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Man Man

Imagine that Captain Beefheart's demented second cousin meets a warped Tom Waits, galavanting with two Franks (Black and Zappa) in the backwoods of Philadelphia and you're pretty close to the dark, deeply strange stylings of Man Man. Frontman Honus Honus' voice is reminiscient of Isaac Brock of Modest Mouse's sputterings, full of grunting and yelping set against the joyous chaos of Wolf Parade or Need New Body as the rest of the band joins in, often with chilling, otherworldly screeches and piercing falsetto and the occasional creepy angelic choir.

Man Man act like a jaunty children's orchestra of keyboards and brass instruments pinned up against a wall of shout-singing, punctuated with unusual percussion as drummer Tiberius Lyn doesn't hesitate to use everything, including the kitchen sink, as a drummable surface. Which is not to say that Man Man is overly noisy or pretentious art-rock. You get the sense that they took stock of someone's garage filled with dusty rattles, rusty metal fans, broken keyboards, a discarded flute, long forgotten songbooks and made music the only way they knew how: quirky, fascinating, but still accessible. Freaks of the world, feel not alone, as this band is for you, as the live show is filled with toy instruments, Japanese umbrellas, and animal masks.

The Man In A Blue Turban With A Face is strongly hypnotic, slowly revealing layer upon layer of intricacies not visible to the naked eye. Surreal yet still strongly melodic, Man Man draw upon freak folk, the fringes of klezmer, and the twisted undercurrents of underground rock to great effect.

Man Man - Against the Peruvian Monster
Man Man - Zebra
Man Man - I, Manface
Man Man - 10 lb Moustache

Man Man's official site. Buy The Man In A Blue Turban With A Face from Ace Fu, iTunes Music Store, or Amazon.

Posted by Queen of the Front Row at 03.07.05 at 1:13 PM

Comments

Oh my.

Posted by: David Adams at 03.07.05 at 8:40 PM

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See You in the Pit is an MP3 blog exclusively featuring artists who will be playing the SXSW Music Festival, because the best way to learn about music is to hear it. This weblog will self destruct on March 22nd. You have been warned.

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