Stunted Dwarf

Stunted Dwarf - lo-fi, experimentalist tosh.

While the rest of the UK was gazing at it's shoes or pledging allegiance to Blur or Oasis in the early 1990's, Stunted Dwarf was looking across the Atlantic at the emerging Lo-Fi scene. Taking on the values of bands like the Silver Jews, Trumans Water and Sebadoh, Stunted Dwarf pushed at the boundaries of this new genre - production values were entirely absent, band members played whatever intruments they could get their hands on, songs were not only recorded in one take, but often conceived and developed during the recording.

The band made it's first seminal recording at Lausanne Road in Manchester. The original tapes of this session are long lost, but classics of the "Lausie" period remain - "Trashed (edit)" to name but one.

By the mid-90's, Stunted Dwarf had relocated across the Pennines to Leeds. Instruments and recording equipment had been left behind and this caused the first in many changes of direction. Recordings at 33CA in Leeds followed the lo-fi innovative "layering" approach. Rather than mixing to multi-track equipment a single track recording was made of one song element which was in turn played during the addition of the next element. Stunted Dwarf widened the net and incorporated a wider variety of instrumentation, culminating in the use of squeaky dog on the understated summer sensation "Earring Boy".

Recording at Harold in Leeds saw the next change. Gone was the layering technique and back came the one chance, one take approach. Equipment issues now meant that SD had gone acoustic and this represented perhaps the most sparse of the Stunted Dwarf eras. However, this period saw the one and only vocal driven release, "Effeminate Ogre" - erroneously rumoured to have been shortlisted at no.85 on John Peel's Festive Fifty of 1998.

The transition to the new millenium was not an easy one for Stunted Dwarf. Digital production saw new releases such as "Shedd" and these still followed the lo-fi ethos of making things up as they went along in one take.

Rumours of a comeback are rife but unconfirmed - Bow Down to the Dwarf!