NO-CORE blog

Sightings w Tom Smith at Death by Audio

I showed up to this show and the place was, surprisingly to me, already full. Sometimes shows that are can’t-miss line-ups of legends in my mind have single-digit attendance so I’m not really able to predict these things. But I was happy to see that these bands are apparently not just legends to me.

I completely missed the first act, which was Tom Smith and Don Fleming playing together. Don Fleming is a longtime NYC avant-rocker and Tom Smith is best known as the central figure from the post-music band To Live And Shave In L.A. Tom currently resides in Germany and was briefly in the states around the holidays, playing a few select shows. So I’m sad to have missed their performance.

The second band, Child Abuse, was going on. No photos, I was in the back of the room and they wouldn’t have been good anyway. Child Abuse are a bass drums keyboard trio who play metally brutal prog. Very technical, very tight, but with very messy and grungy sounds. It’s funny actually, most of the time the keyboard sounds like a distorted bass and the bass (run through some synth pedals I’m guessing) sounds like a keyboard. They were as great as ever.

Then the anti-rock, max-confusion band Fat Worm of Error was up!

Fat Worm of Error at Death by Audio

Notice how it’s not even clear what’s going on in this photo? That’s how they sound, but much moreso. Of course 5 people just noodling and doing separate things would be pretty boring. Okay, maybe I’d think that was pretty cool too, but what makes Fat Worm really mind-bending is the way they have a plan and they’ve really honed their own style of playing – in a way that sounds like chaos at almost every moment. Until both guitarists suddenly play the same sequence of notes exactly together and your brain twists 360 degrees in your head in an attempt to figure out what just happened. More Fat Worm photos:

Fat Worm of Error after one of a few costume changes

Fat Worm of Error, feeling it at Death by Audio

I spent a little time chatting in the back room and realized this was almost like a reunion (to me) of people from a show waaay back – at the Polish National Home, now known as the Club Warsaw. Maybe I’ll write all my recollections from that show someday, but it’s where I first met lots of the people playing or in the audience. Anyway, with all these long-time friends and acquaintances in attendance, there was definitely a very friendly and supportive vibe going on. You could tell from all the chatting and joking and cheers, but also from the huge smile on Tom’s face between songs.

Tom Smith with Sightings at Death by Audio

Mark Morgan's guitar moves

Sightings were doing their thing, sounding as focused (yet blurred) as ever. I was told there was exactly one practice for this show but it would have been hard to guess they hadn’t been playing this set for a month on tour. Everyone seemed 100% in command, holding back or cutting loose exactly when needed with no nervous or puzzled glances. It’s a pretty perfect pairing too, Sightings and Tom Smith, as they both work in a similar mode: composed but loose, planned but spontaneous. Sightings works with sound shards and Tom works with words, both of them stretching their material to the breaking point.

Sightings w Tom Smith at Death by Audio

Mark Morgan of Sightings, bending spacetime

Sightings w Tom Smith (and Pat Murano!)

Oh yeah, this fellow named Pat Murano also played with these guys. You can see him lurking behind that synth in the photo above. I can’t say too much about his playing, which is probably a good thing because it means it blended right into the Sightings vibe.

The set was short but satisfying. Definitely worth catching, but if you missed it some people seemed to be videotaping and recording so hopefully that will turn up online soon. Great show all around!

Even more photos over at the NO-CORE Flickr.

On Saturday I dragged myself out to Outpost, a place around the corner from the Silent Barn, for the panel discussion with Phill Niblock, GX Jupitter-Larsen, Al Margolis, Katherine Liberovskaya, AMK, Rat Bastard, Gen Ken Montgomery, Damion Romero, and of course Ende Tymes organizer and long-time noisemaker himself, Bob Bellerue. The subject of the discussion was listed as “Street-level experimental music and the evolution of technology and culture.” That does sound like it could be a stuffy snooze-fest, but it was actually very UN-like some of the pretentious art school events I’ve seen. I almost forgot what it was like just to listen to artists talking about why they like doing what they do, without trying to convince anyone that they’re brilliant and totally deserve that grant or gallery show. Rat Bastard’s opinions also kept things lively, as he disagreed with the other panel members on most points.

