Vagina Dentata Organ Live @ NK Gallery, Berlin. March 2012 #2

Back in the April writings on this blog I mentioned the Vagina Denata Organ performance at the NK Gallery in Berlin, I described the action and the effect. Thinking about it I reckon that the performance was "probably" one of the best live shows I have ever been to over thirty five years of going to live gigs. Certainly top ten possibly top five...and now Tochnit Aleph Records have released "Allegory Of Cosmic Violence". A 12 minute CDr featuring the whole Vagina Dentata Organ performance in beautiful crystal clear stereo. Rarely a recording captures the sound of the venue, the event, the sense of being there, but this release captures the performance beautifully. The CDr comes packaged with five photographs from the performance along with a "Hyper Cylindric Cross" drawing / action score print signed by Jordi Valls. These items are glued to the back of a frame housing a piece of bloodied mirror signed by Jordi resting on a blood red velvet background. An art object.
This was the kind of thing I was expecting as the "momentum" item that was available on the night of the performance. The TNB/VDO 12" vinyl and "art-piece"... only it wasn't ready for the evening, and only available weeks after the event. Don't get me wrong, the TNB/VDO box is a fine release and a must, but this release is special...it captures the evening superbly. "Allegory Of Cosmic Violence" is limited to 21 copies (and I know where 5 copies are) and available from Tochnit Aleph only. www.tochnit-aleph.com
I also hear that The New Blockaders are releasing the recording of their performance on the night, coupled with the performance from the "Never Say When" festival in London. Shall be interesting as Berlin was the finest I have seen and heard TNB play whereas London, May 2012 was probably (no...definitely) the worse. It will be interesting to see the packaging....

I'm now going to play some "stuff" and think about listing my "top ten" gigs...ever! Off the top of the head, Psychic TV Hacienda '84, Ultravox! Lincoln '78 & Plurals at the Wattsfest 2010 .... let me think.....

Pictures.
1: Art Object.
2: CDr
3: Two photographs from the evenings performance.

Factrix/Cazazza

I very rarely buy CD re-issues of vinyl albums, especially vinyl albums that I already have but "California Babylon" by Factrix/Cazazza is one of those exceptions to the rule. The CD re-issue comes with a DVD of the "Night Of The Succubus" performance from which part of the album is culled, and previously only available through stills on the original album cover. I don't think the video was ever commercially available - and if it was it would have only been on NTSC format thus rendering it useless to me. The CD also includes five unreleased Factrix songs from 1981 ... but it was the DVD I was after!
Released back in 1982 on Subterranean Records "California Babylon" is a fantastic document of two live performances where Factrix and Monte Cazazza collaborated. Back in 1982 Monte released "must have" vinyl mainly due to his history of collaborations with Throbbing Gristle and his work as an artist within Survival Research Laboratories. Industrial kids of the 1970's bought Cazazza and I was certainly one of those, travelling 40 odd miles to Nottingham and Selectadisc Records to get a copy. The original LP came with an insert - art collage to accompany the song "Nancy's Little Gun" and a poster. The re-issue has neither, which is a shame.
So was the film worth 30 years wait? Hell, yes! The live performance filmed in a dance studio, perfectly shot with interruptions from Charles Manson and footage from the San Francisco Peoples Temple..."The Nursery"...ticking all the early 1980's boxes. I have lived with "California Babylon" for 30 years now, know every sound - and to see it being performed is beautiful, and I get to see what the "Monochord" strings are. Monte is credited as vocals, strings (monochord). What we have is a body of the guitar, no neck, hit through and echo effect. A slight disappointment is the pointless animal carcass robotics from Mark Pauline, tagged onto the end of the live set like some sort of after thought.
A pity that the DVD didn't also have film from the Berkeley Square gig that features Z'ev and Tana Emmolo-Smith, their version of Brion Gysin's "Kick That Habit Man" is a highlight on the album.

Back in the day I always associated Factrix with Tuxedomoon and Chrome coming out of San Francisco at around the same time...This re-issue is on the Superior Viaduct label and they've also re-issued the one and only Factrix studio LP "Schientot". This CD features a booklet with an essay by Julian Cope.
Well worth hunting out. www.superiorviaduct.com

Pictures.
1: "California Babylon" CD (Superior Viaduct)
2: "California Babylon" LP (Subterranean Records) LP
3: "California Babylon" LP reverse cover - section.
4: "Nancy's Little Gun" insert.

