British born Lucy McLauchlan large-scale monochromatic paintings have covered multi-story buildings across Europe, gigantic billboards in China, windows in Japan, huts in The Gambia, Italian water towers, Norwegian lighthouse, Detroit car parks and abandoned NYC subway tunnels. Implicit within her work is a deep respect for nature as she draws inspiration from her immediate environment; allowing it to inform and direct what is an intuitive and explorative process.

Within Lucy’s ongoing ‘investigation’ into some of Birmingham’s more unapparent areas, ‘Birmingham By Pass’ features new works referencing her days spent along the canals and waterways of Digbeth. Culminating in an installation at the intimate gallery space located just off the canal within our partner venue Centrala.

Lucy’s residency runs from the 9th June to the 8th July, with works along the surrounding canal side.

TAKE A LOOK AT THE FOOD STALLS AND BARS FUELLING OUR WEEKEND OF MIND BENDING, BODY QUAKING FUN NEXT WEEK AT SUPERSONIC…

BARS

Our very own bars can be found in The Crossing, The Wild Stage, Boxxed and the Market Place providing an array of real ale, cider, wine and spirits to aid your weekend enjoyment.

In previous years we have worked our way through eight thousand plastic cups. In a bid to reduce the impact on the environment, we have introduced a Supersonic reusable cup. There is a one off £1 charge, then itʼs your to keep. 

Our bars are run by a team of energetic and hardworking volunteers, so donʼt forget to give them a smile and please treat them nicely! 

FOOD

BEET THE SYSTEM

Hold on to your lunch boxes! Beet the System are a Vegan Worker Co-operative. They specialise in making our their own delicious, fresh Organic Tempeh in Brum which they will be cooking up into some mouthwatering dishes for Supersonic Festival. Plant Power to the People! 

www.beetthesystem.co.uk 

ORIGINAL PATTY MAN 

Birminghamʼs own Patty Pimps and Purveyors of filth return to their street food origins to provide you with serious, quality burgers. 

www.originalpattymen.com 

SRI-LICIOUS 

Specialist Sri Lankan street food dishes, prepared lovingly from scratch; weʼre talking kottu roti, egg hoppers, delicious short eats and adventurous sambols. 

www.srilicious.co.uk

*Dribble*

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Supersonic Festival 2017 plays host to many stunning interdisciplinary showcases across the weekend. In particular, our Friday night at the Wild stage sees groundbreaking new AV work from Birmingham duo Mothwasp and Algorave – a live coding collective. And on Saturday, our partners at Vivid Projects also host a coding workshop with BAFTA-winning digital artist Dan Hett.

Kicking off on the Friday night at 10pm on the Wild stage, Mothwasp creates an unsettling kind of “pitch black broken funk.”

Mothwasp Intro from Beat13 on Vimeo.

Descending from the long line of leather-and-denim clad noise-mongers that post-industrial Birmingham is so fond of producing, yet remain the Midlands’ “least tattooed rock band”. Combining the brute force of drums and guitar, experimental film soundtrack techniques and audio-responsive video experiments derived from defunct analogue projection apparatus, the duo sculpt movies for the ears and soundtracks for the eyes.

Vintage tools used to orchestrate warped futurism.

Live Sci-fi ambience meets video nasty.

Heavy as an anvil with madly repetitive bass and sounds like a tolling bell scattered around fast, incessant beats.

After Mothwasp’s visual performance, the Wilde stage turns into an Algorave, brought to you by Supersonic and Vivid Projects curator Antonio Roberts. If you haven’t heard of or been to an algorave, be sure to check it out; an algorave is a party where electronic music and visuals are generated live from algorithms. The word was coined around 2012, initially as a joke, but has since taken hold with Algoraves taking place in over 40 cities around the world.

Supersonic’s Algorave features artists Heavy Lifting and Blood Sport, presenting a collision and mutation of their current work in a textural and improvisatory reinterpretation of the ‘B2B’ DJ set.

Heavy Lifting is Lucy writing confused live code in TidalCycles and FoxDot – divinely inspired by toads & pickled eggs she bends time signatures to create not-quite-techno rhythms. Also a member of algorave band TYPE and co-founder of the creative collective SONA.

Blood Sport are an aggro-beat trio based in Sheffield; consisting of Alex Keegan (guitar & octatrack), Sam Parkin (drums) and Nick Potter (baritone & vocals). Creating a fractured dancefloor, Blood Sport’s work mixes pre-recorded and live performance using live-coding program Tidal Cycles. 

Heavy Lifting will live-code textures and rhythms using the sample-pack (to be publicly released this year), and Blood Sport will respond with music. This set was originally born out of a request from Blood Sport for Heavy Lifting to create a remix of one of their tracks, using a micro-sample pack Blood Sport had created for live-coding program TidalCycles; and after an outing at the Algomech Festival closing party, both acts have begun to work together on regular live and DJ driven performances.

Miri Kat continues the algorave: an AV Noise Artist working with Max/MSP, processing & found sound. Focuses on the creation of unique sounds and immersive multimedia, equipped with a loved of hacking, cats and mocha.

Closing the Algorave is BITLIP; a veteran livecoder and part-time Algoraver who makes downtempo techno collages out of strange samples, analogue-sounding synths, and broken breakbeats straight out of the late 90s.

Supersonic’s Algorave is hosted by Vivid Projects, a collaborative space supporting media arts practice. Based in Birmingham, they encourage innovation, risk and experimentation in artistic practice and work with artists and producers across disciplines.

Algorave is curated by hellocatfood – the alias of Antonio Roberts, a New Media artist and Curator based in Birmingham at Vivid. His artwork uses glitch art, hacking and technology-driven processes to explore issues surrounding copyright, remixing and free culture. For his live visuals he (mis)uses a range of programming languages to create glitched, broken visuals. He has provided visuals for the likes of MTV, Com Truise, Elmo Sexwhistle, Steve Davis, Henry Homesweet and My Panda Shall Fly.

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A post shared by Antonio Roberts (@hellocatfood) on May 15, 2017 at 6:53am PDT

If Friday night sounds like just your kind of thing, on Saturday from 12:00-17:00 Vivid Projects brings you Creative Coding for Live Visual Workshops.

BAFTA-winning digital artist Dan Hett brings his computational creativity crash-course to Supersonic! Aimed at complete beginners, this course will take attendees on a colourful and interactive hands-on journey into making noise and colour with a computer. The course will firstly look at livecoding visuals and noise in the browser using the amazing LiveCodeLab, and then heads into creating unpredictable and colourful drawing tools using Processing. No previous coding experience is necessary, but you will need to bring a sparkling can-do attitude and a willingness to experiment.

You will need:

– A laptop that can connect to the internet (Windows, OSX and Linux are all fine)

– Google Chrome https://www.google.com/chrome/

– Processing, which can be downloaded for Windows, OSX and Linux https://processing.org/

Tickets £5 for Supersonic Tickets holders / £10 for general public

Supersonic Marketplace

Open Friday 21:30 – 00:00; Saturday 16:00 – 22:00; Sunday 15:00 – 21:00.

By The Crossing Stage, South & City College Birmingham

You will no doubt already be stunned by our marvellous lineup of music, art and film – but no Supersonic would be complete without its vibrant Market Place, complete with talks, high-energy DJ sets and extracurricular activities.

