Underworld Exhibit at Jacobson Howard Gallery (Manhattan)

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

There’s long been a creative and free-flowing osmosis between Underworld, the pop-minded techno act, and Tomato, the London-based design collective, which share personnel as well as aesthetic fixations. At the Jacobson Howard Gallery in Manhattan there is currently, through August 15, an exhibit of work by and related to both outfits. I attended the opening, last Thursday, August 7, where I shot the images below. The exhibit is titled Beautiful Burnout Artjam: The Art of Underworld, and it coincided with Underworld’s appearance at All Points West Music & Arts Festival at Liberty State Park (which I didn’t get to).

The majority of the work in Beautiful Burnout is photography — blissfully mundane imagery that, much like Underworld’s music, locates pleasure in industrial materials, repetition, rhythmic rigor, and occasional bursts of vibrancy. I was informed that, of the images below (just a portion of the overall exhibit), the black and white shots were more likely to have been accomplished by Underworld’s Karl Hyde, and the color (along with the more in-focus black and white) by the band’s Rick Smith. Various permanent wall-art images, not pictured here, were attributed to John Warwicker, co-founder of Tomato and creative director of Underworld.

Also running on various walls were video shorts by Graham Wood, including this sequence:

More info on the exhibit at jacobsonhoward.com, and at tomato.co.uk, where official images of the Artjam in progress have been posted.

PS: The framed text above (“In Tenebrismoke Curling…”) is by Artjam participant Richard Schwamb. Other artists involved in the installation included Laura Schwamb, Naomi Trotsky, and Toru Yoshikawa.

15 x 3

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

Via a nudge from Tim Prebble’s substation.co.nz:

1. What are the last 3 things you purchased? Cab fare home. Dinner. Lunch. 2. What are the last 3 songs you downloaded? Tracks from Miles from India, Kosma’s New Aspects, and Earth’s The Bees Made Honey in the Lion’s Skull (all from emusic.com). 3. Where were the last 3 places you visited? New York. Boston. Portland. 4. What are your 3 favorite movies? Dawn of the Dead. Planet of the Apes. Playtime. 5. What are your 3 favorite possessions? Fujitsu Lifebook P1510D. Original comic art by David Lasky. Robot painting on discarded window pane by Doolittle. 6. What 3 things can you not live without? Iced black coffee. Spicy food. Fujitsu Lifebook P1510D. 7. What would be your 3 wishes? More time. Better organization. More wishes. 8. What are 3 things you have not done yet? Visited Berlin, Hong Kong, or Minneapolis. 9. What are your 3 favorite dishes? Chinese tan tan men. Greek avgolemono soup. Thai gai kaprow. 10. What 3 celebrities/heroes would you want to hang out with the most? Kobo Abe. Teo Macero. Dennis Potter. 11. Name 3 things that freak you out. Aggressive driving. Myopic nationalism. Brand self-identification. 12. If you could describe yourself in 3 words, what would they be? Living. In. California. 13. Name 3 unusual things you are good at. Writing small. Typing fast. Listening to noise. 14. What are 3 things you are currently coveting? More space. Visiting David Byrne’s “Playing the Building” exhibit in Manhattan. Whatever the successor to the Fujitsu LifeBook P1620 turns out to be. 15. What 3 bloggers would you like tag? Brian Biggs (mrbiggs.com). Roddy Schrock (fundamentallysound.org). Jeffrey Stock (fooditude.com).

Images of the Week: Olympic Mettle

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

Best known previously in the west for visual extravangazas in the form of such films as Hero and Raise the Red Lantern, director Zhang Yimou oversaw the 2008 Olympics August 8 opening ceremony, a spectacle with a heavy emphasis on light and sound — and arguably the world’s largest site-specific multimedia art installation.

The literal fireworks by no means overshadowed the figurative ones, notably the initial 60-second countdown, as pictured in the five pictures immediately below. Some 2008 percussionists battered on drums that emitted light, which in turn allowed them to, in synchronization that was a theme for the entire evening, form patterns of Arabic numerals and Chinese characters.

A later sequence showed a rectangular mass of oversized Chinese moveable-type characters (see below) that created an intersection between ancient and modern information technology. While the individual objects signified the long history of invention in the East, each character also served as a pixel in a grid that, like the 60-second-countdown drum-lights, could be choreographed to depict images, shapes and movement.

(Images courtesy of shropshirestar.com, nzherald.co.nz, espn.go.com/olympics, en.beijing2008.cn, and nytimes.com.)

Quote of the Week: That’s Coldplay

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

This is Sasha Frere-Jones of the New Yorker (issue dated August 4) describing the guitar techniques and effect in common between U2 and Coldplay:

chiming, small chords played high on the neck and repeated, over and over, pushing the song away from the divisions of song form and closer to the ecstasy of the drone (when it works)

Full piece at newyorker.com.

Future Folk MP3 from David (Ghosts and Strings) Molina

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

Of the three songs that make up David Molina‘s Canciones del Futuro EP (recorded under the name Ghosts and Strings), two feature prominent vocals, which as is so often the case with songs end up relegating the instrumental material to the role of mere backing tracks. That’s unfortunate, because Molina has a way with murky electronic textures. The welcome exception here is the opening piece, “Heights,” which has some verbal material buried in the mix but emphasizes the electro-pneumatic pulse that serves as a downbeat, the hovering whirl of tone that is the piece’s substance, and in place of a vocal a searing yet understated woodwind line that commands the listener’s attention (MP3).  That woodwind matches the voice heard early in the piece, where Molina just intones some syllables with an emphasis on sound rather than on lyrics. There is some earnest spoken-word material toward the close of “Heights,” but it’s purposefully muddied, stuck amid the music rather than above it. The song is further enhanced by a slow guitar line, and Molina achieves something special when he occasionally tweaks the woodwind, just briefly, into a glorious feedback-laden moment of electronic noise. More info at the website of the releasing netlabel, restingbell.net.