Portastatic

Biography

Portastatic is the nom de plume of Superchunk’s leader McCaughan (Ralph McCaughan, 12 July 1967, USA). With Superchunk up-and-running in the early 90s, McCaughan came to the realization that he had an overflow of songs (in an eclectic variety of styles, but notably quieter than his work with Superchunk) that would probably never see the light of day. So, he decided to release a slew of singles (all on the Superchunk-run label, Merge Records), in addition to tracks contributed to various compilation/split singles under the name Portastatic.

In 1994, Portastatic issued the debut, I Hope Your Heart Is Not Brittle, that was followed the next year by Slow Note From A Sinking Ship (as well as an EP, Scrapbook, that featured appearances by Yo La Tengo). Starting with 1997’s Nature Of Sap, Portastatic began doing more ‘esoteric things’ (in McCaughan’s own words). After this release however, a long drought without any albums...

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