Circuit-Burnt MP3s

The lineup for the next Circuit Bending Festival in New York, at bentfestival.org, has been posted. And even if you can’t make it there between April 19 and 23, the list still provides a handy primer to who’s doing what right now in the wacky world of misusing existing technology on the cheap. The performers’ names are familiar and unfamiliar, and most links on the site lead to something worth hearing. Take Burnkit2600, whose burnkit2600.com site features several near-soundscapes, like the slowly pulsing “Aquacat” (MP3) and two takes on the slurpy, sci-fi-flavored “Whale Hunt” (MP3, MP3). Burnkit may be at its best when it wrestles with percussion. “Naut” (MP3), a live cut recorded in December 2004, plays a distorted riff above snare rolls that, as time passes, are themselves mutated by technology, skipped and tweaked, layered and bent.