Posters available - Cheaper!

The 3 posters that were previously only available through the AoMM4 art show & website are now available to order from bobkurthy.com for cheaper prices!

You will find 'buy now' buttons on the posters in the 'portfolio' section of bobkurthy.com.

Soon there will also be links to order them throught the 'shop' page...

BlowUpBlow in The District Weekly

Pick up the new District Weekly to see this article on m'band BlowUpBlow...

The District Weekly - VOL. 1, ISSUE 48, March 5th, 2008
THE MODERN DANCE
BlowUpBlow's equations for a falling body
by Chris Ziegler

[click thumbnail to enlarge]

[photo by Barri York Hoover]

BlowUpBlow live together under humming power lines alongside a long bleak highway and next to a nursery behind a fence—little leaves poking under wire—and sometimes creepy people come walking silently along the top of their backyard wall, and if waking up to those kinds of horizons each morning doesn't mess with their music, it's only because they moved in with an amenable vibe already inside them.
"We were all already preoccupied with certain odd dark aspects of society anyway," says bassist Dennis Owens, familiar also to many as the co-founder of soul-funk club Good Foot or from behind the counter at Fingerprints.

"And now we're living the dream," says guitarist END, sitting with the rest of the band in a backyard circle under the power lines at twilight.

Their first show in seven months was last week at the Prospector—drummer Bob Kurthy took some time to explore a side project called fatherhood—and once they got everything turned back on, Long Beach's gravity increased massively. Owens and Kurthy are a rhythm section whose fossil footprints will be found in nuclear mud a million years from now—one unreleased song turns two notes into a boat about to roll over—and END and singer/guitarist Paul Zansler use particularly ruined rock guitar—riffs that could have been sold to girl groups, if they weren't turned inside out—to reanimate the troglodytic caveband ethos of the unsung late '60s. They're a dark, loud and nervous band with that power line electricity somewhere as inspiration—"The average person who likes indie would look at us and think, 'They're harshing my mellow!'" says Owens.

Zansler says Owens turned him on to Can, and drummer Kurthy's dedication to prog-rock is so noted that he's been specifically profiled in other papers, but Owens easily details the band overlaps anyway: "Ramones, Devo, AC/DC, Motorhead, Turbonegro's Apocalypse Dudes, James Brown, the Stooges, and '60s garage rock," he says, and certainly all those actual records rest ready for action not 20 feet away in the Blow house's album bunker. (Currently rolling: African wedding-band music from the '70s.)

A lot of that is rust-rock—not so clinical as "proto-punk," and alive with a specific dread that hovers between Pere Ubu's "vaporous dawn" (last phrase of their first liner notes) and Pere Ubu's "formless void." (Last phrase of their second liner notes, from the "Final Solution" 45 that lent BlowUpBlow a particularly ferocious cover.) Head down in the BlowUpBlow practice space, listening to stridently grimy live tapes recorded on Kurthy's little digital unit, it's easy to sense the menace. At the end of "It's Time," a seven-minute track nailed into Kurthy's rigid drum pattern, the song heaves and surges and Zansler looks up: "This is like when the tanks come over the trenches.

They're funny guys, too—END always has something ready—but as Behemoth once said: "It's just a joke, man!" (And as Zansler once sang: "I wanna laugh!") But what's Zansler's most cheerful lyric? Well, everyone gets a laugh about that as he wonders: "Pick out the prettiest worm in the can?" he says. "What a can of worms. 'Did Jesus let it happen? The devil ran wild / everybody got it / they put the fear back in style.' Doesn't that make you happy?"

They get to have the first song on the coming Fidotrust Long Beach compilation, and so their sound will introduce the city to the world: "Sunshine Part 1," a tight and tense riff, locked into repetition until the song cracks and hiss and wind sweep in—not so much a kick in a soft spot as a chilly finger tapped on the top of the spine. Maybe not cheerful either, but still: It's dark by the time we're done with the interview, but they're all around a lit little candle and laughing as I leave.

[click here to go to original, online article]

AMM4 video segment

Well, the Art of Musical Maintenance 4 show has come to a close. But the people at Pirate Satellite TV have put together a video promo segment, which I've embedded below...

