Electric Black

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2bKSwtPRr8&feature=player_embedded - Fearless Music

we fuck on cinder blocks
by IB
MARCH 18 2009

Roll up! From the cancerous bowels of New York City...

"The most punk rock country-blues chamber orchestra on earth."

The debt owed Tom Waits here is striking - after a three minutes past midnight fashion - but other songs hint at something beyond "Rain Dogs". Front man, Johnny B. - "A Legend in his own mind" - has the kind of presence Sideshow Bob might approve of. Or Captain Beefheart painted into a corner with a cuban cigar.

http://siblingshot.blogspot.com/2009/03/love-on-cinder-blocks.html - Siblingshot On The Bleachers

Electric Black :: Our Love is Smoking
By Amorn Bholsangngam
MARCH 26th 2009

New York’s Electric Black is all the dark corners and alleyways in their hometown personified. The sextet, led by frontman Johnny B.’s smoky vocals, serves up brooding testimonies of the most sinister parts of the human experience through their cinematic country-blues stylings. More often than not, any comparison made to the incomparable Tom Waits is heresy, but Electric Black may be one of the few to deserve being mentioned in the same breath as the enigmatic troubadour. “Our Love is Smoking,” a bluesy, psychedelic aural trip through the Deep South, features a Greg Dulli-esque vocal turn from Johnny B., conjuring all the darkness and nicotine from his ailing throat to deliver a performance that might just put Nicorette out of business.

http://www.urb.com/promotions/next1000/profiles/1548-Electric+Black.php - URB MAgazine

Cool Band: Electric Black
By Derek Phillips
MARCH 19 2009

I have a thing for buzzy, reverb drenched guitar tones. It creeps me out in a good way. Electric Black also creeps me out in a good way. Lead singer Johnny B. sometimes plays a little too close to Tom Waits, but is that such a terrible thing? I mean, we all have our influences and if you’re going to wear them on your sleeve then Waits looks good with anything. Electric Black isn’t just another knock-off though and their sonic palette seems to pull as much from early 60s electric blues and psycho-garage as Frank’s Wild Years.

From the band’s EPK: “Out of the sentiments of Howlin’ Wolf, Jimmie Rodgers, and Woody Guthrie, in conjunction with the poetic license of Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Charles Bukowski, and Pablo Neruda comes a new Experimental Blues Sound, self-proclaimed ‘American Gypsy Music." I can dig that.

http://www.gloriousnoise.com/shorties/2009/cool_band_electric_black.php
- Glorious Noise

Electric Black Blues
By Oded
SATURDAY, MARCH 21, 2009

Proclaiming themselves "the most punk rock country-blues chamber orchestra on earth", NYC's Electric Black set their sights very high. What can you possibly expect from a collection of musicians led by a man who resembles the even darker twin of Side-show Bob (sorry, I couldn't resist)?

Well, nothing, until you hear their first song. Then you begin to realize that their claim of artistic lineage coming from Howlin’ Wolf and Charles Bukowski, to name just two of the alleged progenitors, may not be without ground. The sound is very blues based, but its elements of alternative, rock and creepiness (is that a genre?), mingled with a dash of Tom Waits' spirit, make it more than that. When you hear that singed voice, you know it's for real.

“I wanted to create an album that honestly told the story of human struggle, from the grandiose to the day-to-day. An album that struck a chord with the core of the human spirit, an album that could endure,” says front man Johnny B. It's certainly a remarkable piece of work.

Check out Electric Black on MySpace and their site for streamable tracks and updates. Their official debut performance is on March 26th at Bowery Electric, NYC. If you're in the area, check it out; it promises to be an intriguing event.
Electric Black's debut LP, Electric Black, is due out this May (iTunes)

http://laughingevergreens.blogspot.com/2009/03/electric-black-blues.html
- Laughing Evergreens

Johnny Azari, a k a Johnny B., the Iranian-born lead singer of the band Electric Black (left, with guitar), said that green, initially linked with the campaign of the presidential candidate Mir Hussein Moussavi, "has completely moved on to become the color of revolution and resistance."

