Avant-garde composer, producer, performer, writer, and label manager, active since the mid-1970s.
Born in Adel, Georgia, 1956.
Died January 20, 2022 in Hannover, Germany.
Initial recordings and compositional experiments, 1973-1978. First group, Boat Of, formed in Athens, Georgia, late 1979, in direct opposition to local norms (B-52s, Pylon), with dub and nascent hip-hop culture as primary influences. Other groups followed, with Peach of Immortality, To Live and Shave in L.A., and Ohne making an impact - at least within certain underground circles - from 1984-2008. Following his move to Germany in late 2008, Smith has been extremely prolific, forming other ensembles, performing solo vocal compositions at various festivals, and entering into collaborations with artists as diverse as Sightings, Aaron Dilloway, and Kevin Drumm.
He manages the Karl Schmidt Verlag imprint, which issued over 500 limited-edition (CDr) albums and some books. On March 15, 2015 he wrote: "About 65% of the 380-odd albums issued by KSV were just me anyhow, swathed in one absurd pseudonym after another," so his full list of aliases & releases exceeds what is listed here.