Fistful of Rock & Roll art book update

Back in October 2005, I recieved an email from Electric Frankenstein guitarist/art aficionado Salvatore Canzonieri. He hit me up about having some of my poster artwork featured, along with hundreds of other artists' work, in a book he was putting together.

Soon after, as requested, I submitted 4 pieces of Sal's choosing. Some were originally photocopied flyers which I colored digitally just for this book. He seemed to be partial to work I did in the mid-1990's, which was more in the comic-book vein than the posters I've been doing more recently.

The book, entitled A Fistful of Rock & Roll - Real Rock Art for Real Rock Bands, will be published by Dark Horse.

Over 300 artists will be featured. It will contain 3 main chapters. One will continue where Sal's first book left off, containing Electric Frankenstein artwork. Another chapter will be a chronological historical section showing poster art through the centuries. And a third section will contain rock posters from hundreds of artists, including (editors permitting) myself.

Since submitting my pieces, the book project progress seemed to move at a pace proportional to it's projected weight. I actually thought the project may have been shelved indefinitely.

But here is the latest word, according to a post by Sal on a forum at Gigposters.com from Oct. 2007:

People at Dark Horse are currently editing the text.
It is slated for release in June 2008.

And from the Electric Frankenstein News page (date of post unknown):

...The new book is called: "A Fistful of Rock & Roll - Real Rock Art for Real Rock Bands", and it is featuring over 500 of the world's greatest Rock poster, lowbrow, and underground artists! Tons of fantastic artists (like Coop, Kozik, Alan Forbes, Art Chantry, Johnny Ace, John Pound, William Stout, Dennis Worden, Cliff Mott, and more!) are in this art book, it's even bigger than the previous book! 400 pages with a FREE DVD inside featuring more art and songs from great Rock & Roll bands, sponsored by Devil Doll / This Dark Reign Records!

Oh! and I discovered the following on the Fistful of Rock & Roll MySpace profile:
(click thumbnail to enlarge)

A Fistful of Rock & Roll - Real Rock Art for Real Rock Bands! Book 1
Published by Dark Horse Books, publishers of the Electric Frankenstein! art book, scheduled for June 2008!
Stay tuned for Part 2 as well: It's Only Rock & Roll But I Like It! - More Real Rock Art for Real Rock Bands!

And finally, after contacting Sal himself, I've been informed that the book will consist of 3 volumes. The first book will be out in June 2008. The other books, and which one my work will appear in, has yet to be determined...

Write up in The District Weekly

Chris Ziegler wrote a nice little blurb about me/my artwork for The District Weekly, a Long Beach, CA local magazine. Check it out...

Here's the cover...


Here's where it is...
(click thumbnail to enlarge)

The District Weekly
Oct. 17, 2007, Vol. 1, Issue 28, Page 44

BEST OF: MUSIC

PERSONALITY TYPE: BOB KURTHY’S POSTER ART Colossally recognizable typographic insanity from BlowUpBlow’s (and other bands beside) motorik drummer Bob Kurthy, who twists names and places into monsters and masks and stamps it onto a poster. His white tiger and hammerhead shark mark his more intense recent work, but everything he does comes with a hi-def intensity all his own. bobkurthy.com // CZ

Pretty cool. And I'm sandwiched between writeups on Bill Ross & Dennis Owens' Good Foot soul club.

My band in the new OC Weekly!

The new OC Weekly features a review of my band BlowUpBlow's "new" single Supertonight. It's in the Music/Locals Only section--1/2 page w/ color photo. Priddy shweet...

Apparently I am a most motorik* machine from the earth's core...hmm...could be worse.
;-)

(* a Krautrock descriptive)

Here it is. Beware; this article is dense with semi-obscure musical references/comparisons (some of us will need to 'google'):

OC Weekly - Thursday, 19 January 2006
I WANT MORE
BLOWUPBLOW, SUPERTONIGHT/SUPERTONIGHT (AMISH RIOT MIX) 12" SINGLE, SPINAL DISC
Thursday, 19 January 2006
BlowUpBlow - Supertonight
by Chris Ziegler

