ISO creative musicians with no other home

Oakland CA

Description

It's been a long couple years for most of us, right? I saw all my causal gigs instantly disappear and then scrambled to keep *any* creative projects alive. This is my shot-in-the-dark craigslist ad hoping to find some like-minded collaboators. I'm a lifelong musician who has played in a lot of different environments -- I've played in lotsa indie bands, accompanied dance classes on the congas, played classical percussion in orchestras and wanky community theater, been a part of drum circles, played with songwriters and crummy jazz bands, Christmas singalongs for seniors at the piano, glitchy soundtracks for podcasts etc. I'm mostly a drummer and also play keys and percussion. I play guitar poorly, but just well enough for a camping trip. I studied classical music as an undergrad at Oberlin Conservatory, but I am not particularly excited about the cripplingly awkward world of trained musicians. I've been trying to balance head and heart of music making for a long time. I love the craft of making music as a amateur. When the pandemic started, I focused on two areas: playing lots of jazz drumset in my garage and learning about recording. The recording lead to explorations of Ableton, and I've spent the last six months or so putting everything I know about making music into a blender and seeing what comes out of that composition. It's a bit of a mess, but you can hear all that in the soundcloud link below. My influences and inspirations of the moment: Sam Gandell, Coltrane, Albert Mathias, Bjork, T Blanchard, Cass McCombs, oldies and standards, Kendrick Lamar, Nina Simone, The Books, Juana Molina, The Roots, Don Pullen, Phosphorescent, Jessica Pratt, Dolly, Willie Nelson, Fruit Bats, etc. I have a day job.I'm particularly interested in collaborating with folks who love the mystery of the creatve process: choreographers, dancers, reed players, Burning-Man-adjescent creators, socialists, cyclists, ensemble-less classical musicians, people from the midwest who liked emo bands back in the day, folkies, circus musicians, brass bands, percussion ensembles, etc. When not playing music, I enjoy riding my bike, hanging out at the train station with my kid, shopping at Berkeley Bowl for seasonal produce. Are you interested in adding a multi-instrumentalist to your out-there indie band? Starting a casual jazz combo and need a drummer? Starting a Willie Nelson cover band? Interested in a recording project where we rip off the Books and Aphex? Like to sing harmonies to Gillian Welch songs? Want to make beats and need an instrumentalist for hiphop artists? Making a movie soundtrack? Let's talk! Here's some music I've been making lately, mostly based on sampling my kid and playing along: https://soundcloud.com/shimmeringride