Downbeat, September 2011
Pandora's Box Review
***1/2 (Three and 1/2 stars)
'These nine musicians, offering all original tunes on their fifth album, might be graduates of Ken Kesey's Acid Tests of the mid-'60s who have been transported across time to the present.
Along the way, they picked up influences ranging from globalists Paul Horn and Oregon to adventurous rock bands It's A Beautiful Day and Joy of Cooking to Ken Nordine's word-jazz.
Keeping listeners off guard, the Denver-based Coyote Poets loosely fit the contemporary jam-band mold even as "Blood and Bones" and "Quittin' Time" rumble with a blues heft unattainable to many conventional blues bands.'
Frank-John Hadley, Downbeat, September 2011
Coyote Poets of the Universe
(aka Coyote Poets or CPU)
For over ten years the Coyote Poets have been creating an exciting and emotional art form and a unique concert experience featuring outstanding musicianship and award winning poets. The sound is fresh, not quite retro, somewhere between rap and rhapsody, beat and bebop, reminiscent of early Zappa in spirit, and has been popular with all types of audiences.
Instrumentation includes: electric and acoustic guitars, violins, four and five string banjo, saxophones, electric fretless bass, flutes, oboe, clarinet, English horn, keyboards, drums, congas and other percussion toys. Multiple male and female vocalists create a lush and diverse sound.
CPU has enjoyed sharing audiences with bands like Uncle Monk, Potcheen, Blue Turtle Seduction, Public Property, New Vintage, Prymal Rhythm, Gypsy Swing Revue, George W Nixon, Parkin Lot, Catfish Whiskey, Aenka, Forests of Azure, Doo Crowder, and Sons of the Addicted
Their music has received worldwide airplay on hundreds of broadcast, Internet, Satellite/Cable, NewAge, NPR, Jazz and CMJ stations, and critical acclaim in publications as diverse as Downbeat, JazzTimes, The Denver Post, Cadence, Progression, and Tandem / Corriere Canadese as well as Muzikreviews.com, AllAboutJazz.com, O'S Place.com and other web sites, and enthusiastic comparisons to artists as diverse as Ken Nordine, Frank Zappa, Massive Attack, Rickie Lee Jones, Neko Case, It's A Beautiful Day, Joy of Cooking, and The National.