WATCH THE VIDEO HERE:

http://video.nytimes.com/video/2009/07/16/style/1247463459471/life-as-a-runway.html - New York Times (Print & Online)

It’s Thursday, March 26, 2009 at the Bowery Electric in New York City, minutes before Electric Black’s first show, the show that could make or break them, and their drummer is late. Band members mull about the crowded underground space anxiously making small talk with people who have never heard of them, and have only come for the open bar. Their manager, Andreas Zettmeissl, is eager to take his mind off the concert starting late. New York is a competitive town: Bands that fail to acquire a fan base quickly tend to die fast, and Johnny B., lead singer/songwriter/driving creative force of Electric Black, has had a few amazing breaks in the process of getting this. There is the melancholic fear that maybe his luck has run out before the very first show.

Johnny B, as MySpace refers to him, is standing off stage right, leaning on the wall, curtained in shadow and aviator sunglasses. He doesn’t bother to talk; it seems useless amidst the club chatter and the distant rumble of Motorhead’s “Ace of Spades.” He seems placid, until nervously he touches two fingers to his lips, remembers he no longer smokes, and shoves his hand in his pinstriped suit coat pocket. Somewhere underneath the glitzy rock star garb is (probably) a nicotine patch.

It’s not that he’s trying to save his voice—Johnny’s singing is always thick and full of rubble, drawing all-too-easy comparisons to Tom Waits. Restraint is his primary mode of operation. It’s why his suave but beat-up leather jacket, comfortable as his skin, doesn’t fit quite right.

“I’ve been there, man, all the cliché rocker addictions. It was hard, but I had to give them all up to get where I am now.” That struggle has colored Electric Black’s music. “My favorite was mixing everything together in a big brown pile, getting a bottle of Jameson’s and two sixers and locking myself in my room for twelve hours getting high as a kite and writing. ‘Weary Path’ [the fourth song on the debut self-title record. Electric Black] was written like that.” The same weariness of combating loneliness and addiction seeps into his work and his words—carefully chosen, cool.

Electric Black’s sound has the heart of an acoustic folk band in the body of a 1970s hard rock band, blending old school Americana songwriting (their only cover is a crushing run-through of Hank Williams’s “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry” that feels completely in step with the remainder of their set), and instrumental complexity. “We’re a group of virtuosos,” Johnny states matter-of-factly.

Johnny once spent his time living alone in a New York loft, where he began to master guitar and stage performance in front of his friends. The loft days are over for now; his apartment, a short walk from Avenue B, is sparse, and he sleeps on a twin mattress on the floor. There are two folding chairs and a low table; most visitors, and Johnny himself, prefer to sit on floor cushions—a reminder of his Iranian heritage. There are also neatly stacked posters, advertising cards, and T-shirts all branded by hand with the Electric Black logo. Johnny has made many of them himself, and they take up more space than his personal possessions.

Johnny seems nothing like a typical musician about to release a debut album. He is not cocky, overconfident, disrespectful, or egotistical despite his formidable songwriting chops. Rather, he and his lyrics seem to breathe from the very act of living; weary, yet still kicking. Johnny spent a year’s worth of bleak economic times working on Electric Black, finding musicians to play and write with, and polishing his songs. It’s a gamble, perhaps the kind of fool’s errand that typified the Cobain-worshipping teenagers of the 90s, but there is a gravity in the way Johnny talks that conveys something deeper than confidence, an almost religious faith. “Electric Black’s almost a survival mechanism. I need to make music to live.” That vibrancy and urgency permeates the gypsy-rock Electric Black plays, giving it a dark, neoclassical edge.

Not surprisingly, Johnny loves vintage singer-songwriters with a taste for the dark and moody. He paraphrased Leonard Cohen after passing a sleeping, possibly dead, homeless man in a Manhattan gutter: “There is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.”

The Sunday before the show, his other side, the performer, took to where the music comes from: the streets. To promote the show, Johnny took Electric Black’s accordionist, Melissa Elledge, and lead guitarist [former lead guitarist], Tucker Rountree, out with acoustic instruments, and one hundred balloons emblazoned with their logo. They marched through the streets jamming, and stopping traffic. The music, and the bulbous mass of multicolored rubber and helium drew peoples’ attention but Johnny kept it with a steely confidence. Women stopped in their six-inch heels to look at him, an old man clapped along to provide the drum beat for a few moments. He became like a sort of crazed pied piper once the band reached a small park, attracting a crowd of small children.

