Pink Skull

What turns you on?
greasy hair, hallucinations, big asses, smells.

What is your favorite word?
burgers

What sound or noise do you love?
pink

Have you driven anyone insane?
absolutely, in both the good and bad ways

Have you ever made a practice of confusing people?
yes, all the time?

What should everyone shut up about?
music

What advice should you have taken, but did not?
'don't do all of that, julian'

What is your vital daily ritual?
shower, coffee, sit and look out window for half an hour...

What do you fear most?
going deaf. although, it seems like it would be really peaceful

How would you like to die?
very quickly and in a very messy way. perhaps spontaneous combustion with a few close friends? definitely not burned to death or, for that matter, in a crowd

What is your earliest memory?
running around the living room listening to king crimson wearing a collander as a hat. ironically, also my last friday night

Do you collect anything?
records, synthesizers, and chairs

A fundamental thinker?
rodin

What is your most recent extravagance?
i'm not a particularly extravagant guy, but maybe the cowhide rugs in my living room?

What five words best describe you?
quiet, vaguely ethnic, medium build

What is your worst addiction?
none of them are worse than any other of them, really. although i did have a really great coke habit for years. that was definitely the best one. i'll say the internet. it's the worst.

What were you doing at midnight last night?
drunk and being dragged to bed by my girlfriend

Who is your worst enemy?
record stores

Who are your favorite heroes of fiction?
talking animals, gulliver, little alex

Who are your favorite heroines in real life?
alice coltrane, gianna michaels, joan jett

Who would you have liked to be?
prince - Alainfinkielkrautrock

Pink Skull’s debut longplayer Zeppelin 3 blasted through the Philadelphia duo’s love of 60s psychedelia, 70s kraut Kosmische and 90s bleep rave – amongst other things. With Endless Bummer, their sophomore effort released on boutique New York label RVNG, their sound has matured, relying less on scattergun processed MPC beats. This is in part due to the original core duo of Julian Grefe and Justin Geller adding a drummer (Jeremy Gewertz), bassist (Mike Hammel) and guitarist (Sam Murphy) to the Pink Skull ensemble.

The resulting album is one of 2009’s pleasant surprises (check out our full review here). Disco pogo workouts like “Chicken Dream Inside Egg” and “Oh Monorail” bring to mind The Emperor Machine in their pomp, whilst tracks such as “When Falling Straight Through A Goat” and “Wheet” hint at the ambience of Eno and The Orb.

Julian spoke to Juno Plus about Krautrock, mediocrity and, erm, ruptured testicles.

Your second album has just been released – is seems quite different in style and approach from your debut…

Yeah, we are thrilled with it. It was a bit of a change of process for us, as we were recording a lot of the sounds live. That was a treat because we hadn’t done that before.

So you added a band to the line-up?

Yeah that’s right, now there’s a bass player, a guitarist and a drummer. I think that structure has helped us become more focused – we are less slippery with the computers now. On the first album most of the instruments played live were played by me, and then we used samples for the rest – old riffs we like, stuff like that.


You guys seem to draw on a range of genres – what would you cite as your main influences?


I worked in a record store in Philadelphia for a long time, and after a while I would naturally gravitate towards more obscure music. Your taste changes too. There was this corridor of record shops in Philly, back when people bought records, and I worked at one called Repo. We were like the record store mafia. I had a pretty strong love affair with cosmic rock, a lot of 70s German stuff. I was never so much into the synth-based music … people think Dusseldorf is God’s gift to music, but I’ve never been the world’s biggest Kraftwerk fan. I love the spacier, more Tangerine Dream-style sound. I listened to lots of Italian prog too, and add to that a large helping of Chicago house. I’ve been playing house for years as a DJ.

“One or two of the song titles are about people I don’t like … I’ve got a good story about one of them but the person in question is too famous and too vociferous for me to own up”

The track titles on Endless Bummer are superb – a personal highlight is “Several French Revolutionaries Standing On The Back Of My Neck”. How do you come up with them, and do they all have some meaning to you?

There is a story behind some of the track titles, and some just pop into my head I guess. There are definitely one or two about people I don’t like … I’ve got a good story about one of them but the person in question is too famous and too vociferous for me to own up!

Everyone at the Juno office was hugely impressed with the individual vinyl sleeve pressings for Endless Bummer, ranging from “Butt Acne” to “Nuclear Warfare”. Whose idea was that?

We got 900 records pressed up like that, all with different types of “bummers”. It was actually Matt at RVNG and Kevin O’Neill from ‘Will Work For Good’ who brainstormed it and did most of the work. I was supposed to make it down to help out but … (laughs) I was actually out of town that weekend.

And are you happy with how they came out?

Delighted. I actually think vinyl has actually increased in relevance in the past five years. People go out of their way to buy vinyl now, more so than they used to – there’s extra love and care.



