Michael Tritter: synthi, modular synth
Chris Seeds: pianos, organs, pedal steel.
Joe Fiorentino: bass.
Art Lavis: guitar, tamborine.
Jon Warren: percussion, tabla.
Jake Oas: alto and tenor sax.
Artanker: drums, vocals, percussion.
Influences
J dub listens to a lot of indian classical and east asian dub. Chris is listening to and making nashville soul (check out his side project Mossy Pine). Joe has an amazing jazz collection and puts on more and more latin music these days (salsa? merengue?). I believe Art listens to rock and says he can play anything on Bowie's "Station to Station." Jake loves the music that was playing at his 8th grade dance when he was dancing with his crush, and will take any opportunity to squeeze a convoy song into a cover of one of those old favs. We all dig Gabor Szabo. I'm listening to the At War with the Mystics a lot lately and loving it. and I just got back from Brazil where I was hearing the most amazing stuff played all around me, live, and free. found another Donovan record I love - Open Road. Matt from Standing Nudes turned me on to Cymande and I can't get enough. also digging this James Gang record - "Yer Record," I believe, and it rocks. and another Black Oak Arkansas record - "Keep the Faith," maybe their best ever. raw sound. also going through a major Pretty Things obsession - Parachute. and I highly recommend Relatively Clean Rivers.
Sounds Like
Time Out London: simmering, downtempo funk and avant-jazz while maintaining a delicate balance between soul and sleaze.
The Wire: ...an eclectic groove stew, equal parts funk and freakout. There are definite tinges of Miles Davis' early 70s groups. "Ejector" could be straight off Big Fun with its mid-tempo laidback shimmer and shimmy. "Black Dauphin" soups itself up into a ghetto Prince strut, jutting its chin into the sun baked fuel thick city air. Likewise, "Geyser" is a slippery piece of funk with some warm smokey guitar playing. The standout is "Open Up," a slow burn number with a percussion rustling intro, the guitar player rolling on the faders before the beat kicks in, his instrument now digging deep into the reverb on the bottom strings and surfing the echo on the high notes.
XLR8R: (Office Top Ten Album Pick) ...New York supergroup Artanker Convoy makes pretty drone jazz on the brilliant Cozy Endings
Seattle Weekly 6/13/07?The references to '70s Miles Davis will abound; Artanker Convoy's Cozy Endings is a slab of jazzy grooving that simmers like Brooklyn pavement in mid-August. While Davis is an apt comparison for this mix of jazz, psychedelia, bossa nova, and soul , it's more a descendant of trumpeter Don Cherry's Brown Rice in its attempt to make jazz into something more accessible, trippy, and danceable. Every number on here is a laid-back (note: laid-back, not slow) burner that swings, shakes, and sometimes struts. Though the percussion work is light overall, the leader of the band is drummer Artanker (hence the band moniker). He and bassist Joe Florentino lay down extremely minimal beats of shimmering cymbal and subtle bass lines, which the band proceeds to build around with liquid keyboard drips and saxophone purrs that float just above the song's foundation. In this way, they are like Can; each song grows organically into something awkwardly suited for a dance party of sorts. Given that they are on the Social Registry label, it's only natural that they also have a significant trance element to their music. Like the best of its ilk, Cozy Endings is a major chill-out record. Now that I think of it, Beastie Boys songs like "Namaste" and Lighten Up" are also major reference points for this record. BRIAN J. BARR
Time Out New York: " raw, ferociously funky stuff that nods toward 70s Miles, with Artanker driving the whole train from behind his kit."
The Journal Review: "an updated, dancier version of Pink Floyd."
Spin.com: Artanker Convoy played a heavily psychedelic, dub-inflected set. The Brooklyn six-piece channeled Can and Spacemen 3 with their dense sound, and differentiated themselves from like-minded contemporaries with the prominent use of hand drums and a saxophone. The set was accompanied by visuals of the band members refracted through effects that accompanied the music, making the performance all the trippier.
Norman Records: "sounds like David Holmes funking up Tortoise which is no bad thang, dude. In fact the whole 4 tracker is on a funky, jazzy post rock trip down NY Blvd. Niiiice!."
Philadelphia City Paper: "...sounds great ... lulls the listener into a stupor with slight shades of soul, Krautrock, bossa nova, hip-hop, psych, punk funk and New York noise. Prepare to be bowled over."