The Market Place is a space for independent distributors, record labels and pedlars of curiosities to sell their wares, network and for you to meet face to face. It’s also where the bands sell their merchandise. The area is equipped with a tearoom serving a selection of epicurean delights, including cakes (of course!), tea and coffee and a bottle bar for those who prefer a tasty ale with their lemon drizzle cake.

So here’s the lowdown on all the sellers joining us at Supersonic, plus a taste of the wondrous activities you’ll encounter in the Market Place over the course of the weekend.

Bunny Bissoux 

Bunny Bissoux is an artist, illustrator and hardcore fanatic, raised in Birmingham and now based in Tokyo, Japan. Her work is heavily inspired by popular culture, with recurring themes including music, teen angst, pro-wrestling, animals and idols. Previously collaborating with Capsule on exhibitions, t-shirt designs and the infamous trading cards at Supersonics gone by, Bunny returns to selling prints, zines, badges and stickers in addition to vintage trading cards, cult memorabilia and treasures from Japan.

Workshop – Sat 5-7pm, Sun 4-6pm

Bunny will also be running drop-in workshops [info here] over the course of the Festival weekend to make your own uchiwa – paper fans commonly made by concertgoers in Japan, emblazoned with band names, pictures, slogans and words of admiration, to send a message to their idols or as a memento of a live experience – show your support for the festival acts, proclaim your adoration for your all-time favourite band or create a Supersonic souvenir to treasure forever!

All materials provided, but feel free to bring an image of your favourite band or musician.

Box Records

Founded by Pigs x7’s Matt Baty in 2009 and home to fuzzed-out and furious British bands including Terminal Cheesecake and Casual Nun, Box Records is a DIY record label & distro specialising in only the wildest and finest strains of UK underground psych, noise, punk, kraut, prog, folk and rock. Expect vinyl, cassette, prints, t shirts and more!

Shelanu: Women’s Craft Collective

Shelanu is a developing social enterprise of migrant and refugee women producing high quality craft objects in collaboration with Craftspace and inspired by their new home, the city of Birmingham. They will be selling their Birmingham souvenir and Migrating Birds ranges.

Defunkt Dialekt / Irrational Media

The Irrational Media Society is a Birmingham-based record label creating vinyl for a worldwide selection of artists, with only one item on its agenda: ‘do what you love and do it well.’

Edgeworld Records

A Supersonic regular since 2011. No longer a shop but still active with pop-up stalls specialising in all things Alternative, Outsiders, Emergent…VINYL!

Farmer Glitch

A member of electronic mavericks Hacker Farm & pHarmerz, Stephen Ives (a.k.a. Farmer Glitch) customises discarded found objects into sonic devices – transforming rusted buckets and old cameras into potent noise-machines. In addition the Farmer himself specialises in his own line of compact and affordable noise-making kits, to suit a range of devious tastes.

Farmer Glitch Workshop – Sat, 3-5pm [info here]

eastvilleproject.org.uk

Lancashire & Somerset

A humble record label, currently living in the hills of Shropshire. Lancashire and Somerset attempt to help and support a growing family of bands with a like-minded ethos. Privileged to put out very special releases on mainly the superior format of vinyl. Artists include Enablers, Kogumaza, Nathan Bell, Daniel Bachman, Mugstar and Nick Jonah Davis.

Melophobe Records

Buyers and sellers of good quality vinyl records specialising in indie, post-punk, noise rock, metal and free jazz.

Wow And Flutter

Wow And Flutter is a record and comic shop in Hastings, East Sussex, specialising in cult artists and unusual releases. It opened in December 2014 in the heart of Hastings’ America Ground, a vibrant area close to the pier and home to many artists and designers. 

The Marketplace Stage will also play host to pounding DJ sets from Fat Out, Golden Cabinet, Dorcha and the place where you may also catch…

Black Metal Life Drawing with Russell MacEwan (Black Sun)

Sat, 6.40-8.40pm

Join Russell MacEwan (Black Sun Drum Korps) in exploring the brutal and beautiful art of black metal, in a two-hour introduction to life drawing, presented in the context of heavy metal and black metal art, music and history. Ritualistic in form, carbon in soul, unleash your creative potential and inner darkness in two hours of demonically fun life drawing. No previous experience required. Participants may bring their own sketchbooks if they wish, and all other materials are generously provided by Cass Art Birmingham.

Magreb Sharit Dance Party

Sat, 9 – 10.30pm
You are invited to come and spend some time with Willie Stewart and Natalia Beylis of Woven Skull and their collection of cassette tapes they have gathered up on their travels through Morocco. It’s a chance to listen, dance and celebrate the many styles of music found in North Africa and it’s place in tape culture. You can pick up a fanzine giving a brief history of the music found in Morocco as well as a mixtape or two with a selection of songs  from the Chaabi, folklore, Berber, Gnaoua and Sufi traditions.

Supernormal Presents: Sabbath-Aoke

Sat, 10.50pm-12.20am
Come all ye Children of the Grave, accept the challenge to embrace your inner Wizard, and sing your heart and lungs out to your fave Sabs anthem. Supernormal – the annual Oxfordshire festival enclave where the most otherworldly wonders of the underground converge – has been reaping minds and destroying larynxes with a regular karaoke session each year honouring the likes of Prince, Kate Bush and The Fall alike, and it seems only fitting that they should bring the Sabbathian version of this spectacle to Birmingham, the Home Of Metal and motherlode of all things Iommi-Butler-Osbourne-Ward. Moreover, we’ve enlisted the help of an unholy incarnation of both Ozzy and Sharon O. to host the ceremony. Satan’s coming round the bend, indeed.

Sunken Hum Tapes

Sun, 4.10-5.10pm

Using a four track, two tape decks and cassettes from her collection, Natalia Beylis layers seemingly incongruous recordings atop of each other to spawn strange juxtapositions and garbled parallels. Inside her stockpile of tapes are recordings she made on family vacations, a cassette of a roadside preacher she picked up in a truck stop in Nevada, rantings of blissed-out self-improvement gurus, weird noises from the natural and unnatural world and more.

So there we have it.

Come take a saunter around the Market Place at Supersonic 2017.

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JUNE HAS ARRIVED! SUPERSONIC BEGINS IN A MERE TWO WEEKS! And guess what? We have EVEN MORE delectable offerings heading your way. Check out our film screenings…

TONY CONRAD: COMPLETELY IN THE PRESENT

Sunday 12:00 I Vivid Projects 16 Minerva Works 158 Fazeley Street Birmingham B5 5RS I
free to Supersonic ticket holders I £5 to non ticket holders

Tony Conrad: Completely in the Present is a non-fiction film examining the pioneering life and works of artist, musician, and educator, Tony Conrad.

Conrad was one the great American artists of our time, we were honoured to have him perform as part of our 10^th anniversary edition of Supersonic.

Since the early 1960s, Conrad’s films and compositions have been the stuff of legend for artists and musicians everywhere. His vast, inter-disciplinary repertoire has single-handedly created and influenced major film and compositional movements. He performed in and recorded the soundtrack to Jack Smith’s legendary Flaming Creatures; he turned the paradigms of cinema upside down with The Flicker, a film composed of only black and white frames; his development and practice of Just Intonation and Minimalism through his work with Stockhausen and La Monte Young still has the music establishment scratching their heads; his pivotal role in the formation of The Velvet Underground has directly or indirectly influenced everyone who has picked up a guitar since; as an early adopter of activist public access television he democratised the emerging medium of portable video.

