Anton Barbeau represents the Sacramento chapter of that nameless coterie of enduringly reliable, acid-tinged singer-songwriters that includes XTC's Andy Partridge, Robyn Hitchcock, Julian Cope and the Bevis Frond's Nick Saloman. His new album bathes beautifully constructed, thoughtfully arranged songs in a fading psychedelic sunshine, and it would be many casual consumers' album of the year if only they got to hear it. Four stars.
-Sunday Times
"Prolific, pretentious, precocious, intelligent, quirky, nasal, amusing, annoying to some, pop genius to others, and never ever boring -- this, my friends, is the cumulative description of northern California's musical auteur Anton Barbeau."
-PopMatters
"The man in question is Anton Barbeau, cult hero and left-field maverick from Sacramento, California. Mind you, calling him a 'singer/songwriter' is a bit like calling Jimi Hendrix a 'strummer.' His songs are fervid, swarming, tangential and often humorous, but possessed of a compelling inner logic."
-Dorset Echo
Anton Barbeau is a cult-hero's cult hero. With his esoteric and highly-personalized brand of psychedelic power-pop, his "mind-bending" stage show, and his auto-neurotic humour, he is quietly yet quickly building a global fan-base. The release gig for his record Guladong was held at the Cavern Club in Liverpool. His previous disk, King of Missouri, recorded in Bromley with psychedelic legends the Bevis Frond as backing band, was released in Europe on the Frond's Woronzow label and in North America on Vancouver's Bongo Beat Records. The album has been described as "a stellar display of psychedelic power pop" while The Sunday Times of London says of it "...like Bob Dylan fronting some great lost British freak-beat band."
In his hometown of Sacramento Barbeau has won a number of SAMMIE Awards for Album of the Year, Songwriter of the Year, and most recently the somewhat puzzling Most Popular Folk Singer Award. In 2001, a 23-hour Anton-a-thon was held in his honor with over 20 performers covering Anton songs, and the sleep-deprived star performing sets with members of his various backing bands.
Barbeau has shared the stage with the likes of Weezer, Robyn Hitchcock, Barry "the Fish" Melton, Mono and even a reformed Bay City Rollers. 2006 was an action-packed year for Barbeau, with a US west-coast tour crammed between two UK jaunts, and three album releases, including a collaboration with Game Theory/Loud Family guru Scott Miller called What if it Works?, followed by two solo albums. The first, In the Village of the Apple Sun, is a Beatles-meets-Julian Cope-meets-Joe Meek psychedelic pop odyssey featuring CAKE's Gabe Nelson and Oxford folkstress Sharron Kraus, released on San Francisco's Four-Way Records. The sister disk, Drug Free, out in England on Pink Hedgehog, mixes traditional American/English pop structures with Kraut-inflected space rock stretchiness and includes crowd-pleasers such as the title track and "Leave it with Me, I'm Always Gentle." 2007 sees the release of The Automatic Door on Oxford's legendary Shifty Disco label. The album is layered with the Sandy Denny-like harmonies of Su Jordan and features the Soft Boys' Kimberley Rew on guitar and the the backing of CAKE's classic rhythm section. All this while Barbeau continues relentlessly touring tea shops and stone circles in the UK. Oh, and yes, Adrienne Barbeau IS his cousin!