Vice (UK): "(9 out of 10) lushly jazzy in a cool, electronic, tastefully abstract way"
CMJ: psychsperimental outfit that culls elements from dub, funk, jazz and earthly excess
tinymixtapes.com: Cozy Endings plays out like an inversion of the blaxploitation cinema score, from the double entendre of the album title paired with the CD's cover art to the tightly disciplined rhythmic structure of the band's distinctive no-wave-meets-'70s white boy funk stylings. Much in the same manner that Clock DVA's White Souls in Black Suits was a re-imagining of British soul as filtered through the Northern English sensibility, Cozy Endings is a distillation of crossover jazz/funk kitsch seen through the post-rock prism. To put a finer point on it, the album's primary focus is on the eerier, minor-key side of the genre brought into prominence by the likes of Lalo Schifrin and David Axelrod and currently practiced by artists such as Barry Adamson and David Holmes. Cozy Endings, however, has as much in common with experimental psychedelic rock as it does with the crossover jazz sub-genre, but it's an undeniably smooth, compelling record that demonstrates the band's considerable chops and propensity for memorable arrangements... it plays like the psych-inflected work of a Bitches Brew-influenced contemporary jazz quintet, or perhaps a Krautier and more angular experimental funk outfit à la Medeski, Martin & Wood... The highly visual nature ... makes for an evocative listen that renders the music suitable for the soundtrack medium. But what makes the music of Artanker Convoy of such great consequence is the sheer depth of the band's recordings, which are brimming with immediacy and an inordinately tight sense of control. Cozy Endings is an indisputably groove-heavy amalgam that, though it retains the air of the familiar, manages to avoid sounding derivative through the unmitigated strength of its compositions. The band make prolific use of the subtle nuances of the recording process — room noise, the squealing of fingers across a bass guitar string — to color these tracks with organic flourishes that pulsate with warmth. ...squealing James Chance-style horns coalesce around a gravitational center that allows the track to jell, thus keeping the abstraction down to a manageable level. Much of Cozy Endings is infused with noirish overtones that resonate with a late-night, urban grittiness. The eerie, nocturnal Fender Rhodes and reverb- and wah-wah-laden guitar effects of "Ejector," for instance, accentuate the track with a brooding sense of municipal decay. The brilliant "Black Dauphin" is perhaps the most fully realized piece on the album and is an epic, tense composition that shows the band at the pinnacle of their compositional prowess. The track's saxophone accompaniment, courtesy of Joan Oas, is both fluid and breathtaking.
Musicemissions.com: "Six of Brooklyn's finest crank out and up a SERIOUS groove, one that would be ingested eagerly by both Ravers and Krautrock fans alike. The funk on here is hardcore and the rhythm section of bassist Joe Fiorentino and drummer Artanker bring back echoes of the JB's or Sly Stone. "Crown Vic" and "Natch" settle into deep grooves that show a willingness to expand jazz-like within a tune and wring for all its funk. The astounding "Portuguese" sounds like the songs you thought were amazing when stoned; though unlike those, cold sober this tune still leaves you shaking your head and debating whether or not to fall over yourself to praise it. The band is tight and sounds like they have been together forever. They also sound like they have swallowed many sections of pop history and remade it as their own."
Crashinin.com: "Rumored to be a big hit in South America. Artanker Convoy just want to make you dance in your shoes with their grooved out flavor that would fit in perfectly on a Soul Jazz Records compilation. Psych-soul six piece with an additional remixed track by Sasha Crnobrnja of Organic Grooves. This is kick ass fun stuff. Fans of !!!, Tussle, Outhud, ESG should check this out."
Relativetheoryrecords.com: "A fantastic blend of Krautrock, Bossa, Jazz, Dub and some of the early New York Noise artist like Liquid Liquid and ESG... the compact disc is amazing. I have spun it several times and it's a soundtrack full of dub, lounge, late seventies Miles, and the middle east. Cozy Endings is recommended for fans of Tortoise, Pharaoh Overlord, Fight the Big Bull, The In Sound from Way Out! and will be available June 19th."
panpot.ca: "This record is great and you should buy it. It's one of those records that not only floors you sonically and with its artistry, but also reminds you that you've been neglecting an entire genre of music... This is dance music in a completely different fashion to what you would expect to hear in the club on any given Friday, with nary a cow bell or a four-on-the-floor kick drum beat to be had. Yet I doubt any rock music fan keen on "going out dancing," (you know who you are), would be able to resist the tight grooves that this group dishes out. Artanker Convoy has the rare ability to allow a song to slowly build up to its necessary pace and feel, resisting the urge to overplay or let things barrel out of control. It's this restraint that makes this record so pleasing to listen to; as a listener you can't help but trust that the six musicians know how to get you to the end of the track, taking the best possible route along the way.
