In case you missed us last Sat March 14th 2009, we played an epic set for Bad Weather California's tour kick-off. Our newest muse seems to be leading us into a blending of Afro Beat a la Fela Kuti with some Ethiopiques vibes transmitted about, and of course some Pink Hawks style psychedelia dispersed as always. As of now, we are still 100% improvised and we should continue with this idea. If you didn't already know this, we've been improvising for three years now; the corners of my mouth raising up with pride.

Respect!
Yuzo Nieto
Pink Hawks

P.S. Please absorb our newest track "seventy" in order to fully investigate the above mentioned notions and tell us what you think.

Catch The Pink Hawks


Gene Davis, DDN Staff Writer
Thursday, January 1, 2009



The Pink Hawks make jam bands look lazy for falling back on any kind of song structure.
The experimental band has no songs rehearsed going into a show, preferring instead to make everything up on the spot. The result can be hit or miss depending on the concert, though the shows are always daring and interesting.
Yuzo Nieto, who founded the band along with Mike Neff, said he enjoys the possibilities that unrehearsed music provides.
"Whatever emotional state you are in at the time, it feeds into the performance," he said. "The music that ends coming out is some of the most innovative stuff out there."

Final lineup?
The Pink Hawks have had a revolving cast since the band formed in 2006. However, Yuzo said the band has finally settled into a solid lineup, which he thinks will produce positive results.
"We've developed a more solid sound," he said. "It's more synchronized now and more together."
'Very therapeutic'
The Pink Hawks is one of several projects that Nieto plays in. Pee Pee and Yuzo Nieto and the Hand That Rocks the Dreidel are more traditional outfits in the sense that they play established songs. And while the other two bands will likely find more success as a result, Nieto said Pink Hawks will always be dear to him.
"I like the Pink Hawks because it's so cathartic to play the music," he explained. "It's very therapeutic."

Divisive band
Not everyone will enjoy the Pink Hawks. The band's shows usually result in half the people leaving the room while the remaining audience moves closer to the stage with intense interest in where the music – which often resembles an acid-induced freak out — will go.
"I just like playing what I like to play, if people feel challenged by that then that's fine," said Nieto. "I'm just trying to play things from my heart."

"We'll be playing fort-building music tonight," said Yuzo Nieto, the Pink Hawks keyboardist and saxophonist, before the band launched into a half-hour-long exploratory set. Every show the Hawks play is improvised, and Nieto not only likes to fill your ears with some intriguing ear candy, he'll give you something to watch, sometimes incorporating painting or performance art into the band's live shows. Saturday night's performance art included Simone Groene-Sackett and (Westword intern) Adam Gildar, both clad in sleepwear, building a fort out of sheets, pillows and sofa cushions.

I'd completely forgot about building forts. I know I built a few as a kid, but hadn't thought about the childhood process of architectural daydreaming again until Saturday night. I'm pretty sure I had some sheets that were nearly identical to ones they used. It was a bizarre juxtaposition of thinking about my childhood and then listening to Pink Hawks creating sound in a somewhat childlike way. It's not that the music sounded childlike, it's just that sometimes to fully immerse yourself in improvisation, it involves some childlike thinking, and not worrying about what you're playing, or sometimes not even thinking about what you're playing.

check em out. actually everything we have ever done has been made just for you as you listened. that is if youve been to any of our live shows. but if not imagine you are at one and we are making it up as it goes. then you'll understand.
also, i will periodically be changing the songs on here. if you download them all you will notice that if played in order, they continue infinitely.

werd,
ph

Barrington Levy
with Pee-Hawks and OdAm fEl mUd

The Oriental Theater
Friday, Dec 14, 2007
8:00pm all ages

Hailing from Jamaica, international reggae star Barrington Levy has
sat at the top of dancehall charts worldwide since he was 14. Called reggae's 'Mellow Canary' by virtue of his strong, pure vocal style, he's renowned as the first original singer of the dancehall era.

Also, Pee Hawks-- the love child of bands Pink Hawks and
Pee Pee-- will be performing an all-improvisational set as a 12+ member symphonic movement of folky electronic psychedelia.

Additional blood thirsty performance by the neo-kabuki samurai performance group OdAm fEI mUd.

Feel free to come as your own piece of performance art or simply be
injected with the cocktail of 'crazyfuntime'.


The Oriental Theater,
4335 West 44th Ave
Denver, CO 80212
303-455-2124

With a name like Pink Hawks, you'd be forgiven for thinking the band was some kind of acoustic-punk duo. But Pee Pee's sax man, Yuzo Nieto, and a rotating cast of bandmates shred the conventions of music as well as your expectations of a live band. When performing, Nieto's aim is to engage as many senses as possible, including painting and performance art; during one show, ice cubes with odds and ends inside them were passed around the crowd. The music is improvised at each show, which means no set is ever the same. Within Pink Hawks' rich pageantry of sound, you can hear echoes of Sun Ra's melodically off-the-rails piano playing, Jimi Hendrix's irreverent warping of blues to otherworldly realms and the languid, sonically adventurous atmospheres of Yo La Tengo's And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside-Out. As much artistic revolutionaries as musicians, Pink Hawks (due at the Lion's Lair on Friday, September 28) bring the struggle for a more interesting world home to roost.