(***New videos up on youtube. The page for my americana/roots side project Koala?! and the Exploding Meth Lab can now be found at www.soundcloud.com/theexplodingmethlab
KOALA has been making d.i.y. bedroom outsider lo-fi anti folk punk since 2003, but due to mental illness and drug addiction he lost his focus and nothing ever came of it. After sobering up and regaining a degree of sanity, he began writing and recording again in the fall of 2015.
K0ALA was raised in Los Angeles and grew up in the punk rock and hardcore scene, moving into indie and noise rock in his young adulthood. Influences are taken from punk and hardcore, from indie folk and indie rock, from noise rock, from outsider, from folk punk, from early americana-roots, from folk and country, from alt. country and antifolk, even from the lyricism of hip hop (i.e. wu tang clan, del the funky homosapien, asher roth, el-p).
KOALA has long aimed to cultivate the chaos and urgency in his own life and capture it in his songs (whether he has failed at this or not is up to you). Noise, fuzz, overdrive, feedback, off key vocals, detuned guitars, cheap recording equipment, and of course chain smoking cheap cigarettes all add up to make the fucking mess that is KOALA?! AND THE K-HOLES
Some label better come suck this shit up before Def Jam or Atlantic come a knockin! :/
influences: the Moldy Peaches, The Mountain Goats, attilla the stockbroker, billy bragg, Andrew Jackson Jihad, Violent Femmes, They might be giants, langhorne slim, will oldham, neutral milk hotel, this bike is a pipebomb, woody guthrie, hank williams sr, the holy modal rounders, the fugs, david peel, velvet underground, screeching weasel, mr t experience, the pogues, the pixies, steve albini, new lost city ramblers, kentucky bootleggers, khaki king, john vanderslice, beulah, the microphones/mt eerie, postal service, old crow medicine show, get the hell out of the way of the volcano, ghost mice, defiance ohio, cat stevens, donovan, heathers, bob dylan (early), leonard cohen, nick drake, smog/bill callahan, david allen coe, the carter family, atom and his package, paul baribeau, the beat happening, the vaselines, Cake, CUB, go sailor, mike park etc.
Here are a few reviews from music blogs:
http://madmackerel.org/2016/01/12/100-songs-in-100-hours-40-koala-and-the-k-holes/
http://www.themodernfolk.net/2015/12/koala-and-kholes-sheolburbia.html
http://emergingindiebands.com/k0ala-and-the-k-holes/
Press Quotes:
"I literally almost shit my pants while listening to Koala?! and the K-Holes...But in a good way. My ears were bleeding and my underwear were stained with feces, but it was worth every horrible moment!" -Pitchfork Magazine
"When I first heard Koala?! and the K-Holes I thought to myself 'who do they sound like?' and when it finally came to me I realized they were the spitting image of the Arcade Fire, if the Arcade fire were, like, 78% less shitty of a band" - NME
"Koala and the K-holes made me campaign to get the name of the zine changed to MAXIMUM FULK!, but they wouldn't agree because they said only posers like marsupials" - Maximum Rock n Roll
"If there's on artist to listen to while having questionably legal sex with animals, koala?! and the k-holes would totally be it! They're like Dave Matthews Band for severely psychologically impaired bonobo apes!" - Spin magazine
(if you want videos, go to the youtube link)
(if you want facebook or bandcamp, follow the appropriate links)
KOALA?! (and the K-Holes)’s tracks
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