Barkmarket was a

rock music Rock music is a broad genre of popular music that originated as " rock and roll" in the United States in the late 1940s and early 1950s, developing into a range of different styles in the mid-1960s and later, particularly in the United States an ...

group formed in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

in 1987. Personnel were singer/guitarist and main songwriter

Dave Sardy David Stuart Sardy (born 1967), more commonly known as D. Sardy, is an American composer, musician, songwriter, and multiple Grammy winning record producer. He came to prominence as the leader of 1990s noise rock band Barkmarket before turning mo ...

, bass guitarist John Nowlin and drummer Rock Savage. Barkmarket's music was usually loud and aggressive, touching on many styles (most prominently including heavy metal,

hardcore punk Hardcore punk (also known as simply hardcore) is a punk rock music genre and subculture that originated in the late 1970s. It is generally faster, harder, and more aggressive than other forms of punk rock. Its roots can be traced to earlier punk ...

and

noise rock Noise rock (sometimes called noise punk) is a noise music, noise-oriented style of experimental rock that spun off from punk rock in the 1980s. Drawing on movements such as minimal music, minimalism, industrial music, and New York hardcore, a ...

), but not resting definitively in any one genre.

History

In 1986, they released an independently recorded demo tape called BARKMARKET, then in 1987 recorded ''1-800-GODHOUSE'' on cassette 4tk. They were signed to Purge/Soundleague in NYC. After recording the second album ''Easy Listening'' the band moved to

Triple X Records Triple X Records was a Los Angeles-based record company started by three former employees of the bankrupt Greenworld Distribution: Dean Naleway, Peter Heur and Charley Brown. The label was known for "a fearlessly eclectic catalogue that broke away ...

, who released the group's third album, ''Vegas Throat''; the latter featured guest work from avant-jazz guitarist

Marc Ribot Marc Ribot (; born May 21, 1954) is an American guitarist and composer. His work has touched on many styles, including no wave, free jazz, rock, and Cuban music. Ribot is also known for collaborating with other musicians, most notably Tom Wait ...

. ''

Vegas Throat ''Vegas Throat'' is the debut studio album of the American noise rock band Barkmarket, released in 1991 by Triple X Records. It was reissued in 1992 on Rick Rubin's Def American label with an alternate track listing and the song " Ten Convictions ...

'' attracted the interest of

Rick Rubin Frederick Jay Rubin (; born March 10, 1963) is an American record producer. He is the co-founder (alongside Russell Simmons) of Def Jam Recordings, founder of American Recordings, and former co-president of Columbia Records. Rubin helped popula ...

, and Barkmarket was one of the first groups signed to Rubin's American Recordings. ''Vegas Throat'' was reissued by American, which then issued ''

Gimmick A gimmick is a novel device or idea designed primarily to attract attention or increase appeal, often with little intrinsic value. When applied to retail marketing, it is a unique or quirky feature designed to make a product or service "stand ou ...

'' and the ''Lardroom'' EP. During this time, they released the ''Peacekeeper'' EP on the Man's Ruin record label. '' L. Ron'' (1996) was Barkmarket's final album. Sardy's engineering/production work was taking precedence over his own band, and the group quietly broke up in 1997. Sardy has since become an in-demand producer and mixer for many heavy rock groups (e.g.,

System of a Down System of a Down (also known as SoaD or simply System) is an Armenian-American heavy metal band formed in Glendale, California, in 1994. Since 1997, the band has consisted of Serj Tankian (lead vocals, keyboards); Daron Malakian (guitar, voc ...

Marilyn Manson Brian Hugh Warner (born January 5, 1969), known professionally as Marilyn Manson, is an American rock musician. He came to prominence as the lead singer of the band which shares his name, of which he remains the only constant member since it ...

Wolfmother Wolfmother is an Australian hard rock band from Sydney. Formed in 2004, the group is centred around vocalist and guitarist Andrew Stockdale, who is the only constant member of the line-up. The band has been through many personnel changes since ...

Helmet A helmet is a form of protective gear worn to protect the head. More specifically, a helmet complements the skull in protecting the human brain. Ceremonial or symbolic helmets (e.g., a policeman's helmet in the United Kingdom) without protect ...

