Todd Trainer is the drummer for the band Shellac. He also performs as a solo artist under the name Brick Layer Cake. He previously played drums for the bands Breaking Circus and Rifle Sport, and he played drums with Scout Niblett in 2005.
Todd Trainer is the drummer for the band Shellac. He also performs as a solo artist under the name Brick Layer Cake. He previously played drums for the bands Breaking Circus and Rifle Sport, and he played drums with Scout Niblett in 2005.
Trainer resides in Minneapolis, Minnesota and maintains close ties to his parents and sister Terri. His Italian greyhound Uffizi inspired the title of Shellac's fourth studio album Excellent Italian Greyhound . He and his dog, along with his band Shellac, were featured in an episode of Dogs 101 in 2009 centered on Italian Greyhounds.
Critics generally have favored Trainer's primitive approach to rock drumming. A review in The New York Times of a 2001 Shellac performance described the "stubborn crack and thud of Todd Trainer's drums", [1] and critic Brent DiCrescenzo wrote that "Trainer beats his drums so primally, you'd swear he's only wearing a loincloth." [2] A review in Spin of the Shellac album Terraform declared that Trainer "gracefully resurrects the lost art of the [John] Bonham stomp". [3]
Brick Layer Cake is the solo project of Todd Trainer, who plays every instrument and sings in a deep, spoken word monotone. The music of Brick Layer Cake features very slow tempos and "drone-like" compositions, which Steve Albini described as follows: “Think of Nick Drake on downers fronting Black Sabbath, if Black Sabbath played only the good parts of their songs."[ citation needed ]
Cake is an American alternative rock band from Sacramento, California, consisting of singer John McCrea, trumpeter Vince DiFiore, guitarist Xan McCurdy, bassist Daniel McCallum, and drummer Todd Roper. The band has been noted for McCrea's sarcastic lyrics and deadpan vocals, and their wide-ranging musical influences, including country music, Mariachi, rock, funk, Iranian folk music, and hip hop.
Shellac is an American indie rock band from Chicago, Illinois, composed of Steve Albini, Bob Weston and Todd Trainer and formed in 1992. Their music genre has been classified as post-hardcore and noise rock but they describe themselves as a "minimalist rock trio."
At Action Park is the first full-length record by Shellac, released in 1994.
The Jesus Lizard is an American rock band formed in 1987 in Austin, Texas and based in Chicago, Illinois. They were "a leading noise rock band in the American independent underground…[who] turned out a series of independent records filled with scathing, disembowelling, guitar-driven pseudo-industrial noise, all of which received positive reviews in underground music publications and heavy college-radio play."
Touch and Go Records is an American independent record label based in Chicago. After its genesis as a handmade fanzine in 1979, it grew into one of the key record labels in the American 1980s underground and alternative rock scenes. Touch & Go carved out a reputation for releasing adventurous noise rock by the likes of Big Black, the Butthole Surfers, and The Jesus Lizard. Touch & Go helped to spearhead the nationwide network of underground bands that formed the pre-Nirvana indie rock scene, and helped preside over the shift from the hardcore punk that then dominated the American underground scene to the more diverse styles of alternative rock emerging at the time.
Terraform is the second full-length record by Shellac, released in 1998.
Bob Weston is an American musician, producer, recording engineer, and record mastering engineer. Critic Jason Ankeny declares that "Weston's name and fingerprints are all over the American underground rock of the post-punk era, producing and engineering dates for a seemingly endless number of bands." As a performer, Weston is best known as the bass guitarist in the groups Volcano Suns and Shellac.
Anthony Philip Harford, better known by his stage name Tony Martin, is an English heavy metal vocalist, best known for his time fronting Black Sabbath, initially from 1987 to 1991 and again from 1993 to 1997. Martin was the band's second longest serving vocalist after Ozzy Osbourne. He has since been involved in many other projects.
Steven Albini is an American musician, record producer, audio engineer, and music journalist. He was a member of Big Black, Rapeman, and Flour, and is a member of Shellac. He is the founder, owner and principal engineer of Electrical Audio, a recording studio complex in Chicago. In 2018, Albini estimated that he had worked on several thousand albums during his career.
Breaking Circus was a post-punk band from the 1980s, based in Chicago and later Minneapolis, founded by guitarist and vocalist Steve Björklund.
Rob "Blasko" Nicholson is an American bassist. His influences include heavy metal bands Iron Maiden, Motörhead, and Corrosion of Conformity. He performed on Rob Zombie's solo albums and is currently part of Ozzy Osbourne's band. He is also noted for his contribution as bassist to metal band Cryptic Slaughter within underground metal circles.
Flour is the musical project and nickname of Minneapolis musician Pete Conway, who wrote songs and played bass guitar in the bands Rifle Sport and Breaking Circus until the mid-1980s. He released four solo albums on Touch and Go Records from 1988 to 1994 on which he plays most of the instruments himself. Flour toured as a live band twice with a lineup that featured ex-Big Black guitarist Steve Albini on bass and former Breaking Circus percussionist Todd Trainer on drums before they went on to form the band Shellac. Flour's solo recordings feature the drum machine sound characteristic of Big Black, which was also toyed with by many other independent rock bands in the Midwest during that time period. Flour's third solo album Machinery Hill was described by Allmusic's Richard Foss as "an oddball masterpiece of grinding guitar, fluid bass, hammering drums, and very creative ideas".
Excellent Italian Greyhound is Shellac's fourth album, released on June 5, 2007. The album's title is a reference to drummer Todd Trainer's Italian Greyhound, Uffizi. The album was recorded at Electrical Audio and mastered at Abbey Road by Steve Rooke. The drawings for Excellent Italian Greyhound were created by Jay Ryan from the band Dianogah. As well as a hand screened obi sleeve surrounding the jacket, there are several pictures taken by Joel Larson. As with 1000 Hurts, the vinyl pressing of the album includes an unmarked CD version at no extra charge. The band encourages listeners to purchase the vinyl to hear the record as it was intended.
Uranus is Shellac Record #2, a two song 7" on Touch and Go Records. It was released in 1993 on vinyl format only. It is believed that it was recorded at the same time as their first release, The Rude Gesture: A Pictorial History. As their first release had printed liner notes listing the microphones used during the recording, this release listed details about the recording tape, tape machines, and mastering equipment used.
The Bird Is the Most Popular Finger is the third release by Shellac. The title is a parodic reference to the album The Pigeon Is the Most Popular Bird by Six Finger Satellite, and was originally the title of an article on Shellac that appeared in the magazine Alternative Press after the release of the band's earlier singles. It is a two song 7" released in 1994 on Drag City. It was Shellac's first non-Touch and Go release.
Rifle Sport was an American post punk band active in the 1980s and 1990s, from Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Shane Gaalaas is a Canadian-born drummer, multi-instrumentalist and songwriter best known for his long running affiliation with Japanese rock superstars B'z, whom he joined in 2002, and his extensive work with guitar virtuosos Michael Schenker, Yngwie Malmsteen, Uli Jon Roth, Vinnie Moore, and Jeff Kollman.
Dude Incredible is the fifth studio album by the American rock band Shellac, released on September 16, 2014 on Touch and Go Records.
The End of Radio is a 2019 album by Shellac. The album contains two previously unreleased recordings made for the BBC Radio One's John Peel Show in 1994 and 2004. Steve Albini has spoken about his admiration for John Peel, stating that "he listened religiously to every single record he received in the mail, devoting hours of every day to the task".
Liars and Prayers is Thalia Zedek's fourth solo album, released four years after Trust Not Those in Whom Without Some Touch of Madness.
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