ZKPR is composed of Rick Schlude, Ido Moskovich, Zane Muller and Matt Kaufman. The first three were high school friends who grew up in the Chicago suburbs. They graduated from college, moved to the city, and following a series of late-night neighbor-galling living room jam sessions, decided they had better start an actual band. In Kaufman they found a like-minded drummer (via Craigslist), shined up some old demos they’d been working on for years, and have set out to gain enough ground musically that they can justifiably quit their day jobs and be full time rock stars.
They’re an indie rock band specializing in rich harmonies, driving rhythms and noisy, hooky guitar textures. The songs are unabashedly pop songs, smearing the pallette of late ‘00s indie rock across catchy, danceable, thoughtfully-crafted tracks. They just finished recording debut EP, "Tall Men With Feelings", with producer Neil Strauch, who has worked with artists such as The National, Andrew Bird and Iron and Wine.
The name ZKPR is sort of a self-deprecating joke. Early on when they were explaining their sound to friends, they realized that the list of comparisons that kept coming up – Deerhunter, Grizzly Bear, Fleet Foxes – was almost exclusively populated by bands with animal names. So, Zookeeper (abbreviated ZKPR to avoid confusion with an Austin-based hipster gospel outfit) seemed like a pretty good fit.