is a varying collection of Cellists playing Alternative Rock . The band officially began in Brooklyn , New York in 1992 , when Melora Creager put out an advertisement requesting members to form an all-cello band. Cellist Julia Kent responded and the two formed what was dubbed the Traveling Ladies' Cello Society.
Creager writes all of the lyrics for Rasputina, save the cover songs, performs most of the vocals, and creates a significant amount of the art for the band's albums, singles, and website.
While Rasputina was locally well-known and somewhat popular with audiences, their music didn't seem to fit into any category. For this reason, the band was largely untouched until an A&R department representative named Jimmy Boyle saw them at a festival concert and signed them to Columbia Records . In 1996 , '' Thanks For The Ether '' was released, and afterwards Rasputina toured with such bands as Bob Mould , Porno For Pyros and, in particular, Marilyn Manson . In 1997 '' Transylvanian Regurgitations '', a follow up Ep remixed by Manson, was released.
On their second full-length album, '' How We Quit The Forest '', Rasputina signed on Chris Vrenna (from Nine Inch Nails ) as their drummer and producer, influencing them to go ahead with the distortion they had been experimenting with. He provided electronic drums, and other electronically produced sound effects in the rhythm department.
All of the members seem to share an interest in the Victorian Era , and express it most obviously through their clothing, appearing in costume at concerts and in photographs. However, despite their love for antiquities, and their sometimes dark, ethereal sound, they don't easily fit into any well defined genre.
Brooklyn chamber-rock outfit Rasputina released their sixth full-length album, Oh Perilous World , June 26 via Filthy Bonnet . Following the release of her 2006 solo album, Perplexions , singer/lead cellist Melora Creager spent the last two years scouring over daily world events and adapting them into songs.
"I wrote the songs featured on Oh Perilous World over the last two years when I realized that current world events were more bizarre than anything I could scrounge up from the distant past," she says. "I obsessively read daily news on the Internet and copied words, phrases and whole stories that especially intrigued me and compiled a vast notebook of this material." {Link without Title}
Oh Perilous World is performed by Creager, alongside drummer Jonathon TeBeest with second chair Sarah Bowman, of The Bowmans .
The album was leaked onto P2P networks in full on June 14, 2007.
Tracklist For Oh Perilous World:
- 1816, The Year Without A Summer (see Year Without A Summer )
- Choose Me For A Champion
- Cage In A Cave
- Incident In A Medical Clinic
- Draconian Crackdown
- Child Soldier Rebellion
- Oh Bring Back The Egg Unbroken
- Old Yellowcake Breaking News
- In Old Yellowcake
- We Stay Behind
- A Retinue Of Moons/The Infidel Is Me
- The Pruning
- Jonathon Tebeest was raised in the Midwest, and recently moved back to Minnesota after a stint in New York City. He has always lived a life of music - he has been playing the drums since the age of 3. With this talent and a fervent love of music, Jonathon has been touring and recording with bands since the age of 19. Along the way, he has also had training on the piano and all things percussion, has picked up the guitar, bass, and pretty much anything else he could get his hands on. Jonathon started his professional career with the intense horn-drivin party band, 3 Minute Hero in his homeland of Minnesota. That band started his love of performing live as the boys were playing about 250 shows per year during its existence. Eventually it was off to New York, where Jonathon hooked up with Ms. Melora Creager and her group Rasputina. He has since appeared on five of the group's albums, including the recently released ''Oh, Perilous World!''. He has also had the opportunity to tour the nation with Rasputina. In the past, he has worked with many other bands including New Professionals , Mink , Gravity , THIS , Strangelove , Goodfinger and Dirty Excuse . Jonathon is a songwriter and has just started a band of his own.
- Julia Kent is a Canadian musician who is best known as a founding member of all-cello group Rasputina. She began playing the cello when she was six. She left Rasputina in 1999 and has played cello with a variety of bands since then, including the goth/surf rock band, Bela . She was also has played with Black Tape For A Blue Girl , and Joe Gallant's Illuminati . With Illuminati, she appeared on the albums Terrapin, Live Vol. 2, and Shadowhead. She is now the first chair cellist with the musical group Antony And The Johnsons and has played on albums by Delerium , Rachael Sage , and Sheryl Crow . She has now a CD of her own, of looped cello tunes titled "Delay".
- Kris Cowperthwaite was with the band from 1999 to 2002.
- Serena Jost was with the band prior to their signing with Columbia Records .
- Lisa Haney was with the band prior to their signing with Columbia Records .
- Perry James toured with the band during 1998 and 1999 as drummer.
- Agnieszka Rybska was with the band from 1996 through 1998. She left because of pregnancy, and now has 2 daughters.