What is your favourite track title?

“Ruptured Testicle”, you can’t go wrong with that (laughs).

Tell me a bit about your live show, from the footage I’ve seen it looks suitably frenzied and energetic…

We do play shows often, although not many since the last record. We don’t go overseas much – with our ensemble it’s too expensive and too hard – a recipe for disaster. And we are at that age where we enjoy our creature comforts a bit more (laughs). But we are stripping down for four overseas shows in the UK and Germany next year.

“I’ve always thought the problem with so many electronic bands is that they have no drummer – even though the whole thing is based around drums”

How will that work?

I’ll be on a mod synthesiser and drums, we’ll have a bass player too. I’ve always thought the problem with so many electronic bands is that they have no drummer – even though the whole thing is based around drums. Seeing a guy with a computer is boring. This live show requires me to play everything.

How did you hook up with the RVNG label for Endless Bummer?

I never anticipated RVNG putting out one of our records; I didn’t think we were cool enough! But Matt is an old acquaintance with our drummer, and he came to one of our gigs to say hi, and enjoyed it. I must say it’s been a wonderful fit – Matt has obviously got great taste in music!


How do you work on Pink Skull remixes?

It’s usually a collaboration between Justin and myself. Every once in a while one of us will start or finish one off, but it’s mostly a joint effort. We’ve done a bunch of remixes which never came out; bands don’t like some of our remixes – sometimes you can’t wrap your brain around them. I know people who have a tried and tested formula, like a template for making a remix. They basically standardise the whole thing. I’m not like that, I’m not formulaic, and I find that can work against me. People like consistency when it comes to electronic music. So in other words I’m never in danger of becoming stagnant, but I’ll never have success either! And I’ll be mediocre, but I’ll be mediocre for longer than most – sigh.

“I’m not formulaic, and I find that can work against me. People like consistency when it comes to electronic music. So I’m never in danger of becoming stagnant, but I’ll never have success either”

And, finally, how long have you been DJing? What set-up do you use?

I started back in 1996 playing mostly downtempo stuff, and that evolved into playing house. I bought Serato two years ago and can’t stand it – too many flashing lights for me. I was disappointed with Traktor too. Having said that I don’t harbour deep seeded resentment towards those programs – the whole vinyl versus CDs versus laptops thing doesn’t bother me. I’m not opposed to it, I just don’t like it! - Juno Plus

Weird how Pink Skull made a video that almost completely echoes our daily routine. Like, we eat toast too! We carry a log down a street! We ride desk chairs around the streets and shovel large mounds of sand/sawdust in a small enclosed area! Relatable. You’ll have to watch for yourself to see if you can also relate to this video on a primal daily grind is actually kinda fun level. Meanwhile, we’re going to throw this in our headphones and strut around New York like we own the place. As an added bonus, download “Chicken Dream Inside Egg” below because it is Friday and it jams. Buy the record here.

Read more: http://www.thefader.com/2009/11/13/video-premiere-pink-skull-ritualistic-bug-use-chicken-dream-inside-egg-mp3/#ixzz14SJrXoZP - Fader

On the very first full-length for New York's pacesetting RVNG label, Pink Skull takes up the dance-punk DNA characteristic of groups like !!! and The Rapture, mutating it into a wild, wooly beast that's as much of a psychedelic head-twister as it is a dance floor mover. The shambolic, experimental air of Endless Bummer's indie-disco offers a lesson in the importance of geography during the recording process: Had it been cut at a studio in lower Manhattan, it would have sizzled with the bracing compression and relentless grooves one finds on DFA. The barn outside Philadelphia where it was assembled, meanwhile, has seemingly given the members of Pink Skull the mental space to stretch their tunes out into dense and brain-frazzled mini-epics.

Opener "Peter Cushing" takes a stab at revved-up dance tracks, and mostly hits its mark, with angular bass and agitated group vocals, but given that it's coming out at the end of 2009 the track feels solid but a bit belated. The rest of the album uses this dance-punky template as a springboard to reach its loftier, weirder aspirations. It touches on all sorts of psychedelic substrata like kosmiche, motorik and tribal, but it essentially relies on a gritty, garagey take on cosmic disco that parallels UK groups like Chicken Lips and Emperor Machine. The two other full tracks on Side A, "Chicken Dream Inside Egg" and "Ritualistic Bug Use," rock this style to the hilt, and of all the material here will most likely become Pink Skulls' calling cards, as each neatly welds electro, house and psych-rock elements into a swirling, propulsive mass.

