About the Artist

Ella Blame is a duo consisting of singer/composer Ella Blame and composer/multi-instrumentalist Michael D. Temple. They write, compose, record and perform music never heard before of genres Psychedelic Pop, Psychedelic Dance, Symphonic Outer Space Music, and Ethereal/Ambient.

The Ella Blame duo, based in the Milwaukee, WI, area was established in September of 2002. Some time before, Michael D. Temple approached Ella Blame via e-mail, telling her that he loved her voice and music, and that he had composed a tune especially for her. Ella really loved that tune and vocalized it immediately. The result of this initial collaboration is the song "Dance With Me (Temple Mix)". Since then, Ella and Michael have intensified their collaboration, composing new songs (e.g., "How Things Have Changed") that once may be considered milestones in modern pop music.

In the future, the "Ella Blame" duo will perform on stage with a full-fledged rock band (two guitars, keyboards, bass, drums) and a string quartet (violin, viola, cello, contrabass).

About Ella Blame: duo member/singer/composer/lyricist

Ella comes from a family of musicians and she already sang when she was 3. Everyday during her childhood, she heard music almost around the clock: symphonic, operatic, chamber and twelve-tone music, jazz of all styles, R&B, soul, funk, rock and pop.

From the age of 6 to 17, Ella took courses in violin and was supposed to become a violin virtuoso. However, at the age of 17 Ella studied painting, earning a Master-of-Arts degree.

Ella has an extremely wide vocal range that covers the entire baritone, tenor and alto ranges, and exceeds the upper limit of the soprano range. With her vocal cords, she can produce sounds that most music experts consider having been generated by a synthesizer or by post-processing equipment. However, Ella can produce these "strange" sounds without using a microphone.

Before Ella Blame and Michael D. Temple have established the Ella Blame duo, Ella has produced more than 50 songs of various genres together with several electronic musicians and multi-instrumentalists from around the world (U.S.A., Canada, Japan, India, and Germany). She is still collaborating with other musicians, especially Shinji Imai a.k.a. mode complex from Japan.

About Michael D. Temple: duo
member/composer/keyboards

Michael has played several instruments (keyboards, guitar, bass, and drums) since when he was a child. His primary instruments are keyboards and bass.

Complementing his work as composer, musician and music producer, he studied electronics and computer engineering to have a solid professional education for making his living outside of the music realm. His technical studies offered him the advantage of gaining solid experience in analog and digital audio engineering. As a programmer and electronics engineer, he has worked on many advanced technological projects in electronics and robotics. However, his main skill is to compose and perform music of overwhelming variety.

Michael D. Temple was a member of Dorian Gray and The Virgins, and is still a member of Nagasaki Gold.

About Shinji Imai: collaborator/composer/guitar

Shinji Imai has studied jazz guitar, contemporary music and music theory for four years on a music college in Tokyo, Japan. He makes his living by composing music for commercial films, videos and special events. Although he is mainly a guitar player, he's also a pro in programming of electronic music equipment. Shinji's music is worldwide unique and characterized by a complex polyphony hardly achieved by symphonic music as well as by driving rhythm patterns.

Shinji is not a member of the Ella Blame duo but the main collaborator of singer/songwriter Ella Blame.

DK: I'd like to start off by asking for a little background on you, where you were born and raised?
EB: I was born in a large city and raised in my own world.

DK: What was your childhood like?
EB: Between nightmares and wonderland.

DK: How did you go from Classical influences to Kate Bush styled vocals?
EB: I never sang classical style and I'm definitely not a huge fan of classical music. When I was a child, my parents often took me to opera houses which was kind of boring. However, I liked several of the stage designs. Although people often think that my music and my phrasing somewhat resemble Kate Bush's, she wasn't a role model for me. But I deem her an extraordinary and very influential artist.

DK: What made you turn your focus from music in favor of painting?
EB: It was exactly the opposite. I have begun to sing and paint at the same time when I was a little child. But later, music became more and more important. I have a lot of ideas for new paintings and drawings but don't have the time and inner peace to work on them. What I do right now is to create the graphics on my web site, and I designed the cover of the "Ineffable Desire" CD, my logo, and stuff like that.

DK: With your vocal range and artistic qualifications, you could pretty much take them anywhere you like. Do you think you'd ever go down the path of Classical music again?
EB: As I mentioned before, I never sang classical music. It's just "Ella Blame" style and will always be. If I were a singer of classical music, I would always have to reflect other people's ideas and wouldn't have the freedom to "play" with my different voices. Because there are so many
melodies in my brain that wish to come to life, this would never work.

DK: How did you meet Michael and Shinji?
EB: Both of them sent me an e-mail and asked me to collaborate. The first collaboration with Mike was the song "Dance With Me - Temple Mix", and the first song I did with Shinji was "Thought Control". Both songs can be found on the "Ineffable Desire" CD.

DK: Who would you say your biggest musical influences are?
EB: Billie Holiday and jazz of all styles.

DK: Your album title "Ineffable Desire" sounds like there might be a story behind it, is there?
EB: "Ineffable Desire" is something wonderful and painful at the same time. I'm sure, many people know that feeling. "Ineffable Desire" is also the title of the second song.

DK: Do you have any plans for a follow up album yet?
EB: Yes. It will be released in fall 2006 and its name will be "Slippery
Slope". Many of the songs are already finished.

DK: What venues have you played so far?
EB: Several in various countries.

DK: Have you ventured out of Wisconsin for other shows?
EB: Yes.

DK: What are your plans for the next 6-12 months?
EB: Setting up a live show. My dream team would be: Michael D. Temple on keyboards, Shinji Imai on guitar, Mark E. Kirby (Spongehead) on drums, a good bass player, and a classical string quartet playing with guitar effects. Unfortunately, Shinji lives in Japan and Mark in Brooklyn, NY.
We'll see what the future will offer.

For more information about Ella Blame please check out: http://www.ella-blame.com