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John Linnell

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They Might Be Giants
Band Members:John Flansburgh | John Linnell
Backing Band:Marty Beller | Dan Miller | Danny Weinkauf
Linnell - Now
Linnell - Then
Linnell - The Earlier Years

Contents

[edit] Biography

John Sidney Linnell (born June 12th, 1959) is one half of rock duo They Might Be Giants. Linnell co-founded the band with John Flansburgh in the early eighties, and is a primary songwriter and singer for the duo. He generally plays accordion, baritone saxophone, and keyboard for the band.

Before joining TMBG, Linnell claims to have been in a full-on jazz band called The Baggs, and was also in a New Wave band known as The Mundanes. In 1999, he took on a side-project of State Songs. He said he had always had a problem with finding titles for songs he'd written, so he decided to start naming after states, since it gave him 50 guaranteed titles. The unique thing about Linnell's state songs is that, due to the nature of them, they're almost never actually about the states after which they are named. Rather, they tend to be about literally unrelated things, such as bicycle wrecks and acid trips. (Interpretations can always be made to associate anything to anything, mind you.) The first State Songs album of Linnell's was released in 1999, and is still in print on Rounder/Zoë. As of yet, there's been no word on a release date for the second album, although he does reportedly have plenty more songs written for it. Linnell has also been an active member of American Accordionists' Association, appearing in Missionary/Mercenary: The Accordion in the Workplace seminar.

Describing his role in They Might Be Giants, Linnell once said, "I have a personal, a real obsession, with melody and harmony. I can really never get enough of that kind of thing. I don't think too much about the cultural context of what we're doing. I think John is more on that end of it. He thinks more in terms of the larger picture, the larger meaning of what we're doing. I'm more into the technical end: the chords and the rhythms and the melodies." -- The Splatter Effect, 1994

Even though Linnell is usually thought of by fans as 'the one who doesn't wear glasses', he's quite seriously farsighted, and he always wears glasses when he is off-stage.

[edit] Side project releases of note:

[edit] Instruments

Linnell has played the following instruments in recordings or live:

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

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