portal project / september 2004
September 2, 2004 / Open Improv / First Thursday of every month -- monthly open improv night!
September 4, 2004 / Liquid Brick / Reverse Engineer / Pony Law
Liquid Brick
Large ensemble junkist, tribal, electro deconstruction and audio bungling from Birmingham, AL. 50-gallon metal drums, metal percussive constructs, analog synthesis, tape loops and re-sampling collide with the punk/DIY ethos. Truly enveloping sound.
Reverse Engineer
Montgomery, AL improvisational ensemble that develops complex musical strategies around cello, drums, loops, sax and upright bass. Sheets of sound and frantic playing interrupted by mountainous musical beauty.
Pony Law
Pony Law is Death Folk utilizing junk metal, dissonant banjo pluckings, airplane guitar freakouts and stark laments. The sound is much like stabbing your eyes out and letting the blood flow into one of any terrible molasses like southern river. Gutted owls litter the yard. The body is a sinking ship. All the Lions falling into the sun. Stumbling into an abandoned factory dreaming of Loretta Lynn.
September 5, 2004 /Live at WREK/ 7pm-9pm
On the first Sunday of every month, at 7 p.m., Eyedrum does a show on WREK that features nuggets from Eyedrum's archive of live performances.
This month (Sunday, Sep. 5th) we return to WREK's fancy new digs with material from the Brian Montero / Pony Law / White Magic event recorded at eyedrum earlier this year. Brian Montero is a local guitarist/musician, mostly known for Vastopol, a duo project with Alex Lambert on drums, and Pony Law is Matt Proctor, basically southern gothic/surrealist folk music. White Magic is a rock trio from New York. We'll also have some excerpts from a Triage performance recorded back in 2001 at Earthshaking Music; they're a Chicago jazz combo and playing Eyedrum on Sep. 11th. Tune in and check it all out.
And remember that, after the show airs, you can always listen to this and any recent Sunday Special via WREK's 7-day archive if you forget to tune in
(direct links to Sunday Special streams: lo-fi or hi-fi).
September 10, 2004 /Caroline Smith/ 6pm-8pm
Small gallery opening, runs through October 2nd
September 10, 2004 / Lo-Fi, curated by Travis Pack / 7 pm - 10pm
The Lo-Fi show was conceived to showcase local and national artists working in the Lo-Fi genre. Lo-Fi is a term borrowed from the musical or technological realm and applied to fine art in part to recognize a specific movement in the outsider art arena. Taking influences from folk art, self-taught art, art brut, neo-expressionism and other outsider territories, Lo-Fi artists employ the same sensibility of lowbrow techniques that require only the most basic materials and a style that covets a rough yet somehow elaborate simplicity and rudimentary aesthetic over all else.
This show will feature seven such artists of slightly different styles and techniques, but who all incorporate Lo-Fi ideals and methods into their work. These artists are of different backgrounds and have different levels of education, but the work was found to have certain similarities that allow them to transcend the typicality of a traditionally themed "outsider art" show and set them apart as playing a new role in the world of the outsider.
Lo-Fi artists often strive to connect to their audience on a raw emotional level, not by means of ultimate refinement or picture perfect representation, but through a more unprocessed, nearly primitive approach. While the crudeness of style is visually persistent, a fundamental intelligence exists below the surface, a cleverness that differentiates them from their folk-like influences. Reacting to the bigger-slicker-faster-equals-better mindset that often finds itself seated at the core of our modern society, Lo-Fi artists choose to slow down, to position personal style over perfection, to allow sincerity to replace digital savvy, not in order to debunk technological advancement or eschew sophistication, but to offer a balanced expression as counterpart. Nostalgia often plays its part in the raw approach of the Lo-Fi style allowing the past to interact with the present and dispel the notion that the future will be a cold and empty place where binary code reigns over emotional content and intellectual complexity over cultural significance.
