What started as a fictional band to act as an excuse for the members to go to the pub on a weeknight has become something a bit more proper of late after some shows with Flipper and records in the pipeline. Even though they were probably aiming for something between Pere Ubu, Pissed Jeans and Scratch Acid it’s no surprise, with the members being kids of the early 90s, it ended up sounding like Nirvana. Just don’t call it a mid-life crisis.
Lash Frenzy return to this year’s festival to present ‘Vir Heroicus Sublimis’. Celebrating a decade of Supersonic, Lash Frenzy will be taking inspiration from their own decade’s worth of performances and throwing them into a blender, along with your brain. Whatever comes out is whatever comes out, so expect everything and expect nothing. All we know for sure is that there’s more than one person involved and less than 1000. Featuring members of Anaal Nathrackh, Beestung Lips, Benediction, Sally, Einstellung.
If you weren’t able to get in to the Lash Frenzy vs KK Null performance at Supersonic 2010, then make sure you don’t miss out twice!
This performance is one of a number of special collaborations taking place at the tenth edition of the festival.
The Bug is one of many music projects of London-based producer Kevin Martin. Kevin has been a part of a number of groups including Techno Animal, The Sidewinder, God, Ice, Curse of the Golden Vampire, Zonal, King Midas Sound, Black Chow, Cult Of The 13th Hour, Pressure and Experimental Audio Research through which he’s experimented with fusing such diverse genres as grindcore, industrial, metal, hip-hop, dub, jazz and ambient. The Bug’s music draws influence from dancehall, noise, grime, and hip hop.
For this performance Kevin Martin will be joined by the ‘world’s fastest rapper’ and founder of Raggamuffin hip hop Daddy Freddy and Flow Dan (co-founder of UK Grime collective Roll Deep).
http://www.myspace.com/ruinsband
Dragging themselves towards their tenth anniversary like a sloth in a heavy metal parking lot, Mothertrucker are no strangers to the almighty riff. They’ve crafted a sound built on thick dirty distortion, menacing atmospherics, head bopping tempo changes and rewarding climaxes. Not content to sit alongside the navel gazing, post-metal, Neurosis wannabes so prevalent this century, Mothertrucker have evolved their sound into something far more unpredictable without losing sight of what brought them together in the first place – the power of the riff. Once you have found yourself trapped in the headlights of the Mothertrucker, you can but only lay back, stretch your sack & make peace with your maker.
“The sense of menace is generated with huge energy by the belligerently brilliant Norwegian guitarist Westerhus who coaxes a plethora of tortured sounds from his axe, bowed notes elongating into harmonic dismemberment of epic proportions. (…) This is heady, sometimes heavy, otherworldly stuff, fuelled by jazz but never hindered by it. Welcome to the new century of improvised music.” JazzWise Magazine
This performance is produced in partnership with Jazzlines http://www.jazzlines.co.uk/
Ufomammut is a power trio formed in 1999 in Italy by Poia, Urlo and Vita, worldwide recognized as the creator of a unique brand of psychedelic sludge. With long songs, droning vocals and massive effects the band combines a monumental riffing attitude with the psychedelia of the more visionary Pink Floyd. Ufomammut’s live show is supported by the internationally acclaimed graphic and video art of Malleus.
“If someone commissioned you to write a history of noise music in the last 20 years and not mention Kevin Drumm, you’d have to reject the offer. Since the mid-90’s, Drumm has recorded for almost every experimental label you can think of, from Erstwhile to Mego to Hanson, and played with almost every experimental musician you could namedrop, from Jim O’Rourke to Lasse Marhaug to Aaron Dilloway. Most importantly, he’s made every sound imaginable. Primarily with guitar, but also synthesizers and laptops, Drumm has created his own musical universe in which no sonic stone needs to go unturned.” The WIre
It would be near impossible to celebrate 10 years of Supersonic without PCM. This duo have been at the heart of the Birmingham electronic/dance music scene for many years but have managed to keep their music and ethos resolutely underground.
PCM draw from their wide-ranging influences from metal to Krautrock, 60s psychedelia and hardcore to create a unique take on Drum & Bass/electronica. By combining nitrous-fuelled beats and filthy subsonic basslines with alien soundscapes and horror movie unease, PCM continue Birmingham’s heritage of producing dark, heavy music but with their eyes firmly on the dancefloor.
