Melanie Martinez's creative drive and talents have always distinguished her from other musicians. After releasing her platinum-certified 2015 debut album, Cry Baby—which reached No. 1 on Billboard's alternative albums chart and has amassed over two billion streams worldwide —she conceived and directed a video for each song on the album. These mini-movies traced the traumas and insecurities experienced by the album's character, Cry Baby.
 
Melanie’s sophomore album and film, K-12, is another ambitious triumph. K-12's music is a vibrant and singular melting pot of low-key hip-hop, soulful pop and indie-leaning electro. K-12's universe is an expansion of the one introduced in Cry Baby. Using lyrics rich with metaphor, songs address the struggle to find a place to belong—including within friendships, the physical world and romantically—even when fitting into society feels like an uphill battle.
 
To accompany the album, Martinez wrote and directed a 90-minute movie (also called K-12) that incorporates the album's music and mirrors the themes and characters introduced. Filmed on location in Budapest, Hungary, the movie focuses on Cry Baby (portrayed by Martinez) and a class of students who find themselves trapped in a horror house-like residential school. As they experience the usual grade school rites of passage—a lunch room food fight, the embarrassment of gym class, a romance with nefarious intentions, courses taught by checked-out teachers— they have to figure out a way to escape.

shhhh, listen to the secret demos before they're gone 😘💜

The Cartoon Band You Never Wanted. 

Mad Queen is a band of interdimensional hooligans spanning the mediums of sound, page, and spacetime. From synthesizers to jazz chords, these cookie-crafting elves grind tirelessly to bake up an intergalactic revolution against the tyrannical rule of genre-boxes and conventional commercialism.

Mad Queen specializes in synthesizing ingredients from any style of music into a Progressive Fusion Dance-Dish to shake the palette of even the most cynical critic. Following footsteps in the likes of The Gorillaz, Coheed and Cambria, and Linkin Park, Mad Queen takes heavy influence from Jazz, Disco, Metal, Synthwave, and Hip-Hop, and wraps-up all their tracks in a Progressive Rock tortilla drenched in Anthemic Pop elements to create a wall of aggressive repeating grooves and timelessly catchy melodies. They carefully weave a narrative into (most of) their songs illustrating the universe of The Hero Spectrum comics written by Mad Queen’s boisterous frontman, Nox Malzahn. They have been lovingly described as “The Elevator Music of Purgatory” and “Adderall Study Music” by random people on the street and certified line-cooks.

The Hero Spectrum comics follow the story of Chess, Domino, Gammon, and Solitaire, four super-powered bank-robbers, as they attempt to save their dying world, Haventia, from being swallowed by a black hole while simultaneously dodging the noose-tied puppet strings of The Twelve Tyrants and The Old Gods. A symbolically rich literary journey exploring the concepts of humanity, divinity, freewill, nihilism, and the colors of the spectrum between Hero and Villain. Also lots of guns and magic! Stay tuned as the epic tale begins to unfold in Winter of 2021. 

 

Conceived in the deserts of Oregon, and given life in its valleys, Mad Queen has been defending their western coastal home from the forces of silence since 2017. Their ranks are made up by the likes of Nox Malzahn (lead vocals), Tesla Veer (synth), Lazlo Armada (drums), Kaia Rose (bass), Prov Namesk (guitar), Genesis Sine (additional instruments), and Arcade Oghma (piano). They team-up daily with like-minded heroes across the globe by crafting custom aural weaponry for use by other independent artists in the struggle against generic production. Meanwhile, Mad Queen manically hacks away at their own massive Progressive Pop record for release later this year.

Mad Queen can be found under the name @madqueenmusic on most social media platforms (links above) and has a Patreon almost exclusively for buying ramen. Demo tracks and commercial beats are posted to their Soundcoud daily, and their EP, Birth Sun of a Mask-Maker, can now be streamed on Spotify, Apple, Amazon, and Bandcamp. If you’re interested in having an instrumental track commissioned, feel free to contact us for quotes and a consultation. Sign-up for our Newsletter to stay up to date on current projects, band lore, and release information for A Cat Named Chess!

Musician / #BornBrokeDieFamous

For Booking/Collab Inquiries: bornbrokediefamous@gmail.com

Well…music is what it is…in the ear of the beholder.

Thank you for listening 🩵 feel free to use any of my music in your videos and projects 🌟

Sometimes I make music
instagram.com/matruscra/

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