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Nucultures : Butterflies, Zebras, And Moonbeams
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This adventurous double CD collection of music is a kaleidoscope of songs and sound blending shapes and hues with vocals, horns, strings, piano, drum machines, vocal loops, guitars, bass, and left-field electronics into a brilliant textured soundscape.
Genre: Pop: with Electronic Production
Release Date: 2007
Butterflies, Zebras, And Moonbeams Record Label: 1k Recordings inc
  • Buy CD - $20.00
Preview Song Name Time Format Price Select
Night Is Beautiful 5:28 Album Only
All Around You 3:26 Album Only
Head 3:21 Album Only
Behind the Moon 5:39 Album Only
Babylon Is Crying (Tigris) 5:37 Album Only
Run For Cover 2:58 Album Only
Lifeguard 3:26 Album Only
The Rain 3:40 Album Only
The Shadow Box 5:28 Album Only
The Universe Is Expanding 3:04 Album Only
Amorphous Lake 1:14 Album Only
Think I'm Losin It 6:20 Album Only
Lead to Gold 3:33 Album Only
Find Life Alive 4:37 Album Only
Lucy Falls 6:40 Album Only
Red Lights 2:20 Album Only
Mind Dunes 1:31 Album Only
Circles, Lines, and Spaces 4:21 Album Only
Twilight in Grey 1:05 Album Only
Nowhere 3:47 Album Only
In Our Hands 2:06 Album Only
The Rain Reprise 0:43 Album Only
preview all songs

Album Notes

Philadelphia’s finest unite and create 2-disc downtempo opus – NUCULTURES -- “Butterflies, Zebras, and Moonbeams”

TOP 10 ESSENTIAL RECORD OF 2007 - JOHN DILIBERTO (ECHOES)
ESSENTIAL RECORD OF 2007 TOP 25 - ECHOES RADIO STAFF

Recording as the collective “Nucultures”, ‘Butterflies, Zebras, and Moonbeams’ is a collaboration between Philadelphia lyricist/vocalist Ellie Perez, acclaimed guitarist/producer Tim Motzer, and bassist/songwriter Barry Meehan. Each contributes vocals, songs, words and music to this ambitious 2 CD album project.

At a time when artists and labels are downsizing, this group of Philadelphia artists have ramped it up and released an ambitious 2 cd set.—Butterflies, Zebras, and Moonbeams on 1k recordings. This adventurous collection of music is a kaleidascope of songs and sound.blending shapes and hues with vocals, horns, strings, piano, drumkits and machines, vocal loops, guitars, bass, and left-field electronics into a brilliant textured soundscape of modern pop music.

From three perspectives, lyrically and vocally, “Butterflies, Zebras, and Moonbeams” delves into questions of love, war, darkness, despair, light, and hope. musically it’s an eclectic 21 song journey with acoustic guitars ruminating over electronic and tabla beats; the shimmering vocal downtempo tone-poems of Ellie Perez (Night is Beautiful, Run for Cover, Behind the Moon); the dark foreboding jazz of ‘Babylon Is Crying’; upright pianos floating over languid grooves of ‘Think I’m Losin It’ and the wind swept desert guitar musings of ‘Mind Dunes’.

Butterflies, Zebras, and Moonbeams features stellar musical guest contributions from trumpeter John Swana, cellist Helena Espvall, and Brooklyn drummer Jeremy Carlstedt, among many others…

Nucultures latest album is a stunning collection of songs, with some obvious electronic components but Butterflies, Zebras, and Moonbeams is organic at heart.

Produced by Tim Motzer for 1k recordings
(Tim Motzer has collaborated with many artists including david sylvian's nine horses, jaki liebeziet (can), burnt friedman (flanger), ursula rucker, kenny lattimore, dj jazzy jeff, king britt, jamaaladeen tacuma (ornette coleman), jeff sharel, les nubians, isaac hayes...)