My Disco is a musical collaboration between Liam Andrews (bass, vocals), Rohan Rebeiro (drums) and Ben Andrews (guitar) that formed in Melbourne, Australia in 2003. Named after the Big Black song, they create almost euphoric, trance inducing guitar music.
Masami Akita performs as Merzbow. Since 1979 he has been a hugely influential practitioner on the fields of sound art, noise and extreme music. Abrasive and restrained in equal measure, Merzbow is considered to be the most important artist in noise music.
Tokyo based KK Null (Kazuyuki Kishino) is a multi instrumentalist and experimenter. As well as being part of a number of influential progressive rock bands, KK Null has played an important role in the relationship between rock and extreme music/noise.
“We don’t know who they are, or how many of them there are, because articles about them are generally accompanied by celebrity photo montages, or by a shot of them with a T-shirt pulled over their heads. Enigmatic and elusive, they may have named themselves after the US video director because they enjoy his work, or it may be a wry comment on something or other. We have seen them spoken of as an “18-year ‘relay project'” in which members pass on the baton one to another once their endeavours are complete. We really haven’t a clue.
Hype Williams take elements from the past and turn them into something new. You’ve heard that said of many artists before, right? This time it’s true. We like to let our imaginations run riot and think of them as a latterday Throbbing Gristle, a bunch of art terrorists doing abusive, subversive things to mainstream pop culture from the margins.” The Guardian
“Hey Colossus are the closest thing the UK has to inheritors of the crown of the Butthole Surfers…. like the whole Texas Chainsaw Massacre family drunkenly shouting along to Neu! and Loop during Ragnarök” Stool Pigeon
Apathy is everything to these five losers who’ll just about manage to turn up and play without being sick.
Lo-fi grit and metal maledom are fractured and recombined into monotone slabs which reference distaste for modern life as much as they poke fun at the traditions of the punk/hardcore idiom. Still barely functioning after four years of staring at the walls and occasional live performance, the band will finally have their debut album and a split 7″ record with Kilslug in tow with them for the latter part of 2012. All proceeds will be spent on plastic surgery.
You know who these men are. They have been other men. Who they were before does not matter. What matters most is who they are now. These men, with two menacing guitars, violent drums, and wild words will fill that void in you. They will build bunkers out of your bones. They will make weapons out of your teeth. They will drink your tears and feed on your meat. Born from the ashes of Arab on Radar, Doomsday Student come from that untouchable tradition of noise rock from Providence, Rhode Island.
Clifford Torus is Anders Hana (Moha!, Ultralyd & Noxagt) on drums and electronics with Leon Barnett (Horacio Pollard, Neigh%Music) on guitar & vocals.
Heavy, hypnotic, drenched in feedback and driven by a super charged rhythm, Clifford Torus deliver a mesmerising multi-layered rhombus harsh noise, rattle your brains to pieces drums and shamelessly long effects boards to spawn boundless intertwining grooves of pure honey-gore.
For this performance, Clifford Torus will be bringing the mighty Kjetil D Brandsdal of Noxagt for bass duties.
http://cliffordtorus.blogspot.co.uk/
Unpredictable guitar combo pairing Kim Gordon of Sonic Youth and free-noise guitarist Bill Nace.
KIM GORDON
A founding member of Sonic Youth – where she plays bass and guitar and sings, Kim Gordon has also been involved in numerous collaborations with other artists and musicians including Julie Cafritz and Yoshimi in Free Kitten, Mirror/Dash with Thurston Moore and others including Lydia Lunch, Vincent Gallo, and Yoko Ono. With an extensive history in the world of art, both as an artist, writer and curator Gordon has maintained ongoing creative relationships with visual artists such as Dan Graham, Raymond Pettibon, Mike Kelley, Jutta Koether and Richard Prince and exhibited her own installation work across the US, Japan and Europe.
BILL NACE
Guitarist Bill Nace has ripped a new black hole in the free rock universe as a constant, energising presence in the Boston area performing with Chris Corsano in Vampire Belt (and together with Jessica Rylan as Vampire Can’t), Thurston Moore in Northampton Wools, x.0.4 with Jake Meginsky & John Truscinski and a coruscating duo with free reed player Paul Flaherty. His collaborations even extended to a short-lived association with Brighton noiseniks Dylan Nyoukis & Karen Constance (aka Blood Stereo) under the Ceylon Mange moniker.
