MissingPerson's Official Lovely Non-Threatening Arcade Fire Joy Parade.

[sbessiso]

Fuck Beck.

Look at that hair right there.

Outstanding.

Why do you say these things? Do you enjoy hurting me?



(He does have nice hair though )

[MissingPerson]

Just saying. Much as I love Beck's full and well-managed hair, Will's got him beat on the body and shine front.

If it came to a hair-off situation, my money's on the Butler boy, is all. I mean look at that:



Magnificent.

[sbessiso]

He IS really cute.

The Beck of the Old Days would've won the hair-off, but he's just too busy lately feeling Modernly Guilty and fighting urges to jump in the Volcano to worry about hair management.

[MissingPerson]

One thing I will give Beck is consistently strong hair.

Will, you never know where you stand. It's short hair, long hair, short hair, long hair... you never know what to expect.

With Beck it's a much more laid back affair. Although he is perhaps past his hair prime, his hair just does what it wants. Maybe with a hat. That's just how it rolls.

Anyway, here's some Will in a clean white shirt. I mean uh, talking about important politics. Awesome.



(Short hair)

[sbessiso]

I can't believe thats the same guy! What exactly happened to him, MP? The dreamyness is GoneGoneGone!

You know what I was just wishing for as I'm making myself some breakfast? Let's have Beck AND Arcade Fire play Glastonbury 2010. It would be like building a bridge between two islands, world peace would surely ensue

[MissingPerson]

I know. It's all about the hair. And his hands, he's got nice hands. And his complete disregard for his own safety, that too. That's lovely.



Anyway, yes. We could build a bridge! A bridge of clumsy but achingly heartfelt sentiment and nervy progressive techno-folk!

It wouldn't carry Heavy Goods Vehicles, or open up to let ships downriver or anything. But still. It would be a great bridge.

[JSam67]

You know what's funny?

There's enough people in this band for me to do a Band Member of the week thing for nearly three months.

Just a thought...

Do it already. I also give long-hair Will the edge over mid-90s Beck, but just barely. And Glasto 2010 shall have Arcade Fire, Beck and Portishead, and all will be right in the world. Seems more like a suspension bridge to me, but I like it.

[MissingPerson]

I don't really have anything to add, I just really wanted to look at this picture more.

Good God.

Furthermore:



For the record, I've blanked out her face not to be all Single White Female creepy, but just because the good lady herself ain't in the public arena already, so it didn't seem fair. And I've no idea where that photo came from.

[DRcube]

didnt that photo come from an article in montreal about their wedding?

[MissingPerson]

Very possibly, looks like a scan. I only have the photo on it's own.

[MissingPerson]

Bingo, you're quite right.

http://blogs.riverfronttimes.com/ato...tler_got_m.php

[kitt kat]

if anyone's interested, i did a review of miroir noir for my college paper that ran today

http://dailytrojan.com/lifestyle/arc...een_in_new_doc

[MissingPerson]

Nifty.

It's weird to me how few review are around for it though, I presume there'll be a few more when the physical disc gets out there.

Apparently there's a shot of some/ all playing at some of the Obama inauguration stuff. Win did a solo set a while back for a Rainn Wilson charity thing, so hey, maybe that.

[MissingPerson]

Get to know a band member!

Richard Reed Parry



Also Known As:
Richard Parry, Guy who looks sort of like Napoleon Dynamite,"You know, the ginger one?".

Some people call him Richie - please be aware that unless you actually know the guy, this is creepy as hell. All the red headed kids who are clearly Single White Female-ing him at shows are equally disquieting, particularly when they settle together in groups in a fashion not unlike The Children of the Damned.

Richard Reed Parry plays guitar, accordian, double bass, celesta and a shitload of other weird shit. Excepting Win and Régine, he's been in the band longer than any of 'em. When and if he ever goes, the band that remains won't be the Arcade Fire, as far as I'm concerned.

As well as Arcade Fire, he also chipped in with Unicorns and Islands. He's also in Bell Orchestre, an absolutely fantastic instrumental bunch, who should hurry the fuck up and release their second album already, because I came late in the game to their first one and it was surprisingly awesome.

He is said to have studied contemporary dance. Though not implausible, this also sounds suspiciously like something the band might have made up. I'd bet my fucking teeth he's a vegetarian, but I'm unsure as to why I'm so totally convinced of this.

He is an outstanding guitarist and genuinely gifted musician in his own right. Having studied electroacoustics, he likes doing weird sound effecty things - best demonstrated in Antichrist Television Blues - and playing weird old timey instruments that nobody's ever heard of - see Well & The Lighthouse. If Arcade Fire were to have an exchange programme with Radiohead, he'd be the guy they'd send.

