aka Poez

aka Poez Genre: Jazz Secondary Genre: Spoken Word NEW YORK New York USA Jazz vocal spoken word featuring keyboard accompaniment and digital delay. "A sonic fantasia" - NY Times. For full electronic press kit, go to: http://www.sonicbids.com/epk/epk.asp?epk_id=172709 (Includes hi-res photos, audio and video samples) A SPOKEN-WORD PIONEER Recently (October 13, 2007) recognized by The New York Times as "a spoken word pioneer"on the front page of its Metro Section in a Jim Dwyer "About New ...

aka Poez Genre: Jazz Secondary Genre: Spoken Word NEW YORK New York USA Jazz vocal spoken word featuring keyboard accompaniment and digital delay. "A sonic fantasia" - NY Times. For full electronic press kit, go to: http://www.sonicbids.com/epk/epk.asp?epk_id=172709 (Includes hi-res photos, audio and video samples) A SPOKEN-WORD PIONEER Recently (October 13, 2007) recognized by The New York Times as "a spoken word pioneer"on the front page of its Metro Section in a Jim Dwyer "About New York" column, his career trajectory led Paul L. Mills aka Poez from the sidewalks of Boston’s Harvard Square and Greenwich Village to concert stages in Paris and New York. AN ASTONISHING AND UNEXPECTED VOICE There has really never been anyone else quite like him. "A sonic fantasia," said The New York Times in a prior review. "A voice musician ... a young man with a flow of words like a river ... like a jazz instrument" is how The New York Daily News described Paul L. Mills aka Poez. "Plays his voice as a violinist moves the bow across the strings ... beyond the writing, beyond the performing, to a personal portrayal that is a virtual song" The Aquarian Weekly. "An astonishing and unexpected voice," were the words used by Le Figaro (Paris), "Incredible and extraodinary ... words suddenly become rhythm and music" agreed Le Quotidien (Paris), of his concert engagement at Le Theatre du Rond-Point on the Champs-Elysees in Paris, when Patrice Regnier's RUSH Dance Company joined him in live performance of his original work, "Spontaneous Combustion." He has performed in New York at, among other venues, The Bitter End, Kenny's Castaways, Theater for the New City, the Ridiculous Theater, LaMama ETC, the Cornelia Street Cafe, the Bowery Poetry Club, and the Sidewalk Cafe/Anti-Folk Festival, as well as in radio and television appearances, sharing the bill with performers such as Mose Allison, Sonny Terry & Brownie McGee, William Burroughs, and Richard Hell. His writing has been published in Boston's Fusion Magazine, along with that of Lou Reed, Patti Smith guitarist Lenny Kaye, New Yorker essayist Hendrik Hertzberg, and UK television personality Loyd Grossman. He has worked at times as a cab driver, civil rights trial lawyer, actor, bouncer, and philosophy book salesman; lived in Washington, DC; Highland Park, Illinois; Marblehead, Massachusetts; San Francisco; Los Angeles; and Albuquerque, New Mexico. Following a 15-year timeout, he returned to New York after googling his name and finding a web page about himself posted by two Manhattan spoken word artists, Bob Holman and Jackie Sheeler, lamenting his disappearance from the scene, and urging his return. Artistic influences include Indian Dhrupad singers The Dagar Brothers; comedian Lenny Bruce; poet Dylan Thomas; the Firesign Theater; poet Amiri Baraka; and jazz vocalist Mose Allison. Paul L. Mills aka Poez presently resides in New York City near Central Park with his wife, singer-songwriter Suzanne Vega. A collection of selected writings, THE POETRY DOLLARS (Bowery Books, New York, 2007), is available online at www.amazon.com. His October 19, 2008 performance at New York's Cornelia Street Cafe will celebrated the debut of his first album, "The Monotone," produced in August 2008 at Artsider Stuios, New York. Selected tracks from "The Monotone" haven been chosen for rotation on The Que 98.2 FM, Radio Electric, Uptown Jazz Network, UnderWorld MixRadio and Indie 104 Iradio LA. Online digital download of "The Monotone" album (or individual tracks) is available on iTunes, Napster, LiveWire, Groupie Tunes, eMusic, Rhapsody, and CD Freedom. "The Monotone" CD (with two bonus tracks), downloadable mp3 files, and copies of his book, THE POETRY DOLLARS (New York, 2007, Bowery Books), are available through Nimbit Music at http://www.nimbitmusic.com/akapoez. Instrumentation Paul L. Mills aka Poez: vocals, keyboard, digital delay. Discography January 1982: Think and Do, on compilation Vol. 1 No. 9 CooP - Fast Folk Musical Magazine June 1983: Spontaneous Combustion b/w The New Wave Pizzeria, Jasmine Records (single, vinyl) September 1983: Fred Astaire Meets Dr. Seuss, Survivor Records (LP guest track, vinyl) October 19, 2008: The Monotone (11 track CD).