Sleepytime Gorilla Museum
(often abbreviated to SGM
) is an American experimental rock band, formed in 1999 in Oakland, California. The band fuses classical, industrial, and art-rock themes throughout their music. They are known to perform elaborate routines on stage and discuss possibly fictitious stories of dada artists and mathematicians.
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SLEEPYTIME GORILLA MUSEUM TICKETS
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History
After the disbanding of
Idiot Flesh,
Dan Rathbun and
Nils Frykdahl joined with
Charming Hostess member
Carla Kihlstedt (of which Rathbun and Frykdahl were also members) to form Sleepytime Gorilla Museum with
Moe! Staiano and
David Shamrock. Their first performance, on June 22, 1999, was to a single
banana slug (Ariolimax dolichophallus)
[1]. The following night's performance was their first to a human audience.
Some time during the recording of
Grand Opening and Closing
(2001), drummer David Shamrock left the band and was replaced with
Frank Grau. Grau also co-released the album, instigated their first tour and managed the band.
During the recording of the follow up,
Of Natural History
(2004), Grau left the band and was replaced with a new drummer, Matthias Bossi, formerly of
Skeleton Key. The
Of Natural History
tour saw Moe! Staiano's exit, and new multi-instrumentalist
Michael Mellender's entrance. In January, 2006 Sleepytime Gorilla Museum signed to
The End Records who re-released their début
Grand Opening and Closing
with three bonus tracks.
Soon after, an announcement was made that a new album was in the works and had a tentative date of March, 2007. During early 2007, the title and track list for their third studio album,
In Glorious Times
was announced with the release date set for May 29, 2007. Prior to the release, an
mp3 and
music video of "Helpless Corpses Enactment" were available online.
Name
According to their extensive liner notes for
Grand Opening and Closing
, their official history and repeated in interviews, the name "Sleepytime Gorilla Museum" comes from a small group of
Dadaists,
Futurists, and artists named the Sleepytime Gorilla Press who owned and operated what they called a "
museum of the future" which was "anti-artifact, non-historical and closed."
[2]
The "museum" opened on June 22, 1916 (the same date as the bands' first concert, 83 years later). The exhibit was a fire which caused wide chaos and confusion. The following day the museum was closed (hence the name of the first album). The name itself apparently comes from a poem called "Of the Future Hides the Past," written by Museum members Lala Rolo and Ikk Ygg.
The only source of information on the internet regarding the Sleepytime Gorilla Press, Lala Rolo, and Ikk Ygg arises from the band's interviews.
Performance
Their live performances have featured puppet shows, pseudo-scientific scholarly presentations, and performances by members of the
Butoh group .
The band uses many homemade devices as instruments, such as the Viking Rowboat.
Dan Rathbun — who has created most of the band's idiosyncratic instruments — plays, among other
custom-made instruments (though he uses a common
bass guitar most of the time), a custom-stringed bass instrument referred to as the Sledgehammer Dulcimer (or, alternately, the Slide Piano Log), which uses piano strings and is possibly more than 7 feet long; it is played with two sticks: one in the left hand generally used as a fret, and another in the right hand to strike the strings.
Percussionist Michael Mellender's instruments consist of restaurant kitchen equipment, trash can lids, and other "found" metal objects, in addition to traditional percussion instruments. One of the more infamous instruments used by the band was Moe! Staiano's Popping Turtle (now residing in
Brooklyn, NY [3]). It can be heard about 1:21 into the song "Sleep is Wrong".
Categorization
SGM's music can be likened to
experimental rock or
avant-garde metal; however, as inherent to the music, the band attempts to escape any categorization. Some influences include
Mr. Bungle,
Trey Spruance,
Mike Patton,
King Crimson,
Thinking Plague,
Univers Zéro, and so on.
[4] In a review for SGM's second album
Of Natural History
, David Moore of
Pitchfork Media states that SGM's debut album
Grand Opening and Closing
was an amalgam of
Meshuggah and
Secret Chiefs 3, resulting in "some truly cracked prog-metal anthems."
[5]
Discography
Studio albums
- Grand Opening and Closing
(2001)
- Of Natural History
(2004)
- Grand Opening and Closing
(2006) [reissue]
- In Glorious Times
(2007)
Live albums
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DVD
Compilations
- Mimicry CD Sampler
(2004) — Features a different mix of 'Bring Back the Apocalypse'
- Knormalities V.3: Posthumorites
(2005) — Features SGM covering This Heat's 'S.P.Q.R.'
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Members
Some of the strange and unique names of some of these are custom instruments built by the band.
Matthias Bossi
- Drums
- Glockenspiel
- Melodica
- Percussion
- Piano
- Xylophone
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Nils Frykdahl
- Vocals
- Autoharp
- Flutes
- Guitar (6 string)
- Guitar (12 string)
- Percussion Guitar
- Recorder
- Tibetan Bells
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Carla Kihlstedt
- Vocals
- Autoharp
- Bass Harmonica
- Electric violin
- Nyckelharpa
- Organ
- Percussion guitar
- Pump Organ
- Stroh violin
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Michael Mellender
- Accordion
- Euphonium
- Guitar
- Lever-action Lever
- Pancreas (electric)
- Percussion
- Tangularium
- Toy piano
- Trumpet
- Valhalla
- Vatican
- Wheel
- Xylophone
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Dan Rathbun
- Vocals
- Autoharp
- Bass guitar
- Lute
- Pedal-action Wiggler
- Recorder
- Roach
- Sledgehammer-dulcimer/Slide-piano Log
- Thing
- Trombone
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Former members
- Frank Grau – (2001-2004) - Drums, Melodica
- David Shamrock – (1999-2001) - Drums, Piano
- Moe! Staiano – (1999-2004) - Bowed spatula, Food Containers, Glockenspiel, Metal, Paper, Percussion, Popping Turtle, Pressure-cap Marimba, Spring, Spring-nail Guitar, Tympani, Wood
References
- Sleepytime Gorilla Museum
- Album notes for ''Grand Opening And Closing'', CD 2001. The End Records.
- Moe! Staiano - title
- Ground and Sky review - Sleepytime Gorilla Museum - Grand Opening and Closing
- Of Natural History | Pitchfork