Me, being Josef Motley, formerly known as Hot Blooded Detective Joe (for about a week), also formerly known as Guybrush Threepwood, Ryan Grimshaw, Fitzroy James Valentine, Ian Skinsleigh, Stuart Dent, KingRat, Josef Half-a-Head & finally, "A4" (skinny & white like a piece of paper, etc... yeah i was well funny, me) I'm also known as The Man Who Speaks Fast About Nothing. This being the only thing I'm actually any good at. These are my obscure attempts at pop songs on a very low budget.... most of the time I get my friends involved to cover up for my complete lack of musical talent.
I pursue my own ramshackle musical endeavours in my main project, TORTOISESHELL MALE. I make noises using my own scratchy dictaphone-obtained samples played on virtual turntables with liberal use of mentalness. I also like to try and beatbox or play percussion and then be astonished by how out of time the result is compared to how it sounded in my head, I'm also pretty much sure I'm tonedeaf but I enjoy making noises on various instruments all the same, mainly the synthesiser. Well, my PC's keyboard. I write down what letters the notes I play down are, it's a much better system for me personally to use a QWERTY keyboard as there are more letters than the frankly confusing octave system. Well it confuses me. For instance, i did a song called 'self titled' for my other band when it wasn't a band yet, and the notes spelt s-w-a-m-p-g-l-o-w, and that's how I remembered what I was actually playing. I'm a bit simple like that.
Before i began doing solo stuff under the name Josef Motley in 2008, I used the name swampglow, which after the first two self-made records became a fully-fledged electro / hiphop group in 2007, getting to the final in the wedgewood rooms battle of the bands showcase after having never played live before. Basically, we uber-fluked it.
Since then we've been honing our abilities and learning our studiocraft in preparation to unleash ourselves upon the unlucky world again very soon with an EP and an all-new live setup with drum machines, synths & beatbox galore. oh yes.
I've also been and probably will in the future be a member of the collective currently known only as more people, which is a more traditionally instrument based project with live drums & guitars & stuff, and even some proper singing. We've played live once and not done much since as yet, the lineup at the time consisting of a ramshackle bunch of members of swampglow & the strange death of liberal england.
I also attempt 2manyDJs-style "mashups" (as I believe the kids call them these days), but with better tunes & worse mixing, under the name ObscureActivists.
videogames, imaginary and real. bad TV. good anime. indescribable dreams that can only be re-evoked to myself through a list of vague imagery. well worn anecdotes and in-jokes. i'm generally self referential and write almost exclusively about myself and my own obsessions whilst desperately trying not to. i steal lyrics from amusing things i mishear or people actually did say. a lot.
i'm also highly influenced by level grind, having to walk somewhere, and dead things in general. also my continual quest to locate a skeleton called The General that used to belong to one of one of my Dad's friends & my continual quest to locate the picture of an octopus wrapping xmas presents that i once saw in a newspaper round Bujuben's. other than that, everything i do is a mistake.
Sounds Like
You might as well just look at this picture and imagine what that sounds like, for all the good any description of mine will do you.
Here's some old quotes you might find more accurate. Or not.
"I'd describe the Motley sound as the musical adaptation of a man undergoing regressive hypnotherapy as his family sit in the corner couch crying. The truth incendiary to delusion's parasitic nature in this world of inanimate weight."
- Odynophagia, 2007
"It's like you're some kind of alien emitting your own version of our emotion of despair..."
- E.B. Jamieson, 1956
I hate 99% of hiphop but continue to choose to make it for some reason. As my music becomes increasingly niche market, my chances of ever making money from it dwindle expedentially; yet I continue to indulge my follies in various projects including infamous electro quintet "swampglow" & the completely unheard of "Tortoiseshell Male". I have appeared on some actual records, some of them good, others not so. The few I am currently happy with are available free by clicking the links below. My first proper (non-mixtape) album under the name Josef Motley (with producer dCABB & various guests) is due out sometime this very summer, and will include 'profanation' as well as songs currently only heard out so far live (see videos in the opposite column to watch bits of the last few shows i've done with various peoples...)
hahahaha, I'd be both weirded out and honored. You and my girlfriend might have matching tattoos in that situation! She seems to be interested in doing this logo or at least some sort of pink octopus (same goes for me actually, but I'm considering a realistic looking one)
You know... this reminds me. I think it's high time I, or someone else, made another official version of the pixelated octopus. I will never un-love the real deal (as this is an almost exact replica of the original hallucination), but I would like to add another to the family...
just to let you know you can hear the best UK Funky, Garage, Dubstep & Grime tunes all up in the mix bashment style on the Sound Clash Radio Show every Friday 19:00 - 23:00 GMT
I hope you have time to check out my new single 'Build Up A Spliff - featuring Fire D' It is now available as part of the compilation album 'Crucial Step Vol.2'
Online Now!
