Deerhunter is an American band made up of Bradford Cox, Moses Archuleta, Josh Fauver, Lockett Pundt and Whitney Petty, which originates from Atlanta. The band describes themselves as ambient punk although their music spans across a wide range of genres such as noise rock, art rock, ambient, and post-punk. The line-up has varied over the years, due to among several things the death of one of the members.
The band was co-founded in 2001 by vocalist Bradford Cox and Moses Archuleta and the name was proposed by the first drummer, Dan Walton, who was asked to leave the band during the early days. It was Colin Mee, who Coxon met while living in Atlanta that brought the band together. At that time Mee was working at the label Die Slaughterhaus Records with members of Black Lips.
In 2004 the first bass player, Justin Bosworth, died from the head injuries he suffered in a skateboarding accident. He was to appear on only one Deerhunter release, the Deerhunter/Alphabets Split, which was released before their debut album. Bosworth was replaced by Joshua Fauver, who at the time played drums for the Atlanta punk band Electrosleep International. The death of Bosworth influenced the sound of the first album, which according to the members was the result of a lot of negativity. Recording the album was an incredible struggle in the aftermath of the death of Bosworth and as said by Cox this was a record he would never want to do again. The liner notes are dedicated to Bosworth
After the release of of "Turn It Up Faggot" Cox asked one of his best friends from high school, Lockett Pundt, to join the band. The band went on tour playing shows with such bands as of Lightning Bolt and Gang Gang Dance. The tour culminated with a recording session at Rare Book Room in New York, which was organized by the well-known folk musician Samara Lubleski. No material that could be used came out of the session due to the mental and physical state of Cox at the time, together with a disagreement with Lubleski. According to Cox a copy of the recoding is kept under his bed on a scratched CD-R that no one will ever hear. Nevertheless, later the recording was made available as a download through the website of the band, and on advice by the band Liars Deerhunter started the recording of their second album.
The second album was recorded over a couple of days in November 2005 and was entitled Cryptograms. It was released by Kranky in January 2007 and the album featured a more subdued and introverted sound for the band. This album also had liner notes dedicated to a friend of Cox. This time to Bradley Ira Harris, who died from an overdose of heroin in 2005.
In May 2007 Deerhunter released the Fluorescent Grey EP, which was recorded in July 2006 and during the same month the Whirlyball 7" single was also released. That single was only available through Criminal Records, an Atlanta based record shop. In August the same year the band was also reduced with one member after guitarist Colin Mee was forced out of the band due to not showing up at a few gigs. However, he later rejoined the band their European tour the same autumn.
The third album, Microcastle, was released on October 27 2008. The album was leaked on the Internet during May the same year and also following the release Collin Mee again left the band and was replaced by Whitney Petty, a high school friend of Cox.
Quite a few references have been mentioned by Cox as having influenced the sound. Some of these references are The Clean, The Fall, The Flying Lizards, Kompakt Records, The Birthday Party, The Bad Seeds, and Liars. However, according to Cox if he would have to narrow down their influences they would be Echo & The Bunnymen, Brian Eno, David Bowie and My Bloody Valentine.
Author Resource:-
Kevin Hawkins writes about music, the music industry and vinyl records. To find out more about the band and its releases check out Deerhunter on Nylvi.
Nylvi is a new social marketplace for buying and selling music.
![[Valid RSS feed]](http://www.freebie-articles.com/images/rss.gif "XML Feed For RSS")
Category Rss Feed
Print This Article
Add To Favorites