Bassholes

Rising from the ashes of the defunct Gibson Bros. in 1992, The Bassholes emerged to kick up an extremely stripped-down, raw, blues-infected racket. Their debut single, "98 Degrees In The Shade", and their debut album, "Blue Roots", (both released on ITR in ’92) set a new standard for rank sounding recordings. Recorded in their basement and mastered from crappy cassette tapes, these guys single handedly started the whole lo-fi-two-man-blues-band genre. Basically a solo vehicle for the twisted vision of Don Howland, the Bassholes output has been unpredictable. Don's influences run the gambit: Skip James, The Germs, 70's disco, hip-hop - it's all in there. Albums such as "Deaf Mix" and "Long Way Blues" (released on the matador label) are avante-blues-folk records where as 1998’s "When My Blue Moon Turns Red Again" is blistering garage-punk. Country blues has always been at the heart of the Bassholes music and sexual and social frustration has always been at the heart of Don's songwriting.