Deerhoof
Deerhoof is an American musical group formed in San Francisco in 1994. It consists of founding drummer Greg Saunier, bassist and singer Satomi Matsuzaki, and guitarists John Dieterich and Ed Rodriguez. Beginning as an improvised noise punk band, Deerhoof became widely renowned and influential in the 2000s through its self-produced albums.
Deerhoof has released 20 studio albums since 1997. Its most recent, Noble and Godlike in Ruin, was released on April 25, 2025.
History
Formation
Deerhoof was formed in San Francisco in 1994 as Rob Fisk's improvisational bass/harmonica solo project. Greg Saunier joined on drums a week later. They were quickly signed to record a single for Kill Rock Stars after owner Slim Moon witnessed their performance at the 1994 Yoyo A Go Go festival. Satomi Matsuzaki joined Deerhoof within a week of moving to the United States from Japan in May 1995, with no prior experience playing in a band, and went on tour as Deerhoof's singer only a week later, opening for Caroliner. Deerhoof's 1997 debut album, The Man, the King, the Girl, was recorded on a 4-track tape.Deerhoof had a music practice space at the Art Explosion Studios at 2425 17th Street in the Mission District; other bands in this space included Creeper Lagoon, Beulah, Zmrzlina, Don't Mean Maybe, and S-- S-- Band Band.
Breakthrough
joined Deerhoof on guitar in 2002, between Reveille completion and release.In contrast to Reveille digital production process, 2003's Apple O was played almost entirely live to tape in one nine-hour session with Jay Pellicci engineering. Extinction, nuclear holocaust, invasive species, and the Greek god of music all figure prominently in the album's themes. Karen O chose Apple O in the Rolling Stone 2003 Music Awards, Artists' Top Albums, and the album received some critical praise, notably in the New York Times. But in what became a pattern for Deerhoof, the album's critical appraisal improved with time, and Pitchfork later listed Apple O as one of the top albums of the 2000s. The record's antiwar themes were underscored by Deerhoof's outspoken opposition to the Iraq War.
By 2003 Deerhoof had become the longest-running band on Kill Rock Stars. Matsuzaki was editing a Bay Area Japanese magazine, Cohen was waiting tables at a Thai restaurant, and Dieterich and Saunier were doing data entry for legal and consulting firms, but that year they all quit their jobs simultaneously to focus on touring. That year they contributed to Azadi! A Benefit Compilation for the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan. Saunier also released Nervous Cop, a collaboration album with Zach Hill and Joanna Newsom.
Deerhoof's next record was inspired by a crudely drawn character created by the Japanese artist Ken Kagami. 2004's Milk Man featured an opulent, campy sound inspired by Broadway and Igor Stravinsky. It was nominated for "Outstanding Alternative Album" in the California Music Awards, and stayed at No. 1 on the Dusted Radio Chart for six consecutive weeks, and reached No. 1 on the CMJ Core Chart. Also in 2004 Deerhoof received the Editor's Choice Award from 7x7 magazine, and was voted "Best Local Rock Band" by readers of SF Weekly. In 2006 Milk Man was adapted to a children's ballet.
Deerhoof's next release was its first to be sung in Matsuzaki's native language of Japanese. 2005's mini-album Green Cosmos combined an orchestral sound with dance music styles.
Deerhoof spent several months in 2005 in a rented rehearsal space in Oakland, writing and recording daily as a full band. When the result was released that fall, the double album The Runners Four featured each band member taking turns as vocalist, singing unusually wordy lyrics in which Arks and time capsules recur, as though foretelling that this would be this lineup's final recording. Instrumental roles were reversed for Matsuzaki and Cohen.
In 2006, Danielson released the critically acclaimed Ships, which featured Deerhoof as the backing band on many of the tracks. Later that year, after an extensive world tour that ended at Coachella, Deerhoof composed and performed a live soundtrack to Harry Smith's hour-long animated film Heaven and Earth Magic at the San Francisco International Film Festival. This was Cohen's last activity with Deerhoof. The split was amicable. Commemorating Cohen, Deerhoof posted a free EP on its website, one of several it has posted over the years. Chris Cohen now records and tours as a solo act.
Reconfiguration
Matsuzaki, Saunier, and Dieterich began a new recording as a trio. They recorded mostly in Dieterich's bedroom and mixed on the band's laptop in hotel rooms during tours with Radiohead, the Flaming Lips, and Beck. Some material was from the "Heaven and Earth Magic" soundtrack, some was completely orchestral, and one song was specifically created for a Hollywood film's end credits. The album was highly praised in Pitchfork and Rolling Stone.File:Deerhoofprospect.png|thumb|left|Deerhoof at Prospect Park in Brooklyn in 2008
By January 2008 Deerhoof became a quartet again with the addition of the Flying Luttenbachers/Gorge Trio/XBXRX guitarist and longtime friend Ed Rodriguez. That summer Deerhoof released the song "Fresh Born" online as sheet music only, anticipating similar experiments by Beck and Blur by several years. Fans recorded and uploaded their own versions of the song to a website before anyone outside the band had heard Deerhoof's version. The October 2008 album Offend Maggie was praised by VH1, NPR, Entertainment Weekly, Alternative Press, The Guardian, and Mojo.
