SISKIYOU’s self-titled debut album was recorded during downtime from an ambitious tour schedule of leader Colin Huebert’s former band, Great Lake Swimmers. It came out in 2010 on Constellation Records. The second one, “Keep Away The Dead” and solidified their rep. Siskiyou is not a folk band. Sure, behind the distinct shiver of Colin Huebert’s whisper/wail you’ll hear pleasantly plucked acoustic guitars, banjos, slide guitars, and gently brushed drums. But listen closer — there’s something more sinister here, in the sound, in the words. From the crackling of old AM radio tuners, to the squelching feedback of some electric guitar abandoned by its amplifier, the Canadian band’s songs play with conventional arrangements. The songs on the new album speak of death, but not in a self-serious Gothic sense. There is an agnostic and gorgeous resignation to this album, at once atheistic and hymnal. Under Huebert’s direction SISKIYOU employs the simplicity of pop convention to deliver something subtly bizarre and evocative.
BLACKBIRD BLACKBIRD (formerly Bye Bye Blackbird) is the moniker/musical outlet of San Francisco, California guy Mikey Maramag. His reverb-laden musical collages tend to lean towards anthemic, inspirational, and dream-driven themes. Maramag’s influences range from various ends of the musical spectrum. Blackbird Blackbird often tweaks nature-samples and mixes electronic textures with organic instrumentation (guitar, drums, synths, vocal-harmonies). Ghostly female vocals are chopped and screwed, spun around a paint-splattered collage of sound. Maramag’s deep, textured, and hypnotic pop songs pay homage to the psychedelic pop that the Beatles could have imagined but cannot make today. BLACKBIRD BLACKBIRD’s music is made with the warmth of analogue instrumentation spliced with digital bells and twinkles. BLACKBIRD BLACKBIRD’s debut album “Summer Heart” was self-released by Maramag in July 2010, and was really just a collection of his past EPs, “Happy High” and “Let’s Move On Together”.
Concert / Pop, Dream pop, Singer/songwriter & Electro Siskiyou + blackbird blackbird
