The Panic Band
The band itself has metamorphosed more than once since its 1991 inception as musical foil to the impassioned monologues of Umberto Crenca (as Sir Guy de Guy da Portagee) at AS220's Cabaret of the Oddly Normal. Since Halloween 1995, the present incarnation has wowed fans from the disparate musical camps, whether punk, jazz, folk or experimental, being compared variously to the indispensible Captain Beefheart, the German avant-gods Faust and the original psychedelic madcap Syd Barrett.

Here is our new CD (in MP3 format) for your listening pleasure:

You can buy this CD at AS220's Empire Expo (2nd floor).

Here are some older live recordings:

A manifesto of sorts...

The Panic musicians must continually enlarge and enrich the field of sounds.

The Panic musicians must substitute for the limited variety of tones possessed by orchestral instruments today the infinite variety of tones of noises, reproduced with appropriate mechanisms.

The musician's sensibility must find in noises the means of extension and renewal, given that every noise offers the union of the most diverse rhythms apart from the predominant one.

The new orchestra will achieve the most complex and novel aural emotions by manipulating fantastic juxtapositions of these varied tones and rhythms.

The variety of noises is infinite. If today, when we have perhaps a thousand different machines, we can distinguish a thousand different noises, tomorrow, as machines multiply, we will be able to distinguish ten, twenty, or thirty thousand different noises, not in a simple imitative way, but to combine them according to our imagination.

We therefore invite young musicians of talent to conduct a sustained observation of all noises, in order to understand the various rhythms of which they are composed. After being conquered by The Panic eyes our multiplied sensibilities will at last hear with The Panic ears. In this way the motors and machines of our industrial cities will one day be consciously attuned, so that every factory will be transformed into an intoxicating orchestra of noises.

A better manifesto...
To communicate sameness
to express humor
to be serious
to stand out
to entertain
to inform
to enlighten and inspire
is there the same passion
in each person
in all places
through all time?
is there Universal Truth?
is poetry about language?
is art about expression?
try inspite of criticism
sex
be ordinary
resist rhyme
perfect rhythm
resist rhyme
perfect rhythm
no metaphors
no symbolism
no style
monotony
monotony
monotony
monotony
monotony
try to be alone with everybody
be everybody when alone
avoid Zenisms
preach
say nothing
avoid Zenisms
avoid Zenisms at all expense
BOO DA
BOO DA
express all thoughts
edit carefully
avoid Zenisms
don't be tricky or cute
avoid drama
and music
and mime
don't juggle
no magic
no mysticism
what the fuck is spirituality?
what the fuck is moral?
what the fuck is right?
fear rejection
be insecure
be lustfull
be envious
be jealous
be queer
be fucking macho
stiff dick
wet cunt
loving moms
pussy cats
juxtapose
pause (Take a drink)
I think I love
I know I'm selfish
be naked
look good
fat
skinny
short
bald
drink excessively
exercise
and of course exorcise (flaranute)
don't smoke cigarettes
preach endlessly
contradict yourself
no manifestos
no credes
no monologues
no self pity
no stop signs
no traffic lights
no reason
no reason for traffic lights
drive painfully slow
talk fast
fidget
state the obvious
people are born every day
people die every day
restate the obvious
for the sake of monotony
schools suck
knowledge is free
construct nothing
build everything
avoid Zenisms
Zen and the art of
bullshit
Zen and the art of
boredom
Zen and the art of
self consciousness
Zen and the art of
sameness
monotony
again and again
reflect on nothing
be vain
be grandiose
be pompous
be glorious
you genius you
I refuse to end
this for that
be tempted to
say something
be empty
be violent
fuck assholes
be a fucking asshole
flowers and trees
and moons, summer,
evenings and frocks,
relections in water,
blades of grass,
rhyme and reason,
Whitman, pubic hairs
in your goddamn teeth even
Christ had to suck dick or eat
some pussy
be reverent
pray to candles
enjoy confessions
be miserable
and ornery
at all times except when
you want something
say anything
believe in Machiavelli
manufacture
your own importance
love everybody
I know I love Susan
and Dad and
my brother
and mercy me
by Marvin Gaye and Straights
don't get tricky,
respond to yourself
continuity
chaos
fuck this
and that
hate beatniks
enjoy American football
drink beer
and wine and whiskey
abstain in moderation
fear God
for the hell of it
resemble your mother
be your father
or vice versa
feed the poor
or at least pick up the tab
on occassion
occassionally party
at all times
contradict yourself
bums by the way
are not bums
spare some change
or make some
schools and laundry
suck
education and nudity
are free
piss on mansions
even if it's your friends house
swim in heated pools
pool your resources
then exploit them
exhausted,
start over.

