MAUVE SIDESHOW

Mauve Sideshow biography
Active in the 1990s, Mauve Sideshow were a North American kosmische ethereal wave band consisting of then-married duo Ramona Blair (Mellotron, electronics) and Treva Dea (vocals, electronics). Originally based in Houston, Texas, Mauve Sideshow later moved to Seattle, Washington, where they would operate until their divorce.

Mauve Sideshow evolved from Kangaroo Kourt, the pair's more Nurse With Wound-oriented sound collage project, morphing into a neoclassical darkwave band performing a no-less-tripped-out take on early Berlin School, fusing the spirit of Gong with the experimental electronics of Karlheinz Stockhausen and the dreamlike ambience of Tangerine Dream's Zeit and Atem. Blair's impressionistic, ever-changing soundscapes were untethered from melody and rhythm, providing a bed for Dea's Gilli Smyth-like English-word soliloquys. This idiosyncratic sonic template - and a love for the Ventricle M400 Mellotron - informed Blair's other projects Torn Curtain, Angel Provocateur, Steeple of Fyre and Mistress of Strands (among many more).

From 1990 to 1997, Mauve Sideshow released five full-length LPs and a self-titled compilation album, issuing the latter and their first two - 1990's Dark Flowers and 1991's Stray Apparitions - via Refraction Sound, with all releases from 1993 onward distributed through Blair's own Ventricle record label. While Mauve Sideshow never received more than a cult following, their profile was raised in an 1993 interview with the Legendary Pink Dots' Edward Ka-Spel, who gave them and Kangaroo Kourt a shout-out as his most recent inspirations.


- Gordy, December 2023