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Ben Frost at Lincoln Center Unnerves Members in Tuxedos

Last night marked the commencement of New York's Unsound fest 2011, once again cooperatively executed by Polish Cultural Institute in New York and the Goethe-Institut New York. An important genre-defying event of modern composition, this year's festival began with a Lincoln Center performance by Ben Frost in collaboration with prepared pianist Daniel Bjarnson, "We don't need other worlds. We need mirrors" (originally performed at the same event in Poland last year). Frost had Sinfonietta Cracovia, the Royal Orchestra of Krakow, at his disposal and to many's surprise didn't lose himself in it, as everything was very contained, sustained, and minimal. A constant tension remained as the visuals supplied by Brian Eno (manipulated stills from the original Solaris film) were projected above the orchestra.

Below is the actual progression of the evening.

Keller and I find our seats and are amazed by their proximity to the stage. We sit, and I realize that my hands still smell like the pizza we ate. The audience abides by the light flash and shuts up, then the projector plays footage of a performance by Sinfonietta Cracovia of Fragment Koncertu (it is amazing). We applaud. "That sounded very fragmented," says a woman seated behind me. The evening proceeds with members of the Krakow orchestra playing pieces by Penderecki and Reich. All are performed magnificently, sychronized bows violently pumping and at times softly swaying but always damn fine.

Intermission. I am asked not to take pictures. The woman seated behind me is told by her husband that two years ago Ben Frost was a nobody, had only put out two albums (one of which he owns and hates because it's just noise), and look at him now, what a bunch of bullshit, he concludes.

Frost's performance begins, and the audience isn't sure if it has begun because it's so goddamn quiet. There are no swells of black static, but Frost is just as unnervingly noisy with the quiet tension he creates, sustaining, at times even swelling with massive depth, but mostly just faintly churning, like 50 squeaky sets of teeth being brushed, decorated by the scattered prepared piano. The projector displays a blue square, which becomes more squares, then more complex arrangements of pixels until one sees the Kris character, elderly-looking, from Solaris, age in reverse, then age back, then pixelate until just a square again.

I clap as solidly as I can, surprised it's already over. The woman seated behind me says, "It's pretty droney," as her husband murmurs swears under his breath, displeased with the evenings performance. His New York accent is thick, like someone at a Mets game. Keller and I take sometime to come out of the state we were put in and then get some donuts.

Bovine Fiction (double meaning win!)

Mathew Stokoe's 1997 shockfest novel, Cows, received a re-release this year through Dennis Cooper's Little House on the Bowery, and, whether revisiting the cult classic or taking your first venture into its unsettling storytelling, you (assuming you're not a teenage boy into smut) will be sadly disappointed, having wasted all that flinching at its grotesque scenarios for little payoff from the book's narrative or prose.  The book's meandering through a predictable sum of taboos reads like a checklist of gross-outs, seldom contributing to the books ultimate narrative and existing only as shock for shock's sake.  Now, such wouldn't be quite so seemingly amateurish and immature (and thus excruciating to read) if the prose were actually substantial or the character psychology remotely interesting.  Unfortunately, Stokoe fails to deliver as he lazily falls into hyper-masculine explanations and weak anecdotes to describe what motivates his amoral universe of characters.


What helps the novel remain somewhat interesting are its fantastical elements, such as the beast-like and surreal descriptions of his evil mother or the anthropomorphic, talking cow characters.  This is all, however, executed quite literally and driven straight into a wall almost immediately.  What could have worked as some edge-y fabulist fantasy of uncertain imagination remains an unsatisfying, vomit-drenched, horror version of Never Ending Story.

2011's Prematurely Most Preeminent: Tim Hecker

While serving in Germany during World War II, Fluxus artist Al Hansen pushed a piano off of the roof of a five story building, an act which would later become the foundation of one of his most popular performance pieces, the Yoko Ono Piano Drop, a piece that would be mimicked often, including one instance between several college students in 1972.  Such is the sentiment (and album cover) of Tim Hecker's sixth full length recording, Ravedeath, 1972, featuring the opening track, "The Piano Drop," alongside other anti-song titles such as "The Hatred of Music" and "No Drums."  Cooperating with other electronic composer-god Ben Frost (and in tracks like "In the Air," shit gets pretty Frosty), Hecker has completed his masterpiece.  The pulsating fire of damaged symphonic swells that have become his signature are perfected with the primary instrument being an organ of a church in Iceland (Frost's hometown these days).  The record as a whole, as a concept, as a commentary, as a progression of decaying music, is absolutely perfect.
And so the year is looking bright for music thus far, what with an amazing LP from Deerhoof (available on cassette from Joyful Noise), the upcoming new Danielson record (also available on cassette from Joyful noise), that Zs remix record,  and as of tomorrow, the day of love, the release of the record of the year, Tim Hecker's Ravedeath, 1972.  I know, it's only February, but Jesus Christ.  

