Mason Weiss

Born and raised in San Francisco, Mason Weiss is a musician whose performing prowess has brought him to the attention of filmmakers and punk bass players among others. Though he was originally a shy actor in the drama department at Sir Francis Drake High School, appearing in "Our Town" and other plays under the instruction of David Smith (who was also the High School drama teacher of Tupac Shakur), Mason found extracurricular garage band success as a founding member of teenage girl bands Vaginal Fury/Cookiepuss Spleethcrawl, Candy Purse/Big Bag Of Bird Food/Bird Feud, and Hula Hunt/Filial Piety. Moving to Portland in 2002 with Dinosaurus bandmate Morgan Stickrod (with whom he appeared as blink-and-you'll-miss extras in Gus Van Sant's "Elephant"), he soon formed Tortilla/Nike Factory Outlet with economist Kristin Munro and recorded the bedroom pop cassette "Tortilla" (Bird Girl Records) which is still bootlegged and sold on the underground Pacific Northwest music market today. Opening for Boyracer, Mirah and Calvin Johnson raised Tortilla and Bird Feud to cult status along with their appearances in various living rooms, college arcades and basements in Portland as well as bay area haunts such as Aquarius Records, SPAM Warehouse, and one wonderfully doomed performance at the Hemlock tavern before any member of Bird Feud was 21. Around this time, Mason Weiss joined Criminal Love on guitar and bass and appeared in music videos for Veronica Lipgloss & The Evil Eyes, Mutilated Mannequins and other Justin Kelly projects of the era. Over the next several years Weiss founded Manhaterrr with Xara Thustra, co-created the sight-specific performances of Gutty & Moist with Heather Ciriza (briefly cohabitating with Pentagram's Bobby Liebling in Philadelphia's Grey's Ferry neighborhood), co-founding car-crash-punk-jazz troupe Alabaster Choad who recorded the aborted LP "Crash Of the Limburger On Beebusland" which appeared on multiple Maximum Rocknroll year end lists (2012). Mason Weiss appeared during this time in Gary Fembot's art film "Together People". In recent years, Weiss has begun work as a music producer and arranger working with Dad Kat and Curtis Lexx as well as rapper Patagucci who's Weiss-produced "Paranoid Night/180" became a viral hit on Soundcloud in 2017.