Album Notes

The Tool Factory Project Debut CD:

The Tool Factory Project’s eponymous debut CD presents a mix of catchy pop tunes, instrumentals and improvisations all gently satirizing such diverse subjects as UFO abduction paranoia, rock star narcissism and those goofy magic ads from the back of Boy’s Life magazine in the 1960's. Musical styles range from power-pop and folk to fake “beatnik” jazz, J-pop, blues and electronica, all delivered with a bit of a knowing wink to those who are hip to the musical and cultural cliches the Project is exploiting. If Firesign Theater had been a band, they might have become the Tool Factory Project.

Bio:

The Minnesota-based Tool Factory Project originally formed in 1992 as a loose collective of musicians, songwriters and artists with a common purpose of both satirizing and paying homage to the pop culture cliches with which they had grown up. Steeped in the multiple mythos of Cold War paranoia, the Space Race, 60's and 70's TV, comic books and science fiction, the Project’s songs focused on subjects like UFO’s, robots, beatniks and super heroes, and the group embraced musical styles ranging from bubble gum pop to free jazz to atonal improvisation, as well as blues and 70's-style hard rock. As outside interest in the concept was minimal, the original group folded in 1995, but Project co-founder Richard Griffith maintained his faith in the belief that there was room in the world for one more satirical pop group, and continued to write and produce songs in his private studio (often referred to as a “Secret Underground Laboratory Somewhere in the Midwest”). The current membership of The Tool Factory Project is variable, but Griffith remains the Man Behind the Curtain as songwriter, singer and guitarist. The Tool Factory Project hopes you will join them in helping to make the world a better place by making the world a little less serious place. UNITY THROUGH ABSURDITY–DON’T LET THE ROBOTS WIN!