Demystifying Goodiepal

In the tiresome task of discovering left-field rarities, there is often the risk of a misinterpretation here, an ignorant assumption there, but I hereby promise to correct those as they come to my attention. This brings me back to a previous post, where I credited a mysterious work to Sprinintgut, to which the oddly packaged sleeve was labeled. Upon another recent visit to Other Music's "experimental" vinyl section, I discovered a similarly packaged gem, and from the view of the packaging, I could already tell that the vinyl was also cut in a puzzle-shaped fashion, as the one I had found before. This time the jacket's label credited The Drift, from Temporary Residence. Baffled, I took the piece over to the counter and asked the gentleman what was up. If you recall last time, they weren't so helpful, but this particular member of staff knew a thing or two. I explained to him that I had purchased a similarly packaged item, of which I thought was performed by Springintgut, and asked if this was some sort of special series of various artists, blah, blah, blah. I was informed that most of the packaging was just recycled promo jackets from other music (which were later doodled on), and that these were all the same Dutch artist. I obviously felt like a fool. While Springintgut is great, he was not responsible for the lecture on the previous disc, and I have thus misinformed you. So as we open up the new bag of goodies, we will figure this out once and for all.


Simply inspecting the outside plastic's barcode can tell you the actual artist: Goodiepal, a.k.a. Parl Kristian Bjørn Vester, who according to Wikipedia is M.I.A. and wanted by the Danish police for "an unsolved theft from the Royal Academy of Music in Aarhus." He had taught at the academy until 2008, when he quit his position and declared "intellectual war against the stupidity in modern computer music and media art." Such sentiment is expressed in his lecture on the tiny, odd-shaped vinyl discs that I've gathered, a part of what Vester refers to as the "five steps in a Gentleman's War on the stupidity of modern computer music and media based art."  This expensive venture over the past 3 years has led Goodiepal to bankruptcy, but all the details of the man can be found on his seemingly autobiographical Wikipedia page.  

Also to note, this particular package included on additional 7-inch of very European-esque electronic music sans lecture and a small, hand-decorated, hardbound book of images and blank pages (perhaps a journal, but I can't read any of the content and have no idea of its purpose).

We're Running Out of Geniuses: RIP Milton Babbitt

Yesterday, due to unknown causes (perhaps simply from old age), avant-garde composer and innovator of the first synthesizer, Milton Babbitt, passed away. Babbitt was known for his brilliant and complex compositions and musical theories extremely advanced for his time.  In fact, Princeton didn't honor his dissertation on the 12-tone system of modern composers until 46 years after the fact, awarding him his doctorate at 75 years old in 1992 (Princeton admits retrospectively that they were unable to properly evaluate something so ahead of its time).  As one of the first electronic composers with over 60 compositions under his belt, Babbitt will be remembered and missed.

What to Expect in 2011

This may be our last peaceful year before the onset of Armageddon in 2012.  Here's some pleasantries to look forward to in the meantime.


Deerhoof "Deerhoof vs. Evil"
This one is slowly being leaked, technically already out in Japan, and officially in American stores on the 25th (I think).  I haven't heard all of it yet, but it's very... clean.  Polished.  This could be good or bad.


Belong "Common Era"
It has already been 5 years (god, I'm old) since Belong first gifted us with their debut, October Language, recorded in the flood of New Orleans (or something), and now more of their Tim Hecker-inspired beautifully damaged swellings of orchestration will be available on their sophomore offering due out March 21.


Danielson "Best of Gloucester Count"
It has also been 5 years since Danielson's Ships, which was absolutely brilliant.  This record may or may not be as good.  I don't know.   Out February 22nd.


Tim Hecker "Ravedeath, 1972"
Ah, and speaking of Tim Hecker, here he is!  Tim Hecker and I share a love/hate relationship with music, consisting of mostly hate.  Hecker channels that hate into his new drone-y masterpiece, featuring the wonderful "Hatred of Music."  Due out February 14th, the day of love/hate.


The Rum Diary - Bruce Robinson
Johnny Depp in another Hunter S. Thompson adaptation.  Worked last time.


A Dangerous Method - David Cronenberg
This film could very well be terrible. I'm not a big Cronenberg fan; I think Videodrome sucked. Please don't email me about that. Despite my skepticism, and perhaps the historically inaccurate Hollywood exaggeration of how much Sabina Spielrein ruins the relationship of Freud and Jung (and not instead the fact that they came to a crossroads of psychodynamic theory), I have to see this potential dump of cinema as a huge fan of both men and a student of psychology.