THE COLOSSUS OF DESTINY: A MELVINS TALE – FILM

Sunday 14:30 I Vivid Projects 16 Minerva Works 158 Fazeley Street Birmingham B5 5RS I
free to Supersonic ticket holders I £5 to non ticket holders
+ In conversation with Director Bob Hannam

“I always thought it was strange that people didn’t know more about The Melvins and I felt their story needed to be told. The band members had told me that a few people had talked the talk but had never followed up on their threats to make a film about them, so a little over two years ago things really fell into place and now the end product is finished for all to see, ” explained Director and Co-Producer Bob Hannam, who worked in tandem with co-producer Ryan Sutherby to bring the film to fruition. “It has been a long labor of love for the both of us and we are excited for people to see the film and understand the workings of a truly great band.”

“The Colossus of Destiny: A Melvins Tale” follows the band’s history, with rare behind-the-scenes footage from their early days in Washington to their multiple modern incarnations with an eye on the enduring influence they’ve had throughout their 30-year plus history. The documentary features interviews with Mike Patton, Chris Cornell, Jello Biafra, Gene Simmons, Krist Novoselic, Mark Arm, J. Mascis, Josh Homme, David Yow and many more.

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harvesting stones from the moonseer on Vimeo.

THE SEER ~ HARVESTING STONES  (SPECIAL PERFORMANCE)

THE WILDE BUILDING

Giants raised me,

Years before Man,

Before ash drifted

and dust clogged their veins.

The Seer is a multimedia performance devised and directed by artist and filmmaker Conny Prantera, exploring the mythical figure of Cassandra and her modern reincarnation as visionary, healer and political dissident. Bringing together a select group of international women artists and musicians, including Agathe Max, Eliza Bennett, Lani Rocillo, Rebecca Horrox, Tom Fug and Burl. The piece presents multiple video projections, costumes, spoken word and live performance, mixing movement, music and poetry through the diverse cast of players and the participating audience. 

Want to participate? Here’s how…

Choir of the Seer

a voice workshop with Rebecca Horrox

A unique opportunity not only for singers and musicians, but for anyone who takes delight in the freedom to experiment with the voice: any ability welcome.

The choir consists of a 1.30hr workshop on Saturday 17th at 2pm leading to a live performance with The Seer, which takes place later that evening in the form of a masked choir.

The dynamic relationship between voice and body will be explored through a short devised composition for many voices. Beginning with mind and body exercises, participants will locate the voice in different parts of the body creating a sense of feeling, for breath, space and listening. The remaining time will be spent singing the composition for the concert.

Simple to follow with gestural direction and improvised sections, participants will get to use their voice in an inventive and sometimes extreme way focusing upon dynamics, texture, rhythm, and harmony, the voice telling a story of its own amidst the performance of The Seer.

To register your interest, please email [email protected]

www.theseer.co.uk

This commission has been supported by Supersonic Festival, the British Council and Arts Council England. (logos Britich Council/ACE)

With our Volunteer application deadline tomorrow [info here] we spoke to a couple of past Supersonic Volunteers to find out what they had to say about their festival experience…

GUSHI SOHAL

What compelled you to Volunteer with us in the first place?

I was interested in working with Supersonic because I like a lot of bands Capsule host. & Supersonic is a fun atmosphere.

Tell us about your Supersonic Volunteer experience:

My experience of Supersonic has always been enjoyable & fuelled by samosas.  I’ve met a lot of like minded people, get to see friends I don’t usually see on a regular basis & watch so many bands.

How have you used this experience outside the Festival?

Whilst working at the festival  I was able to network, so I have been able to use this experience to further my professional career.

Who are you excited about at Supersonic 2017?

The Space Lady! Dorcha, Xylorious White… Too many to chose from!

KRISTIAN CLARK

What compelled you to Volunteer with us in the first place?

I had visited the festival on two occasions and just loved the experience, the vibe was really friendly and the people were all great, as soon as i noticed the call for volunteers i knew i wanted to be a part of it.

Tell us about your Supersonic Volunteer experience:

My first year volunteering i felt nervous at first but once i met Sean and the rest of the Capsule team I was instantly put at ease. The team are so friendly and they care about everyone having a great weekend, wether you are a punter or a volunteer, they really looked after us all. It was also great that I got to meet a lot of the artists who performed at the festival, there was a real community spirit to it all, where the artist were genuinely grateful to us for giving our time to help run the festival. 

How have you used this experience outside the Festival?

I have gone on to work at other festivals/events around the UK since my first time volunteering at Supersonic. Including Tusk Festival in my home town and some dates on tour with Test Dept.

Who are you excited about at Supersonic 2017?

There’s so much to look forward to as ever…

Richard Dawson playing with a full band! (don’t miss it!)

Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs (also essential, don’t forget the buckfast)

Princess Nokia (super excited to see Princess Nokia, dat girl is a tomboy!)

Ex-Easter Island Head Large Ensemble (beautiful)

Casual Nun (just got into these, love em, can’t wait to see them live)

Grey Hairs (just class, big fan of this lot)

Laura Cannell (excited to see Laura Cannell again!)

ZONAL!? (Kevin Martin & Justin Broadrick collaborating again! should be Mega)

Supersonic always get it right,  I love that every time I visit I don’t know half of the line-up, but always go home with a new favourite band or 6! 

WANT TO VOLUNTEER AT SUPERSONIC 2017?

YOU HAVE UNTIL TOMORROW TO APPLY!

“A howl-inducing music making machine” Ruth Barnes 6 Music

LONE Taxidermist is the chaotic project of cosmic Cumbrian synth artist Natalie Sharp, also an award winning experienced makeup artist and skin decorator based in London. Her work has been published and exhibited internationally for the likes of the British Library, Philharmonie de paris, The Huffington Post, New York Times, The Guardian, BBC, Channel 4 to name but a few. With clients such as Vogue, Google and Sony and longstanding close collaboration with Gazelle Twin.

Natalie’s work is always surreal and her training in fashion and music has led her to work with a roster of artists from the ground upwards. She has been described as “An iconic misfit of the first order’” by Phyllis Cohen and continues to collaborate with esteemed photographers like Perou receiving her initial training by Rankin.

Natalie’s work has achieved Viral success as her self painted images of album artwork for International Record Store Day, putting her on the global map and opening up the art of face painting to an international audience.

Lone Taxidermist plays with the gothic and enchanting to create a disturbed beauty that exists in the darkest spaces of our minds, with saws, organs, bells, broken strings, old blues howling and an exquisite voice that could raise the dead.

On her new project Trifle she’s joined by Philip Winter (Wrangler/ Tunng) and Will Kwerk for a journey into the murky, intertwined depths of sexual food fetishes, Amsr and foley artistry. The live show features music from the group’s forthcoming debut album of the same name, and explores the shadowy worlds of sploshing, cake sitting and crush fetish. It features a visual backdrop from a series of YouTube cake fetishists, and AV artist Ross Blake’s specially commissioned projections.

We were lucky enough to get right up inside LONE Taxidermist’s Trifle at Fat Out Fest 2017 – a stupefying live experience – which we can’t wait to bring to you at Supersonic.

Also not to be missed is LONE Taxidermist and Jenny Hval’s first full stage direction with makeup, costume and blood paint for Hvals Superspecial Supersonic performance.

GET YOUR TICKETS NOW!

http://www.nataliesharp.co.uk/

https://www.facebook.com/lonetaxidermist/

https://www.instagram.com/lonetaxidermist/

Trifle Trailer from Ross Blake on Vimeo.

Supersonic Festival – June 16-18^th 2017

The Market Place has been a vibrant part of Supersonic Festival for many years now. It’s a space for independent distributors, record labels, poster artists and peddlers of curiosities to sell their wares, network and for you to meet each other face to face.  The Market Place is also where the bands sell their merch. This year, the Market Place will be situated in the light, glass-walled canteen of our Digbeth hub venue, equipped with a tea room serving a selection of epicurean delights.

This year at Supersonic, we’ve got a few spaces still available in our Festival Marketplace.

The deal? For £200, you get 2 weekend tickets to the festival and a stall to sell your goods, network and meet audiences face to face alongside likeminded folks.

Deadline for booking 18^th May

For enquiries contact: george{at]capsule.org.uk

“Akin to blending the sonic freak outs of legendary krautrock pioneers Ash Ra Tempel with 90’s Japanese noise mongers Up-Tight or Ohkami No Jikan, London’s Casual Nun deliver some downright heavy psych – a blown out slab of distorted, hypnotic guitar buzz, heady, effect-laden vocals, and plodding drums, everything bleary eyed, garage-y, intense and drugged out! Anyone who has been diggin’ the aforementioned greats, GNOD, The Heads or Loop will definitely fall in love with Casual Nun – at least, we did immediately upon hearing Super Fancy Skeleton, Casual Nun’s debut release.” – Roadburn

Psychometrics are used to gauge and influence in a world where information digestion has moved increasingly towards social messaging. The ability of organisations and entities to use psychometric data to build a psychological profile of a person is an alarming manipulation of our personalities, aptitudes and desires.

 With that in mind, ‘Psychometric Testing By…’ sees Casual Nun embracing a more improvisational approach, with the entirety of the recording created in Wayne Adams’(Shitwife/Death Pedals)  Bear Bites Horse studio during the same session that produced their first LP ‘Super Fancy Skeleton’ .

Casual Nun’s ‘Psychometric Testing By…’ limited edition 12’’ vinyl by Box Records AVAILABLE HERE

” All tumultuous sounds hurtling through a cavernous echo chamber, the band dissect what it means to be psychedelic and discover a new-found jamming ethic, if you thought their debut was good, you haven’t heard anything yet… Coming so soon of the back of their excellent debut, this is an extraordinarily confident piece of music which takes their sound into ever different avenues… This is the true sound of the UK underground.” – Echoes & Dust

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HARESS consists of the core guitar duo of David Hand and Elizabeth Still, based in Bishops Castle in the Shropshire Hills where they also organise the amazing Sin-eater Festival and run the DIY record label Lancashire & Somerset. David is also our incredible visual artist and graphic designer for Supersonic – making us look Superfly.

Hand and Still intertwine dark and repetitive guitar figures in order to create a hypnotic, mantra-like state. Their intuitive playing works on a kind of telepathy until it’s impossible for the onlooker to work out which player is responsible for which sound and they must choose to absorb it as a whole. The resulting music is reminiscent of Ry Cooder’s “Paris, Texas” soundtrack, latter-day Earth, Papa M or even the repetition of Sahara blues but filtered through a warm, rural sensibility.

Haress are frequently joined by collaborators and recent live performances have expanded the 2 piece to also include Pete Simonelli (Enablers) on vocals and Chris Summerlin (Kogumaza) on guitar. A recording made with Nathan Bell (Lungfish, Human Bell) is also in the release pipeline. 

Be sure to catch this beguiling duo at Supersonic 2017!

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Ask many self-styled music aficionados, and they’ll tell you that rock in the early to mid ‘70s descended into a mire of boundless self-indulgence and instrumental virtuosity, in which the a whole generation of progressively-minded musicians and listeners effectively lost the map in a feverish pursuit of excellence and one-upmanship that ended in tortuous track-times, daunting concept sagas and boundless pomposity. This phenomenon has now become the stuff of cultural cliche -after all, how many more music documentaries do we all have to watch in which footage from Emerson, Lake & Palmer’s heyday is interrupted by the Sex Pistols?

Not so in Sweden. For there, music in the countercultural heyday of psychedelia and progressive rock was an explicitly political pursuit, and central to this was the idea that absolutely anyone could make music, no matter how either expansive or limited their technical ability – indeed the egalitarian spirit that many thought revolutionary to punks in the UK was nothing new for the heads to be found enjoying the cult Swedish psychedelia of bands like Träd, Gräs och Stenar, Älgarnas Trädgård or Baby Grandmothers, borne of a free-flowing aesthetic and utilitarian mindset where inspiration was key. 

It’s exactly this lineage forty plus years later where one can find Flowers Must Die, the six-piece Swedish outfit. They pursue an improvisation-based approach removed from the codified realm of contemporary psych, and exploring uncanny and unhinged territory fuelled by diverse record collections yet unique to their own collective headspace. 

Formed while at art school – initially in an attempt to put together a Sir Lord Baltimore style hard rock band – the band quickly took on a life of its own, with Jonas’ passion for soul, disco and jazz interspersing with Rickard’s background in the local noise scene amidst a plethora of other disparate ingredients. Rickard’s brother Martin, guitarist Sven Walan and drummer Lars Hoffsten (a successful artist from the family of well-known Swedish jazz and blues musicians) soon joined the fray, before vocalist and violinist Lisa Ekelund completed the circle, spurring the band on to new levels of psychic abandon.

True to a record encompassing a countercultural rawness and experimental ethos that spans five decades, The members of Flowers Must Die’s ages range from 28 to 63, and the sound of ‘Kompost’, in all its wayward, wild glory, follows suit. The band may have taken their name originally from an Ash Ra Tempel song, whilst the strains of Amon Duul II and the repetition of Can lurk within these overgrown sonic pathways. Yet ‘Kompost’ shows them honing their improvisatory excursions into coherent songcraft amidst spectral techno and cosmic disco shapes, as the angular post-punk pop of The Sugarcubes sits alongside the narcotic clangour of prime Royal Trux, and one-take spontaneity locks horns with nocturnal revelation. It’s a potent assault that’s already seen them make converts aplenty at festivals like Liverpool International Festival Of Psychedelia, Copenhagen Psych Fest and Supernormal. 

Here the outward-looking spirit of 1971 and the anything-goes mentality of the Scandinavian freaks of yore is transposed elegantly to a modern era in need of new horizons, and in a manner refreshingly and paradoxically bereft of retro chic. What’s more, who’s to say what dimensions this alchemical force have yet to explore?

Flowers Must Die live up to their reputation with this fine first full-length offering for Record Recordings. A crucial component in Rocket’s already landmark year of releases.

CLICK HERE TO READ A REVIEW OF NEW ALBUM KOMPOST

https://flowersmustdie.bandcamp.com/

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So we’ve just abut recovered from Easter weekend in Manchester at Fat Out Fest. Strictly no eggs. But there was some Trifle involved…here’s our roundup!

Arriving just in time for a magnificently brutal industrial hammering with a political edge from Test Dept. in Fat Out’s Burrow, we soon acquired the free ear plugs being handed out at the bar – preservation is key when tunnelling through a weekend of noise rock. On the Caustic Coastal stage Giant Swan delivered a feral cross-breed of hypnotic bass, hefty percussion and disorientating noise. Another blinder of a set came from Housewives with their abrasive guitars, droning bass lines and propulsive, relentless drums.

