Bush Tetras

Bush Tetras
Origin	New York City, USA
Genres	Post-punk, No wave, Dance punk, Punk funk
Years active	1979–1983 1995–1998 2005–present
Labels	ROIR
Members
Pat Place Dee Pop Cynthia Sley Julia Murphy
Past members
Jimmy Joe Uliana Adele Bertei Laura Kennedy Bob Albertson Don Christenson

Bush Tetras are an American post-punk band from New York City, popular in the Manhattan club scene in the early 1980s but never achieving much mainstream success. Their music combined funk rhythms and dissonant guitar riffs.

History

Lead guitarist Pat Place and vocalist Cynthia Sley produced the most distinctive aspects of the Tetras sound. Place's guitar lines were rhythmic and distortion-filled. She had been the original guitarist and one of the founding members of the No Wave band The Contortions. With Bush Tetras, Pat continued to pursue some of the musical ideas she had explored in that band, although her distinctive slide guitar is absent from many of the Tetras songs. Sley's vocals were half-spoken, half-sung. In songs like "Too Many Creeps" and "Can't Be Funky," she repeated simple phrases over and over again, creating a hypnotic monotony similar to Place's guitar rhythms.

Place appeared in some of Vivienne Dick's movies co-starring with Lydia Lunch and other musicians from New York's thriving, late-1970s and early-1980s music community, an off-shoot of No Wave. These appearances contributed to the band's prominent position in downtown New York in the early 1980s. At present there has been a resurgence of interest in this period, and the band's influence can be heard in many younger bands.

The group scored two dance hits in the U.S. in the early 1980s, with "Too Many Creeps" peaking at #57 Dance in 1981, and "Can't Be Funky/Cowboys In Africa" peaking at #32 in 1982.

Cynthia Sley joined up with Ivan Julian of the Voidoids to form Lovelies. They put out one percussive post-punk album,Mad Orphan (109 Records), in 1988.

Dee Pop also currently performs with Radio I-Ching and Freedomland. Both groups play improvisational jazz. Dee has also performed or recorded with rock oriented Floor Kiss, Immaculate Hearts, The Shams, Black Flies, John Sinclair, Jayne County, The Amazing Cherubs, Fur, Michael Karoli (Can), Richard LLoyd, James Chance, The Slits, Odetta, Gary Lucas, Bobby Radcliff, Patti Palladin, Darlene Love, Andy Shernoff, The Walsos, Nona Hendryx, Band of Outsiders, Lenny Kaye, Jahn Xavier and the Gun Club. He has also performed with the following jazz musicians: Eddie Gale, Roy Campbell, Marc Ribot, Mark Helias, Dick Griffin, Billy Bang, Borah Bergman, Hanuman Sextet

Bush Tetras briefly reformed in the mid-1990s. In 2005, they resumed performing in New York City, and toured Europe in summer 2006.

Laura Kennedy, original bassist for the Bush Tetras, died on November 14, 2011, after a long battle with liver disease.

Discography

Studio albums

• Wild Things [cassette only], 1983, ROIR
• Beauty Lies, 1997, Polygram Records
• Very Very Happy, 2007, ROIR

Singles

• "Too Many Creeps" / "Snakes Crawl" / "You Taste Like the Tropics" [7-inch EP; #99-02], 1980, 99 Records
• "Things That Go Boom in the Night" / "Das Ah Riot" [7-inch single; #FET 007], 1981, Fetish Records
• "Can't Be Funky" / "Can't Be Funky (instrumental)" [7-inch single; #FE 15], 1981, Fetish Records
• Rituals EP: "Can't Be Funky" / "Funky Instrumental" / "Cowboys in Africa" / "Rituals" [12-inch EP; #FE 16], 1981, Fetish Records
• Rituals EP: "Can't Be Funky" / "Funky Version" / "Cowboys in Africa" / "Rituals" [12-inch EP; #TEES 12-07], 1981, Stiff Records
• Better Late Than Never: 1980-1983 [cassette only], 1989, ROIR
• Boom in the Night (Original Studio Recordings 1980 - 1983), 1995, ROIR
• Tetrafied: Previously Released Recordings, 1996, Thirsty Ear
• Page 18 [EP], 1996, Tim/Kerr Records

Compilations

• "Too Many Creeps" appears on Rough Trade Shops - Post Punk Vol. 1 (2003, Rough Trade Records)
• "Can't Be Funky" appears on New York Noise (2003, Soul Jazz Records)
• "Cowboys in Africa" appears on I [Heart] New York Punk! [free with Mojo issue 144]
• "Punch Drunk" and a cover of John Lennon's "Cold Turkey" appear on Start Swimming (1981, Stiff Records), a live record documenting a one-night showcase of New York bands at the Rainbow in London on 20 February 1981.
• "Sister Midnight" appears on We Will Fall (1997)
• "Too Many Creeps" appears on Totally Wired
• "Too Many Creeps" appears on New Wave Dance Hits of the '80s: Just Can't Get Enough (Rhino Records)

Members

Current

• Cynthia Sley - vocals (1979-1983, 1995-1998, 2005-present)
• Pat Place - guitar (1979-1983, 1995-1998, 2005-present)
• Dee Pop - drums (1979-1983, 1995-1998, 2005-present)
• Julia Murphy - bass (2005-present)

Former

• Laura Kennedy - bass (1979-1983, 1995-1998)
• Jimmy Joe Uliana - guitar (1979)
• Adele Bertei - vocals (1979)
• Bob Albertson - bass (1983)
• Don Christenson - drums (1983)

External links

• Bush Tetras on Myspace
• Too Many Creeps video.
• PUNKCAST#1076 Live video from Knitting Factory NYC.
• Photos of the Bush Tetras at the New York No Wave Photo Archive
• thisisoffset Photos, videos and biog of the Bush Tetras.
• Bush Tetras discography, comprehensive 'Discogs' discography.