Sixteens is presently Kristen Louise and Veuve Pauli, with the occasional appearance of guest musicians, performance artists, photographers, projectionists. Originally based in San Francisco, in the last two years' energetic concentration they have become an international band with a support base in Spain, Italy, France, Germany, U.K., Poland, Holland, U.S.A., not to mention other countries where they have yet to project.
Their supporters span a broad range of the post punk musical spectrum. Electro, Deathrock, Synth punk/pop, Minimal electronic, Art damaged, Darkwave, Gothic, Bored E.B. Mers, early eighties casualties, and Indie rockers.
After touring Europe twice in the last year (2004-2005) they are now based in Berlin. Their music has the character of a nicely composed collage where one can see the jagged scissor marks along the edges of transposed magazine paper.
ALBUMS
EYE13 Into the Gold Wave of Future Non-Rip Off
Since their last record for Hungry Eye, the Fendi EP, Sixteens spent two years globe trotting with residencies in Barcelona, Berlin, and Oakland. As of two American tours (one opening for Blixa Bargeld and Savage Republic), and two more European tours across the continent, they've slimmed down to a two-piece and locked thesmelves in the studio to finish this long awaited follow up. With wailing synthesizers, throbbing disco beats, and dramatic vocals, they've managed to throw some color into the bleak cold-wave sound, like a riotous mixture of the Mute, Trax, and ZICKZACK Records catalogs.
EYE13 CD $12 ppd USA
EYE04 Fendi EP
Sixteens perform a serious dance floor exorcism. Treading the darker terrain of new wave, they blare out an art-damaged electro replete with minimalist beats and eerie analog synthesizers.
EYE04 CD $8
LAST COPIES OF THE CD!
EYE04 12 INCH $8
MEDIA
MP3 samples
- Crystalline Saturate
from Into the Goldwave of Future Non Rip-Off on Hungry Eye Records - Figurative Character
from Fendi EP on Hungry Eye Records - First Place
from debut full length, Casio on San Francisco label Cochon Records.
Video
- A Lesson in Letting Go
live at the LiPo lounge April 2005 Courtesy of Kevin Brown
- Sixteens at Knockout in San Francisco, CA 2007 by Kevin Brown
PRESS
Praise for Fendi EP
Aus dem selbigen Stall und auch Stadt (S.F.) stammen auch die Sixteens, die im Vergleich zu den Weegs noch eine Ecke roher sind, ohne weniger charmant oder morbide zu wirken. Ihr Stil, als "serious dance floor exorcism" beschrieben zermalmen die dunklere Seite von New Wave und schmettern so eine Art kunst-gesch�digten Lo-Fi Electronics zu drastisch minimalistischen Beats und unheimlichen analog Synthesizers. Alles ziemlich verhallt, ein bischen wie Cabaret Voltaire einmal, nur um eine verdrehte Disco lauter. Finde ich Klasse.
Dorfdisco (Berlin/ Germany)
Fendi is a new EP from the Sixteens of San Francisco. Stretching electronic music not to its limits, but deconstructing it down to its furnace-like grinding foundations, the Sixteens make primitive electropunk, pounding those synthesizers and modulators like jackhammers. If the Sex Pistols took the overproduced commercial arena rock of the 70s and created its antithesis by stripping it down to its foundations and erasing all that over perfection, I'd say the Sixteens do the same to the redundant techno/trance EBM bands of today…
The music is brooding, droning frequencies with stark rhythms spiking the horizon. The minimalistic drumbeat gives it movement. It carries it like a sixteen wheeler over nighttime freeways in 4/4 time - otherwise the synthesizers would just be shooting malicious, ambient sounds off into space.
From Deathrock.com
The Sixteens use lo-fi electronics and deliberate, drasticly simplistic beats to lay the foundation for grating keyboard feedback turned twisted-disco, serving up an un-nerving and alien soundscape.
deathrock.com