Tri-State Area
Leidy Churchman and Michael O'Neill.
Tri-State Area began in the summer of 2002, at the Lompoc open mics, in Bar Harbor, Maine.
Leidy Churchman and I first lived there that summer with Math Bass, and we started this group in our garage.
Eventually Math left, but we kept the name. We were the town queers singing hip-hop for a couple of
summers, mostly intent on having fun, but people seemed to enjoy it enough to have us play more.
We played covers but it was more like a performance of queer love and fun. For the most part, I remade the
songs on the MPC 2000 and played acoustic guitar while Leidy sang the lyrics off a page. We combined
Hip-Hop with acoustic guitar, or Classic Rock with a Drum Machine. We took it to Chicago and played
Texas Ballroom and benefits for Howard Brown. We have appeared on artforum.com and performed at
Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, as well as in Stirling’s living room. The latest renditions of
Tri-State Area have ditched the Ipod tracks and have included live musicians.
Our final collaboration is to be revealed in 2010.
"Against the Wind" (featuring Alexis Gideon), from I Like It, 2003.
A show poster from the early days:
Artforum.com - 12/24/06:
Performing at Glasslands, Brooklyn, NY - January 2007:
