High On Fire have posted a new track from their forthcoming album, Death Is This Communion, on their Myspace so that we can all get bloodthirstily excited about it from now til September, when it’s out on Relapse.
I’ve heard some other bits too, and it’s MEATY. As befits production by Jack Endino, there’s more of a grain to it than usual, a deeper kind of fibre, and it’s pretty sweet, even via Myspace. In some ways I’m missing the weird white-hot woundupness of their usual sound, but am coming round to this bigger, more sinewy manifestation - especially as far as the drums are concerned.
They’re coming over to the UK in September, and if you haven’t seen them play live yet it might be a good idea if you did. No one rocks the vest’n'boat shoes look quite like Matt Pike.
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by Frances May Morgan on Wednesday, July 25th, 2007 (1 Comment)
Just wanted to dash off a quick post on last weekend’s Supersonic, which I can truthfully claim is one of the most well organised, neatly programmed festivals it’s been my pleasure to attend. Plan B were representing in force and you’ll see a full review in the September issue (seems so long away). For now, though, here’s a few YouTubey things I shot to give you an impression of what went down. Hail Yow!
That’s David Yow fronting his new band, Qui. Bizarrely, Qui’s set was punctuated at various points by David Yow begging for the return of his passport. Apparently he’d got fucked up earlier in the day and given it away. It took him a day at the American embassy with the Southern Records people to get a new one. Crazy guy.
Atilla and Anderson of Sunn0))) in full grimm flight.
And last but not least, that’s Andrew Dymond aka Duracell who tore it up in the main room after Mogwai’s set with a stack of videogames themes recreated using drums, modular synth and laptop. “Are you magic?” shouted someone, who I think had had rather a lot to drink. You could see what he meant, though.
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by Louis Pattison on Tuesday, July 17th, 2007 (2 Comments)
It’s deadline weekend for Plan B, so, true to form, someone’s booked us to play some music. This keeps happening! I’m not complaining, though. Come see us and all these other awesome people vibrating the Vice pub for the good of humanity, or at least the people who go to the Vice pub.
Also some great stuff at the Pleasure Unit pub on Bethnal Green Road earlier in the day.
TWO SHOWS! ONE DAY! TEN BANDS!
Both happening on Sunday July 22nd.
HUSH ARBORS
Keith Wood aka Hush Arbors is straight outta Virginia, US and a long-time member of Sunburned Hand of the Man alongside his solo psych-folk explorations. Also regularly collaborates with Wooden Wand, Six Organs of Admittance and Current 93.
SHARRON KRAUS
Sometime Oxford, sometime Philadelphia resident Sharron Kraus gives us her incredible dark folk that draws comparisons with Shirley Collins and Anne Briggs, two artists who, like Sharron, have been released on the Bo Weavil label.
ALEX NEILSON
Alex Neilson gives us his unaccompanied solo vocal set of traditional and old-time songs. Neilson’s committed passion for British folk music as well as his deep involvement in the world of free music gives heavy weight to these classic songs.
JOANNE ROBERTSON
Visual artist / musician Joanne Robertson has collaborated with David Cunningham and has a forthcoming album out on Textile Records. Currently showing at the Nog Gallery on Brick Lane is her co-curated exhibition (with Byron Coley) Hot For Teacher. It’s great.
TOM JAMES SCOTT
Tom James Scott is a solo guitarist and sometime member of weirdo-improv rock duo Clunes. His own style is very much centred in minimalist solo acoustic guitar and there is a forthcoming CD album on Bo Weavil in the works.
Pleasure Unit, Bethnal Green Road, London
2.30pm, four pounds
tickets: http://www.wegottickets.com/event/19601
then later (a ten minute walk away)…
SUNROOF!
Sunroof! is the one of the latest manifestations of sonic beauty and oblivion from guitarist Matthew Bower, longtime champion of the UK experimental noise scene, best known as Skullflower’s guiding light and for his work with Total, Ramleh, Hototogisu and Sunlayer.
DIRECTING HAND
Directing Hand is the project of Glasgow-based Alex Neilson, member of Taurpis Tula, Scatter and Tight Meat Trio. Neilson is firmly at the core of free music in the UK and beyond, playing and recording with Jandek, Will Oldham, MV/EE, Richard Youngs and plenty more besides. This particular show will be a drum/vox duo of Alex and vocalist Vinnie Blackwall.
CHORA
Chora have recently relocated from Nottingham to London and deliver glorious psych-drones / vocal whitewash. Impending releases on Chocolate Monk, Gold Soundz, Curor and Utech.
MORGEN UND NITE
High-end oscillations low-end interference nothing in the middle holy fucking extremes one guitar two synths twenty pedals telepathy divided by C sharp equals bastard radiophonic blues offspring of Richard Pinhas and Eliane Radigue equals Morgen Und Nite equals INFINITY.
