David Grubbs (born September 21, 1967) is an American

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and def ...

guitarist A guitarist (or a guitar player) is a person who plays the guitar. Guitarists may play a variety of guitar family instruments such as classical guitars, acoustic guitars, electric guitars, and bass guitars. Some guitarists accompany themselve ...

pianist A pianist ( , ) is a musician who plays the piano. A pianist's repertoire may include music from a diverse variety of styles, such as traditional classical music, jazz piano, jazz, blues piano, blues, and popular music, including rock music, ...

, and

vocalist Singing is the art of creating music with the voice. It is the oldest form of musical expression, and the human voice can be considered the first musical instrument. The definition of singing varies across sources. Some sources define singi ...

. He was a founding member of Squirrel Bait, Bastro, and Gastr del Sol. He has also played in Codeine, The Red Krayola, Bitch Magnet and The Wingdale Community Singers.

Music career

Grubbs' first band was a brief-lived punk/ new wave group called The Happy Cadavers that released the four-song 7" record ''With Illustrations'' in 1982. Grubbs then formed a

hardcore punk Hardcore punk (commonly abbreviated to hardcore or hXc) is a punk rock music genre#subtypes, subgenre and subculture that originated in the late 1970s. It is generally faster, harder, and more aggressive than other forms of punk rock. Its roots ...

band called Squirrelbait Youth that later evolved into the influential

Louisville, Kentucky Louisville is the List of cities in Kentucky, most populous city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky, sixth-most populous city in the Southeastern United States, Southeast, and the list of United States cities by population, 27th-most-populous city ...

group Squirrel Bait, releasing a 12" EP and an album on Homestead Records. Grubbs's next group was the

post-punk Post-punk (originally called new musick) is a broad genre of music that emerged in late 1977 in the wake of punk rock. Post-punk musicians departed from punk's fundamental elements and raw simplicity, instead adopting a broader, more experiment ...

power trio Bastro, which released an EP and two albums on Homestead.Strong, Martin C. (2003), ''The Great Indie Discography'', Canongate, , p. 522–23. In 1991 Bastro morphed into the more avant-garde Gastr del Sol. This project soon became essentially a partnership between Grubbs and Jim O'Rourke after the band's first album. The albums released by the duo include '' Crookt, Crackt, or Fly'', '' Upgrade & Afterlife'', and '' Camoufleur''. In this period, Grubbs also contributed to other projects, including guitar for two tracks on Codeine's 1994 album '' The White Birch'' and guitar, piano, and harmonium on recordings by Palace Music, Will Oldham, Royal Trux,

Dirty Three Dirty Three are an Australian instrumental rock band, consisting of Warren Ellis (musician), Warren Ellis (violin, keyboards), Mick Turner (electric guitar, organ and bass) and Jim White (drummer), Jim White (drums), which formed in 1992. Their ...

Matmos Matmos is an experimental electronic music duo formed in San Francisco and based in Baltimore. M. C. (Martin) Schmidt and Drew Daniel are the core members, but they frequently include other artists on their records and in their performances no ...

, Richard Buckner,

Tony Conrad Anthony Schmalz Conrad (March 7, 1940 – April 9, 2016) was an American video artist, experimental filmmaker, musician, composer, sound artist, teacher, and writer. Active in a variety of media since the early 1960s, he was a pioneer of both ...

, Pauline Oliveros, Arnold Dreyblatt, and many others. Since the breakup of Gastr del Sol in 1997, Grubbs has released numerous solo and collaborative records, mostly on the Drag City label, for which he co-directed the Dexter's Cigar sub-label.Proefrock, Stacia " David Grubbs Biography,

Allmusic AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Mus ...

, retrieved 2010-01-23. In 2000, his album '' The Spectrum Between'' was named "Album of the Year" in the '' Sunday Times''. His 2017 album '' Creep Mission'' was described by The Quietus as "a typically playful and intellectually ambitious set – and is as good an entry into the world of Grubbs as any." In 2018, Grubbs released ''Failed Celestial Creatures'', a collaboration with Japanese guitarist and electronic musician Taku Unami. According to Pitchfork, the album "feels of a piece with Grubbs’ last two records under his own name, ''Creep Mission'' and ''Prismrose'', both nominal solo releases that each features a handful of guests. On all three albums, Grubbs uses the presence of collaborators to play with drones, repetition, and improvisatory interplay, taking his style to a more intuitive place." He operates his own label, Blue Chopsticks, which has released new and archival recordings from Luc Ferrari, Derek Bailey and Noël Akchoté, Workshop, Van Oehlen, and Mats Gustafsson. Grubbs is also known for his collaborations with writers Susan Howe, Rick Moody, and Kenneth Goldsmith, and with visual artists including Anthony McCall,

Angela Bulloch Angela Bulloch (born 1966 in Rainy River, Ontario, Canada), is a Canadian artist who often works with sound and installation; she is recognised as one of the Young British Artists. Bulloch lives and works in Berlin. Life and career Bulloch stud ...

