Recently I saw one of the very few bands/artists whom I’ve come to love during the past (largely desultory) musical decade, Hartford CT’s The Magik Markers, who played a headlining show at Seattle’s Chop Suey.
I first saw their lead singer/noise guitarist/front person, Elisa Ambrogio, in November 2008, entirely by accident, as she was then (very briefly) guesting on guitar with a Bay Area group called Six Organs of Admittance, then doing a short tour with my beloved New Zealand noise merchants, The Dead C.
To say that I was SHOCKED and inspired that night by her fearsome talent would be a vast understatement—she was like a feral animal attacking her (lefty) guitar, mauling it, stomping to and fro, rolling about conjuring up firestorms of screech and feedback—all of which brought the decent-but-nothing-special Psych/Folk stylings/songs of Ben Chasny (Six Organs’ slightly over-celebrated front guy) up into the “A-Minus” range, and made them riveting, at least while Miz Ambrogio was on stage!
I immediately tried to figure out who she was, and discovered that her own band, The Markers, had an extensive catalog of homebrew cd-r’s (dozens!), and had recently released their first proper (i.e. available on LP and cd!) album, 2007’s BOSS (produced by Lee Ranaldo for Thurston Moore’s label, Ecstatic Peace).
I soon acquired and loved it (in fact it was my favorite new-ish album of 2008!), and then made a point of purchasing EVERY SINGLE ITEM of theirs that I could find. I now own about a dozen (out of over 50!), having purchased two recent cd-r’s after the show last night.
They released their next album on Drag City (2009’s similarly-excellent BALF QUARRY), have another one out on the label that I’ve yet to hear (2013’s SURRENDER TO THE FANTASY), and are currently on tour.
By the by, I like this person’s take on the impulses undergirding her own passions and areas of expertise, from a blog called Her Noise Archive. The quote from Elisa herself is sheer, eloquently-intuitive GENIUS, and probably a better summation of my own impulses toward messy noise and angry screaming in performance than anything I’ve ever read by my Rock Critic Heroes, Lester Bangs included!
‘We are part of an American tradition that was arcane 40 years ago: the non-virtuoso artist, the artist that should not have been, birthed of suburbs and average intelligence. Hitting the subconscious by accident, communicating out of a sweaty desperate want. Magik Markers have always been that. Basement, mouth-breathing, know-nothing nobodies itching to get at something they don’t understand.’
I recently came across this quote by Elisa Ambrogio, of Magik Markers, in The Wire (November 2013, #357, p. 16). When I first met Fatima Hellberg of Electra who introduced me to Her Noise, and again later when approached to be a guest curator, I felt exactly like a ‘know-nothing nobody itching to get at something I didn’t understand’. This instinctive reaction to my own set of knowledges and awareness of lack of knowledge; my own specialisms and conversely my propensity towards generalism in my magpie-ing artistic practice, sets the tone for this blog.
This is the current version of the group, which began as a basement trio around 2001, soldiered on for many years as a duo, and is now restored to its full glory with a tall, fuzzy (in both senses!) bass player—
Anyhow, I didn’t recall us ever chattin’ about these folks, and I feel sure that you’ll enjoy what they’re up to.
It’s almost as if Sonic Youth had gone on from DIRTY and never started to suck, partly by lettin’ Kim sing all the songs and play most of the guitar! LOL
Here’s their informative Wikipedia entry, which for some reason has a discography that’s several years out of date—
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magik_Markers
– Tom Kipp
(Check out the Magik Markers website – http://magikmarkers.tumblr.com/#2)
In Noiseblood – How the Magik Markers got their name
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZqwZUEMVPg
