Gideon, Alexis
Sun Wu-kong
2LP + DVD. A one-hour multimedia video opera based on the 16th-century Chinese novel "The Journey to the West," "Video Musics II" joins the brightest lights of contemporary animation (Becca Taylor (Punk Planet, Arthur); Cynthia Star (Coraline, Moral Orel, Robot Chicken); Ezra Claytan Daniels (Darkhorse Comics, Top Shelf Comics)) with the most promising talents of contemporary music (Rachel Blumberg (M Ward, Arch Cape); Cory Gray (Norfolk & Western, Carcrashlander); Shelley Short (Hush)) to create an aural and visual universe that gleefully transcends both media. Is it film or music, high art or pop? Gideons work would fit snugly at either the Whitney Biennial or SXSW, which is to say it cannot be contained, really, by either venue. Marked throughout by the ambition, commitment to detail, and refusal to settle that have earned Gideon a cult following on both sides of the pond. Alexis Gideon has toured nationally with Dan Deacon and Shelley Short as well as played with Barr, Marnie Stern, Panther, Parts and Labor, Zs, People, Matt and Kim, and many, many others.