Matthew Crowe and Bob Bucko, Jr. met at a DIY basement show in Bucko’s hometown of Dubuque, Iowa in 2009. Despite living three hours apart, the two proceeded to strike up a friendship that led to endless hours of friendly jamming with various assemblages, eventually coalescing into a focused duo exchange. Sex Funeral’s sound is reflective of the interaction between two friends more than being representative of any particular genre.
Early in their trajectory, there was no ambition to play beyond Crowe’s basement, leading to decisions such as their joking adoption of the Sex Funeral tag. Come 2013, however, they left the cozy confines of the basement, released their first tape, and started playing the occasional show. As Bucko began touring regularly under his own name, the foundation was laid for Sex Funeral tours to soon follow suit. They have hit the road two or three times a year since 2016.
Over the years Sex Funeral has altered its initial instrumentation of drum kit and tenor saxophone with the introduction of electronic drum pads, samplers, and assorted electronics and acoustic instruments. The late 2018 release Duo For Electronic Percussion utilized four drum machines as sole sound sources.
2019 was a particularly fruitful year for the duo, with over one dozen hours of home recordings being made on Crowe’s patch of land in rural Iowa. Releases assembled from this period include "All Teeth" (Gay Hippie Vampire), "Palace Zones" (forthcoming on Midwaste Tapes), and "Forgotten, hardly written" on Bluesanct / Orphanology's 'alphabet series'.
"Forgotten, hardly written" is Sex Funeral’s first recording featuring overdubs. Recorded to 4-track cassette, the album integrates the sounds of nature into the group’s use of electronic manipulation, bridging worlds with lysergic drips and pastoral drones.
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credits
released March 13, 2020
Recorded to 4-track cassette May 7+8, 2019, Indianola, Iowa
by Matthew Crowe + Bob Bucko, Jr.
Collage by Matthew Crowe
Layout by Mkl Anderson / 4k Design
Orphanology / Bluesanct (ORPHAN00S, 13 MAR 2020)
• (C-38) = ltd to 50 copies
• DIGITAL = unlimited
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