Balls Capone Holds CD Release Party at Ace’s High Saloon

Balls Capone recently hosted a CD release party at Ace’s High Saloon, for The Cat Cheats at Cards. Well…that’s not exactly true. As it turns out, it was really more of a re-release party.

The band”s latest work, The Cat Cheats at Cards, was initially released in early 2020. Frontman Patrick Neville tells us the band had finished recording and mixing the CD Counterpoint Studio, just as the Covid lockdowns kicked in. Neville says he remembers thinking, “What if the world ends and we all die?”

Neville says he remembers thinking, “What if the world ends and we all die?”

In a bit of a pandemic panic, the band rushed the mastering process of the CD—before the world could end—and quickly pushed it out to all the usual streaming sites. However, as soon as the band realized the world was not ending, Neville—who seemed a bit embarrassed about the hasty release—says the band realized they needed to have the CD properly mastered.

Mastering isn’t cheap: $250 per song seems to be the going rate and Neville says they paid $500 for the down-and-dirty mastering job. This time around, Balls packaged up the production files and sent them off to a studio in Nashville that Neville had worked with before.

So it was, on this night at Aces High Saloon, Balls Capone released the remastered version of The Cat Cheats at Cards.

Ace’s High Saloon is relatively new to the venue mix in Salt Lake City. The staff are friendly, the drinks were cheap, and the stage was large with a good amount of space for fans to watch the show.

The staff are friendly, the drinks were cheap, and the stage was large with a good amount of space for fans to watch the show.

When Balls Capone kicked off their set, my first thought was the volume was a bit loud. I mean: I never need ear plugs, but I found myself scrambling to stuff bit of cocktail napkins into my ears. Ace’s High is mostly a Metal venue, and I suspect they will quickly get used to hosting bands like Balls Capone, that require a bit more subtlety in the sound.

Throughout the evening, the band played most of numbers off the CD. I was a bit disappointed that they didn’t play Favorite Dream…one of my favorites. We wrote about the song in a July 2020 article. But this was understandable—and as a benevolent fan I totally forgave them. The song is really an old-time acoustic tune, not well-suited for the amplified rock music on the menu that night.

The band does have an eclectic mix of tunes on the new CD. Neville says The Cat Cheats at Cards marks a natural progression for the band, with Neville, Max Muscolino and Jimmy Lauscher all contributing to the writing. On the band’s first CD, Equal Opportunity Apocalypse the writing was all done by Neville.

When asked what influences the band has, Neville says he likes to tell people to imagine a cross between Neil Young and Alice N’ Chains. That pretty much summed up what I heard that night.

Neville says he likes to tell people to imagine a cross between Neil Young and Alice N’ Chains.

Balls’ next gig is August 21, 2021 at Funk N’ Dive Bar in Ogden, Utah

Balls Capone is Patrick Neville on guitar and vocals, Max Muscolino on bass and vocals, Jimmy Lauscher on guitar and backing vocals, and Evan Powell on drums and backing vocals.

Note for streaming fans: only the original release of The Cat Cheats at Cards is available on streaming platforms. Neville says the band will be adding the rerelease , soon, and will keep the original version up as well. You can buy and listen to the rerelease at the band’s Bandcamp page.

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Salt Lake Bard (The Bard) is Utah’s leading source of curated, local-music news and reviews. You can find more live show reviews here.