Cozy Endings has a very similar feel to trumpeter Don Cherry's forgotten masterpiece, Brown Rice, with both records managing to walk the fine line between jazz and other more pop and accessible fair. The players on both discs have incredible musical chops, but more importantly they have the sense of taste to know what will best serve the song, sacrificing any personal need to be flashy or over play, which isn't usually the case with this kind of instrumental music. There is also a definite CAN vibe throughout much of this disc, with songs slowly building into weirdly danceable grooves, creating trance like interactions between instrumentation, with the group often sounding like one huge wall of sound. The rhythm section is insanely good, laying down a frame work for guitar, keys and sax to float over, augmenting the feel of the song as the instruments careen in and out. The arrangements are so good and the interplay so seamless that at points I was often unaware that one instrument had dropped out and had been replaced by another... this record is great and you should buy it!"
I'll just come right out and say that Artanker Convoy's Cozy Endings is this year's supreme recording for chillaxin'. The lightly psychedelic groove-bent songs have loads of space, take there time finding their conclusions, and find their way with plenty of elegance and sophistication. And every listen reveals more defined forms that were previously obscured in the haze. Their funkier take on Kraut-like minimal repetition, with lotsa Ege Bamyasi rhythms, is beginning to remind me more and more of On the Corner Miles Davis despite its Bitches Brew flashes of color.
The added DVD, which also includes bonus songs form other recordings, more than merely one of those obligatory market-based decisions, begins working particularly well when it arrives at the more abstract pattern videos and dancers that are often part of their show – particularly the ones that include the masterful work of Nicole Wolcott.
Kataweb musica (http://www.kwmusica.kataweb.it): "The album is a continuous rhythmic groove that agitates the body not to make it dance, but to raise the new worlds' poetry (or verse?) freak. It is not nostalgia, mind you. The approach is modern, the son of much listening that does not produce a mere imitation, but that transforms itself into something personal."
Kinda muzik: "Het zestal Artanker Convoy steunt op normen en waarden die jaren geleden door artiesten als Can, James Brown, Faust en Neu! zijn vastgesteld. Inderdaad, Mature Fantasy ontvouwt zich als een diepe groove waarin funk, krautrock en postrock de belangrijkste elementen vormen. Komend van Social Registry, het New Yorkse label waar onder andere ook de experimentele club Gang Gang Dance zich op bevindt, is Mature Fantasy een schone plaat. Dat wil zeggen, de manieren van Gang Gang Dance baden in een nogal sterke experimentele waas, waar Artanker Convoy gestructureerder te werk gaat. Met het volume vol open werkt het album als een hypnotiserende ontspanningssessie. Zo een waarvan je in slaap valt en je je niet meer herinnert wat er voor dat moment precies gebeurde. Maar of dat positief is?"
Artanker, Joe F and Chris Seeds played in the 90s acid bubblegum group Stratotanker. Before that, Artanker and Joe F played in The Jinx Clambake Explosion with James Murphy of LCD Sound System. Art Lavis played with Princess Superstar and later occasionally toured with The Oranges. Jake Oas played with the Low Down Dirty D.A.W.G.S. Jon Warren played percussion for the Robert Ivey Ballet and studies tabla under Misha Masoud.
Tritter is our newest member, if you saw us in the UK you were lucky enough to catch him. He's been producing the Mossy Pine record that Chris wrote that just came out on Heron.
Check out our recent interview at uncensoredinterview.com
Luke Lukas is back with an album full of that gleeful gloom that made us love him at first sight. His trustworthy 4-tracks and him go their separate ways so he's now presenting 12 perfectly arranged folk songs to us. Luke reveals himself as a kind soul, but like the western movies taught us, a dreadful killer always hides under every placid looking Texan.
"Leaving his strongly lo-fi sound that impressed us the first time, he treasures the recipe, packing in this new plain, delightful work a caring love for vocals, which are worthy of Neutral Milk hotel, with a touch of Chordettes feel."Daniele Dileo - Lab Magazine
I'm dropping a line to friends who have commented on my music,hope you don't
mind the plug.
I've a new funky folky quirky e.p available to order and its a lovely
handcrafted CD package to boot.
Its on preview on my myspace page
Online Now!
![SANDY'S [THE SPIRIT] FAN MYSPACE](http://c4.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images02/14/s_cd3791d4a05e4221ae1308a786b5dea7.jpg)
![HiP LiKe! [blank]](http://c2.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images02/68/s_7728c8faffb640a391ef0ab2586c8a89.jpg)
