Yip Yip

Born out of a high-school friendship in March 2001 in the Orlando suburb of Winter Park, FL, quirky electronica duo Yip-Yip (Brian Esser and Jason Temple) didn't set out to perform live shows. Instead, they concentrated on making music at home, using a variety of keyboards, samplers, and other instruments to create their unique NES-meets-noise sound that eschewed melody for pattern and idiosyncrasy. In 2001 they self-released their debut full-length, 1, with Skills appearing the following year. In 2003 the EP High Heel to Mammal was released, and it was also around this time that Yip-Yip decided to start playing live shows. They started to appear locally, booking their first real tour in 2004 and continuing onward from there, helping to make a name for themselves by playing videos and wearing matching hooded jumpsuits (either white or black-and-white checkers) on-stage. In 2004 they pressed a limited number of their third full-length, Pro-Twelve Thinker, which was then picked up by California-based Strictly Amateur Films and reissued the following year. Though on a label, the band continued to do its own artwork and recording, releasing a couple of singles and an album, In the Reptile House, before showing up at New York's CMJ Festival in the fall of 2006 and 2007 and issuing yet another full-length, Two Kings of the Same Kingdom, in the winter of 2008. - Marisa Brown