John Mannion at Ende Tymes Fest

I didn’t catch the video screening on any of the days, but I did get back in time to catch John Mannion kicking off Saturday night. Speaking of doing a lot with a little, Mannion’s main instrument is an open box fan, to which he applies an amplified screwdriver and subway pass. A laptop and effects also play a role, but still, it’s fun seeing the noises being produced by the fan-playing.

KILT filled the room with some thick wall-to-wall sound. Phil Niblock was one of the more famous performers (I gathered) and had one of the bigger crowds. However, he really only sat at his laptop so there was nothing to see. The sounds were a thick and constantly shifting river of tones. It sounded cool, but I felt like it would be more appropriate in an art installation setting where people come and go, as there was no big change in the sound at any point and little to watch.

Sick Llama at Ende Tymes Fest

Sick Llama I’ve also never seen but heard the name pretty often. He made slow-motion echoed sounds sort of like… well, not entirely unlike a sick llama. GX Jupitter-Larsen, of Haters fame (a band which is sometimes just him so I’m not sure what the distinction is) did something or other with a suitcase that resulted in a heavy rumbling noise. The sound was nicely gritty and physical, but I do wish I could have gotten a better idea of how it was created.

Kyle Clyde at Ende Tymes Fest

Kyle Clyde had a simple set-up and sonic palette compared to some, but really sold it with a gripping performance. Then at the other end of the spectrum, and closing out Saturday night, Yellow Tears had the most elaborate set-up with TVs, remote video, bowls of water, keyboards, etc. I couldn’t quite tell if their performance-art-like show, which seemed to be all about … drinking pee? … was supposed to be dark and disturbing or just a goof. It did end with someone getting a pie in the face though.

My resolve and health were deteriorating by night 3, though the quality of the acts didn’t slip. But the heat and hours of breathing cigarette smoke were starting to make me ill, so I made Sunday a shorter night and probably missed some great stuff. I was told that Gen Ken Montgomery was awesome.

Mike Shiflet created a varied range of textured sounds, almost peaceful but never boring. Damian Romero somehow made the walls, floor, and ceiling vibrate with some intense frequencies. It felt like he’d turned the whole Silent Barn into a speaker which we were all inside of. I was really, really glad I caught the set by I’D M Thfft Able (that spelling might be close to correct…) which turned out to be another one of my favorites.

I'D M Thfft Able at Ende Tymes Fest

Much like Crank Sturgeon or john Mannion, I’D M has an approach where you can see how all the sounds are made. It’s simply contact-miked objects and improvised vocal sounds. But from that basic starting point, I’D M went way, way outside the box with his performance, creating some of the oddest, most surprising, and harshest sounds (his amplified scratching down a chalkboard made one audience member cover her ears and run to the back of the room). At various points he stumbled around, dropping and rolling bowling and billiard balls while singing stream-of-consciousness phrases. I wasn’t the only one impressed and I think he got the wildest cheers and applause of all the acts.

ID M Thfft Able at Ende Tymes

This overview is seriously incomplete, but this YouTube user, mathgrind, got far more and better videos than anything I got. I’m embedding a playlist of his Ende Tymes videos below, in no particular order. Please feel free to add other links in the comments.

The weekend before last I caught a good portion of the epic Ende Tymes Fest at the Silent Barn in Queens. This is far from a complete overview, but I did catch most of the acts and got a few good photos and videos, so I’m going to post them up in parts. This was a 3-day, all-noise event with several long-time veterans of the noise scene represented. And when I say noise, I don’t mean just the “anything goes” stuff, but specifically the rhythm-free, note-free, harsh sound variety.

Twisty Cat at Ende Tymes Fest

When I got there on Friday evening, TwistyCat were going on. They’re locals who do cool free-horns through effects sounds. It’s not the harsh skronk of Borbetomagus, but it’s also not drone stuff. Somewhere in between. Vertonen did a fun set that ended with a feedback noise jam over Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way” which (I’m pretty sure) just happened to start coming through his radio.

Crank Sturgeon at Ende Tymes Fest

Crank Sturgeon is one of the scene veterans and someone I’d never seen before, so this was a real treat for me. My personal tastes also lean toward the absurdist/low-brow/dada, which had a smaller representation at the Ende Tymes, so this performance was very welcome. In addition to all that, I am always impressed when someone can do a LOT with a LITTLE. Sure, you can make some mean noise with a laptop, table full of effects pedals, modular synth and mixer – but can you put on an amazing noise show with TWO TIN CANS AND A STRING?

After the above segment, Crank Sturgeon proceeded to stretch packing tape across the venue and back (contact miked, which sounded amazing), strung up a violin from the center and did some kind of performance piece that seemed to be about him ejaculating cotton ball “clouds” onto a packing tape “sky.”

MV Carbon put in a good set of mutant sounds made with effects and a cello. (Was that instrument a cello? I don’t even know.) Bran (…) Pos was really cool to watch, creating noise from processed vocal sounds along with processed video of himself making the vocal sounds.

The Rat Bastard Experience also brought the low-brow in a big way. The Experience was comprised of all of the members of Cellular Chaos with Rat on guitar, C Lavender on a radio or something, and Nondor Nevai on “vocals.” And by “vocals” I mean freaking out and tackling people while sometimes holding a microphone.

Rat Bastard Experience at Ende Tymes Fest

ISA Christ actually did bring a strong rhythmic element in, but run through a suitcase-of-noise-gear. And Hex Breaker Quartet closed out Friday night with their heavy psych-drone. Filling the position in the NYC scene vacant since Double Leopards?

Part 2 coming soon!

Neg-Fi at Silent Barn 03/13/11

I am hereby going to dub Neg-Fi “The most punctual band in New York City.” Even though they did cut an agreement with the organizers to start a few minutes after their designated time and put in what, for them, qualifies as an epic set (20 minutes?), I’m pretty sure no other band is in the running for this title. I’m always using the word minimal to describe Neg-Fi’s music, but I don’t think that’s really the right word, because they’re always plenty loud and fill the room with sound. It’s just such tightly scripted and executed music. Punctual is actually closer. Or maybe maximal.

E.I.D. at Silent Barn 03/13/11

This was one of the Silent Barn’s upstairs-downstairs shows, and downstairs the one-man noise project E.I.D. (Explosive Improvised Device) was going on. This contact mic harsh noise has been around almost 20 years now if you think about it, though it seems to be less popular at the moment and I think E.I.D. is too early for a retro resurgence – but he’s definitely carrying the flame.

The sounds here were actually really varied and dynamic. Lots of quiet-loud moments. More like a Masonna without the vocals than a C.C.C.C. or something. My only complaint: protective gloves! Does Masonna wear kneepads? Does Lucas Abela put masking tape on the edges of his glass? Bleeding for your noise is just part of the HARSHness, dude. Okay, okay, I’m giving E.I.D. a hard time, but there’s just something about a guy doing the full-on, serious noise thing (in a Macronympha T-shirt no less) that begs for a little heckling. But for real, I was impressed by how good this sounded.

Benn Miller at Silent Barn 03/13/11

Back upstairs was Benn Miller, who played a table full of fun, ancient-looking stuff. Cassette tapes, loop station, reel-to-reel, old synthesizer, and saxophone run through effects. There was also a drummer who did a good job of playing along, keeping things loose enough so that the oddball sounds could run free, and just tight enough to add a little rock. My only complaint here is that all the stuff could have been turned up because the drums were by far the loudest part.

Deathcrush at Silent Barn 03/13/11

Then Deathcrush (from Norway I discovered) played, and at first I honestly thought this was just terrible, but I was totally won over by the end. So many things made it seem like this was going to be awful. First, I’m always skeptical of bands that seem like they spent more time getting their hair, make-up and clothes right than their music. (male or female of course) Deathcrush came out of the gate with rock star “attitude” and “moves,” accompanied by completely un-tuned guitars and beyond rudimentary technique. (except the drummer who clearly had some solid skills) My first impression was that this band did all their song-writing and practicing in front of a mirror with non-functioning prop instruments, and this was the first time they’d been handed the real thing to use. It was like they thought they were in Def Leppard but came out sounding more like… The Dead C?