Vibracathedral Orchestra

Have just spent a pleasant while listening to the latest release from Vibracathedral Orchestra, the eponymous double album re-release on VHF Records. Originally released on their own label back in 2004, VHF have re-issued with the same cover but with a bonus DVD.
I have come late to the work of Vibracathedral Orchestra, they used to be a bug bear of a very close friend and included a member called Stream Angel of whom we should only avoid...I think a woman was involved...but anyway VCO were strictly verboten and I missed out. Discovering the work of Neil Campbell & Astral Social Club over the past five or six (great band) years it is only natural that I would get to hear Vibracathedral Orchestra.
I have been picking up bits and pieces, odds and sods here and there - 7"'s and live tapes and as soon as I saw this album advertised I knew it had to be heard. The original sells for funny money on the Internet!
The sound of Vibracathedral Orchestra here is the sound of Section 25 circa their "Key Of Dreams" album and of Neu! and Popol Vuh (and undoubtedly a host of mid 1970's Krautrock troupes that I have never heard of). There is also a hint of mid 1980's Soviet France, the time when they were producing "Eostre" and "A Flock Of Rotations".
Surreal moments of July 2012. The other day I found myself singing along to the song "I Ran" by A Flock Of Seagulls with Frank O'Farrell's grandson. A couple of weeks ago I had to shout at my kids for running around the legs of Ray Reardon at a charity garden party whilst he was trying to give a speech. Surreal.
But I digress.
Four sides include extracts of pieces culled from larger improvised pieces. At times the feel is Eastern, zithers and sitars mix with tablas and maracas ~ although I know non of these instruments were used in the recordings ~ and at other times it is pure head down no nonsense mindless trance. The sides are edited as if the tracks were recorded in one long session. Rather like Section 25 and This Heat used to do. It is sheer genius. I have played this album loud so it rings throughout the house and I have played it blind drunk on the headphones and it remains a classic release, and easily file-able along side the releases of Astral Social Club and Ashtray Navigations.

The sound, delivery and approach takes me back to 1985 when a group of friends used to gather in a room in a squat in Central Manchester and make a noise. We used to have a "rehearsal space" in John Nash Crescent in Hulme, Manchester 15 and we would gather once in a while and make a noise. There would be half a dozen or so of us with guitars, bass guitars, keyboards, drums, microphones... a pre-ritual of hot knives, chillums, bongs, spliffs and/or alcohol would take place then we would pick a chosen instrument and "jam". I used to record every session. I used to mark the tapes either "Filth Family Incest" or "Initiates Of Carnifex" depending on the mood of the jam. "F.F.I." tapes were harsh like Einstruzende or Swans whereas "I.O.C." tapes were like....well, were like Vibracathedral Orchestra. Non of these tapes exist now of course. Living in Hulme in the 1980's - everything was temporary.
One day I shall (again) make a noise like VCO.

Buy this LP/DVD. Go to vhfrecords.com

Pictures.
1: Vibracathedral Orchestra LP.
2: Oscar & Isabel F. run rings round Ray Reardon.

Schimpfluch-Gruppe Event in Bristol. November 2012.

Date:

30 November - 2 December 2012

Venue:

Arnolfini, Bristol

Produced by:

Sound and Music in partnership with Arnolfini, Tusk Music, Harbinger Sound and Second Layer Records

With the foundation of Schimpfluch in Zürich in 1987, Rudolf Eb.er created a platform for extreme and outsider artists and the generation of highly disturbing and irritating audio/visual works. Gradually expanding to the Schimpfluch-Gruppe art-collective, Eb.er and Joke Lanz have channeled grotesque humour into an ongoing series of confrontational radio broadcasts, physically demanding performances, ‘abreaction plays’ and ‘psycho-physical tests and trainings’.

Rejecting any given norm and genre, tearing down mental barriers, unlocking all gates to the nether regions of the human psyche, their celebrated work aims to unlock an awareness of existence and encourages the audience to get off the plane of miseducated adulthood.

This weekend festival acts as a long-overdue retrospective and a celebration of the now. Through an extensive programme that highlights the influence Schimpfluch has had since the late 80s, the audience will be treated to a selection of performances, sound-installations, films and photographs. Alongside core Schimpfluch acts such as Runzelstirn & Gurgelstøck, Sudden Infant, G*Park and Dave Phillips this carnival weekender features rare UK appearances by international guest artists such as GX Jupitter-Larsen, Phurpa and Vagina Dentata Organ.

Essential - The New Blockaders are also performing in collaboration with GX Jupitter-Larsen, making this probably the greatest event of the year - see you there!

Bristol Nacht

On a mild but wet evening in the centre of Bristol a small corner of North London came to entertain. When I first heard about this gig I thought it must be a Beartown Records evening, but apparently not - just a group of friends getting on the 4:50 from Paddington to Temple Meads and bringing their art to the South-West.
The Cube Cinema is a small cinema (a cineplex when Dieter Muh played there a few years back with Putrefier + Stimulus) in the Stokes Croft area of Bristol, a beautiful venue and ideal for the four performers. Compact and bijou and seated.
I have been getting the releases of all four projects for the past couple of years, with each of them releasing some of the most essential (to these ears) sounds and to get them playing in the same venue in one evening was just too good to miss.

