Digital Lady

Digital Lady was an experimental rock band from San Francisco. The band formed in 1968 when Desmond Wolfe and Ioine Cusmari discovered a common interest in subversion, tattoos, and The Meters. They soon added Donald Twain on bass and Manfred Ziegler on drums to round out the group. Manfred was brother to Ron Ziegler, notable for serving for a time in the Nixon Administration and calling Watergate a "third-rate burglary".^[1]

Their first EP, Lush Bum,^[2] was poorly received except in small circles in and around the Laurel Heights district of San Francisco. It wasn't until their full length, Impeccable Creams, was released that they began to develop a substantial following.

First Efforts

On February 29, at a 'Leap Year Party' they'd mutually crashed, Cusmari encountered Wolfe attempting to steal the recently released musical album, Switched-On Bach. Their discussion quickly turned to a mutual affinity for the 900 Series Moog synthesizer. Shortly after, Cusmari and Wolfe took to the studio to record their first EP, Lush Bum. Consisting of six tracks (total running length 22:16), Lush Bum was allegedly recorded in only two weeks. Although photographs of the recording sessions have yet to be unearthed, the recording setup was said to be notoriously sparse; Cusmari and Wolfe recorded their EP with two acoustic guitars and a single Shure SM58 microphone. Drums were improvised using kitchen dishes and utensils.

Unfortunately, upon the release of Lush Bum, Digital Lady failed to gain the respect of their peers in the San Francisco music community. The EP was universally scorned by critics for its thinly veiled innuendo and brash obscenities, and was mocked for its rudimentary attempts to duplicate the sounds of the Moog synthesizer with acoustic guitars. However, the falsetto-drenched harmonies of Cusmari and Wolfe were generally well-respected.

Influences

Digital Lady's essence can be heard in a variety of today's bands, including The Provisionals, who covered the Digital Lady song, Girls In Green, on their first EP. Similarly, smatterings of Digital Lady can be heard here and there throughout the shoegaze genre. There is also mention of "thumbs gone weird",^[3] in the movie, Withnail and I.

References

1. ^ NYTimes Sun Feb 11 2003
2. ^ Leibnitz, Mendel. "Digital Ladies". Indie Archives 2.2 (2003): 20-23.
3. ^ Withnail & I:Criticism and Reflections: Jennifer Child

• NYTImes , February 11, 2003
• Leibnitz, Mendel. "Digital Ladies". Indie Archives 2.2 (2003): 20-23.
• Withnail & I:Criticism and Reflections by Jennifer Child