Writhing Electra is a modern rock band based in Southeastern Pennsylvania. Writhing Electra was formed by Danielle Pavlos and Bob Hooker in August of 1999. An afternoon practice session in a 200-year old stone barn revealed a common love of alternative rock pioneers, experimental music, classic jazz vocalists, traditional country, and almost anything else that can be tuned in on a short wave radio or found in a used CD store.
We met up with our first drummer, Steve Witmer, at an open mic night in York. With the addition of drums, Bob contacted Maria Gerasklis, a bassist he'd met almost a year before (through her internet classified seeking musicians to form an all-girl 80's-style band!). Natalie Miller joined us about 2 weeks later on violin and rythym guitar.
In late October, we went into a studio in York County and recorded several tracks. Some of the results of those sessions accessible below:
Steve Witmer chose to leave the band in December for personal reasons. We were quite fortunate to welcome Matt Shellenhamer on board as our percussionist. We continued along and played a variety of venues in South Central Pa, including Gulliftys Underground, The Historic Blue Star Inn, and JT Croc'n'berrys. We shared bills with a variety of other local artists including The Fat Little Demons, P.L.C, Jack Shift, The Gliders, and Michael Reich & Chile.
Pictures from these line ups of Writhing Electra are available at the following link:
Sadly, a variety of personal and
other reasons caused this project to come to a close in the late fall of
2000. Danielle relocated to Arizona, Bob moved to Delaware; Matt focused
on playing in Locke; Natalie and Maria began working on their own project.
Since then, folks have moved here and there and life goes on. But it was
a lot of fun while it lasted...