These Feathers Have Plumes kicked off the evening, with bowed glass and laptop. A sound that filled the small venue beautifully...small problems with the acoustics at the start were soon ironed out and Andi performed a great piece of drone music. Cheapmachines performed next with a quieter experimental piece from Phil Julian. I had warned Tamsin (the present Mrs. Cammack) to bring earplugs for Phil's set...but they weren't needed. Cheapmachines provided a set in three parts. A static live performance with the sound of hums and vibrations crawling around the buildings interior walls before creeping up behind and attacking the senses, moving into a dark space with tweaks and rumbles. Sensory deprivation. The final part sounded like a treated sample of a badger trying to escape from a large metal barrel, again an almost binaural experience was achieved..excellent stuff. I believe ennui set in as Phil moved and attempted some circuit bending electronics. Best Cheapmachines live set I have seen.
The brilliantly named Aqua Dentata followed. Aqua Dentata performed to film. It did surprise me somewhat that the performers were playing a cinema and only one had brought along visuals, the opportunity of visual equipment is rare enough these days and to get to project on a "cinema-sized" screen is too good to pass. Aqua Dentata performed a slice of minimalistic drone, layered textures of electronica to a great hypnotic piece of animation, a stark black and white pattern shifting film that put the two words solar anus into my head.
BBBlood completed the great evening with (again) a quiter assault than anticipated. With a sound that isn't too far away from that of Putrefier Paul performed with a table of effect boxes, contact microphones and sample loops for just under half and hour. The longest BBBlood live set to date? Hard to describe other than all consuming noise. 20 odd minutes in the world / mind of the Baron Bum Blood. Excellent.

All four artists are regulars on the London "circuit", I recommend you catch them all soon. If the evening lacked anything it was audience and a set from Duncan Harrison.

The following morning I made it down to the Bristol Harbour for a breakfast pint and a stroll amongst the book stalls and secondhand record stalls~where I found a mint copy of Ada Wilson's "Tattoo Hosts Vision On" LP. Now is that the name of the album or band?

Pictures.
1: The Cube Cinema Poster.
2: These Feathers Have Plumes.
3: Cheapmachines.
4: Aqua Dentata.
5: BBBlood.
6: Down At The Dockside. (Sunday Morning).

Lethal Dose 50

Have just spent a pleasant while listening to LD50 and their last release ~ the CD "21st Century Awakening" on Nuit Et Brouillard. (Cat no. NB CD 05). I saw the album floating around secondhand and cheap on discogs a couple of weeks ago and thought I'd give it a listen. I like LD50, or Lethal Dose 50 as they are called here. I first came across them in 1998 when we shared billing at the 11th International Independent Music & Arts Festival in Sint-Niklaas, Belgium. It was a great evening and LD50 gave a great set using equipment that we (as Dieter Muh) had once used. Roland JD800 and Drumatix if memory serves, so their sound was similar to early Dieter Muh...only dark ambiance approached from a different route (if that makes sense). I got their "Out Of Dimension" CDr there and then.
I am not too certain whether or not LD50 are still active, they are a hard one to find on the Internet, it did surprise me that this album was released in 2006.
"21st Century Awakening" with sleeve quotes by H.G.Wells is sixty four minutes of soundscapes. Ten pieces in sixty four minutes. The sound is purely electronic. Synthesizer, keyboards, electronic rhythms and pulses and voice samples. The style (the genre) is dark ambient, dark ambient electronica a la LOKI Foundation with a slice of Kraut 70's progressiveness thrown in. It is an album of two halves, the first four pieces are too busy, too much happening in too shorter time, pieces are not given time to breathe or settle. Each track has an excellent part - the titular piece with its' compass readings for example - but it is all hurried along. I notice that this album features a third member for the first time. LD50 were always Stefan & Tom, but this album also credits Bernard Herstens as a member...has this made the sound too busy? Also the levels seem to be "all over the place", I was thinking the album was probably cut direct from cassette, but there is a mastering credit. Christian Renou (AKA Brume)....
By track 5 the album didn't have much going for it and then it all changed. "Dose IV.v.586" is a great slice of post nuclear ambiance. "Anti Dose IX.s.265" has a great bass lead rhythm and hand clap..the track moves at a great pace. Faith is restored. Tracks five through to ten would have made a great 12" mini album. I think the artwork is bloody awful though.
I'm glad I spent time and money and bought this album, but I'll stick to "Out Of Dimension" or "Quiescent Shadows" next time I want to hear LD50.

So, are LD50 still active? Have Stefan Scheers and Tom Adam moved on? It has been six years since this release. I know Nuit Et Brouillard are still active~I've just bought the Maison Close CD on their Force Majeure label, but what about LD50? Can anyone please answer?

