Jul 2, 2008 1:14 PM

Podington Bear's Identity Revealed

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The formerly unknown artist Podington Bear, whom we have highlighted several times on Listening Post, has been revealed to be Hush Records owner Chad Crouch.

Someone entered "Poddington Bear Aka Chad Crouch" into the artist field in Gracenote’s online CD identification database for his new CD, The End. When reviewers and fans inserted it into iTunes, Crouch’s identity was exposed.

According to a Gracenote representative, the artist data in question could have been entered by his label (in other words, by Crouch himself), although he would have probably gotten the spelling right ("Podington" instead of "Poddington").

Stream Podington Bear – "Ebullience":

The other possibility is that one of the first people to insert the CD into a computer entered the data, because Gracenote gathers user submissions of album information. Regardless of who entered the artist name (we have an e-mail in with Crouch to clarify), Crouch outted himself as Podington Bear on his blog on Wednesday.

It was hardly a huge revelation, in retrospect; a June 10 e-mail sent to Listening Post from Hush Recordsto promotie the new Podington Bear CD was signed "Thanks for yourconsideration, Chad."

A substantive (ahem) interview with RocketBoom, embedded below, touches lightly on such topics as Crouch’s species (human not bear), his label (Hush Records), his "helping bring up" of The Decembrists, his (relative) failure to record 156 songs in a year (it took 18 months, he finished on Tuesday), his plans to collaborate with the delightful Esperanza Spalding, whom we have comtemplated covering here before, and his love for DayTrotter. (Ironically, he had e-mailed us earlier, "I actually don’t read the strict MP3 blogs. Listening Post stands alone!")

Gracenote is on vacation today, so Listening Post was not able totrace how the information was entered into the Gracenote system. However, a company spokeswoman confirmed that Podington Bear’s realname could have been entered either by him, on the label side, or byone of the first people to insert the CD into the computer and who knewPodington’s real identity.

Why did he decide to start out anonymous, and then reveal hisidentity? In part, because "Bands are (perceived as) guilty of nottrying enough or trying too hard. Guilty ofmaking music that isn’t in league with the A list, or (of) aping the A list. Guilty of being preciously sincere or coy and artificial." His fullstatement is included below.

Rocketboom, which uses a Podington Bear song for its theme music, interviewed Crouch over iChat from his Portland, Oregon location:

And here’s Crouch’s full statement on the topic:

If you caught anything of the Podington Bear story, you probablyknow that there’s some joker somewhere in Portland, Or. USA that made abunch of instrumental tunes under a pseudonym and put them up on theinternet for free, then archived it all in a box set, which HUSH ispresently selling. Depending on how you roll, I guess, this is eithermildy interesting, or a suspect ambition, or N/A. If you have asensitive cute meter, the bear face drawing, songs with twinkle bellsounds and a blog with picturesof kittens may well send up red flags. Moreover, the sheer volume ofmusic–One hundred and fifty or so songs in a player window, liketchochkes in a display case–will likely serve to reinforce a hunchabout the music being applicable to your interest, N/A, or even anaffront.
And so it goes in this information age where music saturationdemands hair-trigger American Idol-esque parsing. If you spend a lot oftime with and around music, it might increasingly feel like trafficcourt, which is to say, basically everyone is guilty and the clock is ticking, let’s keep moving so we can go home. Artists and bands who labor over making a case to be heard are affordeda few seconds from a judge (you and I and bloggers and the peoplecompelled to make comments on the bloggers comments, etc.) and moreoften than not the instinct is, well you didn’t mean any harm, so I’ll reduce your fine. Now get out of my face. Bands are guilty of not trying enough or trying too hard. Guilty ofmaking music that isn’t in league with the A list or aping the A list. Guilty of being preciously sincere or coy and artificial.
With this in mind I can’t say that I blame bands for dressing up incostume, having a shtick, trying to produce a "viral video," or gaming MySpace, or whatever.
All this is simply backstory for one aspect of why I chose to makemusic as a bear for 18 months. Yes, I am me. Podington Bear.