PARTING THE WILD HORSES MANE ON BOTH SIDES
PTWHMOBS is Pascal Nichols of Stuckometer and Kelly Jones of Cooper-Jones, who promise flute / drum / vocal meltdown.
Old Blue Last, London
8pm, six pounds
tickets: http://www.wegottickets.com/event/19602
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by Frances May Morgan on Tuesday, July 17th, 2007 (No Comments)
Tuesday 17 July, 8pm The Hope, Brighton (11-12 Queens Road)
6 quid adv/7 quid on the door
The Strange Death Of Liberal England Mechanical Bride The Legend! (Everett True)
“The name is drawn to indicate the welter of confusion felt by these five youths from Gosport, a crap seaside town near Portsmouth…is it five? It’s hard to tell, because they never keep still on stage, leaping about, switching instruments and smudging their guitar strings like Sonic Youth in reverse, thrusting giant placards into the audience’s faces bearing slogans like ‘Repent! Repent!’ and ‘I Saw Evil’, hammering the hell out of a keyboard or two, shouting off-mic in unkempt harmony like the bastard children of Silver Mt Zion Orchestra, instruments dropping out altogether until there’s just a hint of triangle or ricocheting feedback, before the flame-haired mop starts yelling blue passion once again” - Plan B 23
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Friday 20 July, 7:30pm The Hub, Brighton (The Vogue Gyratory, 106 Lewes Rd)
3 quid on the door
Pete And The Pirates
Mathew Sawyer And The Ghosts
The Legend! (Everett True)
plus Plan B DJ Jon Slade
“Songs tumble and soar for the stars like a cross between The Chills and my Nineties Irish crush The Frank And Walters, and yes, I’m sold. The way the vocals vibrate, mic overloaded. The way the drums come pounding through solid and friendly. The guitars that nestle snugly up to the other guitars. And of course, it’s about the sound, not just the song - Phil Spector, Sonic Youth and Ramones understood that, as did Flying Nun, why don’t more artists?” - Plan B 19
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Saturday 21 July, 7pm Hanover Community Centre (33 Southover Street BN2)
8.50 quid adv/10.50 quid on the door
Holly Golightly The Brokeoffs The Legend! (Everett True)
“Holly Golightly. Forgive me while I swoon. Her name, her music, her whole persona is associated with a certain exquisite Fifties-style fashion and rock’n'roll; sharpness, style. Her music is a drawl of simple eloquence, a sugar-sharp dispatch from past times where a song was a song, and a melody a melody, and all that mattered was honing the sound so you could communicate both with elan. I can’t think of anyone so able to define her own sound this side of Kim Deal, although I’m not so convinced it’s deliberate on Holly’s part. She plays uncomplicated, cheap, nasty, attitudinal, punk rock rock’n'roll of the highest order. She is, as Jack White once put it, herself - and there is rarely a higher compliment”- Plan B 22
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Monday 23 July, 8pm The Pressure Point, Brighton (33 Richmond Place BN2)
5 quid/4 quid (student)
Tenebrous Liar Revenge Of Shinobi The Legend! (Everett True) Virgin Passages
“Guitars wail softly; feedback melts into feedback, sharp noises jar and trip as if from a great distance. A soft voice stumbles across anachronism and narcotic desire, meaning lost in mumble, the guitars becoming louder now. There’s a mandolin, an echo slide, a handful of late night recording sessions and a handful of love. There’s misery and then there’s wallowing. This is beyond both” - Plan B 19
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Monday 30 July, 7.30pm Prince Albert, Brighton (48 Trafalgar Street)
6 quid adv/7 quid on the door
The Nightingales Christy & Emily Violet Violet Plus Plan B DJ Everett True
“Songs tumble past, pasty-faced and brimming with mother’s pride, as fresh and corruptible now as when they were first aired two decades back, times changed and words tilted appropriately - ‘Use Your Loaf’, ‘Urban Ospreys’, ‘Which Hi-Fi?’. The crowd rears as one, raises a pint or three to heaven, and still the melodic tumult continues: imagine Erase Errata, The Ex and someone smart, large and bespectacled rolled into one, tightly excoriating ball, and you’ll be nowhere near” - Plan B 17
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by Everett True on Friday, July 13th, 2007 (No Comments)
On the 7th of July, Boredoms got 77 drummers together to play 77 Boa Drum in Brooklyn Bridge Park. There’s about a million clips of it on Youtube but this is my favourite so far because the sound isn’t too awful and the first few minutes is just footage of the sky.
What an amazing day out. I wish I’d been there.
Here’s the link in case the youtube thing doesn’t work.
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by Frances May Morgan on Thursday, July 12th, 2007 (1 Comment)
I’m still processing the fact that I saw Cecil Taylor, Anthony Braxton, William Parker and Tony Oxley playing together on the same stage last night, at the Royal Festival Hall. It was the kind of show it’s hard to write about because there was just so much happening, at all times, even in the pauses, the quiet moments, something was always happening, something was always in the air, passed around between the musicians and never dropped.
