Toby Driver

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American musician

title: "Toby Driver" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["living-people", "1978-births", "american-multi-instrumentalists", "tzadik-records-artists", "hampshire-college-alumni", "musicians-from-new-york-city", "place-of-birth-missing-(living-people)", "american-vibraphonists"] description: "American musician" topic_path: "arts" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toby_Driver" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary American musician ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox musical artist "]

FieldValue
nameToby Driver
imageToby Driver.jpg
captionToby Driver in Reykjavík, Iceland in April 2025
backgroundsolo_singer
birth_date
birth_placeMeriden, Connecticut, U.S.
genreAvant-garde, experimental
occupationMusician, singer, songwriter
instrumentvocals, guitar, bass guitar, keyboards, synthesizer, clarinet, drums, tuned & untuned percussion
current_member_ofKayo Dot, Alora Crucible, Bloodmist
past_member_ofmaudlin of the Well
website
::

| name = Toby Driver | image = Toby Driver.jpg | caption = Toby Driver in Reykjavík, Iceland in April 2025 | background = solo_singer | birth_name = | birth_date = | birth_place = Meriden, Connecticut, U.S. | genre = Avant-garde, experimental | occupation = Musician, singer, songwriter | instrument = vocals, guitar, bass guitar, keyboards, synthesizer, clarinet, drums, tuned & untuned percussion | years_active = | label = | current_member_of = Kayo Dot, Alora Crucible, Bloodmist |past_member_of = maudlin of the Well | website =

Toby Driver is a multi-instrumentalist, composer, songwriter, producer, label owner, and solo and visual artist, best known for his work as leader of the experimental bands Kayo Dot and Maudlin of the Well. As bandleader, Driver performs lead vocals and many instruments, writes and arranges the music, produces the albums, and creates the majority of the album artwork.

Early life and education

Toby Driver was born in 1978, in Meriden, Connecticut. He learned clarinet and piano from a young age, and during his high school years, he recorded several albums under the moniker "Spoonion" using tape recorders and a karaoke machine. He later released his favorite cuts of these albums online as collections. After playing with a handful of bands in high school, including a Nirvana and Jane's Addiction cover band, and a gothic-progressive-metal band called Celestial Providence, Driver formed Maudlin of the Well with his friends Jason Byron and Greg Massi and recorded a demo entitled Through Languid Veins (1996).

He attended Hampshire College in Amherst, MA, where he expanded Maudlin of the Well, and where they recorded their second (Begat of the Haunted Oak... An Acorn), third (Odes to Darksome Spring), and fourth (For My Wife) demos which turned into their debut album My Fruit Psychobells... A Seed Combustible. During this time, Driver also studied under composer and jazz legend Yusef Lateef, and composed, directed, and performed an oratorio for 20 musicians based on and titled after the epic poem Six Trillion Miles Before the First by Jason Byron. Sections of this piece later reappeared on motW's reunion album, Part the Second (2009).

Career

Maudlin of the Well

Driver was a founding member of Maudlin of the Well in 1996 along with Jason Byron and Greg Massi. They morphed into Kayo Dot in 2003 during the process of recording what would have been motW's fourth album, and titled Kayo Dot's henceforth first album Choirs of the Eye, due to label problems and the desire to avoid being pigeonholed in the metal scene. In 2009, due to fan requests and contributions, Driver and Terran Olson reformed Maudlin of the Well to record Part the Second, reuniting with guitarists Massi, Josh Seipp-Williams, and drummer Sam Gutterman. The album contained five newly released songs, some of which were at least partially composed in the early days of the band (as far back as 1997), with lyrics co-written by Byron and Driver. The band describes their style as "astral metal," referencing Driver and Byron's interest in astral projection. Driver has stated that he used astral projection and lucid dreaming as methods to retrieve music from the subconscious. Maudlin of the Well's lyrics deal with this topic as well as ghosts and the paranormal, the occult, kabbalah, nostalgia, and betrayal. The liner notes and lyrics for companion albums Bath and Leaving Your Body Map (2001) contain a puzzle that leads to an as-yet-unknown solution.