--Umberto Crenca

Village Idiot As Spiritual Leader in the Americas

Introduction

Boogey oo de fili oh mi hygen spotch; jik a crick a fildther ho the lawyer jaw. Gunther gladden in a piercesake by the flickers of a fallen glimmer. How the hearthen found a fishlight crown. In a crowsy sippy frere? In a bumsy oppo zoo? The cheap deep is mellifloss. Under grather windle way, from the flyshot ever trown; under gither bindle bay, down the mishow water frown.

Building Communities Through Gumbo

Culture forrows things der damn in gumption bucket round the flan. Up and dup below the bump if culture ripples big and lump. The cheap deep lawer jaw. Hugging horrows of the lie the borrows culture gum the pie, the pocket, the mooch. Misconstruct the fellows foot, the ugly little yellow root, the gumpy bittle banker boot, and beautiful indulgent froot. The bindle dumpling gullets the ham gully of the muddy and the hully. Hoo the reclusive mousy boy of culture. Mugger the wuggers in America.

Courting Fruity Bellows of Hope

Interpreting intercated pic-a-pic dawbs of bawbs and wealthy vibes in a world f America. Who is flax wag when all co-gawd bluey hosts in a fixer mor-a-mor? Mellifloss and ba-ba-bo lawyer jaw. The cheapo depot, all pic-a-pic and wealthy vibes and filthy hosts of lawyer jaw. We bleed more mor-a-mor. Ba-ba-bo! The fretful nest strictures flow.

Picking the Plastic Golum

Affixed in viceboy donkey piffle, flown with a backhand jigger, oblige all stiffies to fight gum figures in America. Quibble the pickers, nibble the snickers, and build with liquor. Communities. Children are hidden sans big boobers from wallow snake fjords in in fallow triumph turnips. Parsnips of sorts in safe fords of snickerbuildings. Quibbling the picketers. How now the backhand jigger? All flown with a donkey's piffle stick. Under listless lawyer jaw.

Village Idiot as Spiritual Leader in America

Picking the fuity golum; counting the plastic bellows of gum; grouching the horny spectacle of bikeplates; boogeying the damn deep lawyer jaw; all in the sake of the bindle dumpling. No printing of girie inkling; no muggering the wuggers of the Americas; no constructing the ugly little yellow root and the spindle boot; all in the sake of the bindle dumpling. Rippling the culture lump; grathering the hygen spotch; heatening the fishlight crown; all is bindle dumpling bait. Horrowing the mousy boy of culture is the bindle dumpling.

And then...
Girl asks her father to buy her a mirror in which she can see anything in the world. He obtains one from the devil in return for his daughter at the end of five years. Virgin promises to save girl from evil. When five years are up, girl escapes, goes to king's palace, where she is hired as a servant, in male disguise. Prince discovers her identity, marries her. While he is away on a trip, devil sends a letter in prince's name to king, ordering him to have the girl torn apart by horses. King reluctantly does so. Prince returns, finds wife dead. Later he finds her in a cave in the image of a saint. Prince and king bring image to town, where it is worshiped.