How did a boy from Chapel Hill, North Carolina, who
memorized Janet Jackson dance routines and learned to dub his vocal creations
on a dual cassette tape boom box, who became an organic farmer because of a
romantic attachment to a man, and who became a professional back-up hip-hop
dancer for a San Francisco drag queen before returning to his musical roots,
find himself living in the Bushwick neighborhood of New York City with a
gorgeous new five song EP on his own label, 3KB Records, entitled Musik/Dance/Love that fuses the major
elements of his life?
When Andy Kuncl tells you how this all came to pass, you
begin to doubt his age—a mere 36. No slouch, he is also not hyper. He has a calming
personality and a serenity of heart. All his energy gets fed into his art
rather than the talking about his art. He is lanky, pale and with a strokably
bushy red beard and merriment in his eyes. He is the kind of man that
boyfriends might describe as sweet, low-maintenance and easy-going. (The Bushwick
boyfriend of five years was not asked to verify this guess.)
A tour of the bare facts of his life seems colorized even in
outline form.
Knowing his parents would never approve of art school, he chose a
more conventional course of study and got a degree in geology because that is
what his favorite professor taught. Inspired by Ani DiFranco, he started
playing guitar in his sophomore year. He says, “In Pittsburgh I saw a poster
for her concert and I went to it. I was amazed. I had never seen anyone play
guitar like that. Then I discovered Patty Larkin. Finally I knew what I wanted
to do. Playing and singing consumed my life. And, I taught myself graphic design while working at the
school paper. My roommates were business majors and we would joke about the
fact that I was the one who had actually started my own successful business
called Missing String Music that was
my platform.”
After college, Andy toured extensively. He says, “I played a
lot of Borders bookstore coffeehouses and many college cafeterias. I did that
for five years. I made a business connection that flew me down to Orlando
frequently to do music showcases. I lost interest in music. That’s when a
friend got me into organic gardening back in North Carolina. It captivated me
because I could see things grow faster than they do in the music business. I
started my own farm called Disco Beet Farm. I fell in love. We were squatting
in a big old house with no heat, I had Lyme Disease and we needed a change so
we visited San Francisco and moved there. I got a job at a food store cooperative
called Rainbow Grocery. 300 worker/owners with no real boss. Very dysfunctional
set-up but it worked. A guy who worked there was interested in me. I didn’t
want to get involved with a coworker so I resisted. The first song on the EP is
called ‘Tried 2 Resist.’ Its
original version was a video/song I made in the backyard in fifteen minutes in
response to an email he had sent me. I stopped resisting him. At the same time,
I started taking hip-hop dance classes and I was doing showcase performances
with different choreographers when I auditioned for and got hired by a dance
company called Loose Change where I did a lot of Capoeira, house and Lindy Hop.
Then I got a job with choreographer Nick Cave where I danced in one of his huge
spikey ‘sound suits.’ I also was a backup dancer for drag queen Syphillis
Diller at TrannyShack. When I worked with great choreographer Ronald K. Brown,
I felt that I had done it with dance, and I returned to music.”
The impetus for that return was primarily the death of a
close friend, Kevin Brock, one of the three KBs in the name of his label. The
others are choreographer Ronald K. Brown and boyfriend Karl Beck. Andy says, “Kevin used to sit me down
and say “What are you doing? Are you doing what you love? If you died
tomorrow…?’ He died in his sleep, and his death kicked me into gear to move
back into music.
“Musik/Dance/Love
is in an alternative/dance/pop style. In it, I transition from an acoustic
guitar singer/songwriter and fuse the music of my dance experience. Love is the
third element in my life and I now see that I made all of my major moves
because of love.”
Andy says that his musical style is sometimes compared to
Sade, Peter Gabriel and Rick Astley. When a different comparison was made,
suggesting that he might be the love child of Boy George and Sarah MacLachlan,
he laughed and denied them as influences, saying, “I think it would be better
to say ‘If Arthur Russell and Robyn had a son...’”
Andy is currently working on expanding Musik/Dance/Love
into a full length album. The last track on the EP is instrumental only, a
direction he continues to explore. Not afraid of dreaming big, he is looking
for a DJ with whom to collaborate on remixes (Sin Morera would be a good match)
and has an idea about organizing a series of performances involving teams of
local artists. When Andy says, “I want to do things that excite me and make me
move,” he is not to be doubted. His continuous evolution will always be
fascinating but his swiftly growing fan base is hoping that music will continue
its hold on him and that he will be producing and performing many more
songs. You will agree when you
listen to the five tracks of Musik/Dance/Love
at AndyKuncl.com.
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