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Richard Spitzer

Richard Spitzer

July 19th, 2019


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Since his childhood Richard Spitzer has been confronting the forces of misinformation, groupthink and consumerism head on with musical rebellion. Raised by an Orthodox Jewish family from Queens, Richard Spitzer grew up under the tight grasp of strict rabbinical law. He attended yeshiva where his first taste of music was intense mandatory prayer 3 times a day. Every aspect of his life was under the control of extreme Judaism.

Feeling mentally held captive as a teenager, he sought out the attention of a neighborhood girl from the outside world. He started collecting music of every genre and learned to write songs in hopes of one day serenading her. His interest in music grew so vast that his massive cassette collection was later discovered at school by a Rabbi, who, upon seeing a death metal album in the collection laden with crosses and satanic imagery, instantly expelled young Spitzer from the Yeshiva.

Now in public school, Richard attempted to win over his neighborhood crush. He sang her a song on guitar, but she told him "I only like club music with synths & heavy dance beats." After tagging along with her to several underground raves, he began to collect synth gear and produce techno in hopes of win winning her love. Despite his efforts, she fell in love with a well known bass DJ who impressed her with his hi-end professional studio, fashionable clothing, and his growing scene popularity.

Feeling rejected, Richard traded the constant trend chasing of the club life for the social camaraderie of indie bands where he played keyboard, guitar, bass & drums in various Brooklyn acts. Ultimately he became fed up with what he called "the superficial popularity contest" of the music business. Richard would often get into arguments with his bandmates and was inevitably kicked out of every group he joined for vigorously opposing any form of self promoting. Richard was adamant about against press, flyers, social media and text invites to promote to friends.

In 2016, now loveless, band-less and jaded, Spitzer aimlessly wandered the streets, eventually running into an unruly workers strike against giant media mogul Time Warner. At its helm was then presidential candidate Bernie Sanders chanting loudly on a megaphone, "Enough is enough!” Feeling inspired, Richard went to bed listening to an audio book of Karl Marx's The Communist Manifesto. That night, Marx visited Richard in a dream warning him of Tr*mp’s inevitable win and prophesied that the American people would lose their collective sanity in the wake of the 2016 election. Corporate media would levy for power with social media influencers. Through mass misinformation America would be divided on a new level.

Marx commanded Richard to go onto social media communicate directly from the heart to the masses unfiltered with only guitar and voice. "Remind society," Marx told Richard, "through music we can communicate clearly and by sticking to its core we can create a new type of spiritual dialogue that will unite and enlighten the people."

His debut solo LP, Richard Spitzer, is eleven tracks of a man and his acoustic guitar on this Marxist mission to ‘unite and enlighten.’ The sonic result is as if the lovechild of Rivers Cuomo and Elliott Smith woke up next to a cell phone stacked feeds deep in memes about modular synths, news of yellow vests and Russian collusion, and the occasional text from his girlfriend.


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