Greg Box - Lead, bass, other guitars, drums, general guru
David Brown - Drums
Antonio Papaleo - Drums
Rob Fisher - Lap steel, guitar, piano, percussion
Ross Palmer - Bass, guitar
Russell Parton - piano, singing
Sam Ritchie - Trumpet, guitar
Sean King - Guitar, singing
Mike Taylor - Saxomophone, menthols
Ana Silvera - Piano
James McKean - Backing vocals
Dan McKean - Guitars, bass, piano
Dan Lea - Brushes on 'Trees They Grow High'
Influences
Elvis Presley
Elizabeth Cotten
The Replacements
Bob Dylan
Pavement
John McCormack
Screaming Jay Hawkins
Tommy Johnson
Yo la Tengo
Palace / Bonnie Prince Billy
Red House Painters
Elliott Smith / Heatmiser / Quasi
John Lennon
Sebadoh / Sentridoh
Thelonious Monk
The Pogues
The Clash
Lydia Mendoza
Scud Mountain Boys
Leonard Cohen
Sonic Youth
Trojan boxsets
Harry Smith
Orson Welles
Sounds Like
...we have a deal.
All music bought directly from this site will come with a ten song bonus CDR of whatever new songs I've got lying around. And a drawing. And a stamp.
Songs from a Dazzling Drift CD Album
Pointy Records, 2005 (POINT019CD)
"This could be the start of something major" - **** Q
"A masterclass in storytelling" - Dazed and Confused Price: £10
Notes for Holy Larceny CD Album
Pointy Records, 2007 (POINT022CD)
"Excellent" - ***** Amelia's Magazine.
"Folk and country melodies soaked in a warm melancholia" - Metro
I assure you - this is the better CD album - YZ. Price: £10.50
Jangadeiros Cassette Album
Best Kept Secret, 2009 (LIE139)
Limited to about 200 copies! It's my favourite collection so far. Price: £8
"Captivating, indeed mesmerising... Every moment is to be treasured."
- BBC
NEWS
Pointy Records will release my 2009 Christmas single "Another Song di Natale" on 14 December. Check back soon!
Hello. I'm Yo Zushi. I'm a Soho subterranean with failed literary aspirations.
I recently worked on a short film musical about singing milkmen fighting crime; it's called Milkwatch. I co-wrote the script and did the musical elements, which feature the London Gay Man's Chorus in full force. Milkwatch, directed by Michael Taylor, launched at the East End Film Festival and was funded by Film London through New Pathways. The film was nominated for the Best of the Boroughs Award and screened at BAFTA; it has recently been picked up by a web distributor (more news to come). I've embedded it below:
In mid-2009, I teamed up with the cult lo-fi Italian label Best Kept Secret, who releases limited edition cassette tapes. Available now is Jangadeiros (SOLD OUT - SORRY), a ten song dip into my basement tapes and lost blues. Most of the songs were recorded by Dan Lea of By the Fireside at Golden Hum Studio, London. To get your hands on one, look me up on www.indiepages.com or come and see me play. There's only going to be 200 copies or so!
My second album, "Notes For Holy Larceny", was released on Pointy Records on the 10th of September, 2007. Find it on amazon or in all good UK stores, should you be so inclined!
Here's what people have said:
"When with guitar, he relates lucid tales of alcohol-fuzzled intrigue and mishap to gentle folk and country melodies soaked in a warm melancholia."
- Metro
"Warmly satisfying... Like a Richard Hawley with knowing winks."
- Q Magazine
"Notes for Holy Larceny arrives well crafted and honest... By the end of the record, you're left feeling serene, worthwhile... all the credentials to be the under-sung musical hero that we just don't get anymore... broken optimism and warfare. Excellent."
- *****, Amelia's Magazine
"A raw intriguing talent"
- Steve Lamacq, BBC Radio 2
"...dreamy and beautiful... His perceptive lyricism revels in the minutiae of a wondrous day in the city, with a tinge of old American blues. It’s Conor Oberst sharing an orange juice with Johnny Cash... versatile yet intense... Yo Zushi’s campfire tales are at once wistful and uplifting, and this talented songwriter’s fire looks set to continue burning."
