Ill Prospekt: enigmatic SA band presents EP

San Antonio outfit Ill Prospekt — a shape-shifting collective of purportedly up to 30 or 40 musicians united around a man referred to as Dr. Grey — stands out as something of a mysterious presence.

The project began in 2004 as a product of Dr. Grey's impulse that there "wasn't enough weird music around." Since then, the collective has gigged around town in wildly varied incarnations and opened for the likes of Octopus Project and Com Truise. Still, they aren't big self-promoters, Dr. Grey has a penchant for covering his face in pictures, and it takes more than 30 minutes and a Twitter message to gain audience — by contemporary standards, that's pretty mysterious.

The music of Ill Prospekt ranges from experimental electronic to psychedelic rock, to trance, to freakout pop, to video game aping chillwave, to whatever else comes out of the open and free space that Dr. Grey seeks to create with his collaborators. For Dr. Grey, the interesting element in creating Ill Prospekt's music is "getting as many minds together as possible and seeing what comes out of that spirit of collaboration." This is the approach that has lead to the project's debut EP Sun Shine Hider, for which this party is being thrown. Dr. Grey indicates that, although CDs will not be available at the show as originally planned, there will be an email sign-up list so that those in attendance can receive the finished EP digitally when it is available (probably in mid-to-late February, according to Dr. Grey). Aside from featuring a slew of local musical talents like Mason Macias (Daytes) and Alyson Alonzo (Sugar Skulls), several of the EP's 10 tracks were produced by Gordon Raphael (The Strokes, Education) on his fabled sojourn in Saytown. Full of possibility and chaotic tendencies, Sun Shine Hider is a release worth getting excited about and its songs will be on full display Saturday.

"I want to see the world melt and people's minds along with it," Dr. Grey told the Current in reference to his motivating live philosophy. "Out of chaos comes beauty."

In this particular instance, the melting will be accomplished with three people on stage live-mixing electronic sounds and samples, live instrumentation, vocals, and staggering visual barrages. Ill Prospekt's lineup for this show is Dr. Grey (electronics, theremin), Jacob Stultz (guitar, electronics, vocals), and Birthday Gurl (live projections).

"This music is me and it's you and it's everything," Dr. Grey said. "I hope people will come to the show and appreciate it and gain fresh perspectives."