Although the group playing was incredible, one of the highlights for me was a solo set by William Parker — wasn’t expecting it, for a start. I don’t know how long he played for: time kind of folded in on itself, the way it does when music really forces you into its space rather than making its way into yours. After the rolling, multi-hued sounds of Cecil Taylor and Tony Oxley’s opening set and before the all-out brilliance of the full band, this was an interlude of weird, stark power. Parker stood with his head bent and face obscured by a cap: big, anonymous and uncompromising. Rumbles of noise, harmonics like burnished blades, every stroke of the bow pulling the sound together into an almost visible, albeit abstract, skeleton. And these moments of sweetness that spiralled out of the heavy structure like voices, tremulous and plaintive. And I couldn’t move. It felt good to sit that still, to let my mind out of its loops for a minute and into some kind of fierce peace.
And Cecil Taylor, I swear he’s made out of spider-silk or rubber-tree bark. Wrists like snakes, fingers seemingly drawing the notes out from the keys, not striking them in. Piano as fast-moving water, not static percussion.
It was very hard to write about. I mean, it is very hard to write about.
Luckily, Plan B jazz gent Daniel Spicer was also there, so I’m sure he’ll have something more proper to say about it, which you may be able to read in the next Plan B or on this site. And if you want to hear the concert, it’s going to be on Radio 3 on Friday evening.
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by Frances May Morgan on Monday, July 9th, 2007 (3 Comments)
My muse is shot to shit at the moment, derailed into submission/autopilot by heavy psychic damage and domestic bad vibes, so I’m determined - perversely - to start blogging again just to kick it back into its previous healthy shape. Fuck it, you know?
To start with, here’s an extract from something my good friend Dr Wommm wrote after the Ramleh gig we went to last week. I think he may have a point. In fact, I’m sure of it - much as I love a good knee-trembler of a bass frequency and have been known to throw myself at a cavernous drone, chasing the high end of noise-based music is one of the great pain-pleasures in life, as is trying to sing the ever-ascending theme of Morricone’s ‘Vergogna Schifosi’ and ending up dizzy, knowing you’ll admit defeat before the singer’s even got halfway to her peak and not really caring. Onwards, as they say, and most definitely upwards.
Those skull-ringing harmonics that most players roll off, deeming them too harsh or cutting, just too fucking much, are the essence of real sonic psychedelia for me, ‘cos they’re the frequencies which really disorientate and fool the ear, which change the sound so drastically when you move yr head an inch in any direction, which make yr fillings rattle, make the top of yr skull vibrate like a coked-up throat singer whistling through their brainpan, make you feel ecstatic one moment, confused and agitated the the next. Especially with judicious use of phase effects, the treble is the key to yr unmind.
Have composers throughout history called for a bass or a baritone when they wanted to give a feeling of the other? Nope, they called on the services of the castrati, or (particularly in these more apparently enlightened times), the countertenor. At the other extreme, what instrument, in the soundtrack of an otherwise trite and tacky 50s B-movie, has ever provoked the feeling of cosmic unease like the high warbling glissandi of the theremin? Or listen to Hermann’s score for Psycho, or Sala’s trautonium on the soundtrack to The Birds, Hitchcock understood.
You’ve probably read AMP’s review of Faster Than Sound in the current issue of Plan B - or, indeed, here on her blog - but I wanted to pop up a few short YouTube clips that hopefully give a slightly different glimpse of the event. Taking place at Bentwaters, a Cold War airbase notorious for a rash of UFO sightings, Faster Than Sound is a unique sort of festival: a mix of experimental electronic music, modern classical sounds, and digital art, all taking place in the sort of desolate whereabouts that suggests nuclear holocaust is just around the corner.
The site is free-roaming, meaning you could just flop down in the geodesic dome and listen to the music, or roam off to stare through distant chain-link fences at strange silos, explore long-derelict huts, or comb the further reaches for all manner of sound experiments like this, the 360 degree speaker circle, where acts including Sonic Arts Network and Haswell and Hecker played sets.
Perhaps the weirdest experience of the day was the forest walk, a path along the perimeter of the site you walk wearing headphones. Tune them into the correct frequency and you hear the crackly radio broadcast of a military pilot following an unidentifed flying object above Bentwaters back in the Eighties. The spooky thing being, I’d heard it before; it’s the same broadcast sampled on the first drum’n'bass record I ever bought, Photek’s 1995 single ‘UFO/Rings Around Saturn’. I spent the whole walk waiting for the drums to kick in.
There were bands, too - here’s a kinda wobbly excerpt from D.A.T Politics’ set.
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by Louis Pattison on Friday, July 6th, 2007 (No Comments)
