Yonatan Gat

As Member of Monotonix

Gat first came to prominence as the guitarist and founder of Monotonix.^[6] After finding themselves banned from most venues in their country due to the wild and controversial nature of their concerts, the band decided to leave Israel and tour the United States and Europe, gaining notoriety and praise for their revolutionary live shows. With Monotonix, Gat released an EP and two albums on Drag City Records. The guitar work in these recordings was praised early on by the likes of Pitchfork mentioning "guitarist Yonatan Gat slides in and out of solos without ever throwing the rhythm off the rails. The descending guitar line that follows is sweet and yearning enough to fit onto a damn Strokes record."^[7]

During the band's 5-year existence, Gat played 1,000 concerts as its guitarist and co-founder, collaborating with musicians such as Fugazi's Ian Mackaye and Guy Picciotto and Beat Happening and K Records founder Calvin Johnson, while touring as support band for Pavement, Faith No More and Silver Jews. The latter's frontman David Berman would go on to co-produce Gat's 2018 sophomore LP Universalists.^[8] In 2008, Monotonix were called "the most exciting live band in rock 'n' roll" by Spin Magazine.^[9]

As Composer and Solo Artist

After Monotonix's final world tours in 2011, Gat stayed in New York, completing a degree in anthropology under a scholarship from Columbia University, and in 2014 began recording and performing as a bandleader and solo-artist, engaging Gal Lazer (drums) and Sergio Sayeg (bass) as his core studio-collaborators while expanding his projects to include musicians such as Brian Chase (Yeah Yeah Yeahs), Greg Saunier (Deerhoof) and Thor Harris (Swans).^[10]

His new sound maintained the confrontational punk urgency of Monotonix, this time using improvisation and advanced editing techniques as composition methods, while incorporating influences from various genres of music from around the world.

Gat began touring the United States and Europe both as headliner and sharing the stage and with Of Montreal, Thee Oh Sees, and Sun Ra Arkestra, often performing his set on the floor in the middle of the audience.^[11][12] He released his debut EP, Iberian Passage, written and recorded while he was living in Portugal, in the spring of 2014 on Joyful Noise Recordings and his full-length studio album debut, Director, followed in 2015. Within months of Director's premiere, an EP produced by Steve Albini titled Physical Copy followed.^[13][10][14] Gat's band performed in SXSW that year and was praised by BuzzFeed and SPIN as one of the best shows of the festival.^{[15][16][17][18]}

Gat's latest album, Universalists, was released through Joyful Noise Records on May 4th, 2018.^[19] In that same year he went on to release a split 7-inch with Os Mutantes, play a guest solo on "most popular modern band in Niger" Tal National's new album, and premiere (on cinema outlet NOWNESS) a collaboration with a Rhode Island Algonquin powwow drum ensemble – the Eastern Medicine Singers. The album's release was followed by a world tour, often with Gat backed by an 8-piece band which included members of his own ensemble of musicians, as well as the Native American drummers and singers of the Eastern Medicine Singers.

Musical style and equipment

Gat's recorded output is mostly instrumental and uses improvisation and editing as compositional tools. It is built around his guitar playing, while containing heavy use of field recordings, as well as sung and sampled vocals (his own, his bandmembers', his collaborators' and vocal field recordings collected around the world).

While recorded live in the studio, Gat's albums contain heavy use of editing techniques influenced by a wide range of producers from Miles Davis's Teo Macero productions to Kanye West's Yeezus. His music was defined by Magnet Magazine as "Melding improvisation, world music, punk and avant-garde into a vital new music form." ^{[20][21][22][23]}

Gat has endorsement deals with Guild Guitars and Ernie Ball Strings. He often performs with a Guild S200 Thunderbird connected directly to a 1980s silverface Fender Twin Reverb amp with 1960s JBL speakers. He prominently uses the amplifier's reverb and tremolo but usually refrains from using effect pedals, opting instead to focus on the instrument's natural wide dynamic range, from punk and noise attacks to gentler Erik Satie-esque melodies.^[24]