Andreas told Johnny that giving too many balloons to kids was a poor choice: children can’t pay to see rock bands in clubs. There was a guilty pause, and Johnny decided to play a song for the kids in the park anyway. This caused some debate amongst the band—isn’t the music a little bleak for children, the exposed love and liquor lost? After a minute of convincing, they played one song, “So It Goes.”

Johnny plays the same song, dedicating it to his stepmother, who was nearly barred entry to her son’s big debut—on her birthday no less—when the drummer returns from his extended nap and cigarette break. The crowd is dancing, booty grinding, intoxicated by strains of electric guitar and accordion running in with the gentle nihilism in the words. It seems Electric Black is coming alive into its own, not purely out of Johnny alone. The crowd likes it. I’m fairly certain many of them will follow Johnny and Electric Black to the next show.

Johnny stopped his mighty holler, and handed a balloon to a passing toddler in the space where the guitar solo is supposed to be. “Think he’ll remember the jerk who gave him a balloon?” Johnny asks to no one in particular. When Johnny sings it without a microphone in the park, he and Electric Black are reaching back to the early history of rock—the traveling bard, the man with no name who has seen more than we know. It’s a hard world for that kind of rock star, it just doesn’t jibe with the internet-driven corporate thing rock has become. Johnny does not compromise, if the black leather jacket, which gestures towards 80s hair rock, doesn’t fit right, then it will be the one to change before Johnny does.

http://www.brooklynrail.org/2009/07/music/johnny-b-has-a-patch - The Brooklyn Rail

Remember when you were an angst ridden teenager, and you discovered an album or band that made you react physically? It moved something in your chest, which you had probably already learned is called a heart, and serves no use except to cause you utter pain and pump blood through your veins and eventually kill you in most cases, and if it doesn’t kill you it will cost you lots of money and anguish in the long run. But, I digress. In some cases, your heart can actually serve as a barometer for just how good a band, song, or album is. Electric Black has turned me into an angst ridden teenager once more. I can’t remember honestly the last time I was so excited to go see a show, because let’s face it- the vast majority of bands in this city are just SO DAMN MEDIOCRE. You know a band isn’t exactly captivating when you find yourself taking one or more cigarette breaks during their set. In fact, the mediocrity of a band’s performance can be directly measured by the length and number of your cigarette breaks- and yes, there have been bands whose sets were one LONG cigarette break, which is the equivalent of my interest monitor flat-lining. Truly tragic. Needless to say, there WERE no cigarette breaks during Electric Black’s set.
From the start, the anticipation level on March 26th at Bowery Electric was high, but I had been waiting impatiently for WEEKS. I had seen them once at The Delancey over the previous summer, when The Scene was still going on. That one “fluke” performance hooked me, and I knew I had to have more. But there was to be no more- until March 26th. They couldn’t have picked a better venue for their actual debut, really- the downstairs room is small enough to be intimate, yet big enough to accommodate a music thirsty crowd.
They finally came on stage, late, after the tension in the room had reached a fever pitch. Yet rather than cool it down, they fanned the flames higher by coming out in intervals during the first song instead of all at once. Johnny B. (also of The Dirty Pearls) and Doug Wright came out first, songwriter/singer/guitarist and upright bass player, respectively. They were soon joined by Lucas Leto on percussion, Tucker Rountree also on guitar, Melissa Elledge on accordion and Jackson Kincheloe on harmonica. They didn’t disappoint by any means- their smoky blend of blues, country, and rock, infused with a touch of purest soul, enchanted the crowd and seduced them into a blissful state of rapture. A guest appearance by soprano Jennifer Rosa elevated the experience into something dangerously close to religious. Their performance overall rocked the crowd to the core- and it was evident that the musicians felt it themselves. If Tom Waits and Nick Cave had a whole bunch of kids together and the kids were raised on Pablo Neruda and whiskey and formed a band when they were old enough, that band would be Electric Black.
Their album is equally impressive. The first song and single, “Our Love Is Smokin’” , is a brilliant mix of sultry bass lines and suitably raspy vocals, with a dash of wicked dry humor here and there and lyrics that’ll make your knees weak. This musical mastery carries itself throughout the album- songs such as Watchya Doin’ and One More Song For The Road will make you tap your feet at the very least, if not make you get up and shake your money maker, while tickling your head with clever lyrics. Weary Path, the fourth track on the album, starts off with an ominous accordion solo and winds into an explosive waltz that carries you entirely into another dimension. They also do a downright gorgeous cover of “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry”. Overall, Electric Black is a killer band that is worth far more than whatever they charge at the door- because they’ve made it clear that somewhere in this city, genuine musical talent and passion still exist.