Deathcrush at Silent Barn 03/13/11

But as I watched, I found I did a complete 180 in my thinking. First I thought: if they were pulling out rock star moves and sounding like Def Leppard, would that be better? No way, that would be terrible. If they sounded like a sludgy & dirgey noise-rock band but spent the show crouching over their amps and staring at their feet, would that be better? Again, no way. Then at some point they did this one song and by some combination of willpower and magical happenstance it sounded perfect. Even when the guitarist was holding up her guitar and gesturing to her tourmates that a new string was needed, feedback howling away and sounding no different than it was when she was furiously doing something with it a minute ago – there was this great semi-melodic vortex of sound going on, like a Venus in Furs moment – and I officially changed my mind. The headbanging into the audience finale sealed the deal. Deathcrush were kind of awesome.

Paranoid Critical Revolution at Silent Barn 03/13/11

The Paranoid Critical Revolution, usually a duo, played without their drummer, who I’m told had quit the band. So it was just member Reg Bloor playing guitar. Reg also plays in Glenn Branca’s guitar orchestra, and on her own she sounds like a whole orchestra of guitars. I don’t really know how it’s done, but using an amp that doesn’t look all that big, she can blow out any eardrums in the room. Earplugs take a ton of the treble away, but it still sounds hellishly loud.

We’d had a brief conversation about black metal before the show started and with that in my mind, I couldn’t help thinking how Reg’s style is kind of black metal. The super-fast strumming with little notes picked out of a hurricane of white noise. It’s like part black metal, part no wave, and part nuclear holocaust.

Because of some overlap, I only caught the end of Altaar’s set. They also had thoroughly filled the room with smoke-machine fog, so my point and shoot camera was useless. This was the band that had been described as black metal, but we Americans do know a thing or two about our metal genres, and just because a band is from Norway does not make them black metal. I’d put this firmly in the sludge/doom metal category. Maybe with a noise-rock bent, given all the pedals in use. So what I saw was about 10 minutes of slow, heavy, thudding noise-dirge – which it wouldn’t really be fair to judge these guys on, as it was probably just the triumphant climax to an epic show. I’m going to assume that’s the case.

Satanized at the Cake-Shop

The Cake-Shop is one of the last places left in Manhattan that I still go to for shows, with virtually every other show happening in Brooklyn these days, but it’s also just about my favorite place for shows. They’ve got coffee and yes, cake!, and awesome records to browse, and the downstairs show space is great. And of course they host awesome shows like this one, which deserved a far larger crowd than it got.

White Suns at the Cake-Shop 2/27/11

The White Suns opened things up with their thunderous noise/rock. For some reason, this sounded better than any previous time I’ve seen them. Things can sometimes sound pretty indistinct when you’ve got 3 different people making 3 different grinding and/or screeching noises, but I could distinguish everything that went into the formula this time. While watching them, it occurred to me that while they look like a rock band, this is really a noise band with some rock instrumentation. They do scripted songs, but elements like rhythm or, um, melody? (ha ha) are distant seconds to sheer noise terror.

Drums Like Machine Guns at the Cake-Shop 2/27/11

Drums Like Machine Guns are a long-time favorite. They’re generally a mixture of oddball experiments and howling, head-banging beats-&-noise. To be honest, this show was noticeably less intense than I’ve seen from them. I mean, these dudes always sound great, but they’ve set the bar pretty damn high for themselves with past performances. On the other hand, they did some different stuff, possibly knowing that most of the people in attendance had seen them several times before – and that’s a good choice too.

Satanized at the Cake-Shop 2/27/11 - 2

Satanized at the Cake-Shop 2/27/11 - 3

Satanized pushed things to new extremes with their music, becoming more obtuse and perplexing than ever. Which is meant as a high compliment, in case you don’t know me very well. Satanized are both heavy-bottomed and high-ended. The chugging bass and heavy, complex drums almost sound like they’re operating in a different dimension than the super-shrill guitar, which sounds like equal parts Mick Barr and Big Black. I’m used to Alex’s maxed-treble guitar sound, but he did some harmonics things this time that went into dog-whistle territory.

