Label Description:
After thirteen years of hibernation, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, the most gloriously uncategorizable American band in existence, has emerged from stasis to proudly announce the imminent release of their fourth studio album, of the Last Human Being. The album marks the first release of AVANT NIGHT – a new imprint headed by Nick Ohler and facilitated by Joyful Noise Recordings.
Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, comprised of multi-instrumentalists and rotating vocalists Nils Frykdahl, Carla Kihlstedt, Michael “Iago” Mellender, Matthias Bossi, and Dan Rathbun, plays an arsenal of instruments ranging from the somewhat standard (drums, electric guitars, bass, electric violin) to the rare (bass harmonica, nyckelharpa, marxophone) to the homemade (Slide-Piano Log, Electric Pancreas, Pedal-Action Wiggler). The group has consistently evaded easy categorization, garnering accolades from across the aisles of contemporary classical music, prog rock, industrial music, metal, avant-garde improv, and more. Their music, inturns bashing and bucolic, enveloping and unsettling, tends towards long-form epics interspersed with mysterious field recordings.
“As this slow-rolling planetwide Anthropocene Extinction event deepens, Sleepy- time’s work has only grown more… more
credits
released February 23, 2024
Most of these recordings were started at Polymorph in Oakland, CA in 2010-11. Additional overdubs in the intervening years were done at Polymorph and in home studios across the land. S.P.Q.R. was entirely recorded and mixed at Polymorph in 2004 and previously released as a 7” on Dephine Knormal Musik. (Hi, Moe!) “Hush, Hush” and “El Evil” were recorded at Polymorph and home studios in 2023.
All songs: Sleepy Time Gorilla Press Music, BMI, except Hush, Hush and Silverfish (Broca’s Fold, ASCAP) and S.P.Q.R. (Rough Trade Music)
Mixed by Dan 2023 ~ Produced by SGM ~ Mastered by Todd Rittmann
Art by Per “Ward C. Picnic” Frykdahl
Design by Jenya Chernoff and Nils
Logos and lettering by Nils
Photos and film stills from the film “The Last Human Being: A Critical Assessment,” directed by Max Baloian, featuring Shinichi Iova Koga
~ Ministry of Revivification ~
Meredith Yayanos – Special Ambassador, Ordained Symposiarch Of The John Kane Society
Mallory McAvoy – Diplomatic Liaison, Bailiff Of The Guild Of Bards
Erik Carter (an uncle) – Futurist Coordinator
John Karr – Audial Conveyist And Evidence Hoarder
Scott Crowley – Moving Picture Husbandry and Conservation
Jenya Chernoff – Head Of Propaganda and Graphic Design
Gregory Scharpen – Imagist, Disinformationist
Nicholas Ohler – Patron Saint of Fucked-Up Music
Karl Hofstetter – Locked Groove Stasis Enabler
Robert S. Meitus – Disentanglementalist
Boundless gratitude to our families, our friends, and our vast community of independent artists, musicians, and makers of all sorts. Thank you to Penelope Allman, Max Baloian, the Bossihlstedts, Steven Clark, Merlin Coleman, Sean Crawford, Dawn & the Faunettes, Thor Harris, Gooby Herms, the Kihlbossis, Shinichi Iova Koga & inkBoat, Claire Mack, Michael McCamish, Simon Miller, Lara Miranda, Dominique Persi, Nieves Rathbun & Jasper, Greg Scharpen, Janice & Gordie Shaw, Free Salamander Exhibit, Kitka, Rabbit Rabbit Radio, and Dr. Grordbort’s Infallible Aether Oscillators. Nick & Anya from AVANT NIGHT would like to thank the Joyful Noise Recordings team and Kramer & Valerie from Shimmy-Disc for their friendship, mentorship, and assistance with making this album a reality.
Endless props to the one-thousand-one-hundred-and-twenty-two generous people who helped us “SAVE THE LAST HUMAN BEING!” on Kickstarter. Boundless gratitude to all who volunteered time and energy to those buck-wild LHB film shoots oh so many years ago. Bottomless cheer to each and every member of the John Kane Society whether living, dead, or liminal.
Truly, it is all of you who have made this complex revivification possible. Rock against rock, and rejoice!
Music For The Rest Of Us 