ABOUT

javacrossknit is the name of a modest project recording studio and a publishing company. Both were founded in Ann Arbor in 1998 and relocated to Chicago in 2003. Both are, as well, outlets for music made by taj. You might wonder who he is. Read on….

taj is reluctant to call himself a musician. Sure, he plays guitar and sometimes bass. He sings. He programs drum machines and occasionally plays a few notes on a keyboard or rattles some hand percussion. But don’t musicians perform? In front of people? His teenage bands were rehearsal-only units. Although he was more active years ago in college jazz ensembles, he has played in public only a few times in the last fifteen years. What he has done instead is record music at home, layering guitar sounds, tightening and loosening grooves, and bringing together all of the things he’s ever heard and loved in ways subtle and noisy, ethereal and earthy, profound and whimsical….

You’ll soon get the opportunity to come up with your own adjectives. Over the last few years—whenever he could steal time from his day-job as a university professor—he’s been working on his debut collection, Honey-Flavored Soap. Expect to see a final release in 2013, followed soon thereafter by other projects long in gestation.

If you’re interested in learning more, use the links to the right to read his musings on music, to learn about his influences, to hear demos of songs from upcoming releases, and to access other items of questionable value…