About Cosmic Cartel Dedicated to new ways of creating, collaborating, and sharing music, CosmicCartel.com is a netlabel, founded in 2004 by Boston based musicians Cyrus Sink and Robert Pehlke with the goal of presenting complete albums of original music by its roster of forward thinking electro-acoustic recording artists as free mp3 downloads. In addition to a Remix page with free audio tracks and the samples from a complete song by one of our artists, CosmicCartel offers award-winning film, video, and multimedia music scoring, music supervision, and music licensing services. Artists Conundrum, a loose collective, came together in 1998 to record and perform Sink's eclectic global groove music. To date, Conundrum has released four full-length recordings including "Tea", "Spitting Mandarin", "Lucky", and self-titled "Conundrum". Each recording has its own unique take on the possibilities of a true "world" music, bringing together disparate beats, instruments, sounds, and textures. Robert Pehlke rattles shakers, blows conch shells, beats the drums, drops sub bass, and takes his trumpet down some dubbed-out back alleys. His five CDs "Robert Pehlke", "Solarity", and "Coconut 1, 2 and 3" on CosmicCartel.com are a testament to his multi-instrumental prowess, creativity with sound and engineering, and commitment to the groove. Broken Beauty, a duo featuring multi-instrumentalists Cyrus Sink and Robert Pehlke, records live improvisations using primarily electric trumpet, vintage keyboards, percussion, and an array of effects pedals. Their self-titled debut "Broken Beauty" is a 3-disc set that captures some of their extraordinary sonic explorations. Cyrus Sink has released two solo albums showcasing radically different sides of his musical personality. "Alcazar," is a solo classical guitar recording, while his self-titled release "Cyrus Sink" is an avant-garde improvised space/noise experiment, with Fender Rhodes, acoustic bass, assorted winds and reeds, and shred guitar - much of it tweaked beyond recognition About Robert Pehlke Pehlke earned a BA in Studies in Religion from the University of Michigan, where he studied the world's great mystical traditions. His musical training includes Javanese Gamelan with Dr. Judith Becker, Indian Classical music with long-time Ali Akbar Khan student Thomas Hunter, and training with African master drummers from Congo and Senegal. A multi-instrumentalist, recording artist, and creator of film scores, Pehlke is also an experienced design manager. About Cyrus Sink Originally from NYC, Sink earned his Bachelor of Music cum laude in 1994 from the Berklee College of Music in Boston with a major in Bass Performance. An experienced professional multi-instrumentalist, composer, educator, and recording artist, Sink's other gigs have included stints as a music teacher at Amherst College and Suffield Academy, recording engineer at Newbury Sound in Boston, and music buyer for Virgin Megastore. He has studied with Yusef Lateef, Andrew Jaffe, Ewe master drummer Godwin Agbeli, and bassists Darryl Jones, Jerry Jemott and Bruce Gertz, among others.