"So how the darkness doubled: long time cooling for BlowUpBlow's Supertonight single, which was a signature song when they used to play it in 2004 but which needed a just-so recording to get it right. Fine with me: this double A-side maxi-single claps the Can/Ubu original against a loft-disco Liquid Liquid remix and packs in a few tracks from last year's Sunshine on the Frontline CD (reviewed earlier in OCW) and that adds out to about 15 heavy minutes of heartbeat-in-darkness repetition rock. Rapture is sort of a reference—though I can almost guarantee you this song owes more parentage to Can's I Want More than House of Jealous Lovers—so maybe "relative" is a better word. Supertonight is a stark dark song carefully faithful to that spirit of '79, when Suicide and mass murder (as barely tolerated by Pop Group) put some pig-iron into pop. Bassist Dennis Owens (also in Free Moral Agents and also keeping the good at club Good Foot) and drummer Bob Kurthy are the rhythm section from the center of the earth and guitarists Paul Zanzler and END (possibly also known as ENDio Morricone) lock leads like Television with Levene instead of Verlaine. Marquee Moon is a dance song, too, and though Supertonight drops Television tightness for Mission of Burma atmosphere, it puts the same spots before your eyes. The "Amish Riot" remix deletes almost everything but a generous dub echo and remakes Supertonight into something by Material or especially Liquid Liquid, whose Optimo lends a lot to the tense Amish finale. Disco (as they called it one summer) actually did get this dark (Was Not Was took Detroit creepdom digital) and Martin Rev did as much for a drum machine beat as anybody; Zansler with remix reverb here stutters like Alan Vega (as in: "America America is killin' its youth!") and I could even hear some Big Black (or Dale Nixon) in the way BlowUpBlow built this song around a machine. (Machine being Kurthy—that most motorik drummer.) People talk about club-friendly and a-good-beat and that's just what Supertonight has always had, though something about those phrases as used here makes me want to tug a helmet tighter down on my head. Final Solution wasn't a dance song, really, but Supertonight is a real good one, though it's pretty great if you really don't care to dance at all again ever, too. A deep dense record that used well all the time it took.

Contact: blowupblow.com

BLOWUPBLOW PERFORMS WITH THIS EVENING AND SOLO CLIQUE AT ALEX'S BAR
2913 E. ANAHEIM ST., LONG BEACH, (562) 434-8292. THURS.,
FEB. 8. $3. 21+."

[Go to original, online article]

BlowUpBlow review in the new OC Weekly!

Michael Coyle has written a very, very good review of our [BlowUpBlow] CD Sunshine on the Front Line in the latest OC Weekly (Vol. 11, No. 20, Jan. 20-26, 2006).

Pick one up, and check out Locals Only on page 22...not to be confused with a separate article on the same page entitled Yearn to be Blown. This is merely a coincidence. :-)

OR, check out the online version HERE.

OR...well, I'm just gonna copy it right here:

Locals Only
by MICHAEL COYLE
Thursday, 19 January 2006
BlowUpBlow
Sunshine on the Front Line

"BlowUpBlow is made up of four guys with some serious local pedigree: Dennis Owens, Bob Kurthy, END and Paul Zansler, if you wanna drop names. Legends, one might even be tempted to call them, since they can be linked back in one way or another to almost everything fun that has happened in Long Beach in the past 10 years. And now theyre all working together as one. Expect greatness, yes? Many people hear BUB and knee-jerk something about Gang Of Four, which is actually still a compliment when its done right, as it is hereBUB do indeed rock snappy rhythms and fuzzy-funky bass lines that make you want to dance all herky-jerky. But really we keep thinking of the glory days of old SST Records: this sounds like punk rock that was meant to be played on vinyl, like it coulda been shipped in the same box as everything else Ginns label put out in 1985. The guitar is constantly on some crazy melody line, but subtle like how J Mascis would do it under all that distortion, or how D. Boon would just keep piling it on without it ever getting too heavy: the album opens with Lost All Control, a dirty boogie with Iggy desperation, followed by the paranoid car-chase fury of Get Anywhere, and it launches straight up from there, mentioning bombs dropping at least twice. Thats a good signthey know the kind of damage they can do.

