Pinn Panelle

(Pronounced “Pin Puh-nell”

“Pinn Panelle comes from the words ‘Pin Panel’ being made to sound like a human name. ’Pin Panel’ refers to the face of a Pachinko game machine, and to us, the act of turning those words into a human name relates to how people turn to technology and other artificial things for comfort, or for love.
  
The gap between the raw ingenuity of today’s Electronic music world, and the thrill of a live Rock band performance has all of a sudden been reduced to a new low. Pinn Panelle is what happens when a Rock outfit pushes the limits on themselves and on their physical instruments to perform music that is not only innovative and powerful, but genuine and meaningful. With the release of their viral, live Dubstep cover video of “Scary Monsters And Nice Sprites” by Skrillex, the band has voiced what they’re capable of, and hints at the massive potential their future holds

The story of the band begins when Derek Song – a singer-composer, guitarist, and sound designer from Chicago – arrived in Boston in 2007 and met drummer and beat-maker, Justin Conway. The two became friends and started working on music together, essentially epic Rock songs with electronic elements. From there, things moved forward gradually; Jonah Wei-haas, a keyboardist from Tulsa, Oklahoma joined the band next, and the three would then go through an extended process to record and get tracks mixed

Finally in November 2010, all the years of hard work, planning, all-nighters in studios, and the ceaseless building of relationships with fans would pay off with the release of Pinn Panelle’s debut self-titled album. People compare its sound with artists like Muse, Mutemath, and 30 Seconds To Mars; but what they also notice is the seamless weaving-in of EDM, Classical, and anything-else-Pinn-Panelle-deems-cool elements

However, that release was only the beginning of what was in store for the band. As Pinn Panelle continued working hard and performing consinstently in Boston, members began getting more and more into what was happening in the Electronic music world. After all, it was there – particularly in the Drum and Bass, and Dubstep realms – that music production ideas that had never been done before were spawning. Artists like Noisia, Nero, Skrillex, Excision, Reso, Netsky, and Rusko became new sources of inspiration for the band – other acts would include Jon Hopkins, Son Lux, and Chris Clarke to name a few

In the spirit of that innovation and excitement, the members of the band pushed themselves farther, working to incorporate new sound design concepts. Derek began experimenting with alternate ways of controlling audio effects processing live, and this led to what is considered the band’s first live Dubstep cover video: a performance by Justin and Derek of the track off the popular holiday comedy video, “Dubstep Santa.

Around the same time, bassist Nathan Navarro from Murrieta in California, was also living in Boston and doing some similar experimentation of his own. With similar interests and goals, it was only natural for the members of Pinn Panelle to meet up with Nathan and eventually ask him to play with them on a new cover video of the song “Promises” by Nero

Fast forward from there just two months – Nathan is now an official member of the band and Pinn Panelle’s new Skrillex cover video is receiving hundreds of thousands of views in a matter of days. It has been featured on countless websites including CBS news and URB magazine, the front page of Reddit, College Humor, and Shock Mansion, even tweeted to Skrillex directly by Tommy Lee himself

Now, with a lot more eyes on them than before, Pinn Panelle is taking what they’ve learned from their inventive covers, to do what they set out to do in the first place: create new, and even more groundbreaking music.  With a tentative release for their sophomore album in the fall, Pinn Panelle has much more to say.  Stay tuned for more developments