Scott Matthews, whose family runs the guitar effects tech company Electro-Harmonix, featured in this previous Boing Boing Video episode, blogs:
Robin Rose is a long-established painter specializing in ‘encaustic’ works, but back in 1979 he played guitar and synth for new-wave/punk band Urban Verbs (Warner) and regularly performed at clubs like CBGB here in NYC.
For Robin’s new exhibit, titled “Cypher” (April 7-May 17, American University Museum, Washington DC, info/pics), he changes gears and revisits those roots.
“Ascendant” captures the skyward joy that comes when you catch a good groove.
And Scott shares an extra footnote by email for fans of the band Joy Division:
Via email, Robin (the artist) shared this with me: “One of the inspirations for the foot pedal piece was Ian Curtis from the English 1980’s band Joy Division. The Urban Verbs were supposed to play with Joy Division in Toronto, Ian killed himself and thus the show was canceled. I always thought that was a tipping point for my band. Ian Curtis wrote a song called ‘Isolation’.”