Cullen Gallagher's Modern Silent Cinema makes soundtracks for imagined movies (and sometimes real ones). Lo-fi electro-acoustic experimental instrumental guitar music equally indebted to artists as disparate as Michio Kurihara, Jandek, Rhys Chatham, Leo Brouwer, Pelican, Gyorgi Ligeti, Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru, Sun City Girls, and Paul "Wine" Jones. The project began in 2004 as a side project for Gallagher and has evolved into a two-decade songwriting exploration. Gallagher currently resides in Brooklyn, NY, and works as a library cataloger when he is not making music. His other endeavors include the hardcore bands Demoted and steve carface, and playing lap steel in Hard Job.

"I started Modern Silent Cinema in 2004 as a stop-gap between bands, intending just to record a few guitar chord progressions so I could practice bass," Gallagher explains. "Outside of a few stray songs for bands where I wasn't the primary songwriter, this was the first time that I was truly in control of the music I was making. This is what made me realize that I not only love playing music—but that I love making it, from conception through performance all the way to the mixing and final release. There's a hand-made sensibility that is crucial to my practice as a musician and artist. The six albums being released in 2024 reflect who I've been as a musician, how I've grown, and where I'm going. There's no such thing as a typical Modern Silent Cinema album. The Anxiety of Indolence is more post-rock; Flesh Mother explores noise, feedback, and metal abstraction; The Passion Killer Whose Prison Romance Set Off a Scandal is sort of punk-surf; and Ghost even includes shoegaze ballads with vocals (even silent pictures learned to talk). The one constant in MSC is its growth. " 

"The perfect lo-fi rainy day disc."–Arcane Candy

"Beautiful sounds, both raw and polished... There is a feeling this is a lost Fahey or Basho recording."–Lost in a Sea of Sound 

"Reverberates, resonates and shakes to a range of psychedelic, post-rock, krautrock, scuzz and fuzz influences across a myriad of soundtrack-like instrumentals."–Monolith Cocktail 

"From quiet, forlorn electric guitar and bass duets to solo heavy electric guitar riffs. From bluesy workouts to distorted yet melodic songs that strongly recall the likes of Roy Montgomery."–Arcane Candy

Contact: modernsilentcinema@gmail.com

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