Bug Chaser
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Bug Chaser

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"Psych: Meet the 2013 RFT Music Award Nominees"

Bug Chaser isn't merely a band. It's an experience. The group's many members make music, and present it as a sort of interactive art show. Few bands in town are so on top of their presentation game — this fun-loving crew often dresses up in costumes, plays with themes and offers up hilarious YouTube videos. And while the fans respond well to the constant reflection to their affection, the extra efforts are gravy: Bug Chaser's music stands on its own. It is controlled pandemonium. It's a psychedelic circus. It's full-blown insanity. And it seldom fails to amaze.
-Jaime Lees - Riverfront Times


"The Rebellious Jukebox"

If you boiled post-everything octet Bug Chaser down to just a couple of their infinite influences, you might find yourself in similar territory to Man Igno, although you follow a different path and end up with that weird kraut-rock disco crossover thing that was epitomized by Donna Summer's " I Feel Love." Or you could end up in Go-Go Island or AfroBeat or 1990's Seatle or 2001 Rhode Island. You can dance to Bug Chaser's 2 song 45, "Billy Saw a Pear/ She's Ninety" or you can headband to it or you can calmly analyze it and parse its hidden meanings and these would all be acceptable options Bug Chaser isn't a syntheis of all that's come before it, it's all that's come before it and all that's yet to come, played ALL AT ONCE. - Eleven Magazine


"The Rebellious Jukebox"

If you boiled post-everything octet Bug Chaser down to just a couple of their infinite influences, you might find yourself in similar territory to Man Igno, although you follow a different path and end up with that weird kraut-rock disco crossover thing that was epitomized by Donna Summer's " I Feel Love." Or you could end up in Go-Go Island or AfroBeat or 1990's Seatle or 2001 Rhode Island. You can dance to Bug Chaser's 2 song 45, "Billy Saw a Pear/ She's Ninety" or you can headband to it or you can calmly analyze it and parse its hidden meanings and these would all be acceptable options Bug Chaser isn't a synthesis of all that's come before it, it's all that's come before it and all that's yet to come, played ALL AT ONCE.
- Eleven Magazine - STL


"Bug Chaser – “Zwei” tape – self-released [Album As Art #194]"

Five years ago or so I might have poured gasoline all over this cassette, lit it ablaze, stomped on it while wearing a mask of a dead president and then pissed on it to put out the ashes, which is why it feels so fuckin’ GREAT to be able to embrace it NOW-NOW-NOW, in an era of endless cassette blobs and little guitar-drums-bass rockin’ to slake the thirst of eternal teet-suckers like myself.
“Zwei,” by Bug Chaser, is an ugly affair. There’s no melody, no fidelity, no thugs and no harmony. Why? Because this is how brain babies are born, not because the music is complicated but because it’s emotionally all-out and thus frees the mind to focus on other shit. It’s heavy and burly, albeit not in a metal way, and it’s most prominently psych, albeit a modern strain, mixed with minor tweaks and adjustments. Jesus christ is it possible we need to bring back the hard-rock tag? No matter what they tell me, I can’t believe this is rock ‘n’ roll.
The synth swipes are much appreciated but rare and often difficult to hear. When you do notice them, however, it’s like standing in a dim hallway with a few friends and having some weirdo you don’t even know bring beers and an ice bucket colder than Antarctica’s balls. If I’m sounding like a Talladega redneck right now, maybe it’s because sometimes I don’t want to analyze and critique as I just want to enjoy this shit, regardless of its inherent pitfalls (lots of road-trippin’ but no destination, etc.).
Maybe this is the next generation of kids raised on the Shearing Pinx/Isolated Now Waves shit, minds properly rotted and tendencies not prone to the same discriminatory choices of those who lived through a lot of the other influences — whether voluntarily or otherwise — being snapped a salute here. It’s fairly pure stuff. I’m sure this is one of those things where, later on, I’ll find out what these kids have been listening to and have an “a-HA MOTHERFUCKER” moment, but right now I’m guessing these cats are making an honest attempt at adding a layer to the conversation many haven’t had in a long while. And is that rapping?
I’ve covered a lot of bands like this and it tends to be a trap waiting to happen. They don’t agree with any genre tag and they’d rather play for you than talk to you. Hey, that’s fuckin’ fine and dandy if you bring it, and if there’s a cookie-duster moustache or two in the group it’s all the better for the strooooking.

