STOMU TAKEISHI - Plays electric bass altered, agitated, and transformed by electronics and loopers, toggling between Etheral Sounds and Aggressive Urban Noises
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TED POOR - Plays the drums and various metals from Home Depot, Lowes, and True Value Hardware stores
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CUONG VU - Plays "Weird-assed-Trumpet-shit"(real quote), employing miscellaneous, obsolete guitar pedals. He's also the Scribbler/Organizer/Notater/Conceptualist of musical ideas/subjects/objects for the band to look at, be perplexed by, and then ignore.
Influences
In in the last 5 - 10 years, the main people whose music have affected, informed, and/or inspired my ideas and aspirations in music, while sometimes making me scratch my head, are -
Bjork, Radiohead, Sigur Ros, Busta Rhymes, Missy Elliot, Aphex Twin, D'Angelo, Cynthia Hopkins, Helmut Lachenmann, Stina Nordenstam, Gyorgi Ligeti, Tyondai Braxton, Autechre, Arto Lindsay - there are a bunch more...just can't remember them right now...
Sounds Like
Too hard for an inarticulate person (me) to articulate...but some writers have described the music as
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"an acoustic hall of mirrors"
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"It's pure art. There's dark-darkness, joyful lament...and everything about anguish and despair in flat, naked beauty...it will shake you."
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"Its about crafting haunting soundscapes"
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"The first sounds you hear on Cuong Vu's new album are ethereal trumpet moans joined by equally otherworldly clusters of notes emanating from a guitar. These sounds herald the beginning of a musical marriage made in electronic heaven"
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"musical trip through life - a life conceptualized as dense urbanized noise-scapes - intercut with advancing and receding episodes of pastoral calm. Vu's music is a living residue of journeys taken and journeys returned from, in sound."
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"seems to have created the jazz version of a rock music power trio...an out-and-out rocker, complete with auditorium shaking drumbeats and Brontosaurus tooth chomping bass rhythm"
Cuong Vu is widely recognized by jazz critics as a leader of a new generation of innovative musicians. A truly unique musical voice, Cuong has lent his trumpet playing talents to a wide range of artists including Pat Metheny, Laurie Anderson, David Bowie, Dave Douglas, Myra Melford, Cibo Matto, Mitchell Froom, and Chris Speed.
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Since moving to New York in 1994, Cuong has been active in leading various groups (most notably his CVTrio with Stomu Takeishi - bass and Ted Poor - drums), touring extensively throughout the world, and presenting clinics and masterclasses throughout the US and Europe. He has released four recordings - Bound (OmniTone), Pure (Knitting Factory Records), Come Play With Me (Knitting Factory Records) and It's Mostly Residual (ArtistShare) - each having made critics choice lists for best recordings of their respective years.
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Cuong has recently joined the faculty of the University of Washington’s School of Music as an assistant professor of jazz studies and is a "Yamaha Performing Artist". Cuong plays the Yamaha Custom YTR8310Z trumpet.
Hi Cuong, thank you for add me. Man I love the sound of your trumpet, sound's good. Please give a listen on my first release 48 Hour Odyssey. I would like receive your opinion. Ciao. Enrico
Dear Cuong! It's just amazing solo with Pat Metheny group!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Just AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!!!! Thanks
Vielen Dank für die Myspace Freundschaft. Thanks for your Myspace Friendship. Gracias por la Amistad - Saludos. Viele Grüsse aus Hessen – Greetings from Hessen. ***Trio Hispanono***
Hey Cong! thanks for accepting the add, man you're amazing, I've watched you with Pat Metheny but I listened to you at Zinco playing with Los Dorados and it was an incredible experience, you are adding that crazy new thing that music needed!!! Thanks for that!!! Come more frecuently to Mexico!!! :-) Cheers!!!