, Stephen Prina, and Cosima von Bonin. He has composed the soundtracks for

's installations '' Z Point'', '' Horizontal Technicolour'', and '' Hybrid Song Box.4'', and his music appears in two installations by Doug Aitken. Grubbs's sound installation "Between a Raven and a Writing Desk" was included in the 1999 group exhibition ''Elysian Fields'' at the Centre Pompidou. Grubbs's soundtrack work includes music with

for Thierry Jousse's feature film '' Invisible (Les Invisibles)''. Grubbs has also contributed music to the Red Krayola's soundtrack to Norman and Bruce Yonemoto's film '' Japan in Paris in LA'' and to three films by Augusto Contento ('' Parallax Sounds'', '' Strade Trasparenti'', and '' Onibus''), to Braden King and Laura Moya's film '' Dutch Harbor: Where the Sea Breaks its Back'', and to John Boskovich's film ''

North North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating Direction (geometry), direction or geography. Etymology T ...

''. Music by Gastr del Sol appears in the PBS television series ''The United States of Poetry'', Hal Hartley's film '' The Book of Life'', and Doug Aitken's film ''The Diamond Sea''. Grubbs composed the score for Karl Bruckmaier's radio adaptation of Peter Weiss's '' Die Ästhetik des Widerstands'' (Hessischer Rundfunk Hörbuch des Jahres 2007) and contributed music to Bruckmaier's adaptation of Alexander Kluge's '' Chronik der Gefühle'' (Deutscher Hörbuchpreis 2010, "Best Fiction"). David Grubbs 06

From 1997 to 1999, Grubbs was a part-time instructor in the Liberal Arts and Sound departments at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He is currently Professor of Music in the Conservatory of Music at

Brooklyn College Brooklyn College is a public university in Brooklyn in New York City, United States. It is part of the City University of New York system and enrolls nearly 14,000 students on a campus in the Midwood and Flatbush sections of Brooklyn as of fall ...

, CUNY. He teaches in Brooklyn College's MFA program in Performance and Interactive Media Arts (PIMA) and Brooklyn College's MFA program in Creative Writing, and is a member of the faculty of the Brooklyn College Center for Computer Music (BC-CCM). He is one of five musicians (with

Steve Albini Steven Frank Albini (; July 22, 1962 – May 7, 2024) was an American musician and audio engineer. He founded and fronted the influential post-hardcore and noise rock bands Big Black (1981–1987), Rapeman (1987–1989) and Shellac (band), ...

, Ken Vandermark, Damon Locks, and Ian Williams) profiled in Augusto Contento's 2012 documentary film '' Parallax Sounds''.

Academic career

Grubbs received a B.A. degree from

Georgetown University Georgetown University is a private university, private Jesuit research university in Washington, D.C., United States. Founded by Bishop John Carroll (archbishop of Baltimore), John Carroll in 1789, it is the oldest Catholic higher education, Ca ...

, an A.M. degree from the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...

in 1991, and a Ph.D. degree in English, also from Chicago, in 2005.Faculty Bios: David Grubbs
- website of the Graduate Center, CUNY Grubbs is Distinguished Professor of Music at

and the Graduate Center, CUNY, specialised in

sound art Sound art is an artistic activity in which sound is utilized as a primary Time-based media, time-based Artistic medium, medium or material. Like many genres of contemporary art, sound art may be interdisciplinary in nature, or be used in Cross-genr ...

and

experimental music Experimental music is a general label for any music or music genre that pushes existing boundaries and genre definitions. Experimental compositional practice is defined broadly by exploratory sensibilities radically opposed to, and questioning of, ...

, and teaching in performance arts, interactive art and creative writing. His criticism has appeared in '' Texte zur Kunst'', '' Chicago Review'', ''TDR'', ''Conjunctions'', ''Bookforum'', and ''Purple'', and from 1999-2007 he regularly contributed music criticism to the Munich newspaper ''

Süddeutsche Zeitung The ''Süddeutsche Zeitung'' (; ), published in Munich, Bavaria, is one of the largest and most influential daily newspapers in Germany. The tone of ''SZ'' is mainly described as centre-left, liberal, social-liberal, progressive-liberal, and ...

''. Grubbs received a 2005–2006 Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists Award. Grubbs is the author of four books for

Duke University Press Duke University Press is an academic publisher and university press affiliated with Duke University. It was founded in 1921 by William T. Laprade as The Trinity College Press. (Duke University was initially called Trinity College). In 1926 ...

