Toiling Midgets

From the still-warm ashes of Negative Trend and the Sleepers, the Toiling Midgets formed in late 1979 as an instrumental band with Craig Gray and Paul Hood on guitars, Tim Mooney on drums and Jonathan Henrickson on bass.



In 1981 singer Ricky Williams joined the band to record 'Sea of Unrest' (Instant [Rough Trade US]) and lasted through a brief West Coast tour.



By 1983 the Midgets were once again an instrumental band recording what would become 'Dead Beats' (released in 1984 on Jon Boshard and Joe Carducci's Thermidor label) with new bass player Aaron Gregory and 3rd guitarist Annie Unger (Gun Club). The band split by the end of that year; Craig heading to the UK and Paul back to Seattle.



In late 1989, the Midgets reformed just before the San Francisco earthquake. Lisa Davis (Naked Into, American Music Club) replaced Aaron on bass. Singer Mark Eitzel (American Music Club) joined them live and recorded 'SON' (Matador) in 1990, but because of his AMC commitments, could not accompany them on their US tour the next year. Lisa left in the interim and was replaced by Joe Goldring (Wade, Swans; recently Enablers, Touched By A Janitor). The band did the tour instrumentally.



On return, original drummer Tim Mooney left and was replaced by long-time producer Tom Mallon. A Midgets semi-acoustic side project played live and recorded in 1991 with Ricky Williams again singing, Craig, Paul, Tom and Joe, and Mary Redfield (on loan from Wade) playing violin. Goldring left to pursue his many other projects and Seattle ex-pat Erich Werner (Telepaths, Blackouts) joined on bass.



Another spate of recording with Ricky resulted. Unfortunately, this collaboration was not meant to be – Williams died a few hours after its first and only show – on November 21, 1992. The following year, the band experimented with other vocalists (and even did a short west coast tour with David Ripley) but decided a return to instrumental music was in order.



This last, instrumental-only version of the band -- now including Mark Sullivan (Lucky, Motorcade) on piano and organ -- has been together since 1994. A great deal of recording was done in 1995 and 1996 including a project with Joanna Hood (Lafayette, Loma Mar, and Eclipse Quartets) on viola. The band took more than a decade off (1997 to 2008) recently reforming to play several shows and write new music. With any luck, the Instant, Thermidor and Matador LPs will again be available this year, along with an album culled from new material and the recording projects of the mid-90s.