Pat Place

Last updated

Pat Place (born 1953) is an American artist, photographer, and musician noted for her work as a founding member and guitarist of no wave bands James Chance and the Contortions and Bush Tetras.

Contents

Art

Place grew up in Chicago. She studied art in college, graduating with a BFA in painting and sculpture, attending Northern Illinois University and Skidmore College. She came to New York City in 1975 to pursue a career as a visual artist. [1]

Place’s photography work was displayed in 2008 at the "No Wave, Post Punk, Underground New York 1976-80" exhibition curated by Thurston Moore and Byron Coley at KS Art, and at the group exhibition "Happy Vacation" at Thrust Projects, [2] both in New York City.

She was also involved in the no wave cinema scene, appearing in some of Vivienne Dick's movies co-starring with Lydia Lunch and other musicians from New York's late 1970s and early 1980s post-punk community.

Music

Place was the original guitarist and one of the founding members of the Contortions, one of the central bands in the New York no wave music scene. [3]

She then formed the Bush Tetras. Place and vocalist Cynthia Sley produced the most distinctive aspects of the Tetras sound. Place's guitar lines were rhythmic and distortion-filled. [4]

From the 1990s until present, Place has been performing with Bush Tetras and various noise music bands in New York City and Europe.

She participated in Maggie Estep's song and video for Hey Baby, from her 1994 album No More Mister Nice Girl.

Notes

  1. "Perfect Sound Forever: Pat Place talks of Contortions, Bush Tetras". www.furious.com. Retrieved July 9, 2018.
  2. "Thrust Projects".
  3. Masters, Marc. No Wave. London: Black Dog Publishing, 2007, pp. 175-178
  4. Masters, Marc. No Wave. London: Black Dog Publishing, 2007, pp. 175-178

Related Research Articles

No wave was an avant-garde music genre and visual art scene that emerged in the late 1970s in Downtown New York City. The term was a pun based on the rejection of commercial new wave music. Reacting against punk rock's recycling of rock and roll clichés, no wave musicians instead experimented with noise, dissonance, and atonality, as well as non-rock genres like free jazz, funk, and disco. The scene often reflected an abrasive, confrontational, and nihilistic world view.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mars (band)</span> American rock band

Mars were an American, New York City-based no wave experimental noise rock band, formed in 1975 when China Burg and artist Nancy Arlen (drums) brought Mark Cunningham (bass) and vocalist Sumner Crane together to talk about music. They were joined briefly by guitarist Rudolph Grey. The band played one live gig under the name China before changing it to Mars. They played a mixture of angular compositions and freeform noise music jams, featuring surrealist lyrics and non-standard drumming. All the members were said to be completely untrained in music before forming the band.

DNA was an American no wave band formed in 1977 by guitarist Arto Lindsay and keyboardist Robin Crutchfield, and later joined by drummer Ikue Mori and bassist Tim Wright. They were associated with the late 1970s New York no wave scene, and were featured on the 1978 compilation No New York.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Chance</span> American musician (1953–2024)

James Chance, also known as James White, was an American saxophonist, keyboard player, and singer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Chance and the Contortions</span> American band

James Chance and the Contortions was a musical group led by saxophonist and vocalist James Chance, formed in 1977. They were a central act of New York City's downtown no wave music scene in the late 1970s, and were featured on the influential compilation No New York (1978).

Bush Tetras are an American post-punk No Wave band from New York City, formed in 1979. They are best known for the 1980 song "Too Many Creeps", which exemplified the band's sound of "jagged rhythms, slicing guitars, and sniping vocals". Although they did not achieve mainstream success, the Bush Tetras were influential and popular in the Manhattan club scene and college radio in the early 1980s. New York's post-punk revival of the 2000s was accompanied by a resurgence of interest in the genre, with the Tetras' influence heard in many of that scene's bands.

Dance-punk is a post-punk subgenre that emerged in the late 1970s, and is closely associated with the disco, post-disco and new wave movements. The genre is characterized by mixing the energy of punk rock with the danceable rhythms of funk and disco. It was most prominent in the New York City punk movement.