But our highlight has to be the mosh inducing Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs who hit hard with a feverish and transgressive blast of psych-drone dementia. After a heavy rattle from these fellas we were thrown back to The Burrow to be finished off by The Bug vs Dylan Carlson of Earth with some earth shuddering pulsating soundscapes & chiming melodies, glowing in currents of heavy bass darkness. The Bug plays this years Supersonic with Justin Broadrick of Godflesh as Zonal and that litter of Pigs will be unleashed our audience too – we can’t wait!

On to Saturday and after a hearty breakfast to get us back in the game we fancied a bit of pud…and what better pud than Trifle? Lone Taxidermist gave a multi-faceted, multi-layered performance with a glutinous exploration into the dark online culture of Sploshing, crush fettish and cake sitting. We loved getting right up inside a Trifle and perhaps our Supersonic audience will too in June?

Bodies on Everest blasted us next in The Burrow with their triple stacked Doom/Dungeonwave/Ghost Pop to then be consoled and relieved by the bare, sparse songwriting of Irma Vep and his dreamy downbeat dulcet tones. Next up we got half and half of sets from Data Quack (featuring Charles Hayward and saxophonist of Housewives) strumming up an array of abstract textures, car chase sequences and violent grooves and Yossarians telling us stories and prophecies laden with a malicious red midst paired with driving-punk guitar lines. Thrown in the middle of all this was an improv between avant-garde scene saxophonist Colin Webster & Andrew Cheetham chiming in on drums with astonishing flare in the Islington Mill B&B.

As we drifted into the night, in spite of technical difficulties, Moor Mother delivered a terrifyingly dark set of both cathartic angry punk and expansive electronic improvisation. Other immensely heavy sets from Sly & The Dead Neanderthals ft. Colin Webster and Author & Punisher finished off the Saturday in true gargantuan style. A late night set from Blood Sport thrown in gave our jittery pegs some synth laden rough-house-techno polyrhythms to jive to.

And then we (just about) made it to Sunday ready for our Supersonic showcase on The Bernard Stage. Opening proceedings was Birmingham band Dorcha who delivered a beguiling set of synths, strings and heavy beats, moving through thundering chaos to sudden moments of fragile reverie. A set not to be missed at Supersonic this June. Then the wondrous soundscapes of violinist Agathe Max massaged our Sunday ear drums not a moment too soon…right before they were blasted once again by the bleak mantras and doomy negative punk of Rainbow Grave.

Playing together since the 80s and eating a pizza on stage, Trans Am brought their futuristic speed metal and robo-balladry to our heavy limbs and pepped us up once more for the home stretch. Next we were embraced by The Seer – a new collaborative commission curated by Conny Prantera, melding movement, spoken word, electronic soundscapes, alluring visuals and the stark string skills of Agathe Max into an all encompassing experience. Another performance for our Supersonic audience to enjoy this June.

Finishing off the Sunday was the joyous bombast of Islam Chipsy with two live drummers freewheeling the standard oriental scale system into otherworldly shapes, much like the ones we were throwing on the floor. Lots of loud. Lots of love. Other Sunday treats in-between the Supersonic stage came from a street style performance in the Shit Shop by Gambian Kora player Jali Nyonkoling Kuyateh & Drummer from the World percussion collective in collaboration with Charles Hayward. And a band you absolutely have to see this year if you get the chance – Part Chimp – a flood of noise, warmth and distortion.

So, that is that. We certainly managed to Fat Out Til We Passed Out this Easter weekend. The Islington Mill is the place to be. Fat Out is a wonderful thing and thank you to our hosts Emma, Verity and Sophie for taking such good care of us. Til’ next year!

And don’t forgot you can catch: Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs / Zonal / Lone Taxidermist / Dorcha / The Seer – This June at Supersonic!

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STEP AWAY FROM THE EGGS!!!

There’s an alternative way to Fat Out Till You Pass Out this easter weekend…

Fat Out Till You Pass Out is an independent promotion based in Salford NW England. Founded in 2007 by Emma Thompson and Verity Gardner, Fat Out has grown from humble DIY punk roots into a force to be reckoned with in the Salford/Manchester independent music scene.

“It’s more important than ever to create space and support for the independent scene.” – Emma Thompson, FOF Founder/Director

And FOTYPO take their DIY experimentalist attitude down to Islington Mill, Manchester this weekend, assembling their third version of Fat Out Fest with the help of some choice curators

The international line-up works through a three-day course featuring heavy psychedelic riffs from Blown Out, The Bug vs Dylan Carson of Earth, JIBÓIA, avant garde synths from Group A, or if preferable, lounge metal from Lake of Snakes.

This year sees Supersonic host its own stage on Sunday 16th April including performances from Trans Am, The Seer, Agathe Max, Rainbow Grave, Dorcha and Islam Chipsy & EEK.

With other stages curated by The Quietus, The Wire and a collaboration with Le Guess Who plus workshops, delicious food, market place, record stalls and all the glitter one could ever desire, this is set to be a weekend not to be missed.

TOP TIP: Don’t miss the new show ‘Trifle’ from Lone Taxidermist on The Quietus stage.

So c’mon, sod Cadburys, sod Galaxy, and definitely FUCK NESTLÉ and get out there and support your independent, underground music scene! FAT OUT TILL YOU PASS OUT!

GET YOUR TICKETS HERE!

Take a look at FOF 2014 here:

***WE STILL NEED A HANDFUL OF VOLUNTEERS TO COVER A FEW MORE SHIFTS ACROSS THE FESTIVAL WEEKEND***

APPLY NOW!!!

Capsule’s internationally renowned festival runs 16^th-18th June 2017 and there are plenty of opportunities to get involved as a volunteer.

Supersonic has secured its experimental reputation with over 14 years of consistently innovative and explosive concoctions of visual installations, films, exhibitions and music. Guaranteed to open your eyes and ears to music and art outside the predictable genre labels and familiar performance spaces.

You will be part of an ever growing, friendly community of music and art lovers helping to maintain the values of bringing the extraordinary to curious audiences in an all inclusive way. This is will be an invaluable experience into how a festival runs but not only that, you’ll be contributing to something truly Superspecial whilst making friends along the way!

We need a dedicated team of volunteers to help deliver Supersonic over the festival weekend (16^th -18^th June ) and also in the run up to the festival (early June onwards).

• We would like every volunteer to commit to 15 hours over the weekend
• Volunteers must be over 18 years old

This year we are on the lookout for people for the following roles:

Artist Liason/Box Office

Hospitality/Site Set up

Merch/Promotion

If you are interested in being involved – please fill out the application form [here]

***NEW APPLICATION DEADLINE: JUNE 5th***

Presented in collaboration with Supersonic Festival, this musical showcase by Nawa Recordings features some of the Arab world’s most creative, independent and forward thinking artists. Founded by multi-instrumentalist musician and composer Khyam Allami in 2011, Nawa is an independent label focused on releasing new music from the Arab world.

Having released critically acclaimed albums by Maurice Louca, Alif, The Dwarfs of East Agouza and Allami’s soundtrack to Tunisian director Leyla Bouzid’s award winning debut feature film As I Open My Eyes, the label brings its newest artists to the UK for the first time in a genre-defying and eclectic quadruple-bill.

Khyam shall curate a striking array of Nawa artists during the Sunday afternoon of the 2017 edition of Supersonic Festival, in celebration of the festival’s longstanding relationship with the musician and label owner. All of the handpicked artists hone in on their own musical influences–spanning rock, psychedelia, gritty percussion, avant-garde, jazz, electronica – all are united by their exploration of genre-defying, improvisation-based craftwork that hail from the Arab world.