Side B opens with the blistering title tune. A disco-rock groove evolves into a feverish acid trip, with a dizzying kitchen-sink production style that includes pots and pan drums and free-jazz skronk. One fears the track might dissolve into a flurry of exploding effects and cat-fight tape noises if not for the beat locked-down underneath. "Oh Monorail" recalls "Autobahn 66" by Primal Scream, both rock updates of the trademark German motorik groove borne from Kraftwerk's "Autobahn." Then the dance beats halt and a hippie freak-out gets beamed in from outer space, with stoner primitive bongo madness and endless trilling flute.

Such interludes give Endless Bummer its air of madcap eccentricity, appearing less like a designed object than like some flotsam dug out of the garbage (i.e. the newsprint found-art collage inside the LP sleeve). The last full track features the group jamming over the kind of sputtering electronic bursts that were characteristic of old Warp records, and are probably the most innovative mash-up between their live-band vibe and experimental predilections. The vinyl LP closes with a bit of soothing synth called "Fired So Fired," which should be probably be titled "Fried, So Fried" as it evokes a weary band after a long freak-out, lying face down, while an infinite loop unspools in serene exhaustion. - Resident Advisor

On the very first full-length for New York's pacesetting RVNG label, Pink Skull takes up the dance-punk DNA characteristic of groups like !!! and The Rapture, mutating it into a wild, wooly beast that's as much of a psychedelic head-twister as it is a dance floor mover. The shambolic, experimental air of Endless Bummer's indie-disco offers a lesson in the importance of geography during the recording process: Had it been cut at a studio in lower Manhattan, it would have sizzled with the bracing compression and relentless grooves one finds on DFA. The barn outside Philadelphia where it was assembled, meanwhile, has seemingly given the members of Pink Skull the mental space to stretch their tunes out into dense and brain-frazzled mini-epics.

Opener "Peter Cushing" takes a stab at revved-up dance tracks, and mostly hits its mark, with angular bass and agitated group vocals, but given that it's coming out at the end of 2009 the track feels solid but a bit belated. The rest of the album uses this dance-punky template as a springboard to reach its loftier, weirder aspirations. It touches on all sorts of psychedelic substrata like kosmiche, motorik and tribal, but it essentially relies on a gritty, garagey take on cosmic disco that parallels UK groups like Chicken Lips and Emperor Machine. The two other full tracks on Side A, "Chicken Dream Inside Egg" and "Ritualistic Bug Use," rock this style to the hilt, and of all the material here will most likely become Pink Skulls' calling cards, as each neatly welds electro, house and psych-rock elements into a swirling, propulsive mass.

Side B opens with the blistering title tune. A disco-rock groove evolves into a feverish acid trip, with a dizzying kitchen-sink production style that includes pots and pan drums and free-jazz skronk. One fears the track might dissolve into a flurry of exploding effects and cat-fight tape noises if not for the beat locked-down underneath. "Oh Monorail" recalls "Autobahn 66" by Primal Scream, both rock updates of the trademark German motorik groove borne from Kraftwerk's "Autobahn." Then the dance beats halt and a hippie freak-out gets beamed in from outer space, with stoner primitive bongo madness and endless trilling flute.

Such interludes give Endless Bummer its air of madcap eccentricity, appearing less like a designed object than like some flotsam dug out of the garbage (i.e. the newsprint found-art collage inside the LP sleeve). The last full track features the group jamming over the kind of sputtering electronic bursts that were characteristic of old Warp records, and are probably the most innovative mash-up between their live-band vibe and experimental predilections. The vinyl LP closes with a bit of soothing synth called "Fired So Fired," which should be probably be titled "Fried, So Fried" as it evokes a weary band after a long freak-out, lying face down, while an infinite loop unspools in serene exhaustion. - Resident Advisor

On the very first full-length for New York's pacesetting RVNG label, Pink Skull takes up the dance-punk DNA characteristic of groups like !!! and The Rapture, mutating it into a wild, wooly beast that's as much of a psychedelic head-twister as it is a dance floor mover. The shambolic, experimental air of Endless Bummer's indie-disco offers a lesson in the importance of geography during the recording process: Had it been cut at a studio in lower Manhattan, it would have sizzled with the bracing compression and relentless grooves one finds on DFA. The barn outside Philadelphia where it was assembled, meanwhile, has seemingly given the members of Pink Skull the mental space to stretch their tunes out into dense and brain-frazzled mini-epics.

Opener "Peter Cushing" takes a stab at revved-up dance tracks, and mostly hits its mark, with angular bass and agitated group vocals, but given that it's coming out at the end of 2009 the track feels solid but a bit belated. The rest of the album uses this dance-punky template as a springboard to reach its loftier, weirder aspirations. It touches on all sorts of psychedelic substrata like kosmiche, motorik and tribal, but it essentially relies on a gritty, garagey take on cosmic disco that parallels UK groups like Chicken Lips and Emperor Machine. The two other full tracks on Side A, "Chicken Dream Inside Egg" and "Ritualistic Bug Use," rock this style to the hilt, and of all the material here will most likely become Pink Skulls' calling cards, as each neatly welds electro, house and psych-rock elements into a swirling, propulsive mass.

