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The Dead C are a New Zealand based trio made up of members Bruce Russell, Michael Morley and Robbie Yeats. Most often, Russell plays electric guitar, Morley sings and plays electric guitar, or laptop in more recent years, and Yeats plays drums. Formed in Dunedin, New Zealand in 1986, the group is known for its noisy guitar soundscapes and improvisational take on rock music. Robbie Yeats was the drummer for The Verlaines, Michael Morley had played with Wreck Small Speakers on Expensive Stereos, and Bruce Russell was working with the Flying Nun label, who released the band’s first album in 1987, entitled DR503. They became known internationally through their releases on the Philadelphia record label Siltbreeze, especially for the 1992 album Harsh 70s Reality. Early, pre-Siltbreeze albums like Eusa Kills and DR503 find the group still drifting between song-based work and the experimental free rock found in later albums like The White House and Tusk. Recent albums have seen the group add electronics and samples, yet still maintaining their origins in trademark hazy guitar chaos. The group performs very infrequently outside of New Zealand, although they did travel to the USA in March 2002 to perform at the All Tomorrow’s Parties festival, as well as a couple of gigs in Los Angeles and San Francisco. They also performed for the first time in Europe in May 2004 at Le Weekend, an electronic music festival in Stirling, Scotland and will return to the UK to play Thurston Moore’s All Tomorrow’s Parties festival in December 2006. A compilation album covering their first 18 years entitled “Vain Erudite and Stupid: Selected Works 1987-2005” has just been released on the Ba Da Bing! label. |