LISTEN TO A SPECIAL NAWA RECORDINGS PLAYLIST INCLUDING ARTISTS FEATURING AT THE SUPERSONIC FESTIVAL SHOWCASE

Kamilya Jubran Wasl Trio

A contemporary trio led by renowned Palestinian vocalist and Oud player Kamilya Jubran with Werner Hassler (Trumpet, Electronics) and Sarah Murcia (Double Bass, Roland SH-101).

Kamilya Jubran, raised in Palestine, was introduced and initiated to classical arabic music by her music loving parents. From her early university explorations in the group Sabreen, Jubran has been raising awareness to the importance of music and music education in Palestine and spent a very rich and intensive 2 decades of constant work with the group which urged her to deepen her music research and consequently to shape and reshape her musical identity. Continuing on with various other collaborative projects in Europe she arrives here with two companions: Werner Hasler and Sarah Murcia – avid contributors to her work thus far – now forming the Wasl trio.

Werner ran his own band, Manufactur, from 1998 to 2008. His aim at this time was to find ways of using electronic music as a medium for interaction between musicians. Since 2002 he has been working intensively with the Palestinian singer and oud player Kamilya Jubran. First of all contributing to her project Mahattaat, then working in partnership combining Kamilya’s voice and oud with his electronica and trumpet.

For the last ten years Sarah Murcia has played with the Magic Malik Orchestra, and Las Ondas Marteles (Nicolas et Seb Martel). At the moment she is a member of the groups Beau Catcher, Sylvain Cathala trio and Pearls of Swines. As an arranger, she is involved in various projects, particularly Paul Ouazon’s music programs for television and the research atelier of Arte France.

Two or The Dragon

Two Or The Dragon was created by Beirut based musicians Abed Kobeissy (Buzuq/Effects) and Ali Hout (Percussion/Effects) as an expression of their common interest in urban sounds and Arabic music. This project tackles Arabic music’s capacity to express urban soundscapes, and its predisposition to express violence, as a local aesthetic in the region. This interest was sparked when Kobeissy and Hout began to compose music as a duo for contemporary dance and theater performances, as well as several film productions.

 Nadah El Shazly

Egyptian vocalist and composer combining abstract quirky electronics and sultry Arabic vocals. Nadah El Shazly is an Egyptian singer and composer living and working in Cairo. She is currently preparing for the release of her debut album, continuing along her constantly evolving live set, which she has been performing solo on keys, electronics and vocals. Most recently, Nadah became resident composer at Stockholm’s Elektronmusikstudion (EMS) and co-founded the Shorba duo with Egyptian artist Mohamed Shafiq, produced a track for the collective Nassibian Orchestra and composed for film and visual art.

Khyam Allami

Iraqi-British multi-instrumentalist and schizophrenic musician/composer presents his latest series of improvisations on processed Oud, electronics and percussion. Virtuoso Oud player, serial collaborator, musical explorer: Khyam is a musician and composer with a formidable – and continually growing – international reputation. Despite only taking up the oud – his principal instrument – in his twenties, Allami rapidly became a performer of international renown. His remarkably assured 2011 debut solo album Resonance/Dissonance was widely critically praised; he has performed at WOMAD, the BBC Proms and London 2012 Festival, the cultural festival that accompanied the Olympics; and he was the first artist to be awarded a BBC Radio 3 World Routes scholarship in 2010. An “exceptionally refined and graceful performer” whose “compositions are utterly bewitching”.

We can’t wait to be mesmerised by this Supersonic Sunday Showcase from the Arab world.

NOT TO BE MISSED!

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And catch the Showcase across other UK dates:

15th June, Attenborough Centre, Brighton [tickets]

18th June, Supersonic Festival, Birmingham [tickets]

19th June, Cafe Oto, London [tickets]

…Supersonic Festival Soundcloud Mix No.2 now available for your listening pleasure.

Featuring:

Richard Dawson/Jessica Moss/Laura Cannell/Arbouretum/Big Joanie/Tomaga/Kuro/Casual Nun/Charles Hayward/Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs

So go! Open up those ear holes!

AND IF YOU HAVEN’T GOT YOUR TICKETS YET WHAT YOU PLAYING AT?!

We are delighted to welcome back to Supersonic, Richard Dawson. The skewed troubadour, at once charming and abrasive. His music is a collision of opposites, his hoarsely cracking voice suddenly rising to a magical soar that’s been compared to Tim Buckley, John Martyn and Richard Youngs. His shambolically virtuosic guitar playing ranges from sublime intricacy to spidery swatches of noise-colour, swathed in amp static and veering from stumble to enveloping reverie in a way that can recall Sir Richard Bishop or Captain Beefheart. Add this to his snaring way with words and Dawson’s got you pinned.

A much-loved musical spectacle in his native Newcastle for many years now, Dawson sings and plays with a rare intensity and a very singular style.

His set at Supersonic 2017 will be a little different though – he has a new album out this year, one with a definite ‘band’ feel about it. So Richard will be playing with a band. The band includes long-time collaborators Angharad Davies and Rhodri Davies and also two members of Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs – also appearing at Supersonic!

New album Peasant, out June 2nd, is ‘a multi-panelled altarpiece depicting dark ages life in the north east’ and is now available for pre-order HERE on vinyl, cd and limited edition deluxe package.

“Peasant is a brilliant and captivating record, one that creates its own wholly imagined world with both music and words. Dawson writes melodies, just as he did before on Nothing Important, The Glass Trunk and The Magic Bridge. They aren’t melodies that he thrusts in your face, along with handfuls of sugar; they leap out of the murk of instrumentation, like some musical equivalent of watching a moor on a cloudy day, as lakes of golden sunlight appear and vanish on the hillside as the clouds open up and close over. But nor is this confrontational music, designed to ward off the unworthy. It’s music that rewards attention, to its detailing, to its textures, but it’s also beautiful and stirring and moving. It’s just, well, not pop music.”

In a recent INTERVIEW WITH THE QUIETUS Dawson describes the approach to the new album as wanting to create a ‘creaking wooden animal so you could hear all the sinews and all the stretching of the instruments.’ It is an album of intrepid exploration both sonically and historically. Dawson’s avid research into the time period laden the lyrical content with integrity whilst maintaining poetic and relevant remarks on contemporary society.

And here is our first glimpse…

Peasant takes inspiration from a painter of panoramas. “I was thinking of it like a tapestry or a painting that might go around a whole room, thinking about Pieter Breughel the Elder, particularly, who would cover the different stratas of a community from people out in the sticks who had nothing, to people more in a city or town with more possessions and more power. Rather than approach it as individual songs first, it was to see how the whole painting would fit together.”

We at Supersonic cannot wait to marvel at this vivid, enrapturing work of art Dawson and co. will paint before our very eyes this June!

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Dorcha is a 5 piece Birmingham band of synths, strings, electronics and heavy beats, led by composer – Anna Palmer. Drawing from an eclectic array of influences and musical backgrounds, Dorcha is a continuing exploration through alternative songwriting. From classical to punk, trashy pop to psychedelic math-rock with some swooping electronica thrown in between; the band career through intensely dark synth-laden gristle to moments of gentile and delicately-stringed reverie.

