarray and confusion
4. go with you - the ultimate make out song.
5. 5 boros - all the fake-ass dorks who were jocks in high school but think they are cool now because they live in Brooklyn or Philly
or D.C. and think they are "artsy" and "weird" because they dress like the Strokes.
6. should have looked both ways before i crossed you - greg wrote this song and most of the lyrics so I can't answer for this
one. but i can say that greg is completely nuts so i'm sure that it is about something crazy that we wouldn't understand.
7. ex-smoker - personal anxiety and paranoia caused by drugs and this insane world we live in.
8. hydrogen 3 - progression in the face of disparity.
9. shidt list - this song gives worms to ex-girlfriends

Snakes & Music is:
andrew low (guitar & vox) - gregg levy (guitar & keys) - benny rodriguez (drums) – dan o’neill (bass)