AU (pronounced "ay-you") is the work of multi-instrumentalist/singer Luke Wyland. Begun in 2005 while finishing up his degree from the Massachusetts College of Art in Boston, then moved Portland, OR. Currently a full time duo with Dana Valatka on drums, it can be a loosely defined amalgam of players that can swell to double digit numbers with full choir in tow and sees some of Portland's finest lending a helping hand. It's sound is vast and "deftly treads a narrow bridge between the loose-associations of the backwoods freak-folk crowd and the more formalized concoctions of art-poppers like Brian Eno."Since the release of it's critically acclaimed debut album in 2007, it has become a road worn live act who have been touring incessantly for the last few years throughout the US and Europe with great bands including most recently Deerhoof, the Dodos, and WHY?.

They've released two LP's (Au and Verbs) including an earlier solo album under the moniker 'luc' entitled peaofthesea (Aagoo 2005). AU's latest EP, Versions, was released as a limited edition of 500 on 10" vinyl in October of 2009 on Aagoo Records. Recorded in Vermont and New Hampshire through the winter of 2008-9, it stands as a document of the duo's distinctive ability to reinterpret songs from their recorded form and the heightened energy of their live show. With Dana's virtuosic drumming spawned from a youth playing in heavy metal bands, Luke's ability to multitask on numerous instruments at once, and their "special one-on-one musical, almost telepathic connection," it is a snap shot into their sprawling sets that find them deftly navigating between bombastic walls of sound, lilting lyrical numbers, and carnivalesque organ celebrations.

Tu Fawning is the new project of Joe Haege and Corrina Repp. Both Haege and Repp have been playing in Portland and abroad for many years now. However, a mutual desire to achieve something outside the bounds of their other projects, 31Knots (Haege) and Corrina Repp (Repp), lead both of them to begin collaboration on each other's albums last year. One look at the liner notes finds Haege all over Corrina Repp's 2006 Caldo Verde release, The Absent and The Distant. Then the roles reverse as Repp appeared on 31Knots' EP:Polemics (2006, Polyvinyl)and The Days and Nights Of Everything Anywhere (Polyvinyl, 2006).

Haege has also served as Repp's backing "band" for tours they have done with Mark Kozelek and Norfolk and Western, playing drums, piano, samples and singing. This is truly when the ideas for what would become Tu Fawning began to take shape. As Corrina began to expand her songwriting abilities at a lightning pace, by way of writing and performing songs on piano as well as guitar, she also began to challenge/enjoy herself by learning to play drums.

Now with Haege and Repp fully realizing their palette of piano, drums, percussion, guitar, vocals and samples, mutually and individually, they are finally able to tell the types of stories they have always wanted to, both lyrically and musically.

The end result is a hybrid of their own individual sounds coming together, but it feels and sounds so natural, as well as creating something more than the sum of it's parts. Its as if the frantic nature of 31Knots has caught its breath and Corrina Repp has found herself finally uninhibited to sing in front of some antiquated tribal music of hymns and ballads.

Soon after returning from their first tour, Haege and Repp realized that they wanted a sound that would not rely solely on gadgetry to feel organic and full. With two great friends and musicians already on the tips of both of their tongues, they quickly moved to ask Toussaint Perrault and Liza Reitz to join, adding horns/guitar and piano/violin, respectively. Having both spent time in Portland mainstays (Rietz in Swords Project and Perrault in Ape Shape), the melding of the four came quite natural.