The Easy Tells / Christian Gibbs

Show Description

In 2010, singer-songwriter Matthew Crosby and guitarist Ryan Mackstaller, both members of NYC-based rock band, The Majorleans, began collaborating on alternative arrangements of Crosby’s songs as well as new material and a handful of covers. Mackstaller recruited drummer Keith Robinson (Marcia Ball, Charlie Robison) and later bassist Matt Brandau (The Old Ceremony), recent transplants from Austin and Chapel Hill respectively, and by early 2011 the foursome were gigging consistently around the Lower East Side and Brooklyn as Easy Tells, honing a sound centered in American Rock, and influenced by artists like Wilco, Stephen Stills, and Elliott Smith, though not without a healthy nod across the pond. 

The band’s recently completed debut EP, "Got What You Paid For" was released in November, and is available for streaming at www.easytells.bandcamp.com.

A Brooklyn based songwriter by way of San Diego, Christian Gibbs has released over 10 albums under the names Lucinda Black Bear, C.Gibbs, The Droves and Morning Glories. His projects have flirted with many different genres from indie Chamber Psych Folk to the Darker leanings of Americana  and have been praised in the New York Times, Rolling Stone Magazine, NBC News, and other notable publications.  His current project,  Lucinda Black Bear, was  featured on NPR's "All Songs Considered. (#4 on NPR's Top 10 ). He was also the lead guitarist / keyboardist in the critically acclaimed Broadway Musical Passing Strange and was in the Spike Lee movie of the same name. Gibbs began his rock and roll career at 20 when he arrived in London for a semester abroad, answered a help wanted ad for a guitarist and promptly fled college to assume employment as Modern English’s guitarist. The young man’s parental nightmare subsequently took him to posts playing with Jim Thirlwell’s Foetus,  fronting New York rock trio Morning Glories and settling into a solo career signing to Atlantic for one album. He has opened for/shared the stage with Margaret Cho, John Mellencamp, Akron Family, Son Volt, John Doe, The Damned, Little Richard  and many more. He is currently working on an all acoustic album due for release later this year.