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View the trailer from Greetings From Beartown, the Channel 4 documentary
about Menlo Park's absurd Russian tour. (Directed by Barney Clay .)
News and Press
An Artsy, Offbeat Circus Comes to Town
"South Street Seaport will soon have a new, and temporary, tenant. It is Spiegeltent, a combination of traveling circus, performance venue, and beer garden that will be set up today and stay through October 1. The colorful canvas structure (with bars aplenty) will feature acts from rock bands to sword swallowers selected by Vallejo Gantner, artistic director of P.S.122, and Tommy Kriegsmann, the tent's programming director.
As festivals go, this has a decidedly offbeat vibe."It's like being on the set of Baz Luhrmann's film Moulin Rouge,'" Ross Mollison, a member of the tent's production team and a producer of the long-running off-Broadway hit "Slava's Snowstorm," said. "Our shows combine the thrill of the circus with the sexiest, most outrageous aspects of cabaret, "Mr. Mollison, who recalled falling in love with Spiegeltents during his travels through Europe, said. "We mostly picked groups and performers with downtown credibility and serious artistic experience, who are best in intimate surroundings."
Among the hundreds of shows selected by Mr. Mollison and his production team are funky music groups like the Brazilian Girls, the British country rock band Menlo Park and the Hysterics, and folk singer Vienna Teng. They will take the stage next to a sword swallower and a Ukranian contortionist, and deejays King Britt, Tortured Soul, and Rich, and Indian percussionist Suphala will preside over dance parties." --Valerie Gladstone for The New York Sun
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Spiegeltent Comes to New York City
"Since Marlene Dietrich first sang Falling in Love Again on the Spiegel stage in the 1930s, these magic mirrors have reflected some of the worlds greatest performing artists and their enthralled public.
The Spiegeltent is an opulent and spectacular venue of canvas, cut glass, teak, mirrors billowing velvet and brocade which is being brought to New York City by RV Entertainment.
Located at the iconic Fulton Street Fish Market site at South Street Pier and overlooked by the Brooklyn Bridge, this exceptional venue will generate massive media interest as it has all around the world.
For only nine weeks it will be jam-packed with sultry, funky, cutting edge events."
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Review of 'Menlo Park'
(4 out of 5 stars)
"Unless you're completely convinced of your own sanity, don't pick up this album. Here are the unabashedly insane ramblings of madmen set to county-and-western melodies, with a smattering of French fleshing out songs such as Wave Goodbye Whore and Eating You. Singer Chris Taylor is by turns raspy and quivering--a psychotic Elvis gently rocking backwards and forwards in an asylum, describing his beloved as both an aeroplane and a "bulging vein". There's bluegrass in here, with the viola and mandolin giving an air of authenticity, and some lovely sounds behind lyrics that are both nonsensical and crude. It all adds up to old-style country for Bloodhound Gang fans, where women are trailer-park sluts and songs like Paraplegic Dancer are too dark to be amusing. "If you get close to me don't think you'll like what you see," Taylor points out on Double Trouble. Kenny Rogers would agree. --G2
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Review of Greetings From Lambeth
"This is the second in their series of 'musical postcards' and leavens their characteristic chaos, while sacrificing none of their inspirationally unhinged aesthetic. To whit, 'Porno Rodeo' comes on like 16 Horsepower soundtracking 'The Sicillan', while the darkly hilarious 'Dead Neighbour' recalls Fun Boy Three holidaying in Greece with John Lurie. Quite brilliant." --Time Out
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The Potty Menlo Park
(4 out of 5 stars)
The freakish Menlo Park suggests the sort of many-headed monstrosity you would be left with in the aftermath of a nuclear Armageddon. They have coined phrases like "hip-hop county" and "voodoo folk" to describe what they do, but "Bar Mitzvah cabaret" or "unsavoury mime troup" would do just as well. Merely by walking on stage the Menlos make a deafening style statement...Behind the elaborate facade the Menlos can actually play, too...They display their grasp of true country corn with All the Times I Lied...Yet definitions remain elusive, since one moment they might sound as skeletal as Tom Wait's Bone Machine, and the next turn into a thumping polka band reminiscent of a pavement cafe in Prague. Very, very odd." --Adam Sweeting for The Guardian