Kayo Dot

Kayo Dot began in 2003. They have released eleven full-length albums, an EP, a few live recordings, and a handful of remixes and singles. Kayo Dot's musical style shifts constantly, but maintains a ubiquitous aesthetic of darkness, surrealism, impressionism, hallucination, melodrama, and musical technicality. Driver is the only consistent member, although some members who have left the band in the past have returned for recordings or special live performances. Kayo Dot has joined bands such as Pallbearer, Earth, Pelican, and Secret Chiefs 3 on tour, and worked with labels including John Zorn's Tzadik, Robotic Empire, Holy Roar, Aaron Turner's Hydra Head Records, Antithetic Records, The Flenser, and Driver's own imprint, Ice Level Music.

Tartar Lamb I and II

Driver formed the side project Tartar Lamb with Mia Matsumiya in 2006. Tartar Lamb did a brief US and Canada tour in January of that year, and recorded their album Sixty Metonymies with Randall Dunn in Seattle, Washington in December; the album was released in 2007.

Tartar Lamb II was created in 2009 with other members of Kayo Dot and composer and clarinetist Jeremiah Cymerman. It was named a Tartar Lamb project because the compositional method that Driver invented for Sixty Metonymies was used again for the new work, titled Polyimage of Known Exits (2011). Tartar Lamb II did a month-long European winter tour in 2010 opening for Kayo Dot, and a recording from this tour appears on the Kayo Dot/Tartar Lamb II live album, Kraków (2011).

Vaura

Driver plays bass in the band Vaura, who released their debut Selenelion (2012) through Wierd Records and their second album, The Missing (2013), via Profound Lore Records. The band is fronted by writer, philosopher, Blacklist singer and Azar Swan producer Joshua Strawn, and also includes guitarist Kevin Hufnagel (of Dysrhythmia, Gorguts) and drummer Charlie Schmid. Vaura's style is an amalgam of gothic rock, progressive black-metal, and pop.

Stern

Driver played guitar in Stern, the experimental alien pop band auteured by the prolific composer, filmmaker, and writer Chuck Stern (formerly of Time of Orchids). The band included former Time of Orchids and Kayo Dot drummer Kim Abrams and frequent Driver collaborator Tim Byrnes. Stern released five albums as a solo act and three with a full band including Driver: Entitlement (2012), Bone Turquoise (2015), and Missive: Sister Ships (2018).

Discography

As Spoonion 1

  • Community of Sinners
  • Chiffon Gob
  • Acoustic Sex
  • Clone
  • According to the Law
  • Dreaming Winter Awake

As Spoonion 2

  • On the Thoughts and Principles of Dragons
  • A Tree and Its Fruit
  • Space Music
  • How to Find God
  • Opposition Day
  • The Secret Violence of Poison

Maudlin of the Well

Kayo Dot

Solo work

  • In the L..L..Library Loft (2005)
  • The Pod OST (2013)
  • Ichneumonidae (2014)
  • Madonnawhore (2017)
  • Live at Roulette, March 2017 (2017, digital only)
  • They Are the Shield (2018)
  • Raven, I Know That You Can Give Me Anything (2024)

Tartar Lamb I

  • 60 Metonymies (2007)

Tartar Lamb II

  • Polyimage of Known Exits (2011)
  • Krakow (2011)

Piggy Black Cross

  • Always Just Out Of R.E.A.C.H. (Robotic Eclosion After Coming Hylozoic) (2018)

Bloodmist

;Jeremiah Cymerman, Mario Diaz de Leon, Driver

  • Sheen (5049 Records, 2016)
  • Chaos of Memory (2017 live recording)
  • Phos (5049 Records, 2020)
  • Arc (5049 Records, 2022)

Alora Crucible

  • Thymiamatascension (2021)
  • Oak Lace Apparition (2024)

