Rothko are an English,

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

-based mainly instrumental

ambient Ambient or Ambiance or Ambience may refer to: Music and sound * Ambience (sound recording), also known as atmospheres or backgrounds * Ambient music, a genre of music that puts an emphasis on tone and atmosphere * ''Ambient'' (album), by Moby * ...

group. The group mainly use

bass guitar The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and ...

s and keyboards to create their soundscapes. They derived their name from the painter

Mark Rothko Mark Rothko (), born Markus Yakovlevich Rothkowitz (russian: Ма́ркус Я́ковлевич Ротко́вич, link=no, lv, Markuss Rotkovičs, link=no; name not Anglicized until 1940; September 25, 1903 – February 25, 1970), was a Latv ...

. They have been described by others as

post-rock Post-rock is a form of experimental rock characterized by a focus on exploring textures and timbre over traditional rock song structures, chords, or riffs. Post-rock artists are often instrumental, typically combining rock instrumentation with ...

for their use of a rock instrument, the

, to create what is according to some as non-rock music.

History

Formed in 1997, the original line-up consisted of Mark Beazley, Crawford Blair, and Jon Meade all playing

in a variety of different ways. This line-up released three albums on

Lo Recordings Lo Recordings is a label founded in 1995 by Jon Tye. They are noted for their strong visual style thanks to Non-Format, with whom they work very closely and won a D&AD award for several of their releases sleeves. Musical style Lo recordings m ...

and a host of singles and EPs on labels such as

Bella Union Bella Union is a British independent record label founded in 1997 by Simon Raymonde and Robin Guthrie of Cocteau Twins. It is now run solely by Raymonde. History After releasing records with 4AD for a large part of their career, Cocteau Twi ...

, Bip Hop, Narwhal, and Livid Meerkat (

Fierce Panda Fierce Panda Records is a London-based independent record label, with its first release in February 1994. It also produced a small number of releases that year by now famous artists such as Ash, The Bluetones, Baby Bird and Supergrass. Fierc ...

subsidiary) amongst others, before Beazley disbanded it in 2001. Between 2001 and 2004, Beazley continued to perform and release music under the Rothko name either solo or with a variety of different line-ups, including ones which featured Francis Morgan and Michael Donnelly, Beazley and Donnelly together, and the line-up of London/Aberdeenshire experimental rock band

Delicate AWOL Delicate AWOL were a British experimental rock band active between 1998 and 2005. They were notable for their cross-pollination of various musical forms (including indie rock, art rock, post-rock, jazz, Latin and out-rock), their links with Briti ...

. Since 2004, the group stabilised as Beazley (bass guitar), Michael Donnelly (bass guitar), Ben Page (keyboards) and Tom Page (drums and percussion) - the latter three all being ex-members of Delicate AWOL. This line up of this history of the group disbanded in October 2010, with their last and final release being the "Sunset to Sunrise" EP, on Mark Beazley's own Trace Recordings label. Since disbanding, Tom and Ben Page went on to work as Rocketnumbernine, with their debut 12" release, "Matthew And Toby", produced and released by

Kieran Hebden Kieran Hebden (born September 1977), known as Four Tet, is an English electronic musician. He came to prominence as a member of the post-rock band Fridge (band), Fridge before establishing himself as a solo artist with charting UK albums such a ...

(Four Tet) on his own Text imprint and to back

Neneh Cherry Neneh Mariann Karlsson (born 10 March 1964), better known as Neneh Cherry, is a Swedish singer-songwriter, rapper, occasional DJ and broadcaster. Her musical career started in London in the early 1980s, where she performed in a number of punk roc ...

as both her recording and touring band. Michael Donnelly is also recording and releasing music under his own name. The first new Rothko release since 2010, the "Severed Tense" EP, was released on Trace Recordings on 1 July 2015 and features a set of 4 brand new recordings, the group now consisting again of Mark Beazley and Michael Donnelly. A new album is scheduled for a late 2015 release. As Rothko, Beazley also collaborated with artists such as

Susumu Yokota Susumu Yokota (横田進 ''Yokota Susumu'', or ススム・ヨコタ ''Susumu Yokota''; born 1960 or 1961 – March 27, 2015) was a Japanese composer. He released several albums under pseudonyms including Stevia, Ebi, and others. Yokota worked ...

, Caroline Ross of

and JS Adams, aka BLK w/BEAR. He has also collaborated with Graham Dowdall, aka Gagarin, under the name Low Bias and also provided some of the original music score for the

Discovery Channel Discovery Channel (known as The Discovery Channel from 1985 to 1995, and often referred to as simply Discovery) is an American cable channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, a publicly traded company run by CEO David Zaslav. , Discovery Channe ...

documentary " The Flight That Fought Back", about

United Airlines Flight 93 United Airlines Flight 93 was a domestic scheduled passenger flight that was hijacked by four al-Qaeda attackers aboard the plane on the morning of September 11, 2001, as part of the September 11 attacks. The plane eventually crashed in Som ...

. Rothko now consist of Mark and long time group member, Michael Donnelly. Mark also plays in Low Bias, with Graham Dowdall, aka Gagarin, and has recently collaborated with Anne Garner and James Murray under the name Tetherdown, and as Rome Pays Off, with original Rothko member, Crawford Blair.

Discography

*''A Negative For Francis'' (1999, Lo Recordings) *''Forty Years To Find A Voice'' (2000, Lo Recordings) *''In The Pulse Of An Artery'' (2001, Bella Union) *''No Anchor No Chart No Rudder No Sails'' (2001, Burning Shed) *''Not Gone Not Forgotten'' (Live) (2001, Lo Recordings) *''A Continual Search For Origins'' (2002, Too Pure) *Rothko & BLK w/BEAR - ''Wish For A World Without Hurt'' (2003, Trace Recordings) *Rothko & Susumu Yokota - ''Distant Sounds Of Summer'' (2005, Lo Recordings) *Rothko & Caroline Ross - ''A Place Between'' (2005, Lo Recordings) *''Eleven Stages Of Intervention'' (2007, Bip Hop) *''A Life Lived Elsewhere'' (2007, Trace Recordings) *''1997 And Other Things'' (2009, Trace Recordings) *''Discover The Lost'' (2015, Trace Recordings) *''A Young Fist Curled Around A Cinder For A Wager'' (2016, Trace Recordings) *''Sunset to Sunrise'' (2016) *''If You Don't Leave We Will Kill You'' (2018) *''We Will Come Back to Haunt You'' (2018) *''Blood Demands More Blood'' (2018) *''No Anchor, No Chart, No Rudder, No Sails'' (2019) *''Burns in Film'' (2019) *''Refuge for Abandoned Souls'' (2019)

References

External links

Official Rothko/Trace Recordings/Mark Beazley websiteDiscogs: RothkoMark Beazley interview (10/2002)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Rothko (band) Musical groups from London English post-rock groups Bella Union artists