On Friday night at the Granada, hips will be shaking, shoes will be shuffling and Chris Shively (aka Chrissy Murderbot) will finally be home.
It’s been three years since Shively last played in Lawrence, so the Kansas City native is a little more than elated to make it back to his old stomping grounds. He’ll be touting a new album, Women’s Studies, which is gaining a lot of attention across the nation. “A lot of new people have found out about my album,” says Shively. In the past, he stuck to playing mostly European shows. But the new album is giving him leverage for shows on his home soil. “I’ve been able to play more shows in America and better shows in America,” says Shively. “My audience has grown to where it finally makes economic sense to do tours in America. It’s nice to finally have a reason and the means to explore the states and get to know all these different places that I’ve never been to before.”
Mixing the Audiences
One place the electronic artist is familiar with is Chicago. After living in Lawrence, Shively embedded his roots deep within the Chicago dance scene. The distance between Lawrence and Chicago isn’t too vast, and neither are the interests in dance music. “Chicago has always very much been about house music, so you play in Chicago and you have to keep in mind that your audience is coming from a house music perspective,” says Shively, who grew up in the 90’s rave scene in Kansas City. He says a lot hasn’t changed, and that Kansas City crowds are still “expecting that same kind of old school rave music.”
But Shively says he gets a different vibe in Lawrence. “Lawrence is full of a bunch of 19 year-old kids who weren’t around for the rave scene in the 90s, and have very little of that historical context that I appreciate out of Kansas City people,” says Shively. “The Lawrence kids are up for anything. They’re all about new ideas, they want to hear what’s brand new. It’s nice if you can get a mix of those two audiences.”
Chrissy Murderbot feat. Johnny Moog & Coool Dundee – Sweet Thang by chrissymurderbot
Stupid Party Music
On top of his latest album, Shively also has a new EP coming out in October called “I’m A Asshole,” with the intentional grammatical error. That means he’ll still be out touring and promoting his work, starting with a European and west coast tour this fall. “I’m trying to do exactly what I’m doing now, but bigger and better,” says Shively, who insists he knows exactly where his place is in the dance music scene. “I’m not curing cancer or anything. It’s fun and it’s art that I believe in, and I think it does help people have fun.”
Shively noted that dance music culture is meaningful to him, and that there is an element of “wanting to enrich that culture and be a steward to it.” But ultimately, he insists “it’s all stupid party music.”
“It’s artistic, forward thinking, stupid party music; and I think it’s well crafted and bringing new ideas into the musical dialogue,” says Shively. “But at the end of the day it’s still stupid party music. It’s utilitarian, and if it doesn’t work on the dance floor, then you did it wrong.”
Watch Chrissy Murderbot and Machine Drum do it right this Friday at the Granada.
Doing it bigger and better: Chrissy Murderbot to bring ultra dancey night to the Granada
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Fally Afani
- . September 15, 2011
