Steve Smith at National Sawdust premiered our new video These Wicked Things shot and directed by the great Dan Huiting and starring Julia Lee Romero and Brian Carpenter, with hair and makeup by Jackie Chavez and original artwork by Danijel Zezelj, who also created the artwork for our record.
Our first record in TEN years, These Wicked Things, will be released on March 22nd. The next day is our record release show in Boston at Once Ballroom with the outrageously great and inventive Boston bands Count Zero, Jaggery, and Emperor Norton’s Stationary Marching Band. Montreal singer/guitarist Kee Avil will be opening the show with her amazing solo performance so arrive early! Advance tickets available HERE.
Acclaimed Croatian artist Danijel Zezelj was brought on board to create the stunning artwork for These Wicked Things, starting with the cover and ending with a 12-page black-and-white noir graphic novel accompanying the album. Danijel Zezelj resides in Brooklyn and has published several art books and has collaborated with author Kevin Baker on the book Luna Park and worked on the American Vampire series of comic books. Danijel collaborated with uber-talented designers Maricar/Maricor in Australia who worked on lettering, design, and layout for the album.
In 2017, Brian Carpenter flew to Tucson, Arizona to mix the record with engineer Craig Schumacher (Neko Case, Calexico) and Chris Schultz at Wavelab Studios. Craig is known for dialing up incredible sounds, especially in the desert noir canon and he knocked it out of the park on this record. Brian and Craig worked a few years earlier on the Confessions record The Far End of the World.
In 2014, Beat Circus was commissioned by Berkeley Repertory Theater in Berkeley, California to write music for The Barbary Coast, a play based on the true crime book of the same name by Herbert Asbury (Gangs of New York) with book by Dominic Orlando. A few of the songs center around the true-life Mexican Robin Hood figure Joaquin Murieta, who went on a revenge spree during the late 1800 Gold Rush era. The well-known bandit Zorro was based on the Joaquin Murieta. A few pieces from the play based around Murieta (both versions of “Rosita”) ended up in These Wicked Things.