RED PENS
RED PENS
Seeing the Minneapolis duo Red Pens is like witnessing a demonstration. A demonstration in raw sonic bliss. Howard Hamilton III is a string bending master and knows how to make feedback work to his advantage. His confident vocal stylings coupled with drummer Laura Bennett's all or nothing kit pounding are about as uniquely refreshing as it gets these days. The stage is littered with junk shop amps and guitars Hamilton seems to almost get tangled up in while he and Bennett exchange doses of laser beam eye contact showing off a seemingly deeper connection between the two of them than your average indie rock outfit.
MYSPACE :: FACEBOOK :: PICKED TO CLICK 2009
Hamilton and Bennett met in the arena of visual arts and started Red Pens as a way to express their deep love for rock and roll. Howard's old project The Busy Signals went on tours with The Shins and it's beat and loop based jams proved to be an underdog favorite in the early two thousands. Laura is well known as a painter and is best known for her painting on guitar effects boxes. She even has her own signature fuzz pedal, not bad for a drummer. Their debut album Reasons on Grain Belt Records is a mid-fi bonanza of fuzzy reverb drenched art rock. The wiggly winding guitars, slap back vocals and killer back beats are sure to give you that silly grin you've been starving for.
THE CLOAK OX
The Cloak Ox is made of four staunch music-making Midwestern men. They are Andrew Broder, Jeremy Ylvisaker, Mark Erickson and Martin Dosh and their names may be familiar. Of course, they may not be. They hail from Minneapolis, MN, and have been friends for many years, playing a lot—a lot—of music together and apart. They have started bands, quit bands, restarted bands, played in others' bands, inspired other people's bands that became very successful, and even sometimes joined those bands after the fact.
