No Age

Wikipedia:

No Age is a two-person American indie rock group consisting of guitarist Randy Randall and drummer/vocalist Dean Allen Spunt. The band is based in Los Angeles and is currently signed to Sub Pop records. The duo initially played together with drummer Jeremy Villalobos in Wives, and takes their name from the title of a 1987 SST Records instrumental compilation, which Spunt discovered while working at Aron's, a record store in Los Angeles. Along with the bands Health, Mika Miko, Silver Daggers, Abe Vigoda, BARR, and David Scott Stone, No Age has been listed as a mainstay of the Downtown Los Angeles venue The Smell. The band has strong ties with the Los Angeles underground community centered around The Smell. No Age has released three full-length albums, toured extensively in support of them, and is a strong advocate of the All-ages Movement Project, an organization that connects youth to each other and to the arts through independent music.

History

Formation, EPs, and Weirdo Rippers

No Age formed in December 2005 out of the ashes of their previous band, the hardcore punk group Wives, in which Dean played bass and Randy played guitar. They played their first show at the New Image Art gallery for a show curated by friend and artist Rich Jacobs on January 22, 2006. Their first proper show was at The Smell in April 2006 with sister band Mika Miko. "The Smell is where we got to experiment and find what kind of band we wanted to be. It pushed the boundaries of whatever ideas we had about music—and we had a community to try out these new ideas," Randall told Drew Tewksbury in 2008. On March 6, 2006 Randy and Dean played one reunion show as their previous incarnation, Wives, for the underground film 40 Bands 80 Minutes! directed by Sean Carnage. The band recorded 5 limited edition vinyl singles and EPs, and released them on 5 different labels on the same day, March 26, 2007. The back of each record's sleeve was a different color, and had one of the letters that, when you collected all of them, would join to spell "No Age." These 5 EPs and singles were collected and released in album form under the title Weirdo Rippers, on June 11, 2007 through Fat Cat Records. The cover featured the exterior of The Smell, re-done to read No Age and, below, Weirdo Rippers by Amanda Vietta, an artist and friend of No Age. This re-do can also be seen in the band's first music video for the song Boy Void. No Age are known for their community allegiance and playing un-traditional venues, such as their show at the Los Angeles River (shown at left), to protest the Aqueduct. Among other places, they have also played at Food Fight, a vegan grocery store in Portland, Oregon, and the Los Angeles Central Library in downtown Los Angeles. A New Yorker article on the band from November 19, 2007 entitled Let It Rip earned them much acclaim and fans.

Sub Pop, touring, and Nouns

Buoyed by positive reviews in the music press, No Age signed to the prominent Seattle-based independent label Sub Pop. The band have gotten support from many contemporary artists. Deerhunter's Bradford Cox named No Age his favorite new band in an interview with Pitchfork Media on February 2, 2007. Radiohead's Colin Greenwood has also shown his support, most notably when he wore their signature rainbow font t-shirt in their January 16, 2008 live online concert broadcast. On January 25, 2008, No Age began their profile building month-long, 23-date tour with New York band Liars. Liars and No Age also released a joint 7" single limited to 1200 copies to coincide with the tour. 200 copies of the two-song single were sold on tour, with unique cover art for each individual city designed by Brian Roettinger, and the other 1000 featured hand letterpress-printed covers with different ink and vinyl color for each one. Fulfilling their tendency to play at un-traditional venues, No Age played a show at an Ethiopian restaurant named Queen of Sheba in Philadelphia. The change of venue took place at the last minute when Liars' Angus Andrew got sick beforehand. In April Randy Randall accompanied the Altamont Apparel skate team to Paris, France to film them for a short tour film entitled "The Foreigners," with the soundtrack featuring exclusively No Age music. The film is being distributed for free, at skateshops and accompanying certain Altamont products, and also features the video for Eraser. No Age appeared on a straight-to-VHS edition of Juan's Basement on April 22, 2008. The episode was broadcasted on Pitchfork Media's Pitchfork TV site. On May 6, 2008, No Age released their debut record for Sub Pop, Nouns. No Age appeared in an episode of VBS.tv "Practice Space," showing their Bushwick, New York practice space, which used to be a metal shop. In May 2008, UK music magazine Mojo named No Age one of the top ten best new acts, beside Bon Iver and Sub Pop labelmates Fleet Foxes.

Nouns Videos

The music video for No Age's song "Eraser" debuted on June 27, 2008. It was directed by Andy Bruntel, also responsible for the videos of artists such as Will Oldham, St. Vincent, and The Mountain Goats. The video begins with No Age's instrumental song "Impossible Bouquet" from Nouns, before it segues into "Eraser". Another video for the track "Keechie" was posted on Bruntel's website, filmed at the same location along the Los Angeles River that No Age once played at. The video ends on the same character and framing as the beginning of the "Eraser" video, making it a companion video or prequel.

The band have also published a video of their song "Impossible Bouquet" on their blog. A No Age music video for the song "Goat Hurt" has appeared on the band's blog, and is included on a new DVD entitled New Video Works released by Dean Spunt's label, Post Present Medium. The song is off of the band's out of print Dead Plane EP, but was also available through a limited edition 10" EP made available at the Fuck Yeah! festival held in L.A. on August 30, 2008. The video was directed by "sister band" Mika Miko's Jennifer Clavin.

Losing Feeling and Everything In Between through present

No Age has previously worked with skateboarder Andrew Reynold's clothing company, Altamont Apparel, and for the company's fall line they contributed a collection for which the theme was "The human body's amazing capacity to heal." Those contributing were Hisham Baroocha, Sam McPheeters, Matthew Thurber, and the members of the group themselves. No Age's next undertaking with the company came when they went on a tour with members the company and The Goat, a musical group featuring Andrew Reynolds, fellow skateboarder Kevin "Spanky" Long, skate photographer Atiba Jefferson and skateboarding filmer Beagle.

The group released the EP Losing Feeling on October 6, 2009.

On June 24, 2010, No Age announced their new album, Everything In Between, along with the tracklisting. On July 28, No Age premiered the first single from the album, Glitter on a BBC 6 Music interview with Steve Lamacq. On August 10, the album's cover was released, and plans to release two Glitter singles were announced, along with their respective covers. The singles were released on August 24. Everything In Between was released on September 28, 2010, to generally favorable reviews. The band have been chosen by Les Savy Fav to perform at the ATP Nightmare Before Christmas festival that they co-curate in December 2011 in Minehead, England.