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Danny Frankel

Percussionist

Based in Los Angeles and Joshua Tree, Danny enjoys a storied and illustrious career. He first began as an East-Coaster, playing New York in its early Punk-Rock days at iconic venues like CBGBs. While performing there, Brian Eno discovered his band, which resulted in a Warner Brothers deal. Later, Danny became Lou Reed’s drummer for several years, appearing on The Tonight Show and David Letterman, among others.

Danny Frankel

Danny Frankel

Frankel credits Avant-Garde master Paul Motian as his biggest influence, and who also was his teacher. As Danny says, “He taught me to play with abandon . . . going for the moment . . . think in colors . . .”

Danny has performed and/or recorded with John Cale, Wilco’s Nels Cline, Rickie Lee Jones, k.d. lang, Laurie Anderson, Fiona Apple, Jewel, Everlast, Marianne Faithful and Beck, among many others.

Danny accompanied Joe on stage for these performances:

“The Blue Room”
“Just an Ordinary Mind”
“Old Man”
“Murdered by the Mind”

You can purchase Danny’s CD “The Interplanetary” with Nels Cline & Larry Golding here on JoeFrank.com. All proceeds go to Danny Frankel.

Reviews of Joe’s Work

"Joe Frank is an invaluable warrior who stands in defense of our fears, our vanities and our forever-eroding sense of ourselves. He transforms the everyday banality of the human comedy into an inspired weirdness that feeds on pathos and irony, and feels a lot like revelation. Sartre would have called it nausea; Frank makes it art."

Spin Magazine

"The perfect Joe Frank experience is driving down an unfamiliar highway alone at night. You turn on your radio and are greeted by a lush, resonant voice that lulls you into a seemingly simple tale of love: a man at an airport saying goodbye to his wife over the phone, which abruptly turns into a vision of betrayal, alienation and death - often from obscure disease - all brought about by some profound personal failing, which is redeemed at the last moment by a nearly transcendent moment of joy."

Salon

"Joe Frank is a singular voice in radio. What he has done is hypnotic, psychotic, neurotic, sad, terrifying, and some of the funniest stuff I have ever heard anywhere. I can't think of another radio performer who has come close to achieving this kind of alchemy."

Charlie Kaufman, filmmaker

"Frank has created a series of dead-pan radio monologues so sharp and intelligent that during the quiet bits you can almost hear God taking notes."

The UK Guardian

"Frank [is] the apostle of radio noire... His free-form radio dramas... are sometimes moving, often funny, but always manage to confound the listeners' expectations. A maestro of verité, Frank exploits the power of radio..."

Rolling Stone

"Although commonly categorized as radio drama, Frank's work bears very little resemblance to the stagy artifice of plays performed over air. Frank wanders deeply into the unconscious, producing Dionysian stories with a fairy-tale intensity whose effect is often funny, disturbing and deeply memorable."

Salon

"A strange, different, wondrously offbeat, frequently hilarious, altogether brilliant piece of work..There's never been anything quite like it...Joe Frank is an audio Fellini."

The Los Angeles Times

"I came upon Joe Frank's work by accident a number of years ago while driving to my home in the Napa Valley late at night. I couldn't believe the originality and sheer brilliance of what I was hearing. From that moment on I became a dedicated Joe Frank fan. Joe Frank's shows raise the most interesting and enduring questions in new and original ways and are consistently thought-provoking and very funny."

Francis Ford Coppola, filmmaker

"Joe Frank's often bizarre scenarios for the mind are decidedly offbeat radio fare...part surreal satire, part bizarre meditation, part fever dream."

Los Angeles Daily News

"To me, he's what radio is really for... his show makes me think he's getting to some great truth... so completely captivating and just unlike anything else."

David Sedaris, writer