- **** and a half, www.subba-culture.com
"Instruments are rendered with warm beauty, the atmosphere of friends in a room playing music together caught on tape... sounding on occasion like an English Stephen Malkmus... brushed with a poetic grace... beautiful, personal, understated and intimate... a rewarding, artful little record by a definite talent."
- Stylus Magazine
"...a woozy trip around Soho's drinking dens with lyrics scribbled down on napkins over copious glasses of red wine and packs of cigarettes... Steeped in a world weary bittersweet melancholy that's laced with an alcohol fumed optimism, this seems certain to gain a whole legion of new admirers and take him a step closer to those inevitable music awards that are so clearly his due."
-www.netrhythms.com
"Sweet melodies that entice you back... a taste of something different"
- Maverick Magazine
"His second album dances around the maypoles of late night smokiness, traditional folk, nu-folk delicacy and understated classic country, but never gets entangled in any one set of ribbons, instead weaving in and out with consummate skill and in the process creating one of the more interesting albums of 2007... one of those rare beasts, a concept album, wherein the whole of a world of acoustic music coffee bars, late night semi-drunken musings and the deeper darker edges of folk is explored and discovered. An intriguing album."
- Americana UK
Praise for my last one, "Songs from a Dazzling Drift" LP (available now):
"His playfully eccentric lyrics about life's small moments, plucked acoustic guitar and rollicking rhythms suggest a less ramshackle Badly Drawn Boy or better adjusted E from Eels, the likes of Mary Magdalen's Barbershop Blues sparkling in the face of a lost love, and even the Leonard Cohen-like Pin Brooch Cabaret tingling with optimism. Just 23 years old, this could be the start of something major."
- **** Q Magazine, "Q Recommends"
"Yo Zushi's folk songs have earned him plenty of high profile fans around the world and this, his debut LP, looks certain to raise the bar even higher. A masterclass in storytelling."
- Dazed & Confused
"Immediately likeable and with the unerring ability to bring a smile to the lips of any music fan perfectly constructed lyricism With any luck this is just a taster for whats to come from this talented musician."
- Word Magazine
"...diversity and newness throughout... haunting."
- Comes With A Smile
"...a singer-songwriter who does more than slow and painful... upbeat melodies and enchanting lyrics... marvellous."
- **** Maverick
"...With a title lifted from a Robert Browning poem, the album is a classy collection of intelligently literate folk songs that beat with a left of centre Pop heartbeat. Understated, unaffected yet charmingly affecting, the album ought to set Yo Zushi up as one of the key singer/songwriter talents of 2006."
- Tangents
"Should contemplative singer/songwriters become the heroes they once were... then Yo Zushi is one artist who will be leading the revival."
-Flavourpill
Old News:
*Winner of Dazed & Confused Magazine's Re:Creation Award 2004
*Breezeblock Bomb (AKA Record of the Week) on Mary Anne Hobbs's show (Breezeblock, BBC Radio One). She said I was "the spirit of Bob Dylan for the 21st Century", which was nice, but I feel for Mr Dylan himself, who is still very much alive...
*Twice the Xposure Big One (i.e. Record of the Week) on John Kennedy's show (Xposure Part 2, Xfm)
*One of Daily Telegraph's "Bright Young Things" 2004
Thankyou my friend, you're very kind. I guess that I haven't seen you or spoken since that show at The Social a few years ago......yeah, America wasn't so great but most of the bio thing is funny lies. How are you?.....'Wild Mountain Lullaby' is beautiful. Anytime you need a support act for a show, then think of me. Take it easy. Mike pilgrim.
You're doing a celta? Congrats man, good work opportunities there. What are you doing on the 25th of july? Jonty and Michael have invited me to their wedding reception, wanna be my hetero date and represent the bookshop? Been hella busy lately, lets hook up soon, lemme know if you wanna go? Bring Zoe too it says 'Guests are allowed to bring friends to this event'. Maybe we could get a whole bunch of quinto peeps, ex and current, like Liberty, Paul, Ben and Walter too? Who knows, I'll get on the case!
thank you sooo much for the sweet a$$ comment.. we are very grateful.. i'm listening to you guys right now.. very chill..very pretty music.. i like your christmas song.. so far seven sleepers is my favorite but they're all very good.. please let us know if you put out new tracks.. word.. rock on.. -millicent :)
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