Crazy Band
What began as an excuse for six friends to hang out has turned into a full-fledged -- albeit crazy -- band.
By Nate Walton
Before they decided to make music together, Crazy Band were a group of best friends with the fierce allegiance of a street gang. Comprised of five girls and a dude, all in their early 20s and sporting the wardrobe of teen runaways, Crazy Band started out as an excuse to work on something together, and then as an excuse to have more friends come hang out and listen to them. Most of the members had no band experience until a few months ago, but in that time
they've played a slew of shows, including a three-night header at L.A.'s D.I.Y. musical epicenter, The Smell. They're self-releasing a CD of live material recorded on a cellphone and their first album will be out on core L.A. label, Teenage Teardrops. "Crazy Band are an invigorating splash of honesty in an ocean of mediocre, self-aggrandizing shit," says label head Cali DeWitt.
What Crazy Band lack in technical prowess they make up for with bravado: each song a short, chaotic burst of energy on the verge of collapsing into an indecipherable mess. The influences they cite are conceptual rather than technical, including the politics of Crass, the theatricality
of GG Allin and the sinister melodiousness of Danzig. There's a palpable love for the musical tropes of punk rock, but most crucially the music sounds free. With their approach, whatever comes out of their amps will sound like Crazy Band, and that's all they want. "I am tired of rules," guitarist and vocalist Deana Uribe says. "I hate insecurities. I hate fear. I want people to be free and have fun and love themselves, and love their life and what they do. I want to see the world become a place that is an all-encompassing good time. I want to see people being themselves. Being yourself is all life's about."
All members are prolific art and zine-makers. Uribe maintains a gothic poetry and experimental prose blog at groghead.com and drops free Xeroxed samples around the city at spots like Family and The Smell. Twin sisters Jennifer and Jasmin Romero's zines like Dick Fool and Wassup Whatcha! collect mordantly lewd illustrations and fake Shakespearean quotes. Lead singer Jesse Spears is an artist best known for her obsessive paintings of cars and cleavage, with her vibrant, meta-graffiti murals covering the walls of The Smell. Drummer Anthony Anzalone also fronts Mikki & the Mauses, and his ubiquitous flier designs celebrate such archetypal juvenility as foot-licking and Siamese skeletons. And finally, saxophonist Jenna Thornhill-DeWitt (wife of Cali DeWitt) is an alum of L.A. punk band Mika Miko and now she and Cali post photos of their inspiration, piles of trash, on their blog witchhat.biz.
"I've learned from my pre-Crazy Band days that there's a lot of extra people in the music business," says Thornhill-DeWitt. "We don't need to do business with any of them, because that's their business and none of my business."
Nate Walton is an artist from Los Angeles.
Family Bookstore Takes Us to L.A.
they've played a slew of shows, including a three-night header at L.A.'s D.I.Y. musical epicenter, The Smell. They're self-releasing a CD of live material recorded on a cellphone and their first album will be out on core L.A. label, Teenage Teardrops. "Crazy Band are an invigorating splash of honesty in an ocean of mediocre, self-aggrandizing shit," says label head Cali DeWitt.
What Crazy Band lack in technical prowess they make up for with bravado: each song a short, chaotic burst of energy on the verge of collapsing into an indecipherable mess. The influences they cite are conceptual rather than technical, including the politics of Crass, the theatricality
of GG Allin and the sinister melodiousness of Danzig. There's a palpable love for the musical tropes of punk rock, but most crucially the music sounds free. With their approach, whatever comes out of their amps will sound like Crazy Band, and that's all they want. "I am tired of rules," guitarist and vocalist Deana Uribe says. "I hate insecurities. I hate fear. I want people to be free and have fun and love themselves, and love their life and what they do. I want to see the world become a place that is an all-encompassing good time. I want to see people being themselves. Being yourself is all life's about."
All members are prolific art and zine-makers. Uribe maintains a gothic poetry and experimental prose blog at groghead.com and drops free Xeroxed samples around the city at spots like Family and The Smell. Twin sisters Jennifer and Jasmin Romero's zines like Dick Fool and Wassup Whatcha! collect mordantly lewd illustrations and fake Shakespearean quotes. Lead singer Jesse Spears is an artist best known for her obsessive paintings of cars and cleavage, with her vibrant, meta-graffiti murals covering the walls of The Smell. Drummer Anthony Anzalone also fronts Mikki & the Mauses, and his ubiquitous flier designs celebrate such archetypal juvenility as foot-licking and Siamese skeletons. And finally, saxophonist Jenna Thornhill-DeWitt (wife of Cali DeWitt) is an alum of L.A. punk band Mika Miko and now she and Cali post photos of their inspiration, piles of trash, on their blog witchhat.biz. "I've learned from my pre-Crazy Band days that there's a lot of extra people in the music business," says Thornhill-DeWitt. "We don't need to do business with any of them, because that's their business and none of my business."
Nate Walton is an artist from Los Angeles.
Family Bookstore Takes Us to L.A.
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Posted at 2:29 on Apr 13, 2011
i wanna here there stuff