The Blasting Company

Formed in Los Angeles in 2008 around the half-brothers Justin Rubenstein and J.R. Kaufman, The Blasting Company develops music at the crossroads of American folk, Eastern European traditions, early jazz, and an acoustic imagination nourished by street brass bands. Initially active under the name The Petrojvic Blasting Company, the group built itself in an itinerant context, between busking and lineups of varying geometry, before stabilizing around a core of musicians. Its writing blends Balkan melodies, dixieland accents, folk songs and arrangements with woody timbres, with a strong emphasis on accordion, brass and traditional percussion. The Blasting Company became more widely known with the music for the miniseries Over the Garden Wall, whose soundtrack was released in 2016, a project that highlighted its taste for narrative forms and period atmospheres. The band then continued between album releases and commissions for image or audio, with the EPs Sketches of the Unknown and Tiny Star in 2020, For Hire in 2022, then the album Kids of Rutherford County in 2024, linked to the New York Times documentary podcast. In 2025, The Blasting Company also released The Crooked Moon: Hungry Woods and The Crooked Moon: Sword and Seal.