Biography

Traversing and often melding trippy experimental electronics, pop songwriting, and alternative dance music, Larry Gus' early, sample-based releases included his 2009 full-length debut, Stitches. While still musically complex, his third album, 2015's I Need New Eyes, relied less on samples, and Gus performed all the music himself on the synth pop-leaning Subservient in 2019. Greek musician Panagiotis Melidis took the name Larry Gus in 2006, going into solo electronic music production after the dissolution of his more organic punk duo Ginger. He named the project after the Greek word "Larigas," which translates roughly into throat or larynx, but served as an interesting enough example of wordplay to act as a banner for his new sounds. Far less driven by punk, Larry Gus' earliest sample-based recordings were used in TV commercials, eventually giving way to live shows that included improvised looping and on-the-spot construction of kaleidoscopic beats. His first proper solo release, Stitches, appeared in 2009 on the Greek label Cast-A-Blast. Following a slew of compilation appearances, remixes, and online tracks, Melidis signed with DFA and released Silent Congas digitally in 2012, following it with Years Not Living in 2013. He issued his third album, I Need New Eyes, in 2015. He recorded his next full-length using a guitar, bass, drum kit, and portable and vintage synthesizers, with Gus playing all the instruments himself. The resulting Subservient arrived on DFA in 2019 alongside the stand-alone 7" "Kerkis (Judas-Tree)/Foreign Steps" from the same recording sessions. Lyrics to "Kerkis (Judas-Tree)" were co-penned with screenwriter Efthimis Filippou (The Lobster, The Killing of a Sacred Deer). ~ Fred Thomas & Marcy Donelson, Rovi