City and Eastern Songs is the third album by anti-folk artist Jeffrey Lewis, though is credited to Jeffrey & Jack Lewis, Jeffrey's brother. Though Jack Lewis had contributed vocals, bass and songwriting to Jeffrey's two previous albums, this is the first instance in which he was given equal billing on the cover. The album was released in 2005 on Rough Trade Records.

Guthrie Govan (born 27 December 1971 in Chelmsford, Essex, England) is a virtuoso guitarist known for his work with the bands Asia (2001–2006), GPS, The Young Punx and The Fellowship as well as Erotic Cakes (a vehicle for his own music). He is a noted guitar teacher through his work with the UK magazine Guitar Techniques, Guildford’s Academy of Contemporary Music and currently the Brighton Institute of Modern Music. He is the 1993 winner of Guitarist magazine's "Guitarist of the Year" competition.

Govan began playing guitar aged three, encouraged by his father but initially learning mainly by ear. At the age of nine he and his brother Seth Govan played guitar on a Thames Television programme called Ace Reports. At secondary school he was exposed, via older classmates, to "shred" guitarists of the time.

After leaving school, Govan read English at the University of Oxford, though he left after a year to pursue a career in music. Around this time (by Govan’s own estimation, 1991) he sent demos of his work to Mike Varney of Shrapnel Records. Varney was impressed and offered him a record deal; ultimately however, Govan declined. Regarding his reasons he has explained: "it was as though all I really wanted to know was that I was good enough […] I found I was getting a bit wary of the shred movement."

East River Pipe is the name under which Fred Cornog (aka FM Cornog) records. Cornog was born in Norfolk, Virginia, and raised in Summit, New Jersey. After high school, Cornog worked a series of menial jobs before succumbing to alcoholism, depression, drug abuse and eventual homelessness, ending up in the Hoboken train station. During this time he met Astoria, Queens-resident Barbara Powers, and with Powers' support and label (Hell Gate), Cornog released some home-recorded cassettes and 7" singles under the name East River Pipe. Cornog named his one-man band East River Pipe after observing a sewage pipe spewing out raw waste into the East River. These initial 7" singles attracted the attention of UK-based Sarah Records who released his records from 1993 to 1996, making Cornog one of the few American artists ever signed to the legendary British label. Stateside, Cornog released his first LP, Shining Hours In A Can, on the Chicago-based micro-indie Ajax Records in 1994. A year later, he found a more permanent home on Merge Records, the Chapel Hill-based indie run by Mac McCaughan and Laura Ballance. Also in 1995, Cornog contributed the song "Miracleland" to the AIDS benefit album Red Hot + Bothered produced by the Red Hot Organization. Merge released Poor Fricky (1995), Mel (1996), The Gasoline Age (1999), Shining Hours In A Can (2002;reissue), Garbageheads On Endless Stun (2003), What Are You On? (2006), and We Live In Rented Rooms (2011). Artists who have covered East River Pipe songs include David Byrne, Lambchop, The Mountain Goats, Okkervil River, Hazeldine, For Against, The Wisdom of Harry, Hurricane Bells, and others. The New York Times has described East River Pipe's music as "gentle, smart and unspeakably sad." Rolling Stone called Cornog "one of our generation's great eccentric songwriters."