http://electricblack.madapplemedia.com/blog/?p=49 - New York Waste (Print)

Fearlessly Deep: Interview with Johnny B. of Electric Black
By Julie Jigsawnovich
SEPTEMBER 28th 2009

In addition to singing with Freedom Glory Project–a band he co-founded with members of the Iranian band, Hypernova–Johnny B. sings and writes for his own band, Electric Black.

I caught Electric Black live at the launch party for their new CD, on the Lower East Side at Rockwood Music Hall in Manhattan. Seeing Johnny B. perform onstage together with the female accordion player, female guest singer, male guitarist, male harmonica player, male upright bassist, male trumpet player, and male drummer–before a mixed audience, in a public venue serving alcohol–was a reminder I was not in Iran!

Later, I asked Johnny B. a few questions:

JJ: Did you grow up in New York City?
JB: Yes, I moved to NYC from Iran when I was 1 1/2.

JJ: Are both your parents Iranian?
JB: Yes, Shirazi. They met in the underground, fighting Khomeini.

JJ: Shiraz is where I’d want to live, if I lived in Iran. It’s a more Liberal town–and Hafez is from there.
JB: And Rumi. I’d like to go there too. Haven’t been back since I left.

JJ: Do you read Iranian poetry?
JB: I used to read a lot of it, but I can’t read Farsi. English translations get really tired after awhile. You can feel it’s just not right. Poetry rarely translates.

JJ: That’s true. When I visited Hafez’s tomb, I wanted to photograph some graffiti on the wall outside.
JB: Why didn’t you?

JJ: Our guide told me not to, because it was Mujahidin. Were you raised religious?
JB: I was raised without God, left to discover that for myself–thank God, haha! Bothmy parents are, and were, very radical. Really, if I was raised anything, it would be a Red diaper baby. But my folks encouraged me to be myself and discover life and truth on my own terms, through my own mistakes and travels.

JJ: You mention the Devil in your lyrics. Do you believe in the Devil as a metaphor, or as an actual figure or force?
JB: I feel the Devil is the human ego… nagging for things it does not need nor could digest. There is no Devil, only actions founded in fear.

JJ: Fear of…?
JB: Fear in its most concentrated form does not need focus. Fear is a crisis of conscience. That’s why governments and powers at large use it as their cornerstone tool of suppression of the greater human potential.

JJ: There are lots of fearful things going on since the election in Iran.
JB: Yeah, but fear wears thin. It takes a long time, but eventually it does. All human beings ultimately wish to be free. And if they can rid themselves of the impulse to react to their fear, then they realize an internal liberation no army could destroy. That is what is happening in Iran. People just aren’t scared anymore. Now it’s the ones who hold the power who are filled with fear. That’s why they are resorting to torture and murder–because they are scared. It is the last actions of a dying beast to lash out at everyone indiscriminately.

JJ: Do you believe in spirits or souls? What are they?
JB: Yes, I believe in the soul. I believe that the soul is our divinity, our connection to the infinite. I believe that our bodies and minds are tools to experience the soul. But most people are oppressed by their own minds and bodies, rather than liberated.

JJ: Has anyone here in the States treated you differently when they found out you were born in Iran?
JB: Not really, because I don’t look like a typical, bomb-toting, camel jockey. Haha. That’s not funny.

JJ: Your hair is too long!
JB: Yea, and I sing the Blues. I mean, I am very American, you know. I was raised here. I like to think I took the best parts of both cultures and left the bad. I know that’s not true, but I like to think it.

