Motor Primitives w/ Swim Team

Art in the cafe...

Laurel Statz


"The Spectator"


December 2025



Laurel Statz is a painter and Madison area native. Her work, while figurative, is influenced by abstraction and minimalism. The paintings often have a quick and instinctual nature, capturing just what’s needed. While she often times herself to eliminate extra details and over-precision, she has ventured into more detailed works as well. Laurel does not attach narrative to her pieces. Rather, she thinks of them like a journaling process for her scatter-brained psyche. The figures in the pieces are meant to be processing tools for the artist and the viewer. She hopes that seeing these figures helps the...
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Saturday, May 1, 2004

The Motor Primitives formed in 2003 to perform one concert, \"Peace in Our World,\" a benefit for The Madison Hostel. Their new fans were rocked. And frankly, the band had a good time and wanted to keep going! Their most recent gig, played at the Klinic, packed the house. In fact, the bar ran out of glasses!

Take 1/2 power pop, mix with 1/2 indie rock, add a splash of punk, pour into casserole dish. sprinkle one cup new wave, grate emo to taste. heat in 85 degree rock club or coffeehouse for 45 minutes, and voila: Swim Team.

The band describes their music as unhyphenated rock -- clean, straight forward, enjoyable. One local critic described their music thusly: \"[The Motor Primitives] falls more under the category of Canadian \'prairie rock\' also known as \'wheatfield soul\', the late sixties Winnepeg music with clean, slightly jazzy guitars made famous by the likes of The Guess Who and Buffalo Springfield.\" In any case, heads have been known to bob!

Music