Biography
Dead Canaries is an ever-evolving experimental folk-pop collaboration
project led by Jon of the Atom, from Ithaca, NY. Jon originally began
his musical life as a solo artist, and as one half of duo The New Wave
Dirt with drummer Meghan Geiss, releasing records on CD through
Utica's Cozy Home Records collective. Early Jon of the Atom albums
('Atomic Music' 2004, 'Holy Zombie Jesus' 2005, 'My Life In Groton'
2006, and 'An “Off” Day For The Jews Harp Christmas Caroler' 2006) are
always eclectic, often catchy, and sometimes baffling, influenced by
artists as diverse as Woody Guthrie, Beck, and the motown music of the
1960's. The New Wave Dirt's two albums ('Elephant's Tap-Dance Recital'
1995, and acclaimed 'The Apple' 1996) are more contemporary indie-rock
with electric guitars, drums and clarinet bolstering classic songs like
'Ninth Sunny Night' and 'Ghost In A Photograph'. The more recently
evolved Dead Canaries project is somewhere between the two - pushing
the experimental side at the recording and production stage, combining
electronic beats and effects, with an army of contributing vocalists
and instrumentalists including Katie Saul (vocals), Tim Kotch (trumpet
and drums), Jane Gilmore (vocals), Wind-Powered Rebekah (banjo),
Smally Wheelies (vocals), and Phillipe and Louis (cats), with more
progressive song structures. Folk-pop and Jon's clarinet take
precedence, but it is not unusual for records to suddenly change
direction with backwards electronica, psychedelic rock & roll, or epic
Beatle-esque song shifts.
Four records have been released to date as free downloads through Cozy
Home and Quixodelic Records, each of them mastered by Bus Stop Dave
starting with the acoustic-experimental 'Thanks For Nothing You
Freak-Out Prima-Donna EP' in 2007. This was followed by first full-length
album 'Critical Mass: Flying Things Vs. Crawling Things' in 2008,
regarded by pretty much everyone who heard it as an experimental-pop
masterpiece. 2009's 'Something Else' album continued to push the ideas
and sounds further, and in 2010 a new cast was assembled to write and
record double-album 'Golden Sounds/Modern Day Carpetbagger'.
Word on the street is that Dead Canaries are finishing a new record
possibly called 'Space Age Toaster' featuring Jon of the Atom's most
epic and ambitious song to date (a 10 minute medley called 'Peach
Bird'), due for release in early 2011. About the new album, a press
spokesman for the project said "Jon currently lives in a laboratory
adrift on an ice flow. He has been using fire to burn 1's and 0's into
wood and mail them to Bus Stop Studio and Bus Stop Dave makes it
music. Unfortunately due to an accident next December on board a
friend's ship, Jon now has only 1 arm… but we are pleased to confirm
it has both a right and left hand on it. Um… and his foot is a dog.
That's it, I think."
* Apparently I missed the "Fun With Boxes" days and the "far more regrettable
Ages of Green". Ages of Green was described by their bassist as "Spinal
Tap under water".
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