JJ: What is it like to be a romantic man?
JB: I am romantic? Haha, my girl friend would disagree. I meant to write, “girl friends.” Haha.

JJ: Well, you know, you are a star!
JB: Not yet, hon’. Not yet. Doubt I ever will be, nor do I think I want to be. I think fame tends to destroy most artists. I really want a middle class artistic career. If I can make $100,000 a year by playing music, I will be very happy. I don’t care if the world knows my name. I would rather have a small but solid fan base that can grow with me as an artist, rather than millions of fans who like me because of clever marketing and my hair.

JJ: Your lyrics are full of romantic longing, in the grand tradition, (quoting Reign The Night):
“When I first met you, you were so young, eyes of almond brown, and hair so plainly done. Through your tears and misery, I stood by your side. Then it came my time to cry, you pulled away like the tide.”
JB: Yeah, well that song is very personal. I wrote that after some heavy changes.

JJ: (Quoting Johnny B.’s lyrics to One More Song For the Road.) “The moon is silver, the stars are shattered mirrors. I see my reflection there, but the image is not clear.” That reminds me of mirror mosaics in Golestan Palace, Tehran.
JB: All art is a mirror. Good art makes the spectator experience themselves, bad art make the spectator experience the artist… Do you mean romantic in the literary sense?

JJ: Yes, I mean it in both senses. Baudelaire drank a lot, took drugs, had a lot of sex, and he was Romantic in a literary sense–as a comparison.
JB: If you are going to quote One More Song For The Road, and say I’m romantic–please don’t leave out the line where I endorse unprotected sex.

JJ: What’s up with that?! And then you give away condoms as Electric Black swag!
JB: Paradox is the lock and the key, the path to truth…in poetry anyway.

JJ: Pandora’s box!
JB: Well, that’s something a little different. But, yes, I like that metaphor too.

JJ: Jung said that what is inside the box is a nude figure, symbol of sexuality–unrepressed desire.
JB: Jung was God.

JJ: How would you describe Electric Black music?
JB: The Most Punk Rock Country-Blues Chamber Orchestra On Earth.

JJ: Will you ever let Iranian music come into it, or never?
JB: I already have, just haven’t released the song yet. We recorded a song called “Heading Out East” that is set for release on Oct 20th that has setar and daf, as well as violin, harmonica, accordion, cajón, guitar, and upright bass. All instruments are acoustic, recorded entirely live. We did it the way Elvis and Johnny Cash and all those guys used to track–circle of mics. The song kills. It’s a Bonnie and Clyde story, about two lovers on an idealistic binge.

JJ: Can’t wait to hear it! I like that you have women musicians playing with you, too.
JB: I don’t really see race, sex, or religion when it comes to music. I just hear what the player can do. That’s how I decide. Melissa (accordion/keys) has a really strong classical training that really gives us the chamber orchestra edge.

JJ: Is there anything else you want to say for the interview?
JB: The band is planning on releasing a new single every month for a year instead of putting out EP’s or records.

JJ: Distributed through iTunes?
JB: Yes, and Amazon, and others too! It’s very sad that our society has become so fragmented that they don’t have the attention span to listen to a full record anymore. Because it is through the LP that an artist can take you on a journey, and really try to show you an different POV. But none-the-less, the Zeitgeist is changing, and we are changing with it. So singles it is!! You want to ask me anything else?

JJ: Given the choice, do you prefer smoking cigarettes or hookah?
JB: Haha, Cubans, baby.

JJ: Well, you were a Red diaper baby.
JB: Yes, but when I die, bury me in a Green grave.

JJ: Please describe the difference between the current Green Iranian movement and the Red movement your parents were part of.
JB: Well, that was a Communist Revolution. It was, you know, in the middle of the Cold War–and tied in to all that superannuated energy. The Green movement is not a Revolution. It is, at its core, in my personal belief, a Civil Rights movement. The people of Iran want the basic freedom to be able to choose the destiny of their country through democratic means.

JJ: Motteshakkeram Johnny B.



