SMOOTAPHILIA: ENSEMBLE EROTIC
LIVE ORIGINAL SOUNDTRACKS TO SEXY CULT FILMS
Ann Courtney: vocals
Jerome Jordan: guitar
Jeremy Kay: bass
Dave Smoota Smith: Casio, beats & compositions
The best sensual experiences are primarily improvised. We can enjoy listening to the same song countless times, but when it comes to physical pleasure the key to maximum sensation is the unpredictable — improvising intimately in the moment with a partner (or partners). Smootaphilia: Ensemble Erotic embraces this idea in the pursuit of sensual music. What if Miles Davis’ 1972 electric band scored Deep Throat? What if Can composed the soundtrack to The Devil in Miss Jones? What is the connection between music, spontaneity, desire, and performance?
The ensemble’s origins are innocent enough: Dave Smoota Smith first met vocalist Ann Courtney in the shallow end of a YMCA pool in Brooklyn. They became fast friends and discovered a shared taste for boundary-pushing music: Courtney is revered as the fearless and awe-inspiring leader and singer of Mother Feather. Smoota has recorded and/or toured as a trombone player with cutting-edge bands such as TV On The Radio, Run The Jewels, Burnt Sugar The Arkestra Chamber, Sufjan Stevens, and Rev. Vince Anderson & The Love Choir. Smoota has also released two solo R&B albums exploring sexual themes (Fetishes + Pheromones) and leads the exploratory instrumental groups Smoota and The Beast and The Smoota Tête-a-Tête.
When a friend asked Smoota to perform at a live music & pole dancing party he knew it was an opportunity to share a stage with Courtney and attempt to create truly sensual music through structured improvisation. And thus Smootaphilia was born, from pool to pole dance, with Courtney’s endlessly adventurous vocalizations laying on a bed of slinky 69 beats per minute erotic funk steeped in the ancient to the future sounds of Hot Buttered Soul and There’s A Riot Goin' On.
Supported by some of NYC’s grooviest musicians—Jeremy Kay on bass and Jerome Jordan on guitar—Smootaphilia continues to explore its potential as it performs live and prepares its debut album. The band has live scored sold-out screenings at Nitehawk Cinema in Williamsburg and TV Eye in Ridgewood including 70’s sexadelic classic Vampyros Lesbos, Stanley Kubrick’s paranoid Y2K love story Eyes Wide Shut, and David Cronenberg's scandalous auto-erotica film Crash. The band has also scored one-of-a-kind compilations of erotic imagery compiled by Smoota at underground theaters such as Film Noir Cinema in Greenpoint and Tinker Street Cinema in Woodstock, NY.