In a world connected by the World Wide Web and tempted by the boundless prospect of commercial space flight and in a time filled with cool and calculated social intricacies that have become so necessary to our existence, it is the Lo-Fi tones that keep us grounded in the underlying lattice of our emotional roots and the limited warmth of our human soil.
EXHIBITION
The Lo-Fi Show will take place between September 10th and October 15th of 2004 in eyedrum's main gallery. An opening reception will be held on September 10th from 7-10pm.
LECTURE
A lecture, "what is Lo-Fi?" will be held on the Thursday following the reception with artists talks and a subsequent question and answer period from 7-8pm.
THE LO-FI SHOW ARTISTS
Jon Ciliberto, Atlanta, GA sound/installation
Pj Fidler, Hollywood, CA painting
Eric Gilyard, Atlanta, GA sound/painting/sculpture
Harrison Keys, Atlanta, GA Painting/installation
Scott Lawrence, Atlanta, GA drawings/sculpture
Megan Lillie Miami, FL tactile fabric sketches
Ryan Wallace, Brooklyn, NY Painting
Michi, Atlanta, GA Painting
September 11, 2004 / Triage + Black Love (tight bros network presents)
Triage is one of the most active young bands on the improvised music scene in Chicago today. Initially conceived by Dave Rempis on saxophones, Triage has worked regularly for the last five years, performing throughout Chicago at venues such as the Empty Bottle, the Velvet Lounge, 3030, the Hothouse, the Nervous Center, and the Hungry Brain, honing their approach to music that is currently undergoing a great renaissance in this city. They’ve also completed two lengthy US Tours in the last two years, receiving widespread critical acclaim for their work. With Jason Ajemian on bass and Tim Daisy on drums, the group has been key to defining the sound of a new generation of Chicago improvisers.
As a trio, these three combine to create wide-ranging forms of musical expression. Performing original compositions almost exclusively, the band moves through quiet textural pieces, grooving jazz-oriented tunes, and wailing, expressionistic romps with equal ability. Using these compositions as a springboard for their improvisations, they manage to combine the rhythmic sensibilities of the American jazz and free jazz tradition with the more abstract spaces frequently associated with European improvisers. The reconstitution of stylistic elements from these disparate traditions sheds
light on both of them in a unique and powerful way.
Black Love
Summer 2001, Georgia, USA. Rich Hudson hadn't been in a band since the demise of Atlanta's "BOB" in '99. Brian Cook left the Atlanta music scene in the mid 90s after bass-ing for Pineal Ventana, The Titanics and Accustat. Taste here the swampy electronic provocations shrouded in humorous pop unpleasantness. But, "Don't be alarmed, It's just a house trying to look like a space ship".
September 12, 2004 / Kaya Collective Open Mic
September 15, 2004 / literature / LANGUAGE HARM
The theme is Sound Poetry & Improvized Poetry, by the Atlanta Poets Group w. special guest Kevin Hoth performing his multimedia work, "phloem"
$4 at the door
September 17, 2004 / music / ATLANTA CONVERSATION SERIES
$5
a single conversation in the center of the room. two microphones.
duration approx. 30 minutes.
simultaneously a conversation alongside the wall. whispering and notepads. duration congruent to the initial conversation.
music interludes.
cooking.
and you.
September 17, 2004 / music / DP3 + Jeff McLeod + Eric Hinds duo / 9:00 pm
DP3
"DP3 is a quartet composed of musicians schooled in various genres who have come together to make adventurous yet accessible improvised music. While their music is loosely categorized as acid jazz, they have drawn
comparisons to acts as diverse as Bitches Brew era Miles Davis, King Crimson, and Dead Can Dance."