Cellular Chaos at the Cake-Shop 2/27/11

I hadn’t seen Cellular Chaos before, but since I’m almost always into Weasel Walter’s projects, it’s no surprise I thought they were great. It’s nice to see Weasel playing guitar too, and some of the heavy-handedness of Lake of Dracula is definitely present, but it’s also nice how there was subtlety and complexity involved too. All the members of this group are definitely players, but mercifully un-showy ones. There were moments of freakout improv and moments of rigid tightness, on-a-dime switches between the two, and times when it wasn’t entirely clear what was happening. Unclear to the audience that is, but the band was in command at all times.

All around great show, killer line-up from start to finish.

Satanized on MySpace
Drums Like Machine Guns
White Suns
Cellular Chaos

this show brought to you by the number 8

This show got far crazier than any I’ve seen in Brooklyn recently. (okay, technically the Silent Barn’s in Queens) The headliners here were a super-group merger of Sewn Leather and Dog Synth/DJ Dog Dick – both dudes who trade in weird noise/beats mergers – into one band known as DOG LEATHER. Somehow this duo seems instantly more popular than both of those guys together, which seems weird but makes sense. This is just an idea that as soon as you hear it, you know it’s going to be amazing. Everyone came to this show just knowing it was going to be amazing. And it was. Things got kind of crazy. How crazy?

That crazy. Now let me back up and mention some of the other stuff. The first act, filling in for Shams who had to cancel, was Guardian Alien. I recognized these people from other Brooklyn acts but hadn’t seen this one yet. Improvised blast beats, some kind of stringed instrument that sounded somewhere between a lap steel and a sitar, and some free vocals and interpretive dance. That combination might sound like it could go either way, but this had tons of energy and ended long before it needed to. (always good)

Guardian Alien at Silent Barn

Then came Buddy Bag, who played really, reeeeaally rudimentary sludge rock. So caveman-style that the drummer just dropped 2 toms flat on the floor and played with one drum stick and one random big piece of wood. Depending on who you are, you might think that sounds like it would be either awesome or horrible.

Buddy Bag at Silent Barn

Then came Narwhalz (of sound), whose performances I always look forward to. They generally involve a combination of confusion, technical difficulties, freakouts, and “crowd work.” Narwhalz plays Gameboy programming that has been sounding heavier and noisier every time I see him. In fact, this time things sounded so blown out and distorted that it wasn’t clear what parts were the buzzing and popping of a faulty connection or the intended sound.

Narhwalz (of sound) at Silent Barn

For reasons I couldn’t make sense of at the time, the crowd just went nuts for him! Not that they shouldn’t, and I’ve definitely seen a crowd of like-minded friends go nuts in Philly to Narwhalz once, but I usually expect something like this (from the last time I saw him play Silent Barn):

Narwhalz at Silent Barn 06-23-10

but instead the crowd did this:

Narwhalz mosh pit at Silent Barn 02-17-11

A nice surprise. In retrospect I think the combination of a generally excited audience and a few in-the-know instigators is the combination that triggered this. Up next was Nonhorse (Or is it Non-Horse?) which is G Lucas Crane’s tape manipulation project. It’s super-fun to watch, as he juggles multi-colored tapes spilling out of a suitcase and works a pair of cassette players (with some effects) like an expert DJ would cut records.

Nonhorse at Silent Barn

And then Dog Leather was up.

The Dog half of Dog Leather at Silent Barn

Their show was actually something of a slow build, starting with a mish-mash of noises before breaking into some of their rap songs. Set to blown out beats, primitive electronic sounds, and not-quite-on-the-beat samples, all mashed together into a fuzzy wall of noise – but yeah – rap songs. Rapping that sounded kind of like Skinny Puppy vocals, but still.