: ''Records Ruin the Landscape: John Cage, the Sixties, and Sound Recording'' (2014), ''Now that the audience is assembled'' (2018), ''The Voice in the Headphones'' (2020), and ''Good night the pleasure was ours'' (2022). ''Now that the audience is assembled'' was described by The Washington Post as "a new book-length poem

hat A hat is a Headgear, head covering which is worn for various reasons, including protection against weather conditions, ceremonial reasons such as university graduation, religious reasons, safety, or as a fashion accessory. Hats which incorpor ...

reminds us that listening can feel stranger than dreaming." ''Records Ruin the Landscape'' has appeared in French, Italian, and Japanese translations. Grubbs is also the co-author of the collaborative artists’ books ''Simultaneous Soloists'' (with Anthony McCall, Pioneer Works Press, 2019) and ''Projectile'' (with Reto Geiser and John Sparagana, Drag City, 2021).

Personal life

Grubbs lives in

Brooklyn Brooklyn is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City located at the westernmost end of Long Island in the New York (state), State of New York. Formerly an independent city, the borough is coextensive with Kings County, one of twelv ...

with his wife, Cathy Bowman, and their son Emmett Bowman-Grubbs.

Selected solo discography

* ''Whistle from Above'' LP/CD ( Drag City, 2025) * '' Creep Mission'' LP/CD ( Drag City/Blue Chopsticks, 2017) * '' Prismrose'' LP/CD ( Drag City/Blue Chopsticks, 2016) * '' Borough of Broken Umbrellas'' EP ( Drag City, 2013) * '' The Plain Where The Palace Stood'' LP/CD (Drag City/ P-Vine, 2013) * '' Hybrid Song Box.4'' CD ( Blue Chopsticks, 2009) * '' An Optimist Notes the Dusk'' CD/LP (Drag City, P-Vine, 2008) * '' Two Soundtracks for Angela Bulloch'' CD ( Semishigure 2005) * ''Yellow Sky'' split 12" picture disc with Åke Hodell ( Kning Disk/ Håll Tjäften, 2005) * '' A Guess at the Riddle'' CD/LP (Drag City/ Fat Cat/P-Vine 2004) * '' Comic Structure'' LP with artist's edition by David Shrigley ( En/Of, 2003) * ''Crumbling Land'' split 12" with Avey Tare ( Fat Cat Records, 2003) * '' Rickets & Scurvy'' LP/CD (Drag City/Fat Cat/P-Vine, 2002) * '' Act Five, Scene One'' (Blue Chopsticks/P-Vine, 2002) * '' Thirty-Minute Raven'' CD (

Rectangle In Euclidean geometry, Euclidean plane geometry, a rectangle is a Rectilinear polygon, rectilinear convex polygon or a quadrilateral with four right angles. It can also be defined as: an equiangular quadrilateral, since equiangular means that a ...

/P-Vine, 2000) * '' The Spectrum Between'' CD/LP (Drag City/P-Vine, 2000) * " Aux Noctambules" 3" CD (Rectangle, 2000) * '' The Coxcomb'' LP/picture disc (Rectangle, 1999) * '' The Thicket'' CD/LP (Drag City, 1998) * '' Banana Cabbage, Potato Lettuce, Onion Orange'' CD ( Table of the Elements, 1997)

Selected collaborations

* ''Failed Celestial Creatures'' with Taku Unami (Empty Editions, 2018) * ''I Said No Doctors!'' with

various artists A compilation album comprises Album#Tracks, tracks, which may be previously released or unreleased, usually from several separate recordings by either one Performing arts#Performers, performer or by several performers. If the recordings are from ...

( Dymaxion Groove, 2017) * '' Frolic Architecture'' with Susan Howe CD ( Blue Chopsticks, 2011) * '' Souls of the Labadie Tract'' with Susan Howe CD (Blue Chopsticks, 2006) * '' The Harmless Dust'' with Nikos Veliotis CD ( Headz, 2005) * '' Thiefth'' with Susan Howe CD (Blue Chopsticks, 2005) * '' Off-Road'' with Mats Gustafsson CD (Blue Chopsticks, 2003) * '' Arbovitae'' with Loren Connors CD ( Häpna, 2003) * '' Apertura'' with Mats Gustafsson CD (Blue Chopsticks, 1999)

References

External links

Drag City Page

77 Boadrum Site Profile
Viva Radio, September 2007. ( Flash)
David Grubbs interview
on Ràdio Web MACBA - Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona
Brooklyn College Center for Computer Music

Discogs page
{{DEFAULTSORT:Grubbs, David American punk rock guitarists 1967 births Living people Brooklyn College faculty Drag City (record label) artists Guitarists from Chicago American male guitarists 20th-century American guitarists Boxhead Ensemble members Bastro members Gastr del Sol members Squirrel Bait members Codeine (band) members 20th-century American male musicians FatCat Records artists Georgetown University College of Arts & Sciences alumni