The Green Chain has had all sorts of unexpected spin-offs, but perhaps the least expected and wildest bonus is the return of the satirical comedy duo, Local Anxiety.
The media and audience response to Tree Farm, the closing song in The Green Chain, was so overwhelmingly positive that Local Anxiety decided to go back to the studio to record a new all eco-comedy album.
What made the spin-off particularly surreal is that Local Anxiety is Vancouver actor, Kevin Crofton and um… me… Mark Leiren-Young, the writer and director of The Green Chain.
And our new CD, Greenpieces (named after our EarthVision Award winning TV special), will be popping off the presses next week just in time for the launch of the other super unexpected spin-off from the movie, the book The Green Chain — Nothing is Ever Clear Cut. And it’ll be up on cdBaby, iTunes and a jillion other digital download sites just in time for Christmas (we hope).
Both the CD and the book are being launched in Vancouver, November 25th at the Cafe Monmartre on Main St. The book launch is at 7:30, the CD launch and concert kick off at 9.
Since being reborn, Local Anxiety’s Green Guilt Blues has been featured as the closing song in the award-winning short film, The Green Film. And the title song of their first CD, Forgive Us We’re Canadian has been selected as a featured track on the new Songs of Canada CD – a fundraiser for The Association of Artists for A Better World – which is being released any second now! Local Anxiety also did their first live show in… a really long time.. at the celebration of SPEC’s 40th Anniversary.
Greenpieces features more than a dozen tracks including Tree Farm, Green Guilt Blues, I’m White, I’m Straight I’m Sorry, Shoot the Spotted Owl and our own version of Jim Munro’s classic, The Green Chain Song.
It also features our all-new global warming anthem Five Simple Things… and we’ll be donating proceeds from that song to PowerUp Canada.
Writing about Local Anxiety in Maclean’s Magazine Peter C. Newman once declared Local Anxiety: “A couple of new arrivals on the national scene who promise to reorient our national laughtrack… Their satire hits home because it rings true.”
Sterling News Service called Local Anxiety, “Canada’s unofficial court jesters.”
And The Georgia Straight described a Local Anxiety show as:”Like taking a ride on a runaway ice-cream truck with a demented version of the Smother’s Brothers.”
Local Anxiety has been featured on CBC Radio, National Public Radio, CBC’s Sketchcom, Canada AM, Dr. Demento and a whole bunch of fantastic TV and radio shows that are no longer on the air like, you know, Morningside…
For more on Local Anxiety (and to buy our first CD, Forgive Us We’re Canadian, until the second one is available) visit www.localanxiety.com