The Leather half of Dog Leather at Silent Barn

And it just got wilder and wilder. A sledgehammer appeared. A chair appeared. And then a gigantic number 8 appeared. Lots of crowd-surfing happened. My show-organizer instincts almost kicked in several times, but I resisted the urge to remove objects or take down boot-swinging crowd-surfers when I noticed that the people primarily responsible for the chaos were all the people who lived at the Silent Barn! They were loving it. EVERYONE was loving it. I didn’t see anyone in there who wasn’t laughing and smiling even while they were getting knocked over and piled upon. We all knew this was absurd and ridiculous and goofy and the best thing ever. The perfect antidote to the self-conscious, second-guessing, people-watching attitude that NYC has a bad reputation for.

And I leave you with a video of a Dog Leather song from early in their set, before things got quite so out of hand (though you can tell people are already rocking to it). This video strangely came out sounding really good.

I’ve returned from this year’s International Noise Conference exhausted but alive. If you don’t know, this is an epic annual event in Miami FL hosted by Rat “King of Noise” Bastard. Somehow, despite flying amps and tables, indoor fireworks, mosh pit pile-ups, and of course ear-splitting noise, Churchill’s (the venue) continues to allow this event to go on. Over 100 bands each play 15 minutes or less. (Full line-up HERE)

I shot some short videos when I could. If I didn’t get video of something, it might mean I had to eat, sleep, use the bathroom, get ready to play, or that a band didn’t stand in the light and nothing would have shown up anyway. Instead of posting each video separately, I made this playlist. Use the little tabs on each side to skip through the videos, and click that little tongue icon between Play and Volume to access the video list. It’s kinda sorta in chronological order.

There were a number of friends and regulars who dropped out this year, sadly. No Head Molt, Drums Like Machine Guns, Abiku, Loop Retard. But there was still too much amazing stuff to catch everything. At the risk of omitting tons of mind-blowing stuff, I’ll mention a just a few of the highlights:

Night Burger! Every person in the house was rocking out to this by the end. My video does NOT do the sound justice, sadly. When this set was over, everyone was on a total high, smiling from ear to ear and looking at each other all wide-eyed like “Did you just hear what I heard?!”

Time Ghost! I’d never seen this dude before, but in addition to sounding awesome, his show looked amazing with some kind of light-triggered or maybe light-linked synth sounds and his head and face covered in baby oil for maximum shiny-ness. And my video of this one actually turned out pretty good!

Leslie Keffer’s bouncer skills! Angry army dude was clearly not a noise fan, but he sure seemed to like the Cock ESP set and took it as an excuse to jump in with some destruction of his own. In a way, it’s weird and funny when someone really doesn’t get what’s happening, except that it can also be really uncool. I guess a Cock ESP set might look to someone like it’s free-for-all time, but it’s actually not, and when the show is over, it’s over. And when it was over, army dude decided he still wanted to try to bust in some of Churchill’s amps, stick a bottle up Emil’s ass, and then try to talk up C Lavender. Enter Leslie, stage left, who used some kind of snake charmer hypnosis to wordlessly walk Army Dude straight out the side door and shut it behind him. I was impressed.

There definitely was a trend toward dark synth-rock, always with some noise mixed in. Daily Life, which featured both Kites and Lazy Magnet’s Jeremy Harris as members, was a prominent example of this. But I’d like to say that the real trend was “taking it up a notch.” Everyone who I’ve seen at past INCs put in the best show I’d seen by them ever! Seriously. Blue Shift for example? How amazing did that sound? Dick Neff? INC really is a kind of conference, where everyone brings their A-Game and everyone leaves inspired and with fresh ideas to implement. Next year’s going to rule.

I’ll add some links when I find more good stuff online. Please send me whatever you’ve got or leave a comment! The NOISEBLOID blog (http://noisebloid.blogspot.com) has also promised more emerging photos, videos, and gossip from INC.