Other appearances

  • Tusk – The Resisting Dreamer (2007) (vocals)
  • Gregor Samsa – Rest (2007) (clarinet, guitar)
  • Pyramids – Pyramids (2008) (remix of "The Echo of Something Lovely")
  • Gregor Samsa – Over Air (2009) (clarinet, vibraphone)
  • Asva – Presence of Absences (2011) (vocals)
  • Bloody Panda – Summon: Invocation (2011) (remix of "Hashira")
  • Vaura - Selenelion (2012)
  • Stern - Entitlement EP (2012)
  • Vaura - The Missing (2013)
  • Secret Chiefs 3 - Book of Souls: Folio A (2013)
  • Ichneumonidae with Timba Harris & Russell Greenberg (2014, digital only)
  • David T. Little & Third Coast Percussion – Haunt Of Last Nightfall (2014) (bass)
  • Stern - Bone Turquoise (2015)
  • Stern - Missive: Sister Ships (2018)
  • Extra Life - Secular Works, Vol. 2 (2022)
  • Ultraphauna - No No No No (2023)
  • Extra Life - The Sacred Vowel (2024)

References

References

  1. (4 October 2018). "Genre explorer Toby Driver plunges deep into cinematic ballads on They Are the Shield".
  2. "Interview with Toby Driver".
  3. (21 February 2012). "The Listening Party: Interview with Kayo Dot's Toby Driver".
  4. (9 May 2017). "The Complexity of Simplicity: Toby Driver Goes Pop".
  5. (3 October 2019). "Kayo Dot's Epic, Experimental Metal: A Retrospective".
  6. (9 October 2018). "Toby Driver: They Are the Shield".
  7. (26 February 2020). "Kayo Dot's Toby Driver and “the technicality of grace”".
  8. (2 August 2013). "Viking's Choice: Kayo Dot, 'Thief'".
  9. (4 May 2024). "A SCENE IN RETROSPECT: maudlin of the Well - "Part the Second"".
  10. "maudlin of the Well - Part The Second".
  11. "Toby Driver".
  12. (25 April 2020). "Toby Driver of Kayo Dot Interview".
  13. [http://www.kayodot.net/spoonion/ Spoonion.]
  14. (3 February 2021). "Rock ‘n’ Roll High School: Metal Musicians Reveal Their High School Bands".
  15. (3 August 2021). "A deliciously fresh slice from dark avant-garde prog band Kayo Dot ahead of a new album…".
  16. (17 September 2015). "Foul Alchemy #4 - Kayo Dot, Choirs of The Eye".
  17. [http://maudlinofthewell.net/ motW – Part the Second notes.]
  18. (18 June 2012). "Maudlin Of The Well: Bath (Re-Issue)".
  19. (18 June 2012). "Maudlin Of The Well: Leaving Your Body Map (Re-Issue)".
  20. (23 January 2005). "Found Sound 2004".
  21. (9 March 2006). "Kayo Dot: Dowsing Anemone With Copper Tongue / In the L..L..Library Loft".
  22. (24 June 2008). "Kayo Dot: Blue Lambency Downward".
  23. (29 December 2014). "The Best Metal Albums of 2014".
  24. (25 October 2021). "Interview: Kayo Dot's Toby Driver on Nostalgic, New Record, 'Moss Grew on the Swords and Plowshares Alike'".
  25. (10 May 2025). "Every Rock, Every Half-Truth Under Reason is the title of the new Kayo Dot album, hear a first taste here".
  26. (28 February 2014). "Toby Driver of Kayo Dot scored 'Ichneumonidae' (hear a song)".
  27. (30 September 2024). "Review: Toby Driver - Raven, I Know That You Can Give Me Anything".
  28. "Tartar Lamb: 60 Metonymies".
  29. "Piggy Black Cross - Always Just Out of R.E.A.C.H. User Opinions - sputnikmusic".
  30. (26 January 2016). "Viking's Choice: Bloodmist, 'Bare Arms, Black Dresses'".
  31. (18 April 2023). "Jeremiah Cymerman, Clarinetist of Doom Metal".
  32. (31 July 2020). "Sui generis trio Bloodmist get bleak on their second album".
  33. (21 May 2022). "Bloodmist: Arc".
  34. (16 September 2021). "Alora Crucible - "Thymiamatascension"".
  35. (15 December 2024). "The Best Experimental Albums of 2024".
  36. (4 December 2013). "Vaura: The Missing".
  37. (14 August 2015). "Stern: Bone Turquoise".

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