Black Tape For A Blue Girl

The mournful and ethereal qualities in Black Tape for a Blue Girl's music essentially shaped the darkwave identity of Projekt Records, the imprint founded, owned, and run by Sam Rosenthal, who also serves as the ensemble's originator, composer, and keyboardist. From the mid-1980s onward the group has issued more than a dozen ambitious studio albums whose intricate arrangements fuse neo-classical, goth, folk, and ambient strands. Their first release, the minimalist art-pop set The Rope, appeared in 1986; later works grew progressively more expansive, with 1991's A Chaos of Desire and 1996's Remnants of a Deeper Purity remaining perennial listener favorites. After multiple personnel shifts and geographic moves, the band explored a dark cabaret direction reminiscent of the Dresden Dolls and Katzenjammer Kabarett on 2004's Halo Star, then reverted to its earlier atmospheric approach on 2016's These Fleeting Moments and 2021's The Cleft Serpent.

Rosenthal launched Projekt in 1983 as a vehicle for his own solo electronic recordings. Three years later, after relocating to California, his work took on a warmer, more intimate character that coincided with the formation of Black Tape for a Blue Girl, which introduced itself via The Rope in 1986. Follow-up efforts such as 1987's Mesmerized by the Sirens and 1989's Ashes in the Brittle Air leaned heavily on ambient textures, yet the revolving cast of contributors—among them vocalists Oscar Herrera and Lucian Casselman, violinist Vicki Richards, clarinetist Richard Watson, and cellist Mera Roberts—pushed the music toward denser electronic layers across 1991's A Chaos of Desire and 1993's This Lush Garden Within.

Following a three-year pause during which Rosenthal relocated from Los Angeles to Chicago, the band resurfaced in 1996 with the EP The First Pain to Linger, packaged alongside a novel written by Rosenthal; the full-length Remnants of a Deeper Purity emerged the same year. Boasting more elaborate string arrangements than earlier recordings, the album became their most widely embraced release and has been reissued repeatedly in subsequent decades. The group staged its debut live performance after the album's arrival. As One Aflame Laid Bare by Desire appeared in 1999; Julianna Towns contributed vocals to several tracks but departed before release, after which Elysabeth Grant—who had joined initially on viola—assumed lead-singer duties. Rosenthal and his then-wife, flutist Lisa Feuer, settled in New York City late that year and began work on Scavenger Bride, which featured vocals from Grant, Bret Helm, and Athan Maroulis of Spahn Ranch, Tubalcain, and Executive Slacks; Projekt issued the album in 2002.

Black Tape for a Blue Girl next embraced a darker cabaret aesthetic on 2004's Halo Star. Touring followed across the United States, with Grant and Helm joined by vocalist-guitarist Nicki Jaine. Rosenthal and Jaine also formed the duo Revue Noir, which released an EP and toured throughout 2005. The band remained largely inactive for several years, playing only scattered shows in 2007, before returning in 2009 with 10 Neurotics, featuring lead vocals from Maroulis and Laurie Reade plus additional contributions from Jaine and Grant; the record's imagery and themes proved markedly more erotic than prior material.

In 2010 guitarist-vocalist Valerie Gentile of the Crüxshadows succeeded Jaine upon her retirement from music, with Pinky Weltzman assuming the role a year later. After a handful of 2011 concerts the ensemble entered hiatus while Rosenthal authored an erotic novel and continued operating Projekt. He relocated to Portland, Oregon, in 2013, the same year the remix collection Tenderotics appeared; a successful crowdfunding effort also enabled the first vinyl edition of Remnants of a Deeper Purity. Several archival releases and preview EPs followed digitally as work progressed on the next album. Titled These Fleeting Moments, it surfaced in August 2016 via Metropolis, with a deluxe crowd-funded edition issued on Projekt; Herrera rejoined for the project, restoring the earlier ethereal sound. The twelfth album, To Touch the Milky Way, arrived on Projekt in 2018. Eating Rose Petals, a collaboration with Aarktica, emerged in 2020, followed by The Cleft Serpent in 2021.