SARATOGA SPRINGS – Red Shift, a brand new alternative rock band out of Glens Falls, is already packing the house at their shows. Whether they’re playing at Gugs in Glens Falls or at Putnam Den in downtown Saratoga, a Red Shift concert draws a crowd. Red Shift, formed by lead singer Tim Ortiz just over four months ago, is definitely taking off in the right direction.
In late 2015, Tim Ortiz was struck with inspiration. He wrote material that he really liked, and called up the best musicians he knew to bring those songs to life. As a result, Red Shift was born, and is now made up of Kieran Dupper (guitar, synthesizer), Chad Jones (guitar), Andy Frasier (bass), Erich Hobus (drums) and Tim Ortiz (vocals, synthesizer, and guitar). All band members have been playing together in other bands since 1999 – Dupper and Ortiz actually met in third grade and began playing music together early in high school. Now all together again as Red Shift, the band has found their musical niche with each other.
“We’re so new but we’ve taken off really fast,” said Ortiz. “We went from not having a band at all to 800 Facebook likes in two months. Since we’ve known each other for so long, it’s easy working together.”
Red Shift has already received radio airtime, with their music featured on 102.7 EQX, Hits 95.9, and 92.7 The Revolution. Their first single, “Around the Sun,” was recorded this past February. Now, the band’s goal is to have their first EP record out by early summer, which will feature “Around the Sun” as well as more new songs.
“A lot of our songs are about questioning the nature of reality. We also talk about the idea of life being a dream, or a dream within a dream,” said Ortiz. “Our song ‘Around the Sun’ is about our impact on the environment and what we’ve done to it in the past 100 years, but that’s not the main theme for most of our music. I try to write about positive things. I wrote a song about my son, Atlas. I’ve written love songs about my wife. There are a lot of positive things going on in my life, so I’m not going to make negative songs just to sound edgy.”
On Sunday, April 3, Red Shift recorded their first music video, directed by writer and filmmaker Micah Khan. Putnam Den allowed the band to go in and shoot the video for “Around the Sun” for most of the day.
“There’s a lot of silhouette lighting [in the video], and we use slow motion, which makes everything look cool,” said Ortiz. “Mainly, the video is just to show what we look like when we’re performing.”
The video for “Around the Sun” will be released April 30, and the song will be on over 20 music sites, including iTunes, Amazon, Google and Spotify.
But if you want to catch one of Red Shift’s live shows, they will be performing at Putnam Den on Friday, April 29 at 9 p.m., playing with Candy Ambulance, Mirk and Angels on the Fourth. On May 21, they will be playing at King Neptune’s in Lake George, and will be back up there for the village’s Friday on the Lake concert series in Shepherd’s Park on June 24. In the future, Red Shift has plans to play shows in Brooklyn, Boston and Burlington.
Red shift’s single “Around the Sun” is currently available to listen to on YouTube and SoundCloud. For more information about Red Shift, visit their Facebook page at facebook.com/redshifttunes.