Since launching their first full-length album ‘Black Streams‘ in 2015, the band’s genre-defying sound has been praised by BBC 6 Music’s Stuart Maconie on his Freak Zone and they’ve shared line-ups with the likes of Deerhoof, East India Youth and Dream Wife.

Through curating their own multidisciplinary events with artistic collaborators, the band has produced an enigmatic live show accompanied by visuals which continues to excite and bewilder diverse audiences.

The band have recently released a new EP entitled ‘ism’ which adventures further into the depths of left-field electronica whilst still maintaining refined pop sensibilities. Recorded with local Digbeth based producer Luke Morrish Thomas at Flood Studios. 

Last week the band released a new interactive website, built by Phil Dawson and designed by Beth Bellis. You can explore it by clicking here!

In conjuncture with the new website release the band have launched a new collaborative experiment: ‘The Miniatures Project’. As the band explain:

“One day, Anna was wearing a different head and wrote some tiny guitar tunes that don’t really sound like any other Dorcha. We had a real laugh playing them but didn’t know where to place them, so we’ve put them in a house in our brand new website.

This is their home now. And we’re extending the family.

These tunes sparked a new idea to invite others to write for Dorcha. Different heads, same body. We’ve asked 9 other artists from varying musical backgrounds to create a set of miniatures for us to play and record in a day. Over the course of 2017 we’ll release a set of Mini’s a month – starting NOW with Anna’s Guitar miniatures. Get your chops round this!”

Welcome to the weird and ever changing landscape of Dorcha! Who knows what these local Brummies have in store for Supersonic 2017?

GET YOUR TICKETS FOR SUPERSONIC NOW!!!

Catch them at Flatpack Film Festival April 9th

Also appearing at Fat Out Fest on the Supersonic stage

www.dorcha.co.uk

www.facebook.com/dorchauk

twitter: @dorchamusic

We have a very exciting UK premiere at this year’s Supersonic Festival from Tomaga & Pierre Bastien!

The live collaboration between Pierre and Tomaga follows on from a residency they performed together in France in 2016.

Pierre Bastien is a french gentleman born 1953 who builds his own machineries, at the cross between music and visual art, that blends live trumpet sounds with screen projections of on-site, mechanical sound sculptures in a very poetic way. His work is described as “a timeless sounding orchestra, both futuristic and slightly dada, conjuring ancient traditions in its surprisingly sensuous music.”

“Who knows what sort of music he’ll be able to create as his machines continue to evolve.” – Pitchfork

TOMAGA channel various forms of multi-instrumentalism into music that moves by turns through industrial, jazz, psychedelia and minimalism, on it’s way to somewhere wholly other. Devoted to musical exploration, this London based duo obsessively deconstruct familiar tropes, looking for the tension that lies between improvisation and form.

“This is improv music that rocks, rather than swings; improv that borrows more from krautrock and psych than classical and jazz.” – The Quietus

Those of you with a keen eye will notice that Valentina, drummer/percussionist of Tomaga, is one of our cross-over artists. Not only is she part of this exciting new premiere, she will also be performing with Raime AND Kuro at this year’s festival.

Come join this artistic, collaborative community here at Supersonic and bear witness to some of the most exciting new music and art exploding out of the experimental & underground scene today.

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https://tomaga.bandcamp.com/

http://www.pierrebastien.com/

“This music has transcended genre, style and fashion, opening up hearts and minds along the way” – The Quietus

The “outsider musician” label was created with her: Susan Dietrich, better known as The Space Lady, possibly the best known synonymous and feminine to Moondog; Susan began her career in the late 70s, just when she began walking on the sidewalks of Boston dressed exuberantly, sending messages of love and pacifism, accompanied by an accordion and making versions of some contemporary pop hits or classics of that time.

10 years later she moved to one of the cradles of America’s idealistic without prejudice: San Francisco. There she purchased a Casio piano, some effects and a microphone with which she managed to raise to a new level the street musical proposal of the area, and give to her speech a unique personality.

Her legend began taking some awareness in the past decade, when in 2000 Irwin Chusid included her in the compilation “Songs In The Key Of Z” dedicated to such extravagant and unknown figures like the Space Lady.

Earning a steadily growing cult following ever since, The Space Lady could show her music to the world. Since 2013, when Night School reissued the first official album of this particular artist “The Best Of The Space Lady”, Susan has shared stages with artists such as Dean Blunt, Mika Vainio or Julianna Barwick. and playing several festivals like Flow Festival, Incubate or Le Guess Who.

“Heart-warming, eccentric, and unselfconscious that attends to the fact that you don’t need ego and fancy gear to make great pop music.” – Dazed Digital

The Space Lady released last year a split EP with Burnt Ones, the Greatest Hits LP out in Night School will now be repressed and there will be a new record out later this year.

For an insight in to Susan’s mind and her fascinating life story, this interview with The Quietus is a must read [here]

“After a circuitous route of hitchhiking, commune-living, and psychedelic experimentation, I ended up in Haight-Ashbury just as the Summer of Love burst into full bloom. Eventually I hooked up with a hippie named Joel who was dodging the draft, and we went underground together – quite literally, in fact, while living in a cave on Mt. Shasta, up near the Oregon border. It was there we saw a UFO at close range, just above the treetops… and from then on we were convinced we were being watched, if not guided and protected, by aliens.” (The Space Lady’s Greatest Hits, liner notes, 2013)

The Space Lady has most certainly landed. And now, in 2017 at the youthful age of 69 she begins another lifetime and embarks upon a new adventure with a European Tour including Supersonic Festival this June (of course).

Help her reach the furthest corners of the Universe by visiting her GoFundMe page. And watch brand new material and cyber busking videos via her Patreon page and support her voyage for as little as $1 a month!

Supersonic ground control are preparing for landing.

Make sure you don’t miss this intergalactic event! 

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“Precise and pulsing rhythmic minimalism…a three chord punk mission statement turned into a neo-classical manifesto.” – THE WIRE

Ex-Easter Island Hear are a UK based musical collective, composing and performing music for solid-body electric guitar, percussion and other instruments.

Primarily performing as a trio, the group incorporate multiple prepared electric guitars struck with percussion mallets to create works that explore group interplay, repetition and melodic invention through purposefully limited means. 

Their records Mallet Guitars One –Three, Large Electric Ensemble and Twenty-Two Strings have been released to significant critical acclaim from the likes of The Wire, Pitchfork, the Quietus and the New York Times. The group’s live performances at the likes of ATP festival, the Edinburgh Fringe and throughout the UK, Europe and Japan have been praised by The Guardian, Independent, BBC and more for their hypnotic energy, compositional flair and unique spectacle.

Large Electric Ensemble is Ex-Easter Island Head’s first piece for massed electric instruments and drums.

Following on from ‘Mallet Guitars Three’ for four guitars and three performers, Large Electric Ensemble sees the group expand to include twelve prepared electric guitars and drums to create a maximalist wash of amplified strings and droning overtones.

Commissioned by the first annual World Event Young Artist festival (WEYA) held in Nottingham 2012, the piece was developed alongside an ensemble of local musicians from a variety of musical backgrounds. Debuted at the festival and developed over further months, the piece was recorded completely live and with no overdubs across two days in March 2013.

“Skilfully balanced between methodical precision and emotional resonance, the result is a listen that is dynamic, rich and fluid despite the modesty of its parts.” – THE QUIETUS

Following on from the critically acclaimed Mallet Guitars trilogy (2010-13) and Large Electric Ensemble (2014) and honed across high profile live appearances including the Stewart Lee curated ATP, Liverpool Psych Fest and the Edinburgh Fringe, ‘Twenty-Two Strings’ is the latest album from UK-based experimental trio Ex-Easter Island Head.