HumanBeast at Death by Audio

Phew! Some kind of line-up, right? This is going to be the Brooklyn show to top in 2011. And there were lots of big cameras popping off everywhere, so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that this event has already shown up on a bunch of other music blogs. But hey, I was there, I took pictures, it was awesome, I may as well put my show review out into the virtual world too.

dubknowdub – live at zebulon

So first of all, I missed DubKnowDub, but they’re great. I know the show had 6 bands on the bill, but this being Brooklyn, I still didn’t believe the show would actually start before 9PM. So as a consolation, hit play on the above track and let it be your soundtrack to No-Core browsing. (Music starts about the 1:45 mark.) I don’t know who DubKnowDub are exactly, but they get on lots of great shows somehow and they’re tons of fun. Yup, it’s kinda dub, and also kinda noise. Great live. Don’t make my mistake next time!

Diamond Black Hearted Boy at Death by Audio

I did get there in time to catch Diamond Black Hearted Boy, a guy I’ve met before though I didn’t mentally piece together that it was the same person until I talked to him at the show! DBHB comes from the same Richmond freak scene that Narwhalz and Shams do and performance-wise you can tell he’s on the same page. Live, it’s kinda confrontational (for anyone who’s not into it) or just good fun if you are into it. Lots of goofy genre tags have been slapped on him, but honestly, I’d say his music is sort of proto-industrial. Claustrophobic, pushed-too-far-into-the-red samples and loops, usually rhythmic, sometimes with actual beats. Tonight DBHB also made ample use of a piercing whistle blown straight into the microphone which sounded pretty awesome (maybe a little tiresome after a while though) like it was hitting the resonant frequency of your eardrums.

Shawn Greenlee at Death by Audio

Shawn Greenlee’s performance was really fantastic. He used some kind of camera to scan from a handmade book, and then what must have been custom software to turn the images into noise. Then there was a weird spinning disk, and he’d use the trackpad kind of like a Kaossilator, and… well, just watch him do his thing here. That’s my best guess as to what was going on. It sounded super-sweet too, better than it came out in this video. I was captivated.

And then, humanbeast. This was SO GOOD.

HumanBeast at Death by Audio 3

HumanBeast at Death by Audio 2

Last year at the International Noise Conference in Miami, I, like any mortal person, had to take a break and miss some of the acts. When I got back and asked people what I missed, everyone kept saying “Humanbeast! Humanbeast!” (I’m using the no-space spelling that appears on the tape I got) – so I was excited to finally see these guys. They did not disappoint! Their music was absolutely gorgeous, while at the same time being really dirty and messed up – which was also sort of how their performance played out – and how the theme of their lyrics go – taken together it’s cohesive, deadly effective, and totally entrancing. Amazing music meets amazing noise. Again, I couldn’t really capture the sound in full, but here’s my video of them playing “Come Through the Cloth.” I just watched it again and got chills at the point where she sings at the top of her lungs without the microphone.

I don't know if all those expensive cameras are safe there...

And then Rat Bastard of INC and Laundryroom Squelchers fame took to the stage, with his guitar with only 4 strings and 4 tuning pegs remaining. He was joined by Roger of Monotract fame and another guy who I probably should know but don’t, both on guitars. This was basically a performance following the Laundryroom Squelchers M.O. – a terrific squall that sounds at first like sheer white noise. The infamous Nondor Nevai made his trademark after-the-band-has-started appearance and took over vocals, striking poses but largely inaudible over the din. The thing about these Rat performances is that the beginning always seems just like random loud noodling, but if you’re willing to keep listening it starts to take shape and details come out at you. And these guys must have been listening to one another, because somehow they all knew when it was done around the same time.

AIDS Wolf at Death by Audio

AIDS Wolf went on last, and this was the first time I’ve seen their new(ish) 3-person line-up. (and Chloe’s new glasses!) Losing a guitarist has certainly not diminished the volume or chaos of AIDS Wolf live. In fact, I think I like the new sound even better. The band members really seem to be working toward some sort of Harry-Pussy-like psychic communication music that relies on feeling and intuition more than counting beats. They also introduced some sampled sounds and vocal effects which broadened the sound pallet. At least, I think that was an effect and not just a technical difficulty – but you know what? I really enjoy it when a band can make me wonder what’s intentional and what’s not. Living at the edge of chaos. I was also happy to see that the musical chaos inspired some physical chaos in the crowd. It looks like people are just standing around in the above photo, but there was some serious mosh action happening.

