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Larkin Grimm: Parplar
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strangeglue.com | David Morris It's all too easy to forget what music we would be left with if people like Larkin Grimm weren't out there stretching the kind of boundaries that a very highly skilled / schooled musician can't touch. http://strangeglue.com http://strangeglue.com/reviews/larkin-grimm-parplar Although the moniker Freak Folk was used as a way of herding all the slightly off-kilter sheep into one easily judged fold, Larkin Grimm does share certain traits with a few of her contemporaries in the pen. But James Jackson Toth has dropped his Wooden Wand pseudonym and with it the the lo-fi sound. Devendra Banhart is cavorting his Megapuss all around LA and cropping up in style magazines. Not that I blame him, I doubt he would deny part of his appeal was a fashion all along and he seems like a very decent fun-loving fella. MV & EE are still doing what they were doing before they ever even knew they were getting name-checked in the Wyrd basement. Other acts like the excellent Mi & L¹au have gone a little quiet as of late. Larkin Grimm still sounds like a coyote outside the margins, and she sings like someone who has lived there her......
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ARTISTS & GODS Michael Gira
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blurt-online.com | LAVINIA JONES WRIGHT The Swans/Angels Of Light frontman makes his record label thrive even in an unsteady business climate. http://www.blurt-online.com http://www.blurt-online.com/features/view/215/ Nov 26, 2008 As the Big Bad Major Label System falls down dead with an ax in its back, it seems like the last man standing will be the long-struggling indies. With more room to maneuver and more space to be creative with marketing and deal-structuring, it's the artist-run labels that seem to have the brightest futures, and none has as exciting and experimental roster as New York's Young God Records, launched in 1990 by Swans/Angels Of Light frontman Michael Gira. Young God works with Akron/Family, Devendra Banhart, Windsor for the Derby, Larkin Grimm and Mi and L'au to name a few, and demonstrating a deep understanding of how to create solid careers for its artists rather than riding the dead horse of a hit single, YGR has held its ground while the industry retreats. Blurt spoke to Gira about maintaining a solid label in a shifting climate. *** BLURT: Do you think that being a musician yourself puts you in a better position to want to make artist-friendly deals and decisions with Young God? Well......
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Larkin Grimm - Parplar
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SLAP Skateboard Magazine | Guy GrayMs. Grimm is in a class all her ownhttp://www.slapmagazine.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=499&Itemid=72 Just recounting the brief synopsis of Larkin Grimm¹s life ‹that she grew up in a cult until the age of six, then spent the rest of her childhood in the Appalachians, frequently sleeps outdoors, has no permanent address and went to Yale art school on a full scholarship‹ would probably make you want to check out her music. But even that strange collision of events doesn¹t begin to compare to the utter bizarreness of her latest record Parplar. It is a mishmash of styles and ideas, and a collection of captivating stories. It will most certainly be lumped in the freak-folk category, but Ms. Grimm is in a class all her own. Her voice, at times possessed, at other times soothing as a grandma¹s, is chameleonic and well suited for her theatrical urges. With it, she convincingly portrays a wide array of characters and feelings, from the humorous and promiscuous lass of ³Blond and Golden Johns² to the mournful singer of ³They Were Wrong². Instrumentation on the album varies from guitar to dulcimer to some electronic treatments. And with equally wide variety of ideas and themes,......
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Larkin Grimm - Parplar
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Thisaremusic.com I put this on again immediately after hearing the first time. http://Thisaremusic.com Yeah, I feel you, Michael Gira put another ³freak folk² thing out. The man may have gotten a taste of dollars with Devendra, but face it: Banhart wouldn¹t have seemed very cool to just anyone, so I very much doubt that he¹s trying to ride the wave. More like he¹s just plain into this shit. But sometimes, you don¹t have to strain to see why. Unlike the other recent catch for Young God, Fire on Fire (who play on this record), Larkin Grimm sounds like something different, even as nicely as she fits into the Gira canon. Akron/Family may envelop you in a cult-like all-encompassing hippie blanket, but Grimm is much like her name. The melodies are solid, and the construction and production won¹t be any surprise to fans of the 21st-century incarnation of Gira, but the vibe is strange. Her feminist/post-feminist screeds aren¹t really angry and they¹re certainly not Kathleen Hanna material, nor are songs like ³Anger in your Liver² as hippie as you might think. She¹s just real, which makes her a million years removed from the spaced-out A/F but still magically appropriate for Young......
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Larkin Grimm: The Naturalismo Interview
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NaturalismoI welcomed a notorious pervert to have his way with my songs...NATURALISMO: Your parents were members of a religious cult called The Holy Order of MANS. What were the guiding principles of this ³cult,² and how did your involvement in it, even as a child, influence your outlook today? LARKIN GRIMM: The people who joined ³The Order² were looking for an utopian community that protected their sensitivity and spiritual growth without isolating them from society. It was an urban commune, and people considered themselves spiritual healers, healing the environment and everyone around them. Many people living there had different belief systems and spiritual practices. This was encouraged because in general the group believed that all spiritual paths are leading to the same kind of revelation and enlightenment, seeing separate facets of the jewel that is ultimate truth and reality, so to speak. Basically it was a communist society in which all resources were shared, any kind of attachment was discouraged, and it wasn¹t supposed to matter where you were or who you were with because all beings are just one small part of one supreme universal consciousness, so no person was really any greater than any other and the differences......