Vivienne Dick is an Irish feminist experimental and documentary filmmaker. Her early films helped define the No Wave scene. According to The Irish Times, Dick is "one of the most important film-makers Ireland has produced".

No wave cinema was an underground filmmaking movement that flourished on the Lower East Side of New York City from about 1976 to 1985. Associated with the artists’ group Collaborative Projects, no wave cinema was a stripped-down style of guerrilla filmmaking that emphasized dark edgy mood and unrehearsed immediacy above many other artistic concerns – similar to the parallel no wave music movement in its raw and rapid style.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Punk visual art</span> Visual arts within the punk subculture

Punk visual art is artwork associated with the punk subculture and the no wave movement. It is prevalent in punk rock album covers, flyers for punk concerts and punk zines, but has also been prolific in other mediums, such as the visual arts, the performing arts, literature and cinema. Punk manifested itself "differently but consistently" in different cultural spheres. Punk also led to the birth of several movements: new wave, no wave, dark wave, industrial, hardcore, queercore, etc., which are sometimes showcased in art galleries and exhibition spaces. The punk aesthetic was a dominant strand from 1982 to 1986 in the many art galleries of the East Village of Manhattan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Theoretical Girls</span> American no wave band

Theoretical Girls were a New York-based no wave band formed by Glenn Branca and conceptual artist and composer Jeff Lohn that existed from 1977 to 1981. Theoretical Girls played only about 20 shows.

<i>Off White</i> 1979 studio album by James White and the Blacks

Off White is a 1979 album by American no wave band James White and the Blacks.

Punk jazz is a genre of music that combines elements of jazz, especially improvisation, with the instrumentation and performance style of punk rock. The term was first used to describe James Chance and the Contortions' 1979 album Buy. Punk jazz is closely related to free jazz, no wave, and loft jazz, and has since significantly inspired post-hardcore and alternative hip hop.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Noise Fest</span>

Noise Fest was an influential festival of no wave noise music performances curated by Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth at the New York City art space White Columns in June 1981. Sonic Youth made their first live appearances at this show.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tier 3 (nightclub)</span> Nightclub in Manhattan (1979–1980)

Tier 3 was an influential but short-lived 300-capacity no wave art nightclub in New York. Founded by Hilary Jaeger in 1979, Tier 3 was a major venue in the city's underground music and counterculture post-punk art scene, along with the Mudd Club. Live performances showcased punk rock, no wave, ska, noise music, free jazz, new wave and experimental music. The club was located at 225 West Broadway in the TriBeCa neighborhood of lower Manhattan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Scott B and Beth B</span> American film producer

Scott B and Beth B were among the best-known New York No Wave underground film makers of the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Eric Mitchell is a French born writer, director, and actor who moved to downtown New York City in the early 1970s. He has acted in many No Wave films such as Permanent Vacation (1980) by Jim Jarmusch, but is best known for his own films that are usually written and directed by him: Kidnapped, Red Italy, Underground U.S.A. and The Way It Is or Eurydice in the Avenues, starring Steve Buscemi, Vincent Gallo, Mark Boone Junior and Rockets Redglare. Mitchell worked out of New York City's sordid East Village area in conjunction with Colab and other performance artists and noise musicians. There he created a series of scruffy, deeply personal, short Super 8mm and 16mm films in which he combined darkly sinister images to explore the manner in which the individual is constrained by society.

Boris Policeband was a no wave noise music performer who used dissonant violin, police radio transmissions, and voice. Boris Pearlman was a classically trained violist from New York City.

Youth in Asia was an American no wave conceptual art noise music band from New York City that was formed in 1978 by Frank Schroder (bass), Taro Suzuki, Steven Harvey and Stephan Wischerth (drums).

Avant-funk is a music style in which artists combine funk or disco rhythms with an avant-garde or art rock mentality. Its most prominent era occurred in the late 1970s and 1980s among post-punk and no wave acts who embraced black dance music.

References