Monk Parker, Marcellus Hall

BBC-4 Radio called a recent live session "marvelous... absolutely beautiful... one of our favorite sessions of the year”, the magazine El Pais declared a Spanish performance "monstrously sad and brilliantly anachronistic…”, & Rolling Stone France calls his most recent release “perfect, just perfect”. For ten years Monk Parker has sung on stages across the US and Europe, in small groups (most notably Parker & Lily), large ensembles (including the 14-man strong The Low Lows), and solo. Under diverse names he has released five full-length albums and two EPs on such labels as Misra, WARM, Manifesto, PCP, Monotreme (England), Houston Party (Spain), & Crippled Dick Hot Wax (Germany); and played festivals from a Flaming-Lips curated All Tomorrow’s Parties in New York to Barcelona’s Primavera Sound.

His seven-piece band’s live shows revolve around a slew of vintage organs and hollow-body guitars that round out a dense, funereal live sound evocative of early My Morning Jacket or Phosphorescent. Featuring members of Okkervil River & the Polyphonic Spree, the intricately orchestrated brass section evokes both stax/volt-style balladry and Neutral Milk cacophony. Stately, dreamlike waltzes a la Richard Hawley or M. Ward build to explosive, gospel-tinged climaxes, and a woozy country narcosis kin to Skygreen Leopards or The Low Anthem alternates with Velvets-style feedback drones & buried noise melodies.

On June 16th, 2015, Monk is slated to release his very first solo album “How The Spark Loves The Tinder" on the Bronze Rat label out of Berlin. Featuring over 30 musicians, with large strings and horn sections, it was recorded over a two-year period of illness & dislocation following the breakup of The Low Lows and Parker’s subsequent move to Austin TX. It’s eight long, dense, heavily-orchestrated songs chart a dreamy path through the damning consequences of carnality & affection, revelling in the novelistic details of romance. “Sadly yes I know just where to go, where to go / Sadly yes we can all three see the bright writing on the marquee”, goes the first line on the record, from a song about a love triangle gone inexplicably right... and the last stanza reveals both the album’s title and the philosophic theme of the record: “How the spark loves the tinder / How the fuel the spark / How the night longs to not be so dark.” Love in Monk Parker’s world, it would seem, insists on flowering regardless of consequences, and all worldly things conspire & rejoice in that lovely, terrifying process.


As a musician Marcellus Hall has recorded with bands Railroad Jerk and White Hassle and has toured the US, Europe, and Japan. A solo album, "The First Line," was recorded with accompanying musicians and released on Glacial Pace Recordings in 2011 (http://store.glacialpace.com/collections/music/products/marcellus-hall-the-first-line-1). In 2013, with the help of a successful Kickstarter crowd sourcing campaign, Hall and his band, The Hostages, released the album "Afterglow."