“From harsh nightmare riddles, to sweetly swooning tranced-out droning somnambulant reveries, psychedelic folk, prog-rock, old-time country, acidic cabaret, dark circus music, and sinister dream fragments … well worth investigating”
- Dream Magazine
Post-rock’s magical/”folk” surrealists, Alec K. Redfearn and the Eyesores hail from Providence, Rhode Island, the fertile home ground of horror writers H.P. Lovecraft and Edgar Alan Poe and artists of all stripes. Their music captures that city’s essence, blurring lines between past and present, fiction and fact, and transcending musical genres as easily as ghosts float through walls. Composed by Redfearn, the Eyesore's music combines myriad influences - traditional eastern and western European folk music, pre-WWII French and German cabaret, circus music, early 20th century classical (Erik Satie), classical minimalism, maverick 20th century Americana (Tom Waits, Harry Partch, John Cage, Charles Ives), elements from visionary French iconoclasts (Pierre Bastien, Pascal Comelade, Albert Marcoeur), acid folk, noise, psychedelia, drone rock (Velvet Underground, Faust), and more - with a dark, primitive, intentionally rough-edged and gritty, folk-crafted sensibility. Redfearn’s songs, whether instrumental or darkly lyrical, are rhythmically entrancing, evocative and remarkably cinematic.
Be sure to see Alec K. Redfearn and the Eyesores on tour in the following weeks. Their live shows are legendary, and their 2015 tour of two continents is certain to entrance existing fans and captivate new audiences.
[WATCH the official ”The 7 and 6” music video]
ALEC K. REDFEARN & THE EYESORES
USA and EUROPEAN 2015 TOUR DATES
"Joy is abundant the minute Redfearn begins to play the accordion…exquisite song writing. ...This band plays together so well it’s scary." - Lucas Schleicher, Brainwashed
Alec K. Redfearn & the Eyesores includes:
Alec K. Redfearn: vocals, accordion
Ember Schrag: vocals, organ, guitar
Christopher Sadlers: upright bass, vocals
Ann Schattle: French horn
Matt McLaren: drums, percussions
H. P. Lovecraft's 125th Birthday Party at NecronomiCon 2015
Facade Lot, 35 Weybosset Streer Providence RI
August 21 - New Haven, CT, USA
Three Sheets - 372 Elm Street, New Haven, CT
August 22 - Beacon, NY, USA
Quinn’s - 330 Main St, Beacon, NY
August 23 - New York, NY, USA
Trans Pecos - 915 Wyckoff Ave, Queens, NY
September 16 - Toulouse, FR
Les Pavillons Sauvages - Toulouse, FR
September 17 - TBA
September 18 - Toulouse, FR
Le Bol Rouge - Toulouse, FR - Alec K. Redfearn solo
September 19 - Albi, FR
Albi, FR (House show)
September 20 - Carmaux, FR
Rock In Opposition Festival - Carmaux, FR
September 21 - Galgan, FR
Galgan, FR (Peyrator + Vespre)
September 22 - TBA
September 23 - Frankfurt, DE
Dreikoenigskeller - Frankfurt, DE
September 24 - Bruxelles, BE
Centre Vincent Van Gogh - Bruxelles, BE
September 25 - Liège, BE
L'An Vert - Liège, BE
September 26 - Dunkerque, FR
Fructôse - Dunkerque, FR
September 27 - Moyen, FR
Un Peu de Piment - Moyen, FR
September 28 - Metz/Nancy, FR
TBA - Metz/Nancy, FR
September 29 - Lille, FR
La Malterie - Lille, FR
September 30 - Paris, FR
L'Alimentation Générale - Paris, FR
October 24 - Providence, RI, USA
Steelyard Iron Pour - Providence, RI
TOUR UPDATES AT
www.cuneiformrecords.com/tours.html
"...their experimental Balkan/East European folk-inspired music is not only cleverly conceived, but executed with wit, style, and just a hint of darkness… They offer experimental future folk with elements of real dirt and sweat - and a touch of mania. Highly recommended.” - Bill Tilland, All Music Guide
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Alec K. Redfearn & The Eyesores'
Releases on Cuneiform Records
“This is wonderful stuff - brave and experimental, yet warmly human. Make room on your folk revival shelf for something that may be influenced by folk but is in no way a revival.”