Utilising horizontally-laid electric guitars and bass, the group continue to develop their own distinctive musical language, eschewing digital processing and effects for a vocabulary of mechanical preparations and extended techniques, creating a sound drawing on minimalism, gamelan and process music.

‘Salford Large Electric Ensemble’

For Supersonic 2017, EEIH convene a gathering of their Large Electric Ensemble, comprising performers drawn from all corners of the thriving Manchester and Salford underground to present an ambitiously scaled work for sixteen prepared table-top electric guitars and percussion.

Utilising a self-developed language of extended techniques and mechanical preparations the piece sees the groups’ shimmering electrified minimalism expanded to a bold new scale, encompassing members of Gnod, ILL, Action Beat, Mother and tapping into the vast resources of talent at Salford’s Islington Mill and on the Manchester-based Tombed Visions label. 

It is imperative you DO NOT MISS this spectacle at Supersonic Festival 2017.

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http://www.exeasterislandhead.com/

Kuro feature the amplified talents of French violinist Agathe Max and bassist Gareth Turner, joined by Valentina Magaletti of Tomaga (drums) and Helen Papaioannou (baritone sax) for this Superspecial Supersonic performance.

Kuro take their name from the Japanese word for ‘black’, and their debut release for Rocket Recordings marks an experimental union between two diversely storied yet inherently like-minded musicians. Agathe Max, who hails from Lyon, is a classically-trained violinist with a varied back catalogue of studio and live work – running the gamut from spectral ambience to stately soundscapes and adept at summoning dream states and drama alike.

The Bristol-based Gareth Turner, meanwhile, maintains a busy schedule performing and recording with Rocket Recordings trio Anthroprophh (alongside The Heads guitarist Paul Allen) bass/drums duo Big Naturals, and his solo double-bass project Salope, as well as working as a touring tech for Melvins on their trips to Europe.

Yet despite both of these artists’ multi-faceted artistic lives, their partnership was both a natural progression and reflective of an intuitive chemistry. The result of their initial spark is perhaps both artists’ most coherent and captivating work to date.

The result is Kuro’s eponymous first outing, an elegantly sprawling and richly textured work of tumult and transcendence recorded by Joe Garcia (live sound wizard for OM and many others) in the duo’s home city. “An amazing sound engineer” enthuses Agathe of Garcia “He’s got a very good sense of space with sound. We used different sources of mics, with a room recording that would link all the others and give a warm and open touch.” 

A unique, richly atmospheric and largely improvisatory record that stands proud and defiant of pigeonholing, Kuro is neither elegant chamber music nor intense drone-noise, neither psychedelia nor spiritual jazz, yet with elements of all of the above- dwelling perhaps atop a psychic hinterland between the shamanic vortices of Ashtray Navigations, the wild extrapolations of Sun City Girls and the melancholic richness of The Dirty Three. Yet what comes across strongest of all is the original spark of the partnership, summoning altered states, meditative vibrations and internal narratives by the power of eight strings. 

“We wanted to create a journey for the listeners, to create an inner cinema with emotional landscapes, old time cults and stories of lost sailors” reckons Agathe. Indeed, though voyage appears to be only beginning, such is its momentum that any adventurous and self-respecting psychonaut would be well advised to hitch a ride. 

“At times her work approaches the supersonic escape velocity of Tony Conrad; elsewhere, she introduces delicate repeating threads, then  slowly weaves them into a fabric of vast, billowing sound more reminiscent of Steve Reich. With an elegant command of melody and a strident use of rhythm, Max manages to create a remarkably accessible collection of tracks, one that bridges the gaps between minimalism, post-classicism, the avant garde, krautrock, and plain old-fashioned pop.” – Bookcat review.

Don’t miss this Superspecial performance from KURO at Supersonic this year!

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This year’s Supersonic sees some Superspecial performances. Two of which are Anonymous Bash and Charles Hayward Zig Zag + Swirl.

Anonymous Bash is a band born out of a recording which was conceived, recorded and produced at Islington Mill as part of the first Samarbeta music residency.

Directed and led by This Heat’s infamous drummer, Charles Hayward, this band has developed from reinventing a release produced by over 20 musicians into a workable live performance by 8.

The live line up includes; Charles Hayward (This Heat), Paddy Shine (Gnod), Sam Weaver (London Outfit Hungry Ghost), Chris Haslan (Gnod), David McLean (Tombed Visions), Jefferson Temple (Locean) and Marlene Ribeiro (Negra Branca), with special sporadic appearances from Louise Woodcock (2 Koi Karp) performing ‘Wrong Again’.

Here’s an interesting insight into the conception of Anonymous Bash:

Armed with a wealth of experience, Hayward conducts and orchestrates a whirling dervish of sound with the Anonymous Bash crew, shifting seamlessly between time signature and tempo in a devilish and electrifying fashion that consistently weaves a spellbinding effect on the audience. Saxophones wail, bass guitars throb and modular synthesizers whoosh and chirp a top a constantly shifting tapestry of breakneck rhythms and out-rock dub workouts, with each member of the group given their individual time to shine before returning to feed into a sprawling mass of sound led by a man at the height of his powers.

The band features members of Gnod. Since their inception, Gnod’s musical trajectory has been one of constant fluctuation borne out of an incessant need to discover new sonic worlds. Beginning life as a shamanic drone ensemble, at times fitting up to 15 members on stage, these early rituals informed the core ideals that have come to define the group in their years of activity; community and trance-inducing repetition.

Gnod offer a gateway to an aural black hole and along with firm guiding hand, the opportunity to dive head and body first into a powerfully new psychedelic maelstrom full of possibilities.

We can’t wait to venture through worlds of new possibilities with Anonymous Bash, led by the notorious Charles Hayward, who will also be opening another door for our Supersonic audience via another formation – Zig-Zag + Swirl.

Charles Hayward needs no introduction, his kinetic percussive talents and restless mercurial vision having blazed a trail across the British avant-garde for the last four decades, from Quiet Sun through This Heat to Camberwell Now and a plethora of solo material.

On 4th March, This Is Not This Heat performed at The Barbican. It was a night of This Heat music reimagined and sculpted by Charles Hayward, Charles Bullen, Alexis Taylor, Chris Cutler, Jenny Moore, John Edwards, Luisa Gerstein, Daniel O’Sullivan, Thurston Moore, James Sedwards, Frank Byng, Alex Ward, Laura Groves & Merlin Nova, which was met with astounding reviews. [here]

Avid collaborator, Hayward has worked with numerous artists from our Supersonic hive including this year’s Laura Cannell. This Friday sees the launch of a night of new performances called Modern Ritual at Cafe Oto, exploring ideas of ritual through music and words, evoking real and fictional landscapes. Featuring solo sets from Charles Hayward, Laura Cannell and Hoofus, a new collaboration between Laura & Charles and a new performance/talk by Jennifer Lucy Allan and a reading from Luke Turner. You can find more info. [here]

Hayward’s Zig-Zag + Swirl formation comprises a performance in which technology is used to open uncertainty in songs that surf his muse’s trademark combination of a psychedelic continuum and the startling other.

So, Supersonic audience, make sure you get to Anonymous Bash and Charles Hayward’s Zig-Zag + Swirl at this year’s festival.

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