Remember playing rock, paper, scissors during recess in elementary
school? Well, Tim Crabtree’s project Paper Beat Scissors has little to
do with childish games, but there is something youthful about his
approach to music. Instead of locking himself in the ivory tower of
song, he begins by tinkering around on guitar and making sounds
reminiscent of vocals with his mouth.
“It’s more about melody and sounds than anything else,” says
Crabtree, who draws from the personal and the abstract. His bandmates
include Jesse Tesolin on cello, Amy Lounder on violin and Ryan
Veltmeyer on melodica, who help create the moody atmospheric tones of
the four-track demo Flicker, which also includes a beautiful
stop-animation video for the song “Be Patient,” by Chris Tootell
(animator on Coraline).
With their self-recorded disc in tow, Paper Beat Scissors are
heading out on tour to Ontario and back for a few weeks via the train.
All aboard!
This article appears in Jun 11-17, 2009.