The Bobs
| The Bobs | |
|---|---|
| Origin | San Francisco, California, United States |
| Genres | New wave, a cappella |
| Years active | 1980–present |
| Website | |
| Members | Richard Greene Matthew Stull Dan Schumacher Angie Doctor |
| Past members |
Gunnar Madsen Janie Scott Joe Finetti Lori Rivera Maureen Smith Amy Engelhardt |
The Bobs are an a cappella vocal group founded in San Francisco, California in the early 1980s. Now based in Seattle, Washington, they have been recording, and touring throughout North America and Europe ever since.
Founding members Gunnar Madsen and Matthew Stull decided to form an a cappella group when they left their jobs as deliverers of singing telegrams in San Francisco. Instead of covering more traditional doo-wop songs, The Bobs started out with original arrangements of their own songs and songs like "Helter Skelter" and "Psycho Killer" . Although two of their albums are dominated by cover versions, the overwhelming majority of their repertoire is original, with songs discussing diverse subjects like lunar cattle farming, sleepy bus drivers, bumper stickers, laundry, hurricane-related flooding, graffiti, Oliver North, shopping-mall security guards, celebrity autographs, synaesthesia, post office violence, heart transplants, Heaven's Gate, spontaneous human combustion, turtles, rebellious footwear, tattoos, nicknames for genitalia, and felines intent on ruling the world.
Their arrangement of "Helter Skelter" was nominated for a Grammy Award in 1984.
The Bobs have broken with a cappella tradition several times by including instruments. The majority of the 1995 album Plugged is backed by toy drums. Plugged also made heavy use of studio equipment to make the voices sound more like guitars and bass guitars. Coaster includes a rock rhythm section on one song. Rhapsody in Bob features their arrangement of Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" with pianist Bob Malone playing most of the original piano concerto as The Bobs become a vocal orchestra. But this original "band without instruments" usually uses just their mouths, hands, feet and "other body parts".
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Wikipedia