SELECTED PRESS

"Ms. Mendoza has been garnering accolades for her fine, distinctive guitar work… Electric bass whiz Tim Dahl is also another fine force to be reckoned with… Drummer Nick Podgurski is the master of the slow-burning drum style… Right from the gitgo, the trio erupted with an intense post-psych, power trio force. Ms. Mendoza played with a strong Fripp-like sustained tone, while the trio had a Massacre-like primal attack… This was an amazing set that many folks will be talking about for a long while especially as Ms. Mendoza's star is till rising higher.” --Downtown Music Gallery on Unnatural Ways' Victoriaville Festival 2014 set

"a heavy-rocking outfit that featured some gorgeously aggressive interplay between Mendoza and Dahl, Mendoza spitting out shards of notes that Dahl answered with thunderous aplomb.” --All About Jazz

"[they] display an uncanny connection throughout their triumphant recording, dynamically intertwined and unbelievably locked in with one another rhythmically (amazing, considering the malestroms provided by each at numerous times throughout the album). But let's talk about gnarliness. My god, this is gnarly. Which is crazy because of the fact that this is ultimately a jazz record at its core. No one's ever really done this type of duo quite this way, and come to think of it, I'm not sure anyone's ever made jazz quite this way before either (I guess something like John McLaughlin comes sort of close), and come to think of it even more, this album fucking rules. Go buy it". --Crawford Philleo, Tiny Mix Tapes/Foxy Digitalis/Tome to the Weather Machine

"... while there's quite a lot of far-flung jazz chops converging all at once, the whole thing is clothed in a shroud of overdriven distortion and roomy fuzz. It's hard to tell who's kicking whose ass here, but my guess is that these two both walked away from the session bruised and battered in the best way possible. Love Taps? Nay -- these are love wallops, Mendoza's sharp harmonic angles and pummeling rhythm up against Tamburro's storm of cymbals... Mendoza's Weird Forest release was an example of how the guitar beat all odds to rule 2012 with extreme prejudice." --Tiny Mix Tapes

"...a visceral and insightful exploration into the [jazz] form, with as much grit, blood and bile as a Lightning Bolt album. While the tracks might start off with some kind of form, Mendoza has a unique talent of being able to deconstruct this as she plays, devolving the sounds into noise and grinding emotion." --Boomkat

"While most songs follow the familiar head-solo-head jazz structure, the album feels closer to a marriage of free jazz and metal. Every song features a heavy, glorious riff serving as a springboard for Mendoza's dazzling guitar pyrotechnics. Tamburro's drums provide much of the ecstatic energy, somehow propelling the songs forward without losing the beat and going completely free. The end result is a wild, exhilarating ride that's sure to appeal to music fans of all stripes." --Weird Forest 

"Beneath all of the weird effects and improvisational benders, there’s a solid bedrock of technical skill. Mendoza’s not an entirely earthbound player… incendiary, mind-melting leads… Guitar geeks who want a dose of the weird stuff will find plenty to lap up across this album’s 36 minutes." --Adam Strom, Dusted Magazine

"...like lurching freak-out cyclo-metal, Beefheartian free jazz and bent psych(opath)edelic guitar frenzy melded together into one sick rampage, nothing like it around at the moment but it's scary, like Henry Cow and Butthole Surfers at a pig fucking contest in some dark woods... there's shades of weird dusty blues, Chris Corsano-esque mayhem, Stooges dirt and a right brooding atmosphere throughout, all this laced with real freewheeling lysergic mischief and played with the gleeful adventure of improvising spirits. 'Quit Your Unnatural Ways' is a blast, it reeks of total loose-limbed, bloody minded conviction!" --NormanRecords

"Their sound sculptures seem heavily labored over like a complicated detail painting or a score to a black-and-white film, with boatloads of dynamic shifts and tangents to hang the ear on... A poetic convergence of solo guitar and devil-daring drums?" --The Gumshoe Grove

MORE PRESS

CLICK HERE to read Mendoza's Guitar World feature: Exposed: 10 Female Guitarists You Should Know

"The first time I saw Ava Mendoza was as Carla Bozulich's shredding guitarist in her band Evangelista. She was a wizard on a semi-circle of effects pedals, but having kept tabs on her since, I've found she's equally adept with FX-less technique. Imagine Dick Dale shredding with Derek Bailey, then forget everything you know about either -- that's Ava Mendoza."  -- Lars Gotrich, NPR Jazz

When she’s not throwing in her singular blend of free-jazz/blues-fingerstyle/controlled rock-debris with musicians like guitar paladin Nels Cline, synth-pop fringer Dominique Leone, or collabing on film scores with international East Bay heroes tUnE-yArDs, she’s an essential piece of a burgeoning Bay Area free-rock music scene. -- Derek Barber, Tiny Mix Tapes

"With her 2010 album Shadow Stories, Ava substantiated an impression that had been circulating for some time: She is one of a handful of musical geniuses working in the Bay Area. --The San Franisco Film Society

"What obscure, overlooked master playing in some slashing, raw-yet-virtuosic manner is this?" --Nels Cline, liner notes to Mendoza's 20010 solo album, Shadow Stories

"Her technique is impeccable, but her playing is astonishingly expressive. She doesn't just bend blue notes; she wads them up into a ball and throws them up against a wall... Mendoza knows what she does well, which is tell stories with her guitar. Check that. Mendoza knows what she does better than almost anyone else on the planet, which is tell stories with her guitar." --Aiding and Abetting