- Splendid Magazine
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"Unawake" |
For more info on Alec K. Redfearn and the Eyesores at Cuneiform:
http://www.cuneiformrecords.com/bandshtml/redfearn.html
"gorgeous amalgam of 20th Century Americana, cabaret and theater music, Eastern European folk, noise rock and minimalism, a bracing textural snap. …wonderful ensemble interplay…”
- Richard Moule, Signal to Noise
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Alec K. Redfearn and the Eyesores Bio Information:
Alec K. Redfearn is a composer, accordionist, songwriter, improviser and performance artist who grew up listening to hardcore (The Minutemen, Meat Puppets, Butthole Surfers) and metal (Slayer, Metallica). He moved to Providence, RI (home of H.P. Lovecraft & Edgar Allan Poe) in the late 80s and became involved in the AS220 Arts and Performance Collective. “I taught myself accordion as a reaction to grunge,” Redfearn explains. “Since accordion was hated, I said ‘this will be my fuck you’ to the rock world. Then I got obsessed with it.” The accordion led him to British folk, Eastern European, Indian classical music, Turkish and Arabic music, and gypsy music in all its global variations. He started Space Heater, an absurdist “miniature industrial” band that evolved into the Amoebic Ensemble, whose music fused folk music influenced by Weimar Republic composers and traditional European folk, with classical music, free jazz, rock and punk.
When Amoebic dissolved, he founded Alec K. Redfearn and the Eyesores, combining the influences shared by Amoebic (folk, cabaret, jazz) with a melancholy atmosphere invoked by Redfearn’s dark lyrics and songs based on country and rock music. The band’s 1998 debut, The Eyesores, was a six-song cassette, and was followed by a series of self-produced mini-albums. Their 1st full album, May You Dine on Weeds Made Bitter by the Piss of Drunkards, came out on Magic Eye Singles. 2002's Bent at the Waist (Handsome) brought them acclaim for its left-field alternative pop sound, while Every Man For Himself & God Against All (Corleone, 2003) was embraced by avant/experimental and indie-rock crowds.
In the mid-noughts, working primarily with the Cuneiform label, Alec K. Redfearn & The Eyesores began releasing a series of impressive recordings that brought the band international acclaim and new followers among the global avant/experimental rock, avant-progressive music and alt-folk scenes. In 2005, Cuneiform released The Quiet Room, a primarily instrumental, 15 song album featuring an 11-piece band plus guests laying down lush layers of strings, horns and feedback - electronics, telephones, noise-making devices - over a solid backbone of drums/percussion, accordion and bowed contrabass. On The Smother Party (North East Indie, 2006) Redfearn and the band played in a more traditional song format and, although the subject matter was grim, they were presented with a playful, fairy tale-like lyricism. In contrast, The Blind Spot (Cuneiform, 2007) was a more "serious" work, both musically and conceptually impressive, mixing classical and folk instrumentation, electronics and processed noise, vocals and invented/experimental musical instruments. A multifaceted epic, The Blind Spot was a lyrical requiem mass in secular form yet highly spiritual, a cathartic work that dealt with Redfearn’s former drug addiction and coming to terms with the friends lost along the path to healing.
2012's Sister Death is the band's most recent Cuneiform release and its most accessible album to date. Sister Death explores the mysteries of life, death, love, loss, creation and destruction, subjects that have informed Redfearn's songwriting since the early 90s. The dark beauty of the music and lyrics is simultaneously astonishing and accessible; Sister Death transcends single genres while sounding captivatingly familiar, and the musicianship of the band is impressive throughout.
Visit their Official sites:
http://www.aleckredfearn.com/
https://www.facebook.com/aleckredfearnandtheeyesores
[Alec K. Redfearn and The Eyesores: Sister Death in Pieces (excerpt)]
“Redfearn and his squeezebox lead us along dark paths into the misty night, where the darker side of human nature bubbles a little closer to the surface...… There's a musical similarity to some of the Dark Cabaret artists...but Redfearn has a distinctive take on it. The music combines folk, country, jazz, gypsy, and rock in an eccentric but totally organic way. The instrumentation is as distinctive as the music, with Redfearn's accordion usually present (sometimes with effects pedals), organ, french horn, guitar, drums, and percussion."
-Jon Davis, Exposé
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www.cuneiformrecords.com
www.twitter.com/cuneiformrecord
www.facebook.com/cuneiformrecords
www.soundcloud.com/cuneiformrecords
www.youtube.com/CuneiformRecords
“…homespun intimacy…by a band that tends to shun brightness and gaiety. …Led by accordion and winds, with occasional guitar and frequent detours through contrasting textural and mood breaks, Alec Redfearns’s music turns up a clever American twist on the Art Bears/Zamla axis, unafraid to admit having absorbed influences from klezmer and Balkan traditions as well. …place them next to Hamster Theatre and Non Credo on the most approachable side of current American R.I.O. music.”
- Michael Ezzo, Exposé
