Zachery Allan Starkey, Comandante Zero, Shirley House
Monday // Doors at 8:00
$8.00Zachary Allen Starkey borrows aesthetically from goth/punk/avant garde, and his sound is somehow perfectly paired to that look. Electro-clash and 80s grunge come together with vocals akin to The Clash, instrumentation close to New Order, and a general resemblance to Soft Cell. While it sounds straight out of an 80s indie kid’s cassette player, Starkey’s vocals are the modernizing aspect; we’re all FUCKED! is a track about the economy & wall street, while the spellbinding Into The Sun confronts dealing with the unfair loss of a loved one. Beyond all of that it’s the electrifying synth melodies throughout both tracks that have launched Starkey into a phase of recognition. Goes well with cigarettes, eyeliner, and French accents.
It’s Joy Division meets The Roots in a beautiful marriage of minimalist funk and electro. Comandante Zero is ironically enough commanding you to dance and it feels as relevantly retro on the dance floor as Daft Punk’s RAC. Sudden Entropy has a bass line and guitar sequences that are eerily similar to Get Lucky, but with a much less polished production, and an inherent originality. The funk here feels like it comes from the soul, and not the affected vocals of grown men hiding behind masks.
I am finding Shirley House so damn refreshing. It’s some of the best pop songwriting I’ve heard this year, with choruses in the vein of Fun. or Bastille. What’s fantastic is these crystal clear melodies and lyrics, approachable and fun, are presented within a hazy sounding pop production. Run Dadda almost feels like Rusted Root and Vanilla Ice’s production and melodies time traveled to a Brooklyn bedroom.
Zachery Allan Starkey
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Zachery Allan Starkey is an electronic musician and songwriter based in Brooklyn, New York City. His songs combine elements of electro, synth pop, post punk, house music, new wave, and no wave with deeply personal lyrics. Starkey's combination of sweeping, infectiouss synth melodies, kinetic dance rhythms, distinctive vocals and articulate, brutally honest lyrics have helped him develop a strong cult following. In January 2013, Starkey started work on his third full length record, entitled DIY. Recorded with Co-Producer Brian Lee Smith of Sub Tech Zero in a grimy basement studio in the Bushwick neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York, DIY was again completely written and performed by Starkey, with Smith lending his production/engineering expertise. "I called the album DIY because it very much reflects the circumstances under which the album was made", says Starkey. "I lived in New York City for the past four years. I also have not left New York City for the past four years. The songs I wrote for DIY simply real life, the ups and downs, the struggles and successes I have been through during the past four years. I was a working class kid from Ohio who came to New York City on a train with nothing my goals and work ethic. The songs on DIY are about everything I have been through as I worked to carve out a place for myself here in NYC." April 2013 saw the release of DIY's first single, the extremely moving Into the Sun. "Into the Sun is a song I wrote about the death of my Grandfather", Starkey says. "I was very close to my Grandfather when I was growing up. He was killed by a drunk driver when I was 14 years old, and Into the Sun is about coping with this death. I think it's the best song I have ever written." Upon it's release, Into the Sun caught many ears with moving subject matter. The Deli Magazine noted, "By combining basic darkwave synths with Gary Numan-esque vocals, Starkey's newest single, 'Into the Sun', paints personal loss in simple poetic strokes." We're All FUCKED! Followed Into the Sun and preceded the release of DIY in May 2013. A biting critique of Wall Street and the US economic crisis, We're All Fucked quickly became a Brooklyn club hit due to it's populist outrage and and synth hooks. Within a month of release, both Into the Sun and We're All FUCKED have been picked up by underground radio stations from New York City to Los Angeles to Buenos Aires to Lima, Peru. With two more singles from DIY in the future, plus music videos and lots of concerts, ZAS and DIY have a most busy year ahead.