Tour is in support of Fake Four (Ceschi’s label) releasing Serengeti’s indie classic Dennehy on vinyl for the first time with never a heard ep and cassette of the Derek EP
Drawing from emo, indie rock, avant electronica, and more, Chicago-based indie rapper Serengeti earned a reputation as being an immensely prolific writer, evidenced by his barrage of long-players, all imbued with his oddball personality and abstract rhymes. Born David Cohn, the whimsical MC spent most his youth in the Chicago suburbs and began writing rap lyrics around the same time he moved into the city at age 16. His eccentric inclinations developed under his divorced parents' two schools of thought: his mother was a political activist and self-styled socialist, but his father had an upper-middle-class way of life. When Cohn went off to college, he met fellow classmate DJ Crucial, who had similar hip-hop ambitions. Crucial eventually founded F5 Records and issued Serengeti's 2003 debut, Dirty Flamingo. It was the first of practically a dozen albums that he released through various independent labels within the next few years. Noteworthy standouts were the experimental rock-leaning Gasoline Rainbow (2006), released via MF Grimm's Day by Day imprint, and the imaginative, blogosphere-approved Dennehy (2006) on Bonafyde. Signed to Audio 8, Serengeti collaborated with glitch-hop producer Polyphonic for Don't Give Up (2007), but then revisited Dennehy a year later, issuing an expanded version. On the title track, Serengeti invented a fictional character named Kenny Dennis, who became a staple for future albums, including 2012's Kenny Dennis EP, 2013's Kenny Dennis LP, and 2014's Kenny Dennis III. In 2016 Serengeti teamed up with Why? show-runner Yoni Wolf for the collaborative Testarossa. Released under the moniker Yoni & Geti, the Joyful Noise-issued LP was a conceptual piece that told the story of a pair of star-crossed lovers named Maddy and Davy.
Ceschi Ramos is a rapper and singer from Connecticut who has been hopping genres and spilling guts for the better part of two decades. He has been seen outside venues at 3am in Germany playing an acoustic guitar and singing to people that didn’t want the show to end. He has written poems to fans from behind bars whilst locked up on bogus marijuana charges. He has suffered a spiral fracture of the humerus while arm wrestling a marine in Hawaii. He has recorded with and toured alongside some of independent rap music’s most influential figures, including Sage Francis, Busdriver and Astronautalis. He has been in bands described as hardcore, crunk rap, lo-fi synth pop, Latin progressive and psych-jazz-rap. He has crafted abstracted and personal narratives mining the depths of depression and heights of hope. He has slept on countless floors when hotels weren’t in the touring budget and lost girlfriends and jobs all for the love of creating and performing.
Ceschi was born with four fingers on his right hand, which served as partial inspiration for the name of his DIY record label, Fake Four, Inc. Those who have worked with him describe Ceschi as one of the most artist-friendly labelheads out there, a rare breed who values art over profit almost to a fault. Since 2008, he has curated a roster of wildly original and critically praised talent and put out albums from the likes of Open Mike Eagle, Buck 65, Sister Crayon and Dark Time Sunshine in addition to his solo records The One Man Band Broke Up and Broken Bone Ballads.
An engaging, theatrical live performer, Ceschi Ramos has treated entire venues like a stage, viewing the middle of the audience or an empty barstool as good a place as any to perform a soul-baring folk song or tongue-twisting rap track. Ceschi once described himself in song as “a martyr at most… a failure at least” and said that, “In the eyes of history I’ll be no more than a leaf on a tree.” He knows what it is to suffer for his art and is aware that music exploring the ugliness and sorrow of the human condition will always exist on the fringes of a game dominated by disposable escapism and expensive publicists. Yet he still pours everything he has into his craft, and on any given night you can find him tracking vocals at his cousin’s New Haven studio, warmly greeting fans and friends at a dive bar merch booth or rapping double-time in Japan or Europe for audiences that often don’t speak his language, but are able to see the giant heart at the core of it all.
Most recently Ceschi did direct support on over 30 Astronautalis dates at the end of 2016 and is currently on P.O.S Chill Dummy Tour, doing direct support on 13 dates.
CHISME was born of back alley whispers and the heavy San Antonio night air. Their narrative hip hop inspires a riddled stir in your gut. A red bird whistle in the hour that no bird sings. It’s an uneasiness left by the nightmare already forgotten. Lingering smoke in the form of a beckoning finger. Storytellers, simply the truth left untold.
and we like to party.....
Ruby Yacht Makers Guild
Ruby Yacht Makers Guild
