portland, oregon’s menomena formed in late 2000 by brent knopf (guitar, keyboards, glockenspiel, vocals), justin harris (bass, guitar, baritone sax alto sax, vocals), and danny seim (percussion, vocals).

the band’s name is often assumed to refer to the song “mah nà mah nà”, from the muppet show.

early on, menomena drove a 1977 dodge rv across country from gig to gig.  i’m sure it was a sweet, reliable ride in the 1970’s, they however, owned it in the mid 2000’s.  according to brent, "systems that failed (and had to be replaced) during the tour included the following: tires, muffler, brake, master cylinder, exhaust manifold, windshield wipers, horn, side-view mirrors (both fell off).  oh, and did I mention that there were two fires? not one. two.”  their sled earned the nickname “rv danger,” after the seattle band harvey danger.

in 2003, the band self released their debut album, i am the fun blame monster!, and packaged it in an 80-page flipbook designed and hand assembled by danny.  their second lp, friend and foe, also designed by danny featured art work by cartoonist craig thompson, and was nominated for a “best recording package” grammy.

over two years since their last release, mines, the bands fourth lp dropped july 27, 2010.  danny said of the new album, “nothing holds up a process like an indispensable band member being both a perfectionist and a control freak.  especially when your band features three of these types.  and we certainly haven't gotten any more agreeable in our old age - quite the opposite."

danny continued, “mines was constructed the same way we've always made music:  we jammed and recorded hundreds of loops spontaneously, using the same ol' trusty software program brent wrote as a college assignment back in the day.  we individually pieced the resulting loops together like jigsaw puzzles, adding in voices and sentimentality.  we made big strides building skeletal song structures, and did a decent job collaborating as the ideas began to take shape.  but just when a song became familiar to one of us, the other two members broke it apart again, breaking each others' hearts along the way.  we rerecorded, rebuilt, and ultimately resented each other.  and believe it or not, we're all proud of the results.”

the process explained above, called digital looping recorder, or dlr, or deeler was developed by brent.

as a side note, the cover art to mines is a stereogram.  the statue on the front and back cover will appear when you hold it a certain way.

click here an august 02, 2010 world café story.  don't forget, the album cover image always links to sample songs and the band's image to their website.

check here to see if menomena have any gigs scheduled near you.

as always, please buy this album from your local independent music store by people who know and love music and not from retailers like wal-mart (soulless, globally-homogenizing, community-killers) or i-tunes (albums should be listened to as an entire composition with album cover and liner notes in hand).  incidentally, these two companies sell more music than any other retailer in the united states.  that my friend, bites.

even statler and waldorf would dig menomena.

if you agree, please spread the word (about the band and this site).

jason

don't worry if you missed the books profile from last week: here it is.

barsuk records


barsuk records