Autistic Daughters

Named after a lyric from one of the songs on their first album, Autistic Daughters feature the core trio of guitarist/vocalist/percussionist Dean Roberts, drummer/percussionist Martin Brandlmayr, and bassist Werner Dafeldecker, but also include the Necks' Chris Abrahams and Valerio Tricoli among their collaborators. Each of Autistic Daughters' members has a deep background in experimental and improvisational music: Brandlmayr is a member of the avant-garde group Trapist as well as the post-rock/glitch band Radian. Dafeldecker played with the Viennese group Polwechsel and Fennesz, released an album, 2000's Aluminium, with Roberts, and released a string of solo albums in the late '90s and early 2000s. Roberts, meanwhile, moved from the noisy improvisations of Thela and White Winged Moth in the '90s to moodier, textural, and gradually more structured territory on his solo albums. Released in 2003, Be Mine Tonight -- which featured Dafeldecker and Brandlmayr -- was his most straightforwardly song-like collection yet, and shaped the direction of what would become Autistic Daughters. While working on the follow-up to Be Mine Tonight, Roberts, Dafeldecker, and Brandlmayr realized that their chemistry was more like a band than just collaborators, and so 2004's Jealousy and Diamond became Autistic Daughters' debut album. The trio reconvened for sessions in 2005 with Tricoli and again in 2007, resulting in Uneasy Flowers, which Kranky released in spring 2008.
© Heather Phares /TiVo