ESPERS III out October 20, 2009, on Drag City / Wichita. cover art by Xavier Schipani.

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The previous 2 cds have seen me through thousands of miles and entertained many of my friends. This group is exceptionally talented and uniquely melancholy and that, my sweetness, is a good thing.

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Valerie and Her Week of Wonders

Valerie and Her Week of Wonders

This weekend the little-known 1970 film will get a brand new score performed live by Espers, Philadelphia freak folk musicians — including a harpist, a cellist and an "enigmatic electronicist". Will you even need libation at the after-party?

What about a girl who gets her period and discovers her womanhood 'Alice in Wonderland' style? Not freaky enough for you? The 1970 Czech film Valerie and Her Week of Wonders is a nudie fairy-tale head trip, an Aquarian stew of Freud, Murnau, Hefner and the Brothers Grimm, complete with lecherous priests, a pubescent heroine and a vampire grandmother.

Valerie and her Week of Wonders
8pm Saturday and 9pm Sunday--March 10 and 11
Anthology Film Archives

Very cool that Espers is doing the music, but besides that, try to catch this old film sometime. You may like it if you enjoy wicked strange cult films.

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From the Guardian

"Everyone has their special album: the one nobody else has heard of, the one to bring out when you want to amaze people. We asked 49 musicians, producers and writers to tell us about their records to be reckoned with."

This is an interesting article. How do I pick just one special album I'd want someone to hear? The last album I asked someone to listen to was Espers II by Espers, but I have many favorites and they change because I also like so many types of music. And they're talking about obscure albums, and this one isn't. Harder than it looks.

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Espers II - Philadelphia trio Espers' first two releases-- 2004's Espers and 2005's The Weed Tree-- were inadvertently incorporated into the big freak-folk/New Weird America snowball that also tumbled over and swallowed up Devendra Banhart, Joanna Newsom, Animal Collective, Faun Fables, and a mess of other psych- and folk-infused players.

Espers is now a sextet, and II is far darker, deeper, and more ominous than its predecessors, a rich, droning mix of guitars, vocals slathered on vocals, cello, assorted bells, flute, recorder, mini-Korg, Tibetan singing bowls, dulcimer, a bit of bass, organ, the occasional drum, and a cornucopia of effects. Listen

Link

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