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The Dead C
Biography
Forerunners of post-rock and the modern-day revival of space rock, the Dead C were an improvisational, hugely prolific noise-rock trio indebted to Sonic Youth (whose Thurston Moore was an avowed fan), as well as Krautrock and psychedelia. Challenging and mostly instrumental, they were a definite anomaly on the New Zealand scene, which was still known primarily for the jangly collegiate pop of the Flying Nun label when the band first emerged in the late ‘80s. Perhaps in part for that reason, the Dead C didn't attract much of a fan base in their home country; their audience was mostly international, developed initially through fanzine culture and word of mouth. They did, however, help spark a more experimental music scene around their native Dunedin, which was centered around bassist Bruce Russell's Xpressway label and boosted the careers of musicians like Alistair Galbraith and Peter Jefferies. They also influenced a broad range of bands, from the ambient post-rock of Flying Saucer Attack and Labradford to the neo-psychedelia of Bardo Pond to lo-fi indie-rockers like Pavement and Sebadoh. The Dead C's own music held elements of all those styles, and remained essentially the same for most of the band's life: murky, hazy, loosely structured drone rock, enveloped in a thick crust of avowedly low-fidelity guitar noise, and often warped with tape manipulations or studio treatments.
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