Descartes a Kant is a group from Guadalajara, México that blends an eclectic palette of musical influences with other art forms such as theater, dance and film. It's a balanced mix between composition and performance, made from a narrative language that the band has managed to consolidate throughout their career.
Quoting a critic from the Wall Street Journal: "trying to describe their music is to do it a disservice. It’s loud, racy, incredibly imaginative, sophisticated, funny and wild; it’s as if the Yeah Yeah Yeahs fronted Albert Ayler with Frank Zappa conducting”
The Color Forty Nine hail from San Diego, California, where pretty much everything is nice. The weather and languid pace can easily lull you into a blissful complacency...or implore you to seek for more. Hence, this band mines musical stories from these surroundings, daily life, countries traveled, and the fortunate proximity of the neighboring town of Tijuana, Mexico, a whole different place altogether.
Collectively, the members of the band have played throughout the world with projects such as little white teeth (Phil Beaumont), the Black Heart Procession (Matt Resovich, Jason Hooper, and Scott Mercado), the Album Leaf (Matt Resovich), maquiladora (Phil Beaumont), System’s Officer (Jason Hooper) and Manuok (Scott Mercado). The band members have also been touring members of The Black Heart Procession, Eric Bachmann, and Pinback.
As multi-instrumentalists, each member gets to stray from their previous roles to find new musical connections to songwriting. As a bass player for most of his life, Beaumont picked up, by happenstance, a baritone ukulele to travel with more easily, and thus was the genesis of this project. Matt Resovich plays violin and Casiotone through the many effects pedals he builds himself. Jason Hooper, a highly sought-after drummer, picks up the bass for the Color Forty Nine, and Scott Mercado, typically the front man to his own band, Manuok, sits behind the drums to fill out the rhythm section. Their musical home is the attic of a 1910 home in Sherman Heights, where each rehearsal begins with a family-style meal of good food and better wine.