Back to the octagon: All sorts of names scroll through my mind in florescent-orange type as I listen:

• There’s some of that K.K. Rampage/N.T.E.L.O.S. shit, for sure (again, whether incidentally or not)

• Wavves are all over this; that’s how things are going to be for awhile, isn’t it?

• THAT’S RIGHT: Abe Vigoda; shit, I was getting worried there

• I think a tincture of garage-rock flavor via new Gumshoe favorites Hell Shovel isn’t out of the question (not sure about Demon’s Claw)

• Sometimes when the bassist really gnarls his strings out I think of Comets On Fire, and it seems BC are considered psych by … themselves … so … shit, tough to call but I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt …

• … and also mention Psychic Paramount and Titan. While Bug Chaser aren’t at all in that league yet, they’re not far. Not far, at all.

• If Ariel Pink isn’t a pseudo-godfather of some of these cuts I’m losing my touch. Sure, Bug Chaser are much louder, but a lot of their cadences and breakdowns have that flavor … and when they rap I almost think of White Flight.

And yet I still wonder: What do kids like this think of Dilute? Belt Of Vapor? Pretty Girls Make Graves? Early Scritti Politti? 311? Ghost/Acid Mothers Temple? The Deftones? (And do they realize Deftones only had two good albums?) And what do they think of, like, Sam Cooke? Did they have an early ’80s awakening like my brother did or a late ’70s one like I did? Do they wear eyeliner (no, right?)? Jesus homeland-fracking Kristofferson, if there’s more of this out there do you have any idea the can of worms we’re opening? Be scared.
- The Gumshüe Grove


"Bug Chaser"


8 p.m. Friday, December 2. El Lenador, 3124 Cherokee Street.
Comments (0) By Diana Benanti Thursday, Dec 1 2011

The innocuous name Bug Chaser connotes sun-dappled summer pastimes, until you learn that bug chasing is also a thrill-seeking sex game similar to Russian roulette where "donors" "gift" HIV to willing participants. These prolific south-side toughs must be infected with something, because roisterous krautrock isn't supposed to feel this punk. There are many forces to be reckoned with here — wild-boy frontman Pat Grosch's delivery is downright ferocious, bassist Matty Coonfield's pedigree includes Glass Teeth and Tone Rodent, and all can hail the inhuman work ethic of axman Jake Jones, who moonlights as chief maniac of freak-rap brigade King Kong Magnetics. Equally indebted to Cave and Glass Teeth, Bug Chaser is a futuristic colonic for your brain. - Riverfront Times


"Best Rock Band - 2012"

Bug Chaser will overwhelm your festival with strange costumes and short shorts. It will blow your fuses with insane light shows and way, way too many people onstage playing a strange assortment of instruments. And all the gangly impracticality of this band is nothing to the music, which is a loud, exuberant, wonderful rock & roll séance. There is no manner, no influence, no attempt to do anything but get weird and express something about the strange things that move all of us. It all may sound surreal or exaggerated, and if so, it's because you haven't seen it happen. So fix that as soon as you possibly can. - Riverfront Times - Village Voice


Discography

Bug Chaser - S/T LP (Mounds Music, June 2013)
Bug Chaser - Billy Saw a Pear EP (Mounds Music October 2013)
Tower Groove Records Volume 1 Double LP Compilation( TGR June 2012)
Bug Chaser - Electronic remix (cassette 2012)
Bug Chaser - Zwei (cassette 2012)
Bug Chaser - Split cassette with Tone Rodent
Bug Chaser - DEMO (cassette 2011)

Working Albums:
Troubadour Dali/ Bug Chaser split 7'' (Tower Groove Records)
Bug Chaser - Black Cook LP

Photos

Bio

Futuristic Rock-n-Roll from St. Louis that demands your attention. A "loud, exuberant, wonderful rock & roll séance."

Influences ranging from Germany Krautrocker's CAN, Faust, and NEU, to Detroit's punk pioneers The Stooges and MC5.