In April 2010 Deerhoof curated the Belgian music festival Sonic City, inviting an eclectic array of European acts including The Go! Team, Paolo Pandolfo, and sitting in with the Belgian punk band the Kids. In April and July 2010, Deerhoof and Xiu Xiu joined to perform Joy Division's album Unknown Pleasures live at the Donaufestival in Austria and at Brooklyn's Williamsburg Waterfront.
Format experimentation
Building on "I Did Crimes For You", during this time Deerhoof continued to record in a rented rehearsal space in Oakland. Musical influences from the Beach Boys, new romanticism, tropicalia, and the Congotronics series found their way onto 2011's Deerhoof vs. Evil. The band released the album one track at a time via different media outlets online, with a full map and schedule available on its website. The album was acclaimed by Entertainment Weekly, MOJO, and Paste. Matt Goldman's design was the second Deerhoof album cover to feature a mushroom cloud. Shugo Tokumaru remixed "Behold a Marvel in the Darkness". Deerhoof immediately initiated a 7-inch series wherein guest vocalists sang new lyrics over an instrumental of a Deerhoof vs. Evil song of their choice.Deerhoof was The Wire magazine's January 2011 cover story. It contributed to Polyvinyl's benefit compilation Japan 3.11.11, joining the relief efforts for March's earthquake and tsunami. Over the summer of 2011, Deerhoof toured with Congotronics Vs. Rockers, an international supergroup, alongside Konono N°1, Juana Molina, Kasai Allstars, and others. Its onstage repertoire included the Deerhoof song "Super Duper Rescue Heads" from Deerhoof Vs. Evil. In April 2012 Deerhoof collaborated with Questlove, Reggie Watts, Sasha Grey, and others in a conceptual concert event called Shuffle Culture at Brooklyn Academy of Music. In April 2012 a young adult fiction book, Rules to Rock By, by Josh Farrar was published; it is about a 12-year-old girl who is inspired by Deerhoof to form her own band. Deerhoof's version of LiLiPUT's "Hitchhike" appears on the soundtrack. In June 2012 at a Deerhoof performance in Chicago's Millennium Park, contemporary classical music ensemble Dal Niente performed Marcos Balter's arrangement of Deerhoof's "Eaguru Guru". The same month, Deerhoof and The Flaming Lips performed songs by King Crimson, Canned Heat, and Deerhoof onstage together.
In 2012 Deerhoof also began home-recording the record Breakup Song. The band said the album was a response to the tradition of breakup songs, which it felt included too many sad songs and too few empowering ones. After a long final mixing session at Saunier's apartment, Matsuzaki took the front cover photo of a garbage truck in the early morning. The Polyvinyl Records release was also released on Joyful Noise Recordings in "flexi-book" format, allowing listeners to flip from song to song as if each track were a page in a storybook. Deerhoof hero Simeon of Silver Apples remixed "Mario's Flaming Whiskers III". Revealing some of Deerhoof's working methods and group chemistry, a rare full-band interview, with former MTV VJ John Norris, appeared in the fall 2012 Interview magazine.
In October, Deerhoof released a single, "Sexy, but Sparkly", produced by Fear of a Black Planet co-producer Chris Shaw, the first time Deerhoof worked with a producer. It was recorded as part of the series of short documentaries Masters From Their Day, which chronicles the efforts of a band and a record producer as they attempt to record and mix a new single in one day. The song then appeared in the LAMC split-7" series, in which a well-known artist chooses a lesser-known one to make their recorded debut, with proceeds going to the Ariel Panero Memorial Fund at VH1 Save the Music.
Deerhoof's 12th album, 2014's La Isla Bonita, was self-recorded live in guitarist Ed Rodriguez's basement during a "weeklong sleepover arguing over whether to try and sound like Joan Jett or Janet Jackson". The recordings were meant as demos to be rerecorded with former music journalist and Mr. Dream drummer Nick Sylvester, but the band liked the raw DIY versions so much it just kept them and recorded the vocals with Sylvester. The lyrics were heavily influenced by Columbia professor Jonathan Crary's book 24/7. The album art is by Sara Cwynar. The video for "Exit Only" featured Michael Shannon playing two roles, with a cameo by Rodriguez. The Guardian, on its exclusive preview stream of La Isla Bonita, collected testimonials about Deerhoof from various notable musicians and artists, including Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood, Henry Rollins, Blur's Graham Coxon, Adam Green, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs' Brian Chase, and David Shrigley. The album received high praise from NPR, A.V. Club, Alternative Press, and The Wire, and was reviewed by Tune-Yards' Merril Garbus for Talkhouse.