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The Stan Ridgway Band is:
Stan Ridgway: vcs, elec. guitar, harmonica / Pietra Wexstun: vcs, keyboards. electronics / Rick King: vcs, elec. guitar and bass /
Joe Berardi: drums & percussion, electronics / JT Lazar: keys, table saw, sandpaper
One of the most unique singer/songwriters in American music, Stan Ridgway is a true original. From his early days with L.A.'s Wall Of Voodoo, to his even more intriguing solo career, Ridgway has created an impressive body of work spanning close to three decades. Singing on Wall Of Voodoo's debut EP and first two albums, Dark Continent and Call of the West; which included the hit song and video "Mexican Radio"; 2008 now marks more than 25 years since the release of Ridgway and Wall Of Voodoo's "Call Of The West" album. To mark the occasion, Ridgway and his band will be performing key songs and music from the classic 80's albums as well as selections from his many critically acclaimed solo recordings. A celebration in song, story and spoken word.
The Austin Chronicle has said, "It's been over 25 years since Stan Ridgway and L.A.'s seminal Wall of Voodoo released Call of the West, and that calls for a drink. The album's dusty, Barstow-to-Bakersfield, Ross Macdonald-meets-Edward G. Ulmer in a Death Valley Detour to nowheresville title track and grimly optimistic film noir narratives still reverberate across the musical Route 66 Voodoo frontman Stan Ridgway paved, roadkill and all..." Ridgway's post-Wall of Voodoo output has, if anything, cemented his neo-noir rep as one of American music's greatest storytellers, the wild and wily Steinbeck of sad whiskey railroads and rusted, ramshackle American dreams."
Its been a long and influential road for the songwriter/guitarist and original Wall Of Voodoo vocalist. His darkly humorous, and richly cinematic musical tales of the ironies inside the American Dream have been compared to other classic songwriting iconoclasts like Randy Newman, Tom Waits, Johnny Cash and even hard boiled mystery writers like Raymond Chandler and Jim Thompson, as well as twisted film makers like David Lynch and Quentin Tarantino.
Ridgway works in his own unique form of aural and sonic tradition, chronicling all that lies beneath the safe and sane surface. He craftily sets his dark materials to off-kilter and eerie melodies that echo the uneasy action of a cast of characters on the brink. His tales often take place in the microcosmic miasma of L.A. and its outer desert, where his creations try to wrest meaning from the beautiful catastrophe of their lives. The combination makes for a stunning stew of universal provocations. Come and attend a thoroughly entertaining evening with one of America's greatest songwriters and storytellers as he and his band perform classic songs and music from a career stretching from the early 80's to the present.
The Stan Ridgway Band is: Stan Ridgway: guitar, harmonica, vcs / Pietra Wexstun: keys, electronics, vcs / Rick King: guitar, bass. vcs / Joe Berardi: drums, percussion, electronics
Stan Ridgway's latest recordings are "Snakebite: Blacktop Ballads and Fugitive Songs" (2005) and "Barbeque Babylon" (2006) on A440 Records.
Artist's official website: http://www.stanridgway.com
Artist at
http://www.myspace.com/officialstanridgway/
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