Max Tundra

Ben Jacobs was lucky enough to grow up in a house with a piano. As a child he protested about the lessons in which he was forced to learn the music of the famous (dead) composers. “I used to prefer sitting at the keyboard at home and playing tv theme songs and music from adverts”, remembers Ben. Eventually he realised that this expanse of black and white keys could be turned to his own advantage and he began forming his own musical inventions. One day, the teenage Ben bought a Commodore Amiga 500 home computer. Armed with this and a £1 piece of music software, he began to explore the world of electronic composition. Eventually he got so good at using this cheap set-up that back in 1998 Warp Records released his first single. “Warp were the only label who were interested in my first tune,” says Ben. “I sent my demo tape to fifty labels in all, but most people freaked out. A couple of guys made the bizarre criticism that I had too many ideas.” This criticism has frequently dogged Max Tundra (as he was hereby renamed), in a musically diverse, eclectic career where time signatures, musical genres and instrumentation have been given the thorough shake-up they have long needed. Max Tundra's warm, emotive, uplifting songs will capture your spirit, pour it over ice, and serve it back to you at the best disco in town (where you won't get turned away for liking both Destiny's Child and Frank Zappa). Incidentally, there's no dress code either.

OFFICIAL SITE  ::  MYSPACE  ::  FACEBOOK  ::  TWITTER  ::  SOUNDCLOUD

Praise for Max's 2008 album, Parallax Error Beheads You:

“A whole other world of pop music – an absolutely unique, enchanting, and irreplaceable vision of how the stuff can work” – Pitchfork (27th best album of 2008) “Improves upon [his previous] albums’ strengths – wide-eyed eclecticism among other things – managing greater coherence and scope than anything he’s ever done... astounding” – Cokemachineglow “Parallax Error Beheads You is an enormous achievement, one that expands the syntax of the medium” – Momus (best album of 2008) “This year has bubbled and bleeped with the sound of bedroom electronica that harks back to the past, but the third album by Max Tundra is the most joyful of all. A pop tour de force, bursting with bright, bouncy hooks” – The Guardian “It is a near masterpiece, elastic, eccentric and eclectic” – musicOMH.com “He's never made anything approaching a bad record before, but the greatness that Max Tundra's turned out to be capable of still proves to be a revelation of earth-shattering proportions” - The Quietus “Mannered English eccentricity never sounded so deliriously thrilling” – All Music Guide “What Max has created as a result is nothing short of amazing” – Urb