BLOWUPBLOW PERFORM WITH FUTURE ANCIENTS AND SOLO CLIQUE AT THE PROSPECTOR, 2400 E. SEVENTH ST., LONG BEACH, (562) 438-3839. SAT., 10 P.M. $3-$5. 21 ."


Ready to blow / Tenaya Hills photo

Thanks, Mike!

Bob in OC Weekly [out today 12-20-05]

DISCLAIMER:

I forsee some misunderstanding of the following 'quote':
"I've done most of the artwork for bands I'm in: the fliers, covers, posters and shirts."
This refers to the bands I have been in in the past, and BlowUpBlow **BUT** In the actual interview, I stated that I've ONLY done A COUPLE of pieces of artwork for The BOLIDES and that Dr. Mikro Fiche (a.k.a. MIKE SMITH) does the vast majority of Bolides artwork & design--he is the 'art director' and set the Bolides' aesthetic. This is important to me to make clear to everyone--especially Mike.

Got it? Good!

The online version of the article can be found here.

[Orange County Weekly - Vol. 11, No. 16, Dec. 23-29, 2005]
Aural ReportsNO COMRADES
Bob Kurthy, BlowUpBlow
By "Rex Reason" - photo by Matt Otto


"Drummer Bob Kurthy of Blow Up Blow (alias Dr. Drummond of the Bolides) is happy to discuss his artwork, his music and his participant's perspective on the past 15 years of local music. However, it's as one of the area's pre-eminent progressive rock music fans that he truly shines.

You're an artist as well as a drummer?

I've done most of the artwork for bands I'm in: the fliers, covers, posters and shirts. [see disclaimer above. - Bob] I did a comic book with Eric, who's in Blow Up Blow. I always dreamed of doing comics when I was a kid, but that made me realize that I hate to draw the same thing over and over. It doesn't look tedious when you look at it, but it is.

So you're also known as a progressive rock fan.

I like all kinds of different music, but the prog rock thing is something I've loved deeply for over 20 years, and I've always gotten all kinds of shit about it. So I guess I talk about it more because of that. The last couple of years more young kids are getting into that kind of stuff, and there are some bands getting big that I would consider progressive. There's kind of a tide of acceptance. But this will pass.

Who are your favorites?

King Crimson. All eras of King Crimson and early Genesis.

What about later Genesis?

I'm not into the hits. There's stuff on all the later albums that would kind of fit with what I listen to, but not the hits.

How do you like Phil Collins as a solo artist?

I like him as a singer. I don't like the hits as far as the solo career. I do like a few things on his first two solo albums.

Which came first for you, punk or prog?

I listened to punk rock before I got into prog. I was born in 1970, so there was always a little prog rock here and there before I knew it was called that. In sixth grade I saw Devo and the Cars and then got into punk rock, stuff my older brother would bring home. I still like a lot of the punk stuff, but I got a little bit burned out. I started listening to typical classic rock radio. There were songs here and there I would pick out. No one got me into prog rock. I just put things together. I'd go to used record stores. I had no comrades in this. It was a total solo venture.

How do you like the bands that mix prog and punk?

It's always been in the back of my mind playing music, finding some sort of medium there. It's not easy to do. I like NoMeansNo a lot. They found a way to blend prog and punk. It usually takes a lot of dark humor. I'm all for the hybrids. I'm not a purist.

As a prog fan, how do you get music?

In most stores, I don't find what I'm looking for. I listen to a lot of Internet radio. I have 27 progressive rock stations on my iTunes. I used to make lists and go to stores and find one out of 20 things. It's not stores lacking as much as my liking stuff that's not well-liked.

Do you have favorite obscure prog bands?

Lately I've been getting hold of a lot of old Italian prog bands; Goblin, Osanna, stuff like that. All that sound is based on the original British prog bands. One of my favorite bands is a Swedish band called Anekdoten. They're currently playing. But they're my age, and they work regular jobs in Sweden. They don't get over here that much.

Got any favorite local prog-ish bands?

The Mars Volta is partly local. Bad Dudes. There's a band called Big Muscles. It doesn't seem so trendy to the point where everyone's trying to do it.

FOR MORE BOB SEE BLOWUPBLOW.COM AND THEBOLIDES.COM."