- Nana Bornant was with the band from 1998 through 2001 and was therefore present for the band's appearance on Late Night With Conan O'Brien .
- Tom Martin was the original drummer. Although he wasn't really a drummer, {Link without Title} he is now a tattooist.
- Norman Block is credited for playing drums on '' Thanks For The Ether ''.
- Chris Vrenna , drummer and producer for '' How We Quit The Forest ''
- Sarah Bowman performs with her twin sister Claire as The Bowmans , both formerly of the rock band Lowry (band) . She toured with Rasputina for the first part of their 2006 tour and into 2007. Her vocals appear on Oh Perilous World! .
- Erica Mulkey, or Unwoman took the second half of 2006's tour. Notably, she recently performed with Rasputina in New Orleans and has been a long time fan.
- Steph McVey of The Graces was appointed as third-chair cellist, and was with the band for a few shows. Steph is from San Antonio, Texas, and her band attributed their influences to Rasputina and others.
- Creager, Kent and Rybska realized soon after they met that they had all attended the same Nanny School in Manhattan .
- According to Creager, many people assume the song "The Mayor" is about George W. Bush . It is about a mentally ill friend of Creager's.
- The band's name itself came from a song Creager had written called "Rasputina," which in turn was conceived from her obsession with Rasputin at the time.
- Creager is obsessed with Howard Hughes and, at live performances, frequently relates facts and anecdotes related to his decline in mental and physical health in his later years.
- The band's official website claims that the trio was formed in 1891.
- Melora Creager was a touring cellist with Nirvana , playing on live renditions of songs like " All Apologies " and " Dumb ."
Creager is a self-proclaimed history buff and often bases Rasputina's lyrics on said history. Some of these include:
- '' Thanks For The Ether ''
- ---"My Little Shirtwaist Fire" is based on the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire of 1911 .
- ---"Howard Hughes" is about legendary aviator Howard Hughes .
- '' How We Quit The Forest ''
- ---"Rose K." is about Rose Marie Kennedy who was lobotomized at the age of 23.
- '' Cabin Fever ''
- ---"Rats" is about the 16th century decision by the then Pope to declare Capybara as fish for Catholics to eat during lent.
- '' Perplexions ''
- ---"Warbots" is about how robot soldiers are being made. The Pentagon's Gordon Johnson of the Joint Forces Command told about the prototypes that have been invented to make this a reality. Mr. Johnson, the weapons inventor, stated, "The lawyers tell me there are no prohibitions against robots making life-or-death decisions." There was a debate on whether the robots can distinguish innocent life against enemy life. Also the robot's appearance described in the song resembles that of the Daleks , an evil race of robots in the science-fiction series Doctor Who .
- ---"Sky Is Falling" is oddly similar to the storm events in California in February of 2005. In an article written by the Associated Press writer Ryan Pearson, some of the events that took place with these killer storms are similar to some of the lyrics of the song. Some of the article that seems to mirror the song (whether they be the events or the wording itself) include, "...oozing mud blocked highways..." (similar to lyrics) "...surging river carried away part of an airport," (similar in context) "..one man who was killed by a falling eucalyptus tree..." (similar to lyrics) "...teenage girl crushed by rocks..." (similar in context) "...mudslides and a huge boulder that threatened to roll onto the highway" (similar in context).
- ---"Krakatowa" is about Krakatoa , an island in Indonesia that is volcanic. In 1883, a big eruptions of the volcano happened.
- '' Oh Perilous World ''
- ---"1816, The Year Without a Summer" is about during the Little Ice Age , the year 1816 had an unusual weather pattern (due to the volcano Mount Tambora exploding) and was known as the Year Without A Summer . The song also makes mention of author Mary Shelley writing her infamous novel '' Frankenstein '', Freemasons and Benjamin Franklin .
- ---"Choose Me For Champion" is about islanders' sufferings due to Western European invasions and mentions Thursday October Christian .
- ---"Cage in a Cave" is about Thursday Christian's father, Fletcher Christian, who was an 18th century man who was part of the Mutiny On The Bounty in Tahiti .
- ---"Incident in a Medical Clinic" is about the disease Schistosomiasis (also known as Snail-fever).
- ---"Child Soldier Rebellion" makes mention of the Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda 's usage of children as soldiers.
- ---"Oh Bring Back the Egg Unbroken" is about the Tangata Manu competition of the inhabitants from Easter Island .
- ---"We Stay Behind" is about the people who stayed behind in New Orleans during the 2005 Hurricane Katrina. An article from the AP By ALLEN G. BREED exclaims... "I've never even had a nightmare or a beautiful dream about this," he said as he watched the warehouses burn. "People are just not themselves."
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