Daily Mississippian

Last year around this time, the internationally recognized indie-rock band Colour Revolt played at South by Southwest, a music festival in Austin, Texas, with nothing but the clothes on their backs. They had just been robbed in Dallas shortly before the festival began.

This year, Colour Revolt played SXSW with a new perspective: their own equipment, their own clothes and new songs.

The Oxford-based band released its first full-length album, "Plunder, Beg and Curse" April 1.

Colour Revolt started out in Jackson, with different band members and a different name, Fletcher. In 2004, Colour Revolt redeveloped in Oxford, with members Sean Kirkpatrick, Patrick Addison, Jesse Coppenbarger, Jimmy Cajolea, and Len Clark.

"We had always been friends in high school and when we came here, we just kind of formed this band - this super-band," said Sean Kirkpatrick, who plays guitar and sings with the band.

Starting out, they played venues in Oxford, such as Proud Larry's and Two Stick. Soon their name began to grow, not only in Oxford, but around the nation, as well.

In summer 2006, they toured with the band Brand New, gaining national exposure. They also toured with Brand New in summer 2007, and attained other national success by playing music festivals like SXSW and Lollapalooza in Chicago.

"We are getting more recognized nationally," Kirkpatrick said. "It's not huge recognition, but there are more and more people saying 'I know who they are,' and it surprises me every time they say that. It feels great that people outside of our local demographic like our music."

In 2006, the band released their first EP. Although it was popular locally, it did not get much national recognition. This new album, they hope, will be different due to the national and European distribution of the album.

Band members don't credit any one artist for inspiration, and they do not like fitting their music into one genre or category.

"I don't know how you would label our style of music," Kirkpatrick said. "It has guitars, it's sort of rocking at times, but at other times it's melodic. I think it's dynamic. That's our genre: dynamic.

Bassist Addison said, "We take influences from anywhere we can basically - and that can be from any style of music - and we try to incorporate it with ours."

The band said they wanted to go for something a little different with their second album, but still true to their style.

"I feel that it's a lot more ambitious than our last record. I could say in a nutshell that everything's bigger," Kirkpatrick said. "We took what we did in the EP and went farther with it. We obviously want to do something different just to stay motivated and so there's something new every time.

"So there are definitely more new things about this, and I hope everybody would want that," he said.

According to Kirkpatrick and Addison, the new album still features characteristics of Colour Revolt, such as guitars and strong vocals, but this time everything is a little more "out there," with added harmonies, more mature melodies and more percussion.

"We're a very live band, and we tried to recreate that on the album," Addison said. "We recorded the tracks live as well, and we were completely impressed that it turned out sounding like us playing live, but in a recorded environment. The energy is very there."

The 10-track album was recorded locally at Sweet Tea Recordings and released on Fat Possum Records.

Colour Revolt will be playing its next show on April 4 at the Library, celebrating the album's release. The show will be open for those 18 years and older. The band will also perform April 3 at the Thacker Mountain Radio show and April 26 at Double Decker.

"I feel like there are a lot of people hanging on the fence, waiting to see what else happens," Kirkpatrick said. "They have the EP, and they like it, but they aren't sure if it's enough to make them go to one of our shows. I hope this record makes them want to see us live. It sounds live, and it deserves to be seen."

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