Press Releases

• Sep 27 2012 Michael Zapruder Premieres New Video for 'Florida' with IFC

  Michael Zapruder Premieres New Video for ‘Florida’ with IFC   

  Poetry + Music Collaboration ‘Pink Thunder’ Due Oct 16

       “Michael Zapruder is certainly prolific — but it’s his songs’ quality that’s noteworthy. …He builds symphonic compositions in the mold of Sufjan Stevens or Andrew Bird.” – SPIN 

   

  “… beautiful folk-pop ballads resonant of the voice of Rufus Wainwright and wordplay of
  Andrew Bird” – Pitchfork

  
  Watch the video for ‘Florida’ at the IFC premiere or at YouTube

  Download “Florida” at the Kora Records (mp3 Available to Post)          

    Award-winning songwriter and recording artist, Michael Zapruder has premiered a new video for ‘Florida,’ based on a poem by Travis Nichols. Directed by Jesse Yules (Grizzly Bear, Of Montreal, Owen Pallett), the video was inspired by illustrated animal books of the 70s, printed on watercolor paper and animated using thread and swivel brackets. ‘Florida’ is the first single off Zapruder’s Pink Thunder LP, a collection of free-verse pop art-songs released on October 16 via The Kora Records. Pink Thunder features contributions from three engineers, over forty musicians, and from 23 poets, including poems from Noelle Kocot, James Tate, Bob Hicok, Mary Ruefle, D.A. Powell, Dara Wier, Joshua Beckman, and Valzhyna Mort.

  The tracks on Pink Thunder will take an innovative physical form, as Zapruder embodies each song in a ‘portmanteau’ structure (photo below). His portmanteau is a new release format for music, making an album into an art show and a single into an art-object. A digital music player is enclosed in a platform, which in turn showcases an evocative object that is related to the music. Each of the 22  songs on Pink Thunder has its own unique portmanteau. San Francisco’s The Curiosity Shoppe, a combination retail shop/art gallery, is hosting a month-long showing of the Pink Thunder portmanteaus from Oct. 18-Nov. 18

  With three solo records and four US tours under his belt, Zapruder has been covered by Los Angeles Times,

  MAGNET, Washington Post, and many more. His most recent record Dragon Chinese Cocktail Horoscope, produced by Scott Solter (Spoon, Mountain Goats, John Vanderslice), won 2009 Independent Music Award for Best Folk Singer-Songwriter Album and was also nominated in Best Folk Song category. From 2003-2011, Zapruder was in charge of curation at Pandora.com. In this capacity he has been quoted or included in national press stories in the New York Times, Rolling Stone, and on late-night television’s Nightline.

  ‘Storm Window’ Portmanteau:
• Aug 23 2012 Michael Zapruder Announces Pink Thunder,

  Michael Zapruder Announces Pink Thunder, New Collection of Songs Featuring Collaborations from 23 Poets 

      “Michael Zapruder is certainly prolific — but it’s his songs’ quality that’s noteworthy. …He builds symphonic compositions in the mold of Sufjan Stevens or Andrew Bird.” – SPIN

  Download “Florida” at the Kora Records (mp3 Available to Post)

  
  

  Award-winning songwriter and recording artist, Michael Zapruder has announced the release of Pink Thunder, a collection of free-verse pop art-songs, including contributions from 23 poets, three engineers, and a few dozen musicians. The album will be released on October 16 via The Kora Records. What began as a bus tour that brought together hundreds of American poets has been recorded and remixed into a  dynamic collection of poem-songs. Pink Thunder features instrumental contributions from over forty musicians and poems from Noelle Kocot, James Tate, Bob Hicok, Mary Ruefle, D.A. Powell, Dara Wier, Joshua Beckman, and Valzhyna Mort.

  Potent with weird, funny, and singular possibilities, Pink Thunder presents a poetic experiment to see what happens if poems are sung instead of spoken, when words are surrounded by music instead of silence. The album has already been featured on the Poetry Society of America‘s blog and in performance at the New School’s Tishman Auditorium for the Festival of New American Poets.

  With three solo records and four US tours under his belt, Zapruder has been covered by Los Angeles Times, Pitchfork, SPIN, MAGNET, Washington Post, and many more. His most recent record Dragon Chinese Cocktail Horoscope, produced by Scott Solter (Spoon, Mountain Goats, John Vanderslice), won 2009 Independent Music Award for Best Folk Singer-Songwriter Album and was also nominated in Best Folk Song category. From 2003-2011, Zapruder was in charge of curation at Pandora.com. In this capacity he has been quoted or included in national press stories in the New York Times, Rolling Stone, and on late-night television’s Nightline.