Pictures.
1: My Lethal Dose 50 collection. (CDr/CD/Tape).
2: Flyer for Belgian Festival. 1998.

A Somatic Response

There is still a small corner of Hartop Towers that will forever be Sweden, with three packages full of tapes and badges and CDr's coming from that country in the last 24 hours.
I am on the Belaten mailing list. Recommended as their output is usually ultra limited and sells pretty damn fast. I learnt my lesson with the Michael Idehall "SOL" cassette, so now I am a fully paid up member of the Belaten "fan club" ... membership is free.
Belaten is the label operated by Thomas Ekelund of Trepaneringsritualen, their output (so far) has been in the dark ambient, occult territory with cassette releases from the aforementioned Idehall, Trepeneringsritualen and Aether, so "A Somatic Response" has come as a bit of a (pleasant) surprise. The tape is a compilation, a mix tape curated by the project Soma Sema, and if I had been told that it was recorded 30 years ago (1982) I would have believed it. The cassette is mainly electro-pop. Electro-pop music, electronic music made as if hardhouse, rave, jungle, drum n' bass, gabba, chip n' pin, gazebo thrust and cornfeed hadn't been invented. ( I made those last two up...OK). Also it is electronic music with electronic instruments...no laptops or apple macs on this tape.
I am in no authority over these projects. Apart from Soma Sema and Lust For Youth I had not heard of any of the participants and I have only heard of Lust For Youth because Paul (The Baron Bumblood) Watson recommended a couple of their releases to me last month. I know that Thomas is the "musician" in Soma Sema, and I recommend their 7" "Artificial Heart" on the No Emb Blanc label...but don't expect Trepeneringsritualen! Check out the promo video on YouTube. So the tape kicks off with Blitzkrieg Baby, who I believe is Norwegian. "Your Happy Place" has a militaristic beat and very dramatic synthesizer. Think early Ministry with very early Portion Control and a pinch of Laibach and that is the sound of Blitzkrieg Baby. Television Set provide a track that has "bedroom" written all over it. Guitars with a casio keyboard and drum machine. "Staveley Shed" could be a Stuart Moxham demo for Rough Trade in 1981. Instantly likable, as is "Expose" by Vita Noctis. I knew nothing about this band other than they sounded Belgian, they sound like Repetition. Remember Repitition? Their 1981 "A Still Reflex" 7" is one of my all time favourites. The sound is pre-goth..I have a feeling that this could be "minimal wave". Excellent stuff and I want to hear more..I want to hear more Repetition as well. Club Amour are a Depeche Mode tribute band, and have me dancing. Excellent stuff, I can say that I like the odd Mode track "Photographic" from the 1981 "Some Bizarre Album" being prime example and Exhibit "A" m'lud. Nimam Sregleda sound out of place here, too experimental with their sheet metal beating and voice manipulations.Makina Girgir are French and bring us back to the 1980's with "Alpha". An electro-motorik beat, a sci-fi soundtrack that brought the sound of Cerrone back into my life. "Kord" end Side A with a 1970's vocoder disco track, back to Cerrone with a hint of Telex and Kraftwerk. Side A is excellent, retro-lectro but still fresh. Side B begins with Estroboscorpio ~ no me neither. "Slugs" has a great synth pulse with random electro squeeblings before acoustic drums and echo (in a void) vocals come in and fill the track out. Pure Danse Society and it sounds like Estroboscorpio were having great fun playing it. The next couple of pieces bring the cassette down somewhat. Lust For Youth provide an aimless and flat instrumental which is a shame...and Goz Mongo Alliance lose the plot a little with bad drum programming and a monotonic vocal. Like Television Set, the track could have been released (as a B Side) on a Rough Trade Records single from 1980. Estonian vocalist Xiu follows with swimming synths and harmonies, very ethereal and the compilation (sorry, mix tape) ends with Soma Sema and "Dream Baby Dream". This song could win Eurovision for Sweden (never mind "Euphoria"!). A beautiful female voice repeats "Dream Baby Dream" over a tight sequencer pattern that travels through a plethora of studio effects. Simply beautiful. Just a shame this track is at the end of Side B and not on Side A with the "other" great electro-pop tracks. Ah well.

It is great that Thomas wants to share his love for 1980's electro-pop and bring to the fore projects that deserve a listen, a fresh ear if you like. There are a couple of projects on this tape that I want to hear more from and in some cases will part with my hard earned to get my ears around it. The tape is limited to 200 and comes with a password to download the tracks from the Internet and into your ipod, or Mp3 player or whatever.....worth the money. Spend a few pennies more and get the new Belaten badge set. I did!
To get this cassette and on the Belaten mailing list go to www.belaten.se

Pictures.
1: A Somatic Response tape.
2: Inner Sleeve Artwork.
3: Belaten Badge Set.