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!