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REVIEWS

author: Debra
This is one of the best CD's I have enjoyed of late. The vocals, instrumentation, lyrics are wonderful. I would love to hear Nucultures live! CD Baby and Nucultures and Portland Oregon...doesn't get better than that!
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butterflies, zebras, and moonbeams -- indeed!
author: nikki style 2007
Nucultures Butterflies, Zebras and Moonbeams 1K Recordings Butterflies, Zebras and Moonbeams, the first release from Philadelphia musician collective, Nucultures, is an exercise through lush aural landscapes and bedroom loops. It's a fully realized version of Aussie downtempo navel gazer Sia, but with a chamber pop-lite background of literate musicians, who snowball ambient melodic chord structures into things of toweringly great beauty. Synthy plunks are channeled into a kaleidoscope of rueful jazzy interludes. At times, Butterflies, Zebras and Moonbeams could stand as a testament to the budding mystique of a great Miles Davis masterwork such as Kind of Blue. But it exists in a post-Portishead era, encapsulated in its own time and entity. There's that gorgeous block piano chord tinkle on the standout track, "Babylon is Crying (Tigris)." Like a good Davis cut, "Babylon is Crying (Tigris)" fills the room with its ubiquity, changing everything in the room with its seismic wake.
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NUCULTURES - butterflies, zebras, and moonbeams -- indeed!
author: ALL MUSIC GUIDE
Not only is it becoming increasingly hard to find an album that runs the gamut of several different musical styles, but all-encompassing double albums are even more of an anomaly in this day and age. But the Philadelphia collective Nucultures is not your average, ordinary band. On their 2007 two-disc set, Butterflies, Zebras, and Moonbeams, the group (which is comprised of lyricist Ellie Perez, guitarist/producer Tim Motzer, and bassist/songwriter Barry Meehan -- all of whom also contribute vocals) issues a true musical potpourri. With a largely laid-back feel throughout and a mixture of electronic and acoustic instruments (additional players lend a hand), many of the songs sung by Perez are equally jazzy and sultry -- and slightly Portishead-esque -- especially such standouts as the album opening "Night Is Beautiful" and "Behind the Moon." But even Nostradamus couldn't predict the group's next move, as they manage to touch upon electro-acoustic-folk ("Think I'm Losing It"), breezy meditations ("Mind Dunes"), and soundscapes ("Amorphous Lake") -- all the while managing not to lose the listener. If it's laid-back but unpredictable pop that is equal parts jazz and trip-hop that you're after, Nucultures' Butterflies, Zebras, and Moonbeams will most definitely not disappoint.
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BABY SUE REVIEW
author: BABY SUE
NUCULTURES - Butterflies, Zebras, and Moonbeams (Double CD, 1 K Recordings, Progressive/pop) Nucultures is the trio consisting of Philadelphia's Ellie Perez, Tim Motzer, and Barry Meehan...all of whom contributed songs, words, and music to this hefty double disc package. Three different perspectives and viewpoints may help to explain the impressively divergent ideas and sounds on Butterflies, Zebras, and Moonbeams. The packaging on this one immediately caught our attention. The CDs are packaged in a beautifully designed triple fold digipak sleeve designed by Thomas Schmid for Eneone.com. Nice, very nice...but the music is what impresses us the most. Fortunately, this is a case where the packaging perfectly matches the music inside. The press release that accompanied this album accurately describes it as "...a stunning collection of songs with some obvious electronic components...but it's organic at heart." These songs were produced, recorded, and arranged by Motzer in Philadelphia. The songs sound nice and thick...yet they never come across sounding unnecessarily multi-layered and slick. This might best be described as modern pop mood music. There really isn't a sour pumpkin in the patch here...but particularly significant tracks include "Night is Beautiful," "Behind the Moon," "Lifeguard," "Think I'm Losin' It," and "Nowhere." Very nice, rather dreamy in nature... (Rating: 5+)
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