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Thighpaulsandra

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Thighpaulsandra
Thighpaulsandra in concert with Spiritualized, 1998
Thighpaulsandra in concert with Spiritualized, 1998
Background information
Birth nameTim Lewis
OriginWales
GenresElectronic, ambient, industrial, space rock, dream pop, neo-psychedelia, drone, noise, glitch, experimental
OccupationMusician
Instrument(s)Piano, keyboards, vocals, guitar, bass, autoharp, violin, mellotron, synthesizer, french horn, harpsichord, accordion, theremin, sampler
Years activeearly 80's-present
LabelsEskaton

Thighpaulsandra (Tim Lewis) is a Welsh experimental musician and multi-instrumentalist known mostly for performing on synthesizers and keyboards. As Tim Lewis, he began his career working with Julian Cope. A collaboration with Cope in 1993 followed, as the experimental duo Queen Elizabeth. This project completed just the two albums, Queen Elizabeth (ESP Records 1994) and Elizabeth Vagina (Head Heritage 1997), each containing extremely long spacey tracks of between 20–47 minutes in duration. In 1997, former Cope guitarist Mike Mooney invited Lewis to fill for the departing Kate Radley on a Spiritualized tour, where he remained until early 2008. In 1999 he also became a member of the experimental band Coil. He has subsequently released several solo albums.

Career

Beginning his career in the early 1980s with the hair metal band Temper Temper, Lewis next became the house engineer and studio manager at Loco Studios near Newport. Living in S. Wales, Lewis was at first unable to capitalise on his real influences, such as krautrock and improvised electronic music. Eventually, his work with Julian Cope provided the right atmosphere, and Lewis was invited to contribute synthesizers to Cope's Def American albums Autogeddon and 20 Mothers. As Thighpaulsandra, Lewis has also produced and appeared on other records, such as 'Zero Beats Per Minute' by Anal (on Cope's KAK label 1995), RocketGoldStar, and 'Love Peace & Fuck' by Brain Donor (Impresario 2001)

In 1997, Thighpaulsandra joined the band Spiritualized for a US tour and survived the cuts to the band made shortly thereafter, his band mate Mike Mooney quitting to form Lupine Howl with bassist Sean Cook and drummer Damon Reece. Thighpaulsandra can be heard on the records Live at the Albert Hall, Let It Come Down, Amazing Grace and Songs in A&E. He also joined Coil the next year and performed on such albums as Astral Disaster, Musick to Play in the Dark Vol. 1 and Musick to Play in the Dark Vol. 2.

During the same period, Thighpaulsandra also worked on The Waterboys' album A Rock in the Weary Land. The artwork for his Double Vulgar album caused some controversy with several printers not willing to reproduce the controversial imagery. Double Vulgar II was delayed, possibly for the same reason, along with the passing of friend and colleague John Balance.

His first three solo releases came out via the Coil label, Eskaton. John Balance provided vocals for Thighpaulsandra's first release Some Head EP, and Peter Christopherson designed the artwork for the I, Thighpaulsandra double album and for the following "Double Vulgar" albums. London based Austrian photographer Ruth Bayer took the front cover image for "I, Thighpaulsandra". Bayer was the official photographer for many of the first London Coil shows.

Since leaving Spiritualized in 2008 Thighpaulsandra has been working with Elizabeth Fraser on her forthcoming solo album and was part of her group for a series of live shows at the Royal Festival Hall in 2012 as part of the Meltdown Festival. In September 2013 he joined Wire on their UK and European tours playing keyboards.

After a hiatus from solo work, Thighpaulsandra released The Golden Communion in 2015.

Discography

Compilation appearances

Remixes

with Coil

with Spiritualized

with Julian Cope

with Queen Elizabeth

with Cyclobe

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