Yellow Ostrich: “Mary”
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Yellow Ostrich’s Alex Schaaf is a graduate of Lawrence University, where he studied in the Wisconsin school’s prestigious music conservatory. He takes a scholarly approach to his own music: the songs are all carefully composed, often built around dozens of loops that Schaaf creates with his own voice. He has half a dozen releases to his name, all restlessly creative and complex.
Recently Yellow Ostrich has taken flight and moved to New York, and Schaaf has turned the project into a full-band effort. This past spring, the group released Strange Land, a record that found Schaaf taking his music out of the bedroom and into the bright light. The band will be in the bright lights this weekend when they perform at Fun Fun Fun Fest, another stop on a seemingly never-ending national tour.
But today’s song of the day doesn’t come from Strange Land. Rather, it’s an alternate take of a song Schaaf recorded on his own before recruiting drummer Michael Tapper and bassist Jon Natchez. “Mary” first showed up on Yellow Ostrich’s album The Mistress, but we think this version finds the band at a unique turning point–poised between the bedroom and the big stage.
You can catch Yellow Ostrich at Fun Fun Fun Fest, where they’ll be performing Friday, November 2 on the Orange Stage at 12:30 PM. They’ll also be performing at the ND on Saturday, November 3 at 12:00 AM as part of the FFF Nites series.
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