Queen Elephantine is meditative blues of whirlwind ghost ships forced down the hopeless maelstroms of the Nile. Modal doom from Hong Kong, currently based in USA.
Current Members:
Indrayudh Shome - Guitar, Vocals
Rajkishen Narayanan - Vocals
Andrew Jude Riotto - Bass
Brett Zweiman - Tabla
Chris Dialogue - Drums
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February 2009
The group originated as a guitar-bass duo, Indrayudh ("Indy") Shome and Danny Quinn, called The Weapon of the King of Gods, while Shome was playing with his other group, Molten Lava Death Massage. Then they decided to add drums - not one, but two - and changed their name and recorded their self-titled demo album, with a mix of Daniel Murphy, Mike Isley, and Andrew Chu rotating on the two drumsets. (Shome was 16 at the time; Quinn had just turned 17).
The next time they got together was when they recorded the Ramesses suite, which was released as a split with elder. This was done with one drummer, Daniel Murphy, and the trio completely improvised the recording without any preparation or premeditation.
Over the next few months, Mike Isley moved to Hong Kong and was taken as the new drummer. Then, their old friend Alex Buck, moved back to Hong Kong after a stint in the United States, and was the perfect addition to the band, taking on percussion and second drums. This was the four-piece lineup that played several shows and started gaining a reputation. The band then recorded the split album with Sons Of Otis with this lineup (all members were 17 at this time). They recorded The Sea Goat for Catacomb Records and finally they recorded the group's first full-length, Surya.
Then all the members graduated from school and moved to North America for university, where Quinn entrusted Shome to continue on the group. Shome found his next partner in Rajkishen Narayanan, his classmate, who did vocals and wrote songs alongside Shome.
Over the next months, they played with a lot of people, including bassist Andrew Jude Riotto from Agnosis for their first few shows, before settling on Chris Dialogue on the drums and Brett Zweiman on bass. This lineup recorded their first composition together, Chariot In Solemn Procession. They also recorded a song "Droning Earth" for the Droning Earth compilation series. They later released these two songs as the EP Yatra. The third recording from the group was a song called Mephistopheles for the 7" split with UK's Aluna, which has was released late in 2009. Another 7" was prepared from sessions in April 2008, featuring the A Side "To Tartarus," but as this too went unreleased, the three tracks were released online.
In early 2010 Fauna Sabbatha/Ruralfaune released 8XI08 Live in Brooklyn, a recording from a November 2008 show at the 'Meat Wallet' that also featured Naam, Weird Owl, and Bad Dream, and a screening of the documentary Such Hawks Such Hounds.
The second album Kailash was recorded in November and December 2008, with Indy Shome, Raj Narayanan, Brett Zweiman, Andrew Jude Riotto, and Chris Dialogue. The initial issue of the album is a condensed version (60 minutes of the full 71) of the album on cassette tape on Abandon Ship Records in March 2009. The CD was issued in May of 2010 on Concrete Lo Fi Records.
Source : http://queenelephantine.clfrecords.com/bio.html
