The Nightcrawlers were a Philadelphia-based trio who played a very home-grown brand of Berlin school-inspired cosmic electronic music. Dave Lunt and brothers Peter and Tom Gulch all grew up in New Jersey, and all came from a classical music background. After hearing the long-form electronic meditations of Tangerine Dream and Klaus Schulze during the 1970s, the musicians became interested in electronic music and began buying synthesizers, eventually stockpiling dozens of machines, pedals, and mixers. The Nightcrawlers officially formed in 1980, initially consisting of the two brothers as well as Bob Stevenson, who played acoustic instruments such as harmonica, zither, violin, and bells. He wasn't interested in playing a synthesizer, so he was dismissed from the group, and Lunt joined. The musicians played numerous concerts alongside other Philadelphia-area electronic musicians such as Don Slepian and Charles Cohen, often at unconventional venues such as churches, and were affiliated with the International Electronic Music Association. Despite being active for over a decade, the Nightcrawlers only released three studio LPs: Nightcrawlers (1984), Spacewalk (1985), and Shadows of Light (1987). They disliked spending long periods of time working on material during endless studio sessions, and preferred to simply record their improvisations using a boombox and release them on cassette. Over three dozen Nightcrawlers tapes were released between 1980 and 1991, as well as solo cassettes by the group's members and releases by Xisle, Peter's group with Andrew Rath and WXPN DJ Chuck van Zyl. The Nightcrawlers disbanded after the release of the 1991 double cassette Barriers. Lunt became more active as a visual artist than as a musician, and Tom suffered from health problems, eventually passing away in 2013. Peter Gulch remained active as a musician, however, and continued working with van Zyl, sometimes as part of the Ministry of Inside Things. In 1997, Berlin label Manikin released the double CD Traveling Backwards, which compiled tracks from the group's three LPs. The Biophonic Boombox Recordings, a compilation of pieces taken from the group's numerous cassettes, was released by Anthology Recordings in 2018. ~ Paul Simpson