Monthly Archives: December 2010

Arguably, few other bands in the history of the world are as weird, as brilliant, and probably even as under-appreciated as The Kronos Quartet. From its embryonic stages in the early 1970s, founder David Harrington states how he was primarily inspired by fellow noisemaker/music experimentalists, the infamous and equally-strange George Crumb and The Black Angels.

Like many prodigies, he started young — 12 to be exact, when he got together his first string quartet. It took, and years later he was experimenting, taking the theretofore concept of a string quartet and and pushing it over the boundaries of what was accessible. From the Hitchcockian, Psycho -like violin screeching, all the way to “Dark Was the Night”, which is little more than the incessant plucking of numerous stringed instruments, the screech of bows on un-tuned strings, or a re-creation of the soundtrack to Bela Lugosi’s Dracula, Kronos has proved themselves as among the strangest and most haunting  classical/experimental/soundtrack formations in contemporary music.

Kronos’ sounds have been in films like Heat and 21 Grams; chances are, ye’ve heard them before. If not, that’s what Red Bull Music Academy Radio is for, and you can check it out now.