*Electric Black will perform on Thursday, October 29th at The Mercury Lounge, Houston Street at Essex Street, in New York City. Visit electricblack.org for more information. - Persianesque Modern Iranian Online Magazine

If only Frank Zappa had sounded like Electric Black…
By Barrett Brown
JUNE 1st 2009

A lot of bands begin their journey haphazardly enough, perhaps inviting a few acquaintances to their first gig and putting up inscrutable fliers here and there. But Electric Black, being Electric Black, went a little further, hitting the streets with their instruments and a huge bouquet of balloons in order to personally invite random pedestrians to their opening show at Bowery Electric on the night of March 26th. When the big day rolled around, Electric Black played its first gig to a sold-out house.
The opening night success was only partly attributable to the balloon gambit. Despite having not yet released an album, Electric Black had already managed to pick up some attention by way of a couple of tracks the band had released via its MySpace page. In a day and age which overflows with new bands, MySpace band pages, sample tracks, and invitations from new bands to check out their MySpace pages and listen to their sample tracks, the clips offered by Electric Black stuck out like a three-legged kitten in a tractor factory.

There’s something about Electric Black that inspires nonsensical metaphors. For one thing, the band possesses that hard-to-pin-down quality of the sort to which many bands can only aspire. The group itself most commonly refers to itself as “the most punk rock country-blues chamber orchestra on earth,” which is certainly accurate, although the term “American gypsy music” has also been used here and there. Almost inevitably, written descriptions of Electric Black tend to evoke Tom Waits, with this due in large part to the vocal harshness of lead singer and songwriter Johnny B, who himself shrugs at the comparison.

“You know, [accordion player] Melissa [Elledge] has nailed this topic and nailed it shut. She says, ‘Anytime someone can’t classify something they say it’s the Tom Waits of its medium.” And she is dead on. I have, for example, called Stravinsky the Tom Waits of classical music. I know I’m wrong, but fuck it. It sounds cool and makes me look learned.”

She’s probably right; I myself once resorted to describing the group as sounding like “what Frank Zappa might have sounded like if Frank Zappa had been influenced by Frank Zappa and had actually been Tom Waits in disguise all along.”

Besides, says Johhny, “Tom doesn’t own the copyright on overdriving ones larynx nor did he invent the style. He ripped it from Capt Beefheart who stole it from Howling Wolf and God only knows who Mr. Wolf took it from.”

In fact, the band’s influences range among more obscure territory. Electric Black was meant to be, says Johnny, “a true hybrid of all the art and artists I have loved throughout my short life, from Tarkovsky and Kubrick in films, to Frieda Khalo and Magritte on the canvas. Countless authors, poets, and strangers I have met during my journey. The grand weirdos who have seemed to master some small aspect of ‘the art of living’.”

Envisioning the style that he was after, Johnny says, “I heard an orchestral sound in my head, but laid in heavy with blues and country and folk - a sound whose lyrical quality infuses the punk rock mentality with the subtle grace of Leonard Cohen and Lorca.” And then, of course, it remained only for Johnny to find other musicians who wanted to produce the same improbable thing.

This was surprisingly simple, and Johnny is happy with the mix of talents that surround the project. “Lucas Leto (drums) and I have known each other way longer than is healthy and he pretty much reads my mind when it comes to writing a rhythm that can connect with the caveman in all of us. Doug Wright (bass) is simply God and I don’t think he has ever played one wrong note. Jackson Kincheloe (harmonica/lap steel) and I really are the closest in musical taste as we both are blues men to our bones. He can make any instrument weep and scream, which is all I ask of anyone who calls himself a musician. Melissa Elledge (accordion/piano/organ) is classically trained and so refined that there is no way I can find fault with her. She puts a spin on the sound I could never write, and gives us the real orchestral flavor. Georgie Seville (guitar) has got such a real feel for the blues and music in general. He may also be the only guitar player on earth who doesn’t suffer from lead guitar player syndrome. Rhys Tivy (trumpet) is a prodigy. He’s only 18 and can channel Davis, Baker, Armstrong on cue. But always with an original feel that’s so smooth and dirty… like a well-oiled pedophile.” All in all, Johnny explains, “The band is a group of sonic tailors dressing my raw and naked emotion in the finest low-down-dirty styles of the day.”

Electric Black’s first album will be released via digital download on June 16th; the band’s album release show will be held on June 25th at The Delancey. Bring your own balloons.
- Scallywag & Vagabond