The Poison Arrows

The Poison Arrows is produced and conducted by Justin Sinkovich. New to the public, the endeavor took form in 2002 while his band at the time Atombombpocketknife’s schedule slowed. It was this same time when he left his position as cofounder of Epitonic.com and took the helm of File Thirteen Records, a label his bandmates in Thumbnaill had started years ago. Epitonic led Sinkovich to an admiration and interaction with producers of electronic, hip-hop, and avant-garde. Sinkovich built a studio in his house to record the third Atombombpocketknife album and continued to gather second-hand keyboards, sequencers, and crates full of pedals and effects. Songs began to develop in his make- shift recording facility and on airplane/hotel bound laptops touring worldwide with and while traveling to found his second music website betterPropaganda.com. Inspirations were heightened with his collaborations in the studio with File Thirteen Records label mates Martin Rev, TRS-80, The Silent League, and Sterling [he played bass in Sterling throughout 03].

The Poison Arrows pursues the inevitable, a convergence of the under- ground factions of electronic, hip-hop, and rock – a comprehensive amalgamation and tribute to his 4000+ album collection and a basement full of second-hand instruments. The lines between these styles quickly diminished while The Poison Arrows redlines beats and loops, running them through unorthodox chains of guitar effects; meanwhile flooding the result with vintage Farfisas, early keyboards and noisemakers. Melodies are mostly anchored by Sinkovich’s longtime pursuit of guitar, bass, and vocals with the occasion guest appearance of instruments like the violin. The dark songwriting heard in Atombombpocketknife is channeled into The Poison Arrows, seeming to be liberated by the compositional space and in the freedom of writing and recording most all of the music. The Poison Arrows is rather unique. It’s unpolished, yet largely rooted in electronic- somewhat of an contradiction. Sinkovich’s upbringing in the production of punk and other under ground rock, is now mixed with technology and a longstanding fascination with beats, traced back to growing up in the mid-eighties collecting Jonzun Crew, Twilight 22, and UTFO twelve- inches while obsessing over the purchase of every SST Records cassette at the same time.

The Poison Arrow’s debut EP is being released in November of 2004 on File Thirteen. It introduces the project with mixing, mastering, and art help from TRS-80 while a debut album is completed, and while a precursing Premix album is finalized for February 2005 featuring remixes from the album by Martin Rev [of Suicide], DJ? Acucrack, TRS-80, Brian Deck [ of Red Red Meat, Califone], Brother El, Technicolor, N.LN, Sterling, Mike Lust, Jonathan Kreinik [producer of Trans Am, Hot Snakes], and Slo-Ro [of Soul Junk].