Vitamin String Quartet

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Vitamin String Quartet
VSQ logo 01.jpg
Background information
Also known asVSQ
Origin Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Genres Modern classical
Years active1999 (1999)–present
Labels Vitamin
Website vitaminstringquartet.com

Vitamin String Quartet (VSQ) is an American musical group from Los Angeles known for its series of tribute albums to rock and pop acts.

Contents

VSQ is a series of string quartet projects developed and produced by CMH Records, an independent record company based in Los Angeles. The CMH team works with an evolving cast of arrangers, producers, string players, and other creatives on each project. Their albums are released through Vitamin Records and are primarily performed by a string quartet, although other instruments have been used. "Vitamin String Quartet is about applying rock n' roll attitude to classical technique," said Tom Tally, [1] a violist and arranger who has performed on and produced over 50 Vitamin String Quartet albums.

Their albums feature various genres, including pop and rock, metal, emo, punk, techno, country, and hip-hop, and a wide variety of groups, such as the Beach Boys, Gorillaz, The Beatles, Iron Maiden, Bruce Springsteen, Jimi Hendrix, the Smashing Pumpkins, and Lana Del Rey, among others. Their discography includes over 400 albums.

History

The group began in 1999 "as an experiment in transforming rock and pop songs with classical instruments." [2] It later expanded to include a variety of popular music. [2]

From 2012 until 2014, their music was played 24 hours a day on the FM broadcast station WWHK in Concord, New Hampshire. [3]

In 2008, VSQ contributed a recording of "Jack and Sally Montage" to Nightmare Revisited , on which the original score for the 1993 film The Nightmare Before Christmas was reinterpreted by bands like Tiger Army, the All-American Rejects, Plain White T's, Rise Against, and DeVotchKa.

In June 2009, they branched out by including a few original songs on their album Perversions, which also included covers of bands such as Broken Social Scene, No Age, and Sigur Rós. [4]

Movie features

Vitamin String Quartet covered INXS's "Never Tear Us Apart" and Pat Benatar's "We Belong" in the 100th episode of Gossip Girl . [5] [6] [7]

Vitamin String Quartet's cover of Nine Inch Nails' "Something I Can Never Have" was featured in the fifth episode of the first season of the HBO series Westworld , "Contrapasso", and their cover of Radiohead's "Motion Picture Soundtrack" was featured in episode six, "The Adversary".

Vitamin String Quartet's cover of the Red Hot Chili Peppers "Scar Tissue" was featured on the soundtrack of King of Staten Island in 2020.

Vitamin String Quartet has many covers featured in the Netflix series Bridgerton , such as Nirvana's "Stay Away" and Robyn's "Dancing on My Own". [8] [9] Covers of Billie Eilish's "Bad Guy" and Lady Gaga's "Poker Face" were used in the 2024 Doctor Who episode "Rogue," serving as an homage to Bridgerton.

Partial discography

0–9

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

Y

Miscellaneous and compilations

References

  1. Vitamin String Quartet (2009). "VSQ Biography". Vitamin String Quartet. Archived from the original on February 20, 2010. Retrieved March 22, 2010.
  2. 1 2 Vitamin String Quartet (2013). "VSQ: A Brief History". Vitamin String Quartet. Archived from the original on December 21, 2012. Retrieved September 10, 2013.
  3. Lavoie, Rebecca (August 8, 2012). "From Classic Rock to Classical Pop". www.nhpr.org. Retrieved April 27, 2020.
  4. "Vitamin String Quartet: Per_Versions". Vitamin Records. Archived from the original on June 7, 2009. Retrieved June 15, 2009.
  5. "Gossip Girl Music - Season 5, Episode 13". The CW. January 2012. Retrieved April 2, 2012.
  6. Marsi, Steve (January 31, 2012). "Gossip Girl Music From "G.G."". TV Fanatic. Archived from the original on December 14, 2013. Retrieved April 2, 2012.
  7. Eckstein, David (January 25, 2012). "Gossip Girl EP: We've been 'planning Blair's wedding since the pilot'". Zap2it . Archived from the original on January 31, 2012. Retrieved April 2, 2012.
  8. Etienne, Vanessa (January 12, 2021). "Why Netflix's Bridgerton Soundtrack Is Surprisingly Familiar". Men's Health. Retrieved January 13, 2021.
  9. Fuentes, Tamara (December 26, 2020). "Songs in "Bridgerton" - "Bridgerton" Soundtrack Season 1". Seventeen. Retrieved August 23, 2025.
  10. Download The String Quartet Tribute to Alice in Chains by Vitamin String Quartet | eMusic
  11. Top Videos | Popular Videos [ permanent dead link ]
  12. The first run of the album was printed with incorrect album art, as well as listing in the wrong order the tracks— which were hand picked by Mike Portnoy and covered the band's history from When Dream And Day Unite to Train Of Thought . This was corrected in later prints of the album. People with the incorrect art could contact Vitamin Records for a replacement copy. James Curtiss, the Project Coordinator of Vitamin Records, said that the incorrect packaging should be called "a collector's item and leave it at that", as well as stating that "sonically we nailed the sucker, but on the manufacturing side of things, we dropped the ball." (see the official Dream Theater site here Archived October 7, 2009, at the Wayback Machine and here Archived October 7, 2009, at the Wayback Machine .)