King Quasar

King Quasar started his musical adventures in Cincinnati, OH, as a founding member of the band Fugue, whose short, anthemic pop songs, drenched in midwestern apathy and literate themes landed a record deal with the independent upstart Deary Me Records, who went on to release material from such notable Cincinnatians as the Wolverton Brothers, Ass Ponies, the Greenhornes, and the Fairmount Girls. It was there that King Quasar bought his very first keyboard, a Roland D-10, and began recording absurdist sound collages straight to a home stereo cassette deck. Fugue eventually dissolved, and as King Quasar was slowly beginning to make musical aquaintences in Chicago, playing saxophone at Cal's Liquors famous First Friday shows every month, he decided to pack up his car and make Chicago his home-base.

Once in Chicago, he landed the role as bassist for the group Cats and Jammers (Beluga Records), whose extensive tour and recording schedule had him all over the country supporting such acts as the late-legend Wesley Willis, Mojo Nixon, Baltimore's Land Speed Record, and Austin's Brown Whorenet among others. It was his friendship with the schizophrenic Willis that secured in King Quasar's mind that you really MUST write and play exactly what you want, despite the "nay-sayers". At this point, King Quasar started delving into computer-aided composition and recording, first with just a simple midi editor, and later into much more complex software. He would borrow four-tracks from his friends and make cassettes of noise-bass, keyboard texures, delays, and computer sounds, sometimes employing any of his four cats to play atonal piano and organ melodies on top of drones and loops. While in Chicago, he was also a founding member of the band Genuine Goat, a backwoods-loud country outfit that included members of Bleary, Rumble Seat, and others. He also composed and performed the score to "The Life and Death of OCYC", a live postmodern sketch-comedy show by Brooklyn-based performance group OCYC. The show, loosely based on a Catholic mass, played at the Heartland Theatre in Chicago's Rogers Park for a month-long stretch.

Grown sick of Urban living, King Quasar moved to North Carolina, always a favorite stop for him on the road, where he continued to collect budget home-recording equipment in order to ease in the creation of his music. In North Carolina, he has led a hermit's life, retreating to his bedroom at every oppurtunity to record and learn more about the music making process. He has released three albums of his own work: Taming the Wild Electron (a mid-fi surf electronica album); Who Shot the Socialite? (a foray into the techniques and ethos of early electronic compostion); and Lectures from the Nether-Mouth (an experimental pop collection) all on his own Mighty Egret Records imprint. The work he has put into these records landed him the "Artist of the Year" title from Strictly Locals, a Mexico City based collective of underground punk and outsider music supporters.