Month: August 2009

Tangents: Prefuse 73 on Classical, Rhys Chatham on 200 Guitars, RjDj on Tour …

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

Recommended reading, news, and so forth elsewhere:

● Guillermo Scott Herren (aka Prefuse 73) on Electronica’s Classical Under-girding (newmusicbox.org): Lengthy interview with Guillermo Scott Herren, aka Prefuse 73, on, among other things, the influence of abstract contemporary classical music on his electronica: "It's just me being really nerdy and listening to these tape records, these weird throwback Nonesuch records. I'm the first to go to the old experimental music section and just buy all the dollar records that nobody buys. And everybody's like, 'Pfft, what are you buying? Oh, I got that, it's so boring.' But you listen to it, and you're like: What is going on? Because those records are like, one minute will be this beautiful kind of composed piece, and all of a sudden swoosh. And it's so random. And it all came together." Interview by Trevor Hunter. Video available, too.

● Rhys Chatham & 200 Guitars (nytimes.com): Rhys Chatham's 200-guitar piece "A Crimson Grail (Outdoor Version)" performed a week ago Saturday at Lincoln Center in Manhattan (a year after its initially scheduled run was scuttled by inclement weather), reviewed in New York Times by Steve Smith: "Chatham’s piece dealt in massed sonorities and mingling overtones rather than manual calisthenics." Also available, HD performance video of the “end of first part” (vimeo.com) and of the “finale” (vimeo.com). Video found via twitter.com/rlainhart, which also listed two additional reviews: There’s timeoutny.com‘s Sophie Harris: “The sound of two hundred tremoloed guitars ricocheted around the space, even setting off a car alarm in the street (miraculously in tune!).” And artforum.com‘s Andrew Hultkrans: “The third section opened with the guitarists playing repeated fifths, with the basses dropping one sustained bomb at the end of each measure, reminding me of the intro to the Who’s ‘Won’t Get Fooled Again’ stuck on auto-repeat.”

● Moon Score Composer Clint Mansell Q&A (mojo4music.com): Pop Will Eat Itself‘s Clint Mansell talks (a bit) about working on the score to the recent chamber-sci-fi film Moon, as well as about working with Darren Aronofsky, musicians whom he admires (Philip Glass, the Buzzcocks), and performing his soundtrack music live. Also: "I mean, if somebody called me to do the music for Pirates of the Caribbean 4 you know what that score needs to be, and whilst I may be able to make a passable attempt at it I don't think that would be my strong suit." Interview by Andrew Male.

● Up, Bustle and Out Has New Album in the Works (upbustleandout.co.uk): Been a few years since (former Ninja Tune mixmasters) Up, Bustle and Out's album Istanbul's Secrets (latest in an ongoing series of audio travel guides), but the group has a new album, titled Soliloquy, that it's "pitching to reputable labels."

● RjDj (Interactive Music App for iPhone/Touch) Starts World Tour September 10 in Tokyo (rjdj.me):

● Cellphone Speaker Interference Can Be Diminished with Electrostatic Bag (lifehacker.com):

More online resources at disquiet.com/elsewhere.

Tony Allen Afrobeat Remix by Tim (Subbasshead) Prebble (MP3)

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

Back in June, Nigerian legend Tony Allen uploaded a heap of stems (that is, constituent multi-track elements) of the title cut off his recent album, Secret Agent, for anyone to download, mix, and upload. The original is slick Afrobeat: all chanting chorus, ’70sploitation guitar, and trance-inducing percussion. Among the many uploaded mixes is an entry by subbasshead — aka “film sound designer, occasional musician” Tim Prebble, whose great musicofsound.co.nz blog carries the inspiring subhead “Tim’s obsession with vibrating air molecules.”

So what does someone with Prebble’s ear for sonic detail and space have in store for Allen, veteran drummer of Fela’s groundbreaking band? Among many other things, Prebble adds, per his pseudonym, a serious dose of delay, turning lilting guitar lines into rich waterfalls. He also pushes the keys forward until they seem like something off an electric-era Miles Davis album, and focuses the vocals until they sound less like a pop song and more like incantations (MP3).

More on the remix project in a previous disquiet.com post.

Electronic Viola Loops & Drones (MP3)

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

Loops of viola form the music of Dash, aka Jordan Dykstra, who recently recorded a live performance for the great KDVS radio show Phoning It In, on which musicians literally phone in a performance, playing over their phone (presumably a land line, not a cell). In his half-hour piece, Dysktra initially produces pulsing, rhythmic work, his electronic delay systems suggesting far more strings than any individual could ever play (MP3). Eventually, though, those pulses give way, melting and morphing into feedback-laden drones that have a sweet fragility to them.

[audio:http://www.phoningitin.net/files/shows/KDVS/2009/DASH%20-%20Phoning%20It%20In%2006_24_09.mp3|titles=”Phoning It In”|artists=Jordan Dykstra]

More on Dash at existentialmedia.org/thehop.

Image of the Week: Gorfinkel’s Globular Breathing

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

Balloon-powered trumpet installation by Dale Gorfinkel, images by Julian Wearne:

Located via the tag flickr.com/photos/tags/soundart at Wearne’s flickr.com/photos/ikaink account. Photos presumably shot at the West Space Gallery (westspace.org.au) in Melbourne, Australia.

Quote of the Week: Scaling Mori’s Heights

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

From an interview with Ikue Mori at newmusicbox.org. Always intriguing when matters as practical as one’s living conditions so directly impact’s one’s creative output, especially when the intensity and thoroughness of the creative output, as is the case with Mori’s music, thoroughly mask the equipment choice (in her case laptop) as being anything other than an entirely artistic decision:

    FJO: Eventually you decided to stop using drum machines and just use computers for everything. And that’s been about ten years now.

    IM: I started [doing that] in 2000.

    FJO: It’s obviously way more portable to bring one laptop than it is to lug several drum machines.

    IM: That’s really the main reason. I started realizing that what I was doing with all the equipment and cables that I was carrying, I could just program it on a computer. That was my liberation.

    FJO: So, in a way, it’s been a progression towards more and more portability. First you had the drum kit, and then the drum machines which took up considerably less room. And finally, the laptop.

    IM: Living in this city on the sixth floor with no elevator, you have to think about equipment. But also I’ve always liked to take small compact things and make something maximum out of it.

Interview conducted by Frank J. Oteri.