Side B opens with the blistering title tune. A disco-rock groove evolves into a feverish acid trip, with a dizzying kitchen-sink production style that includes pots and pan drums and free-jazz skronk. One fears the track might dissolve into a flurry of exploding effects and cat-fight tape noises if not for the beat locked-down underneath. "Oh Monorail" recalls "Autobahn 66" by Primal Scream, both rock updates of the trademark German motorik groove borne from Kraftwerk's "Autobahn." Then the dance beats halt and a hippie freak-out gets beamed in from outer space, with stoner primitive bongo madness and endless trilling flute.

Such interludes give Endless Bummer its air of madcap eccentricity, appearing less like a designed object than like some flotsam dug out of the garbage (i.e. the newsprint found-art collage inside the LP sleeve). The last full track features the group jamming over the kind of sputtering electronic bursts that were characteristic of old Warp records, and are probably the most innovative mash-up between their live-band vibe and experimental predilections. The vinyl LP closes with a bit of soothing synth called "Fired So Fired," which should be probably be titled "Fried, So Fried" as it evokes a weary band after a long freak-out, lying face down, while an infinite loop unspools in serene exhaustion. - Resident Advisor

Philly's Pink Skull has just come out with a second full-length, titled Endless Bummer. Featuring an admirable array of different sounds and textures, the album is perhaps best represented by "Oh, Monorail." A slow-motion disco beat, horizon-seeking guitar lines, and some synth swells mark the piece, but it is really Julian S Process' multi-layered vocal harmonies that make it special, as they're not only gorgeous, but complex and original—there are no simple chord progressions here. "Oh, Monorail" simply shimmers with a weirdness and beauty that only Pink Skull can pull off. - XLR8R

New York's RVNG boutique has long distinguished itself for not only its expertly curated mixes, but also its imaginative packaging. When Philly mainstays Julian Grefe and Justin Geller, core duo behind disco freaks Pink Skull, put together the first Rvng Prsnts mix back in 2002, they recorded it straight to CD-R and did the printing at Kinko's. Each copy of Endless Bummer, Pink Skull's second album (first for RVNG), comes hand-typeset with a different "bummer"-- real depressing shit like "BUTT ACNE" or "NUCLEAR WARFARE." I got "JOHNHUGHESDIED."

In a year of summery new-music releases and celebrity deaths, Endless Bummer is neither glo-fi/chillwave trendfuck nor downer. Pink Skull's last album, 2008's Zeppelin 3, was a sprawling journey through psych, krautrock, Chicago house, rave, and other styles you might hope for on a killer RVNG mix. Jumping between live disco and acid house, with plenty of unexpected turns along the way, Endless Bummer is just as varied and transportative. It's also (relatively) focused. Recorded by Mazarin's Quentin Stoltzfus at the studio of Clap Your Hands Say Yeah's Alec Ounsworth, the release is available on mp3 and vinyl, with digital-only bonus tracks.

Multiple online reports have suggested that Pink Skull got a full band together only prior to this album, but that's not the case. Grefe, Geller, and their abettors had actually expanded into a working live unit by 2007, and Zeppelin 3's dusty, freeform grooves-- the type of percussive dance-punk explorations that make you feel !!! drummer Jerry Fuchs' death all the more acutely-- get a wild and woolly reprise here. On the near-instrumental title track, for example, a variety of multi-layered, South American-flavored percussion parts support skronky sax and synths that alternately screech and lull.

A bigger change since Pink Skull's last outing-- that rare album to feature vocals from both Mirah and Ghostface Killah-- is the new prevalence of Grefe's own singing, with guests' higher-pitched harmonies balancing out his gruff man-voice. Those vocals are nevertheless the weakest part about opener "Peter Cushing", a limber disco-funk swooner that trades Zeppelin 3's music references for film references, but it's an elaborately realized production that would sit nicely beside something from DFA or Modular. Ostinato bass drives the sweeping, majestic "Oh, Monorail", as Grefe wryly asserts, "You know I hate songs about nightlife."

True to the idea of an album that is more than a collection of dance singles, the contemplative moments on Endless Bummer make return trips more rewarding. Each side of the album closes with elegant ambient synth pieces, while "Circling Bwi" toys with disembodied harmonies. The flute-trilling "Fast Forward to Bolivia, 2000 Years Later, Our Hero Finds Himself..." could score a futuristic update of that old Disney cartoon The Three Caballeros. A track with an even longer title floats a melodic synth line recalling Aphex Twin over complex drum programming. Endless Bummer won't bring John Hughes back, but it would make a hell of a DJ mix. Maybe even cure butt acne. - Pitchfork