Quicksand Quicksand is a colloid A colloid is a mixture in which one substance consisting of microscopically dispersed insoluble particles is suspended throughout another substance. Some definitions specify that the particles must be dispersed in a ...

) or even pop heavyweights like

Oasis In ecology, an oasis (; ) is a fertile area of a desert or semi-desert environment'ksar''with its surrounding feeding source, the palm grove, within a relational and circulatory nomadic system.” The location of oases has been of critical imp ...

The Thrills The Thrills are an Irish rock band, formed in 2001 in Dublin, Ireland. The band was founded by lead vocalist Conor Deasy and guitarist Daniel Ryan, guitarist and bass player Padraic McMahon, pianist Kevin Horan and drummer Ben Carrigan. Their bre ...

. Sardy has been quoted as saying he made a promise to himself that each of their albums would be a progression from 4 track, to 8 track (Easy Listening), to 16 track (Vegas Throat), and then 24 track (Gimmick) with a promise to go back to 4 track for the final album, the beginning of "Visible Cow" on the album L Ron was an attempt to keep that promise. Sardy was picked as one of the top ten up and coming film composers of 2010 for his work scoring the movies 21, and Zombieland by Composers Monthly.

Musical style

Critic Stewart Mason wrote that the band "can at times be frustratingly difficult to pin down, but their best work has a noisy, rattling power." There were also odd touches that demonstrated an experimental edge: the eerie

banjo The banjo is a stringed instrument with a thin membrane stretched over a frame or cavity to form a resonator. The membrane is typically circular, and usually made of plastic, or occasionally animal skin. Early forms of the instrument were fashi ...

and

tape loop In music, tape loops are loops of magnetic tape used to create repetitive, rhythmic musical patterns or dense layers of sound when played on a tape recorder. Originating in the 1940s with the work of Pierre Schaeffer, they were used among cont ...

s on "(Radio Static)" (from ''Gimmick''), and the nearly

delta blues Delta blues is one of the earliest-known styles of blues. It originated in the Mississippi Delta, and is regarded as a regional variant of country blues. Guitar and harmonica are its dominant instruments; slide guitar is a hallmark of the s ...

acoustic slide guitar on "Visible Cow" (from ''L. Ron''). Sardy's ragged, proto-

screamo Screamo (also referred to as skramz) is an aggressive subgenre of emo that emerged in the early 1990s and emphasizes "willfully experimental dissonance and dynamics".Jason Heller, "Feast of Reason". ''Denver Westword'', June 20, 2002Access date: ...

vocals usually offered bizarre lyrics that were at once evocative and absurd, and rarely without a menacing undercurrent: "I bought a handgun made out of glass/I cut a hole in the side of a wild ass" ("Visible Cow"); critic Ted Alvarez wrote, "Sardy's distended

poetry Poetry (derived from the Greek ''poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meanings i ...

often has a dark humor about it; lines like "I opened all your mail" ("Feed Me") and "I got a game/it won't take long/we'll list all our beatings in a cursory

rhyme A rhyme is a repetition of similar sounds (usually, the exact same phonemes) in the final stressed syllables and any following syllables of two or more words. Most often, this kind of perfect rhyming is consciously used for a musical or aesthetic ...

" ("How are You") add a dash of

laughter Laughter is a pleasant physical reaction and emotion consisting usually of rhythmical, often audible contractions of the diaphragm and other parts of the respiratory system. It is a response to certain external or internal stimuli. Laughter ...

to the often humorless scowl across the face of hardcore music."

Discography

Studio albums

* '' 1-800-GODHOUSE'' (1988) * ''

Easy Listening Easy listening (including mood music) is a popular music genre and radio format that was most popular during the 1950s to 1970s. It is related to middle-of-the-road (MOR) music and encompasses instrumental recordings of standards, hit songs, n ...

'' (1989) * ''

'' (1992) * ''

'' (1993) * '' L Ron'' (1996)

EPs

* '' Peacekeeper'' (1994) * '' Lardroom'' (1995)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Barkmarket American noise rock music groups Musical groups from New York City Musical groups established in 1987 Musical groups disestablished in 1997 Man's Ruin Records artists Triple X Records artists American Recordings (record label) artists