Once I high fived him. I'm quite certain it was a defining moment in his life. However, I have not quite forgiven him for since inadvertantly suggesting in an interview that Arcade Fire's Irish audience is disproportionately drunk and toothless. He is well known for sneaking ticketless folk into shows, and this was in fact how the band first met Vincent Moon.

He's a nice dude.

He is aware of how closely he resembles Napoleon Dynamite.

[sbessiso]

He's cuuuuute

[MissingPerson]

Plus he might actually literally be Dancer.

[shakermaker113]

you mean he's not napoleon dynamite?

[DRcube]

haha that was good...any more band member profiles?

[MissingPerson]

About eleven more, yes.

[MissingPerson]

The many moods.... of Richard.

Interview:



The Price is Right:



With Bell Orchestre:



With Bowie, complete with mid song instrument swap.

[DRcube]

About eleven more, yes.

haha really?

post them...or give a link

[MissingPerson]

I'm working on the next one.

It's hard. They like to keep quiet about themselves, and music journalists are lazy, so there's a lot of weird shit floating around that's either only half true or just blatantly insane. Their sense of humour doesn't help either, I'd bet you any money that most of the weirder myths were started by the band.

And by "the band", I mean Will. He once told a journalist that Win sleeps in a coffin.

[MissingPerson]

Get to know a band member!

William Pierce Butler



Also Known As:
"Holy Fucking Shit, He's Going To Fucking Die", William Abraham Butler, Guy With The Gold Drum, Will.

William Pierce Butler, Win’s brother, hails from The Woodlands, Texas. Their great grandfather was Alvino Rey. Rey was an early electric instrument pioneer, partly responsible for the electric guitar as we know it. More on him when I get to Win.

There’s a very, very early Arcade Fire song about him. It's more or less a Win solo. Song's not great, but the sentiment is sweet. Presumably this was well before he was a proper member of the band, because it must be really fucking weird to help nine people sing a song about you.

Fittingly for somebody apparently named after Yeats, he studied Poetry and Slavic studies at Northwestern University, where he also worked on the radio station. He got a research grant to study rock music in Communist Czechoslovakia. He lent his voice to a number of student animations, the best known being Run, Leia, Run. It’s his voice on the Neon Bible infomercial pretending to be Richard. Although he did work on Funeral, he wasn't always on tour for it because he was still completing his college course. In the event, he completed his coursework between shows; but not before having to show a cynical lecturer that he really was in the band with a Time magazine cover he was on.

Should you stumble across an internet post claiming to be by Will, brilliantly, it probably is. He has a tendency to take it personally when the band are accused of inadvertent racism by Sasha Frere Jones, and has been known to lurk around fan forums and blogs under a variety of amusing aliases. His response to the blog accusing Win of stealing a basketball was one of the funniest things on the internet, although sadly the page is now gone.

Will plays guitar, synths, glockenspiel, the signature battered old gold drum, and some manner of woodwind, but seems to be most comfortable with bass. He’s been known to take over vocals for special occasions, as for their cover of Guns of Brixton. He was (is?) also a member of Citizens On Patrol, a fun ska-tinged rock outfit that I'm fairly sure is more or less defunct now.

But he’s best known for his ferociously energetic stage presence with Arcade Fire. He flings stuff around, he climbs shit, he leaps, he falls, he frequently almost dies, he hammers instruments to death with some regularity, and all without losing a limb or missing a beat. Such is Will's astonishing disregard for safety that Win has suggested he prefers not to watch him while they perform, in case he accidentally gets to see his brother die mid-show. His passion for violence is not, however, limited to himself - he once set Régine’s hair on fire, and, on a separate occasion, dropped Richard on his head hard enough to crack apart a crash helmet.

I shook his hand once, and am certain this was as important a moment for him as it was for me. His hands were covered in blood, I presume from knocking seven sorts of hell out of the glockenspiel. I told him he was a crazy bastard; he took this well enough to suggest he hears it a lot.

He may or may not be a Mormon, but the only source for this is famousmormons.net. Although plausible - Alvino Rey converted later in life - I'm pretty dubious about that website because nearly every carbon-based lifeform short of the Pope himself has been on it at some point. They have finally taken Win off though.

He is quite unfeasibly handsome.

[MissingPerson]

The many moods.... of Will.

Interview:



Citizens On Patrol:



Climbing shit:



Singing for Guns of Brixton:



Neighbourhood #2 (Laika) at Reading:

[ArcadeParade]

when Arcade does not put a smile on your face - you know you are hurting for the lineup

[DRcube]

excellent!

[iv3rdawG]

Skip to the Sarah profile

[MissingPerson]

Iv3rdawG, you're always a man of discerning tastes.

The Sarah profile's going to be a pain in the arse though. That girl's a ninja, it's like she didn't exist before 2004.

[iv3rdawG]

Marika would be fine too

[DRcube]

profile of just touring members?