Trabants

Named after the diminutive and once ubiquitous Eastern European automobile, this collaborative of musicians finds its muse in the dusty bins of 60's instrumental surf, garage, psych, lounge, soundtrack and library music from around the world. Trabants was initially formed as a side project by Eric Penna (singer/guitarist of the now defunct Boston band Ketman). The concept was to feature a rotating line-up of Boston's finest musicians playing obscure instrumentals from an assortment of little-known surf and library music records from around the world. The rotating lineup was a necessity since many members also played in busy touring national acts. Trabants' first public appearances were at the Plough and Stars where the band played many epic all-night shows. With the demise of Penna's main band, he shifted his energies full time towards Trabants. The rotating line-up was kept to maintain the propulsive, ever-changing freshness to the performances. At this time, an experiment in vintage mono recording snowballed into Trabants' first full length, "Highwire Surfing" which garnered an Independent Music Award nomination for best instrumental album alongside placement on the show "Becoming" featuring Johnny Knoxville. After some touring and opening slots for legends such as Dick Dale documented on the band's live album, "An Evening with Trabants… Live at New Alliance," Penna relocated to Los Angeles to pursue a career in film and television music where he wrote and recorded the band's second album, "Cinematic". With more music and touring on the way, the rotating line-up continues ever-expanding the bands family tree which has seen contributions from members of the bands Man Man, Mean Creek, Creaturos, The Shills, World Inferno Friendship Society, Beware the Dangers of a Ghost Scorpion, Young Hunting, So Many Wizards, Breakestra!, The Dazies, Bury Me Standing, Jaggery, Cracktorch,