About MANTITS

Mantits is music...

...written by one person and played by one person. There is a voice, usually singing and sometimes shouting. There are chords coming out of a nylon-string classical guitar being played with a flatpick. It is somewhat in the tradition of American folk music, somewhat in the tradition of punk rock. Some songs are slow, some are fast. Most of the words display self-entangled reflections on the social and personal convolutions we go through as we struggle or ski our way through a faceless and dissociated capitalist cultural landscape. Songs are often about hypocracy, self-deception, and social emptiness. Songs are often about culturally sanctioned forms of pseudo-sociopathic consciousness. Some songs are about finding hope through the creation of utopia in the space of a moment or in living a life of hope and vitality and overflowing inspiration by throwing off our personal shackles and allowing ourselves to open up the

awkward space and powerfully experience the glowing intensity of life and togetherness purely for the sake of the glowing intensity itself and the experience of finding home everywhere by living in love and hope and pushing this pulse forward, without concern for ultimate justification or questions of eternal success or failure. And then there's songs like "I Like Golf"...

Mantits is a philosophy...

...of rhizomatic flows, circular questioning, and stinky nuts. The most common theme is in bringing the schizophrenic logic of miserable mind games and suffocating self-denial under masks of the ordinary course of things into the light of day, to shine with all their disgusting glory so that their omnipotence can be somewhat thwarted. Hopefully we can learn to talk to each other without so much fear and competitiveness. Or maybe he's just trying to get in your pants. There isn't a simple solution. We won't escape from this just by willing it or singing about it. Or maybe we will. Who knows? But some things are shittier than others, and arbitrary power struggles and unvoiced and avoided existential pains of isolation and hopelessness in front of a faceless world of people massacreing each other or spitting on each other off-handedly on the way to buy a bag of potato chips and being unable to know how to talk about what matters to them for fear of this terrifying abyss of social awkwardness or the stigma of being strange...if there's any way out of this sea of fart, it's in not letting the webs entangle us in the logic of monotony, lies and despair underneath the banner of professed control and normalcy.

So Mantits articultes them so that we can look it in the face, and maybe look each other in the face a little more. Maybe. Don't worry, Mantits is down with the postmodern gen-X crap enough to hate himself and not take his cause too seriously. And he likes to surf.

But who is the man behind the tits?

In 1992 he began his career as a local Boston solo artist under the name “Buster” releasing such classic albums as “Thank You” and “You’re Welcome” before branching out into making shitty and monumentally embarrassing 4-track cassette recordings in his father’s attic. Soon he and his friend-from-daycare Jared began collaborating. A few sessions later they had recorded such world-historical masterpieces as “Adolf Shitler” and “Believe.” There are rumors about a classic rock band called “Wood Hippo” around this time, of which Jared was in for a few sessions, and Mr. Tits played guitar and sang in of. Legend has it that the band topped the charts. They released a limited edition demo, of which there are no known copies remaining in circulation.

During Wood Hippo’s quick but earth shaking two year career, Jared and ‘Tits bgean practicing with a fellow Jr. High classmate named Ben, and the three then began to call themselves the Inbreds. Their shows during this period were limited to appearances at their school, where they would call themselves the “Nirvanabees” and play terrible renditions of Nirvana songs (as a joke), as well as Inbreds songs. The three had a rocky relationship, due to the vicious and heated climate of Jr. High popularity circles. The real shit hit the fan when Tits threw the contents of a little plastic cup of Jell-o at Ben during lunch at school. Ben was no longer in the band.

At the next Nirvanabees performance, the two arranged to have a nother classmate, Paul, play drums. After an awful Nirvana cover, Paul left the stage, refusing the go on and play with them the Buster song “Shot him in the penis.” They called out for a substitute drummer, and immediately a hand went up from a boy named Pete. The trio was set; here was the Inbreds. After playing around Boston for about half a year, the group picked up a second guitar player. This was the man that they then called “Herpes” (who eventually illegally changed his name to “Trash”). Herpes was a regular stud-machine. The rest of the band was fiercely jealous. He was also chronically late for practice. The group developed a culture of kicking him in the nuts. Eventually the band changed its name to the McVeighs.

The band recorded many times between then and 1999, when they broke up for the second time, finally terminating for good (maybe). Jared had left the group and Lisa had taken his place as bassist, Pete had left and been replaced with Jeremy. They had released a CD—“Tear the Cities Down” and recorded material for another one. In 1997, Mr ‘Tits joined together with the members from Agree to Differ (ex-Freeeks) to form the not-a-metal-band “Castrati. “ Bill, John, Jeremy and ‘Tits recorded a number of times, and still discuss the possibility of releasing the tracks. Oh, and yes, it was the same Jeremy.

In the summer of 1999, the tits hit the man. Perhaps it was news of Kosovo, perhaps it was the termination of his relationship with McVeighs bassist Lisa, perhaps it was too much living in Malden, MA, perhaps it was just a light waiting to hit him in the big ol’ butt. Either way, ‘Tits began playing his particular brand of acoustic music for the first time. Soon after, he left Boston, the McVeighs and Castrati. He ended up in Plainfield, VT at Goddard College, where he began cultivating his now world-historical following. It was there that he recorded his first album, under the engineering of Tom Demers. He briefly played in a band called the Cunt-Trees who had one original song: “I’m Vegan and I’m sXe but I Fuck Fuck Fuck.” He eventually breifly played as part of the back-up band for Lammy (Lammy eventually disbanded, and the one who called himself Lammy turned into the now infamous JerkOff JackOff Frigface).

A couple of times, the two played “Electric Mantits” for groups of drunk friends who would applaud by knocking over refrigerators and puking on the floor. It became evident that the two would form a punk band. Before they got a chance, Lammy and Crumpet began hitting each other with a shovel, throwing beer cans at guitars, and calling themselves “Vomit Dichotomy.” The group expanded, and Mantits joined in the process.

VD toured as Crumpet, Lammy, Mantits, Abby and Leah in the summer of 2002, after the compilation Yer Mom Eats Too Much Lunch came out on VD Records. The band eventually recorded their first full—length release “Big Fucking Faggot blowjob induced faggot handjob faggot bear homo faggot” and continued to play at Common Ground in Brattleboro, VT. In the summer of 2003, Mantits recorded his second album “The Pursuit of Happiness,” moved to Brooklyn, and began playing open mics, hoping for international stardom. After being unable to find a job and deciding that the only venue worth anything in NYC was the Bowery Poetry Club, he gave up on New York stardom and moved back to VT. Now he lives in Brattleboro.

If you have read all of this, you probably have a lot of time to waste, and no friends around to waste it with. Instead of calling someone or going for a walk, you could always just sit on your big ol' butt and play solitaire! Go ahead! C'mon!