Craig Benedict Valentine Badynee (CBVB, at times hereafter) got his first 4-track and microphone at fourteen after raising
the funds from the sale of stolen car radios. Note: Although these illegal profits were split 50/50, CBVB was only the
lookout.
Before he could even play an instrument, he fell in love with capturing any sound he could muster, whether it was
drum-like table thumping, snagging snippets off the TV or radio, or experimenting with the primitive SK-1 sampler,
turning the buzz of a faulty cable into an 808-like bass line. Bringing all these disparate audio oddities together on the
multitrack was where young CBVB really blew his mind.
As his teenage years flitted away, Badynee teamed up with a few like-minded types interested more in making some sort
of beautiful noise than writing proper songs. Together they formed Asha Vida, a group steeped in improvisation and
sonic exploration that sat at the heart of Detroit's radiant '90s space-rock scene alongside fellow underground luminaries
like Windy & Carl, Majesty Crush, and Füxa.
CBVB used to joke that by 1999 he was going to stop making weirdo music and start up a pop group called *1999*, a nod
to his beloved Prince. This sort of happened, but instead, it was 2002 and he called the band PAS/CAL. This band was, by
design, the absolute opposite of Asha Vida's devil-may-care approach to music-making. The devil in every little detail
was all that mattered in the elaborate arrangements Badynee and his pop architects constructed.
Pitchfork described PAS/CAL via an absolutely whirligig of musical reference wizardry, asserting the band possessed an
"Electric Light Orchestra baroqueness" and "Of Montreal schizophrenia." The songs at times had a "Byrdsian jangle,"
were "darkly XTC-like" or tapped into "His 'n' Hers-era Pulp," bridging Stereolab and the Zombies with arrangements to
rival Jellyfish or Jon Brion. After numerous singles, EPs, and an oft-delayed full-length that damn-neared *Chinese
Democracy* territory, the band called it quits as Craig moved to Chicago to bolster his 401k and raise a family.
Fast forward through jobs won & lost, births, deaths, graduations, first-love heartbreaks, braces on & off, bullies &
besties, renting, owning, foreclosure, and owning again. During all this life stuff, CBVB quietly kept at it like the Wallace
Stevens of rock 'n' roll, fitting songwriting in during lunch breaks, before his wife woke up, and after the kids were tucked
in for the night. The songs accumulated slowly, the way interesting things tend to, not rushed toward a deadline but
seasoned by actual living.
He also found an unexpected collaborator closer to home: his daughter Viv, a budding songwriter known to those in the
know as intellectual bimbo. Together they produced a quirky, off-kilter alt-R&B electro-pop EP, a detour that turned out to
be less a distraction than a warm-up.
As a solo artist, Badynee has been drawn back to the often-overlooked late-'70s solo records by artists who had
outgrown their famous contexts: Robert Wyatt, Scott Walker, John Cale, Lou Reed, Joni Mitchell, McCartney, Lennon,
and a quiet cadre of jazz songwriters like Michael Franks, Steve Kuhn, and Carla Bley. It's a lineage that values the
intimate over the bombastic, the well-turned phrase over the grand gesture, and the kind of emotional honesty that only
comes from having actually lived something first.
That sensibility carries through his solo work, where Badynee plays nearly every instrument himself, handles the
recording and production, and occasionally remembers to let other people play saxophone or sing harmony. His 2026
release, *Don't Leave Your House to an Amateur*, drew comparisons to Leonard Cohen, Harry Nilsson, Jarvis Cocker,
Nick Cave, Father John Misty, and early Divine Comedy.
His latest single, I've Been In Trouble Before, is an early first glimpse of a forthcoming full-length album. Inspired by
watching a young relative wrestle with the consequences of a few ill-advised teenage lies, the song folds that moment
back onto Badynee's own spectacularly fib-filled adolescence, and beyond that to his father, the family's first fabulist. It's
less about guilt, and more about confronting the terrifying thought that some flaws are simply in the blood.
Craig is currently finishing his first full-length solo album.