Godflesh, Head of David, Napalm Death, Techno Animal, Jesu, Greymachine, Palesketcher – just some of the projects from the insanely prolific Justin Broadrick, who in his new relationship with 3by3, raises his Techno Animal moniker JK Flesh from the dead for its debut full-length outing, to once again prove his mastery of all things brutal.
Soul-crushingly dark beats and bass, layered with Broadrick’s inimitable guitar and vocal fuzz, providing a stark contrast to 2010’s Palesketcher output, that will resonate with fans of Godflesh and the post-dubstep landscape alike.
justinkbroadrick.blogspot.com/
ZENI GEVA is a Japanese prog-hardcore band, led by singer and guitarist KK Null, a pioneering group of innovators and legends.
ZENI GEVA was founded in Tokyo in 1987 and quickly found a dedicated fan base in Europe and the US. Their popularity in the west enabled ZENI GEVA to be one of the first Japanese bands to tour in Europe and the US with bands like Neurosis, Melvins, Dazzling Killmen, Don Caballero, Eyehategod, Pain Teens, Shellac, Bastro, Crash Worship and more.
Born in the gutter of Baltimore County, raised in the sludge of the Copy Cat. Dope Body was born ad mist the post-hype of Baltimore underground. They are a collage of musical styles encapsulated by a classic (noise) rock structure. Rather than compare their ferocity to another contender, just know that Dope Body is punk spelled other-wards and standing on its hands,
There new full length (Natural History) is releasing May 2012 with Drag City.
Rangda is named for the Javanese demon queen of the leyaks. This power trio is an instrumental psych rock and no wave-styled noise unit. Its members are guitarists Sir Richard Bishop (Sun City Girls) and Ben Chasny (Six Organs of Admittance, Comets on Fire) and drummer Chris Corsano.
While perhaps not as fearsome as their evil, child-chomping witch namesake, Rangda rustle up some wickedly extreme sounds on the six improv-noise blowouts and psychedelic reveries woven into their debut ‘False Flag’, many of which could curdle your marrow if you’re not careful.
As a powerful and loud guitar/drum duo, Lightning Bolt comparisons come cheap….the Flower/Corsano Duo are something else – more like a punk-jazz-trash Konono No.1 or an Eastern sound, opiate-fixated Harry Pussy. As a duo they have that special power to elevate through noise, rhythm and primal harmonix. An exhilarating sight/sound that shudders the body and cleanses the mind. Obsessive stuff.
Promoting exciting new label Small But Hard with heavy as anything artists, including…
Koyxeи is one of the many aliases of Kouhei Matsunaga, when in his Hip Hop/Breakbeat guise with vocalists & MCs.
C_C – after listening to a lot of jungle, dub and breakcore, Eduardo Ribuyo had his brains blown when he met NHK, aka Kouhei Matsunaga. The ensuing metamorphosis brought us C_C, master of handmade beats and analogue feedback loops. Taking k7 tapes as his primary material, and sourcing sounds from anything and everything, C_C produces heavily textured music breathing, repetitious, and deep. Live performances envelop, soupy and treacly, moving incognito through his signature improvised flow.
Devilman comprises of three strong individual talents, Shige (DJ Scotch Egg) on bass, Gorgonn (Dokkebi Q) live mixing, and Taigen Kawabe (Bo Ningen) providing vocals. They are part of a secret underground organisation fronted by the mysterious MR. D.
DJ Scotch Bonnet is the new solo project of Shigeru Ishihara, aka DJ Scotch Egg. A maverick, crazed with energy and excess creativity, Ishihara’s chance meeting with Matsunaga Kouhei spurred an isotopic explosion of activity and inspiration; the result was new dope style distorted bass and beats
Kakawaka makes noise. The lunatic who took over the asylum, Kawakawa merrily blends childish tomfoolery with mind mangling noise. Abrasive sound sculptures beat you into submission until you are sick on the carpet. He spits in your eye and pisses on your face. For thus it is written in the great journal of musical endeavour that someone somewhere will achieve maximum joy from this unholy racket.
Supersonic is produced by Capsule:
Unit 317, Zellig
Gibb Street
Birmingham UK
B9 4AT
