Seminal cello-driven trio Rasputina will release their seventh album,
'Sister Kinderhook' on June 15, 2010. Rasputina directress, Melora
Creager recorded it whilst pregnant in the Hudson Valley just last
summer. She and Brian Kehew (Moog Cookbook, Fiona Apple, Air) mixed it
in Los Angeles with a newborn in the studio. You should have rec'd a
copy by now but if not you can hear the whole album here:
http://bit.ly/akRqTm.
If you like what you hear and want to hear more I'm glad to send a copy
upon request. In the end I'm hoping you'll give serious consideration to
covering this unique and influential outfit coverage via a CD review or
feature.

  This album finds Melora expressing a thematic fantasy of Colonial
Federalism. Subject-wise, she also touches on  feral children (Snow-Hen
of Austerlitz), the Anti-rent Wars of 1844 (Calico Indians), and Early
American portraiture (The 2 Miss Leavens), not to mention the theory
that giants were indeed real, but killed each other off in a
self-genocidal holocaust (A Holocaust of Giants).
  Sister Kinderhook is a return to Rasputina's early, more organic sound.
Melora produced and engineered the thing at her homestead in the
country. Hudson, NY is home to many fabulous female artists that gained
notoriety in the 1990's, including Melora, Melissa Auf Der Maur and
M'Shell N'Degeocello.
  In addition to voice and cello, Melora played banjo and harpsichord.
  For the first time, Rasputina employs a male cellist. Daniel DeJesus
came of age listening obsessively to Rasputina records, and can play and
sing the entire catalog.
  Catie  D'Amica was a local punk-rock teenager. Melora thought, "If I put
her behind an eccentric kit that included a concert bass drum, a djembe
and ankle bells, and if she played her simple but cool punk-rock beats,
we might really have something." When the internet compared Catie to a
"Native American drum machine", Melora knew that experiment was
successful.

  Melora has maintained the Rasputina group for almost 20(0) years. Genres
come and go and Rasputina often gets mistakenly lumped into passing
fancies, but Rasputina manages to survive and defy categorization by
maintaining a child-like delight in music-making alongside a clear &
true integrity.

  Since Rasputina's last full-length recording (2007's Oh Perilous World),
Melora has released a number of limited edition short-works: The Willow
Tree Tryptich (3 ancient folk songs titled The Willow Tree), Ancient
Cross-Dressing Songs (self-explanatory), and The Pregnant Concert (a
full live show from September 2009).

  Melora grew up in Kansas in a musical family which did play together as
an ensemble, though certainly not publicly. At 18 she moved to NYC where
she studied photography at Parsons School of Design. While there, she
began playing the cello with drag performers and eventually the 4AD
band, Ultra Vivid Scene. That exposure to the glamorous world of
professional rock music led her to found Rasputina. She thought it would
be easy. Touring with Nirvana taught her lessons in avoidance of immense
fame, which she has successfully practised since.

  Rasputina made 2 albums for Columbia/Sony (Thanks for the Ether, How We
Quite the Forest), 2 albums for Instinct Records (Cabin Fever!,
Frustration Plantation) and one previous (Oh Perilous World) on her own
Filthy Bonnet Recording Co. label.

www.rasputina.com

For more information and material contact Howard at Howlin' Wuelf Media at
215-428-9119 or howlingwuelf@aol.com