- Dino DiMuro
-
Dino DiMuro 
Background information Birth name Dino R. DiMuro Also known as Poindexter Holloway Born March 24, 1957
CaliforniaGenres Rock, pop, chamber music, Captain Beefheart style, experimental Occupations Soundtrack editor Instruments Guitars, keyboards, banjo, slide guitar, drum programming, etc. Years active 1982 - Labels Lonely Whistle Music Website The Unofficial Dino DiMuro Homepage Dino DiMuro is an independent composer, musician and producer.[1]
Contents
Training
DiMuro's musical education began with piano lessons, from his grandmother, and his uncle, composer Harold Owen.
At age 11, inspired by the Flatt & Scruggs soundtrack to Bonnie and Clyde, he acquired a banjo. He acquired his first electric guitar at 13 (inspired by The Beatles). By age 18, he was very good with guitar and bass. At age 26, he acquired his first synthesizer.
DiMuro is rated by some as an excellent guitarist of the Zappa variety, utilizing blues, all available processing, odd phrasing, elements of noise and 20th century polyscale ideas.
Technique
DiMuro tends to construct six to eight track songs, previously using a four track recorder and a two track DAT. In 2003, he upgraded to a Macintosh Pro Tools setup. He generally overdubs all instruments, though has worked with drummer Eric Scott (3 records in 1986), with partner John Gibson in BERTH (1969 onward), and with live performing bands (1995, 2001). He achieves complete band results, when working on his own.
DiMuro has occasionally used "found sound" from garage sales as the basis for songs, such as his full vaudeville arrangement, over top of an amateur singing - in a variable tempo - "Rockabye Your Baby With a Dixie Melody".
Style
His output includes 8 track home recorded Pop music, oddball little songs, Rock and Roll, unconventional humor, and elegantly arranged keyboard compositions. There are parodies ranging from punk rock with banjo, to the most known unknowns in contemporary music (such as: The Residents, French Frith Kaiser and Thompson, NXS, The Pogues, and Garrison Keilor).
Leo Kottke style instrumentals exist alongside Chipmunk vocals, songs about Nudists and other odd subjects, many unconventional love songs, marching band or orchestra productions on synthesizer, quirky biographical numbers, avant-garde works, and experiments (such as an effective guitar solo, processed to sound like rubber bands).
He seems to walk the line between idiosyncrasy, and audience acceptance.
As one enthusiast noted in 1996:
As far as diversity goes, Dino DiMuro makes Camper Van Beethoven sound like Bachman–Turner Overdrive!!Musical career
DiMuro's fan base varies from a few dozen, to about five hundred cassette buyers per album, yet thousands of people world wide are familiar with his name.
On 4/13/2008[update], a boolean search at Yahoo for Dino DiMuro, yields about 22,000 pages.
He began selling and giving away cassettes of his music in 1983, through OPtion and Sound Choice magazines.
From 1985 to '90 I was releasing about 3 cassettes a year. Starting with GOWER STREET it became roughly one every two years, because of the new marriage and more attention to detail. I sent out Trouble at the Mutual Admiration Society and one or two earlier ones to a couple of underground labels. Not a word. When GOWER got great press, I had calls from clubs and managers, and I sent them copies. Nada. Nobody except AudioFile Tapes and Sound of Pig ever released anything by me, except for a compilation here and there.—Dino DiMuroWith Rivalry Insanity (1984), compositional daring increased, although he had already produced multi-instrument Captain Beefheart style music. There were other albums that were merely good. Albums that resist categories include Composite, A Real Pretty Rose, Snoutburger, I Have a Purpose, and Sunday at the Airport.
That's my favorite kind of music, but difficult to achieve—Dino DiMuroHe has produced albums for other home tapers. This allowed DiMuro to give his listeners a Trojan horse, called Poindexter Holloway: L.A. Kingpin!. It had intentionally nasal vocals, and a style ranging from grouchy to manic. It was deceptively packaged, presenting the unknown "Poindexter", as if he were a major star.
In 1991-1993, DiMuro spent two years on a major production, Gower Street, his best known work. It turned out well, despite being hampered by the L.A. riot, and moving from his long established address. Two albums from that time, Vermont Avenue and Stopgap Sam's Steaming Stew, were simpler, surprising, and almost as good.
DiMuro married Julie in 1994. Julie was in a car crash, and died in 2004.
With the release of Simple Chance of Life in 1995, DiMuro switched to CD releases. Establishing a touring band was cut short, by the birth of his two children.
Train Going Nowhere was a basic, professional studio-recorded rock album. That album took six years to finish, due to glitches, money troubles, and resistance from his wife.
He abandoned an album called Unfinished. It had exotic surprises on it, including a song for DiMuro's son, "You Gotta be as Rich as Bill Gates, to Play with Toy Trains".
album was 3/4 complete when Julie had her accident, and I couldn't relate to those songs anymore. It was meant to be called TALES FROM THE MIDDLE AGES.—Dino DiMuroIn 1997, a stranger, 3,000 miles away, created The Unofficial Dino DiMuro Homepage.
DiMuro is a long time friend of many home tapers from the west coast of the U.S., including Don Campau, who guests on many DiMuro albums, and who recorded a collaboration with him, in 2007. Campau now releases DiMuro's CDs on his Lonely Whistle Music label.
Discography
- Sleep Alone Tonight! (1982)
- Adults Are Just Children with Longer Legs (1983)
- Rivalry Insanity
- Composite
- Too Cool To Go Swimming
- Please Do Not Exit Thru Playland (1984)
- The Best of Dino DiMuro (1985)
- Trouble at the Mutual Admiration Society
- DiMuro House
- Snoutburger
- Vegas Train (1986)
- A Real Pretty Rose
- Poindexter Holloway: L.A. Kingpin! (1987)
- I'll Be Good
- High School Football Game
- I Have A Purpose
- She's A Climber (1988)
- Sunday at the Airport
- Gower Street (1993)
- Vermont Avenue
- Stopgap Sam's Steaming Stew Tapes 1, 2 + 3 (1994)
- The Wedding Tape
- The Simple Chance of Life (1995)
- Train Going Nowhere (2001)
- Unfinished (2003)
- Sleeping Highway (2004)
- Outtakes Universe (2005)
- The Ultimate Love Song Collection (2005)
- Don Campau and Dino DiMuro: Playdate (2007)
Secondary discography
- Contains "Carving The Fat I, II, and III," ANDY (synthesizer collaboration involving DiMuro's cat), Nasty Doctor, Berth Reunion Rehearsals I II & III, Phantom Sampling (Lumpy Gravy Meets Rutles Christmas Album disturbed video soundtrack), and more.
Tertiary discography
- Contains "Veteran's Day Massacre," guests spots on albums he produced and distributed for Ted Lee, (such as "Highway Submerged For Canine Transit,"), Don Campau, and others, L.A. Cellular, Wave at the Train (west coast home tapers' documentary) and more.
References
- ^ Chadbourne, Eugene. "Biography: Dino DiMuro". Allmusic. http://www.allmusic.com/artist/p509915. Retrieved 31 May 2010.
External links
- Video on YouTube
- Dino DiMuro at last.fm
- DiMuro Soundclick Page (not recommended for dial-up connections)
Categories:- American composers
- American banjoists
- American pianists
- American guitarists
- Living people
- 1957 births
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.