In closing: Awesome show. Good people, good times, great sounds. Show ran on time?!?! (props to Edan) Amazing. I went home feeling reinvigorated about music in general.

I caught this super-cold and super-booked show at the Silent Barn Friday evening. I saw everyone at the upstairs show, but missed a bunch of the downstairs going-ons unfortunately.

keeping warm at Silent Barn

Did I mention it was cold? I guess the Silent Barn crew is living without heat this winter. Hardcore. Above you see Neg-Fi and Doldrums watching another act and trying to keep warm.

Neg-Fi at Silent Barn

Neg-Fi did their tight and punctual No Wave two-step thing. Got the crowd moving without a single drumbeat.

unknown band in Silent Barn basement

Then I headed downstairs to see what was going on at the more avant/weird-noise show. This band played, and it sounded pretty awesome when they actually played and weren’t just chatting with their 5 friends who were there. I know that seems like the natural thing to do when you feel like your 5 friends are the only ones paying attention, but hey, that’s why I always advocate selling it like you’re playing for thousands no matter what. Because maybe that kid in the back corner is actually really, really into it despite appearances and would have been your fan for life until you let the song trail off and started rambling… Also not into the hunched over facing away from any audience style. But like I said, the sounds were great. Rhythmic mechanical-death-throes noises.

Doldrums at Silent Barn

Up next was Doldrums (who came down from Canada) which started out as some serious post-Narwhalz/Kyle H Mabson thing. Pop song sampling interspersed with short bursts of noises, heckler-baiting, and stand-up comedy. It went on like this for the bulk of their time and was pretty entertaining. Not quite on Narwhalz’ level but still. Then at the very end the Doldrums dude decided to play a couple of songs.

Doldrums encore

The drummer only decided to play after the crowd demanded one more song, and this was by far the highlight. Hard to believe they almost ended without playing this, after setting up the drums at the beginning and all. Melodic but noisy but spooky but edgy. Real nice, and it doubled my positive impression of them.

Cat with Nat Roe at Silent Barn

Back downstairs, this performance was going on. Nat Roe lured a couple of the silent Barn resident cats down with the promise of food and then tested their determination with escalating noise, music, and a vacuum cleaner. Honestly, I’ve got a soft spot for animals and felt kind of bad for the cats here, though they certainly weren’t harmed and were free to leave the scene at any time. I’m pretty impressed with that cat’s willingness to continue finishing its meal even when the vacuum cleaner started up – most household pets’ most-hated appliance.

Wharton Tiers Ensemble at Silent Barn

Wharton Tiers is a long-time NYC music dude, best-known for recording some pretty legendary bands and albums. Here he plays drums along with a bassist, saxophonist, and FIVE guitarists. I don’t know if the knowledge of Mr. Tiers’ CV colored my impression, but this came across to me as a totally classic NYC-flavored experience, part Branca/Live Skull/Sonic Youth, part Television/New York Dolls.

Sediment Club at Silent Barn

I think The Sediment Club are one of my favorite bands going right now, doing a fully old-school No Wave, but also fully vital and now-sounding thing. Some of the songs come out swinging with a double-time Contortions attack, others have a more slow-burn approach. But always the rhythm section is tight, the keyboard sounds kinda messed up, and singer/guitarist Austin plays guitar exactly like any dedicated No Waver would: whammy bar in hand, slide on finger, and treble turned up.

The Sediment Club in contact mic madness

The Sediment Club "No More Earth"

The last act of the night (although I lost track of what was going on downstairs) was Knife City, an all-out chiptune dance attack. Here’s a video of Knife City’s hands and his biggest fan’s feet.

I’m down in Miami at the International Noise Conference, and some more photos and video will follow, but as a little sneak preview, here’s the Laundryroom Squelchers set from Thursday night, Feb. 11th. This is shot in portrait format so you may want to go fullscreen for viewing. I think the David Lynch style lighting helps capture the madness.