Posted on: September 20, 2010 Posted by: James McQuiston Comments: 0

As a rock and roll band playing year round, TV Buddhas has been dealing with having no home, no friends and no time for themselves, not by the consumption of alcohol or drugs, as the cliché goes, but rather by creating an illusion of a normal everyday. For the past few months, the vlog has become their way to see their own lives from afar through the lens of a camera. It shows them walking through supermarkets, shopping malls and roadside attractions, discussing home design or cooking, pretending to be living a comfortable life beyond the band.

In a world where rock and roll has completely changed its skin, TV Buddhas document the last remaining vices of a modern day hard working DIY band on the road in a commercial wasteland, a reality that doesn’t give a damn anymore about punk honesty or unknown bands writing heartfelt songs. Underneath the radars of big promoters, hipster publications, and hype driven music consumers, TV Buddhas move forward from one empty club to the other, from one financial flop to the next, documenting their wallets going slimmer, their sense of failure and missing out growing more and more impatient, and their attempt to balance that out with humor, by surrounding themselves with their own private world.

The vlog shows pictures of a music scene in recession and its indifference to genuinely new things, an image of an indie band going deeper and deeper into itself in order to block out the sense of alienation it feels from the outside. It attempts to present a basic punk narrative that shows the other side of being in a garage band, the part no one shows, but is so vital to uncover.

More about TV Buddhas

Originally based in Tel Aviv, but now located in Berlin, the three-piece rock band know as TV Buddhas will Americanize themselves over the course of a non-stop six-week tour of the US this Fall. The band will be supporting a new EP on the We Are Busy Bodies label. The band recently made the “Let Me Sleep” single available and now present the “Fun Girls” for your pleasure.

TV Buddhas consists of brother and sister Uri and Mickey Triest, and Mickey’s husband Juval Haring. The band makes punk rock in the vein of Richard Hell, Modern Lovers and The Ramones. They bring back outsider rock and roll, straightforward lyrics and raw simple playing with heart. They started as a duo, leaving Israel around late 2007 to tour in Europe after just a month of rehearsing and three songs in their setlist.

The band grew and expanded, wrote songs and recorded on the road, on days off in between more than 400 shows to this day. As a trio, the TV Buddhas S/T EP is their first release. Recorded in their current home base of Berlin in about an hour and using just one mic and a field tape machine, the EP showcases the basic elements of TV Buddhas: minimalist drums, loose guitars and an anti social edge. Like a post modern take on Jonathan Richman mixed with The MC5.

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