Trumpet - Andrew Boring
Bass - Kareem Khalifa
Drums - Davis Petterson
Paul Mercer - violin
http://www.dp3online.com
Jeff McLeod
Montgomery, AL's Jeff McLeod will be improvising on the Chapman Stick, dredging up sheets of raw sound from the shared subconcious mind . . . music and non-music meeting to make something a little darker than the normal air (and much louder). Visit Jeff's website for more info: www.soundandchaos.com
Erik Hinds
Erik Hinds of Athens, Georgia is active as a composer, performer, and promoter of a wide range of music. His upcoming albums are 'Appalachian Trance Metal,' incorporating all of the above, and a song by song (piece by piece?) solo rendition of Slayer's 'Reign In Blood.' He has played with William Buchanan, Chris Cutler, Ernesto Diaz-Infante, the Eastern Seaboard, Lisle Ellis, Drew Gardner, the Georgia Guitar Quartet, Vinny Golia, Frank Gratkowski, Jeff Grove, Carl Ludwig Huebsch, Harald Kimmig, Peter Kowald, Craig Lieske, Marshall Marrotte, Larry Ochs, Brian Osborne, Ravi Padmanabha, Julie Powell, Dave Rempis, Roger Ruzow, Blaise and Robyn Siwula, Carl Smith, Sandor Szabo, Ken Vandermark, Eric Zinman, and his own SS Puft Quartet among others. Erik plays quartertone electric guitar and the H'arpeggione, an upright instrument with 12 sympathetic strings. His current groups are the Erik Hinds/ Jeff Reilly duo and Kyle Dawkins' Walls became the world. Erik lives in a solar-powered house with his wife (and dog) and runs Solponticello Records.
Contact Erik Hinds at info@solponticello.com
September 19, 2004 / film / The Gadabout Traveling Film Festival
The Gadabout Traveling Film Festival
$10
What's the Gadabout All About? The Gadabout is a nationally touring film festival that seeks to open new avenues of distribution for truly independent filmmakers that get pushed aside by Hollywood and the commercial film festival circuit. Focusing on short, mostly "low to no budget" films, the Gadabout offers an alternative to the cliche world of commercial film. Whether they are amateur, or recent film school grads, our filmmakers love what they are doing, and their work shows it. The Gadabout is NOT a competition, rather a celebration of indendent film and video.
Above all, the Gadabout is super cool. We tour in a van, and show amazing films to our new friends we get to meet while traveling.
We have completed 2 national tours and have screened the works of filmmakers from all over the country, and the world (India, Singapore, Australia, Argentina, Isreal, and the U.K.). Independent in every sense, these films share the same willingness to challenge the conventions set for commercial filmmaking.
This is filmmaking as an artform.
The Gadabout is growing even more! This year we will be touring with live music by hyper-pop favorites, The Kiss Ups, a stencil art show, a zine distro, and a book tour by our friend Jacinta Bunnell, (Girls Will Be Boys Will Be Girls Will Be... and the Girls Are Not Chicks coloring books.) For some dates this year we will include a program facilitating people of all ages to make their own films, art, zines, etc. So we are growing into a total indie-media extravaganza!
www.gadaboutfilmfest.com
September 23, 2004 / music / psi + GFE $5
psi
Jaime Fennelly - electronics
Chris Forsyth - guitar
Fritz Welch - drums, cymbals & objects
Brooklyn, New York based electro-acoustic trio. Cathartic, hermetic, meditative noise that slowly evolves into nothing.
Together they have released two records, "The __ who had begun his career as a useful __ of the __ court later became the __ of __ and the __ of __." (Evolving Ear) and their newest release "Black American Flag" (Evolving Ear).
Jaime Fennelly - electronics
Chris Forsyth - guitar
Fritz Welch - drums, cymbals & objects
Recorded March 29th, 2003 at WKCR, NYC by Jacob Danziger
contact - chris@evolvingear.com
www.evolvingear.com
www.antiopic.com/allegorical/september2003.html
www.fluxartspace.org/gallery/album85/psigroup
"(psi) retains an overall warmth that separates them from the experimental pack." - BUFFALO (NY) ARTVOICE, April 2003
"psi makes landscapes of creepy music." - WASHINGTON DC CITYPAPER
"a weird, subversive, static melange of sounds" - ALL MUSIC GUIDE, www.allmusic.com
"a very beautiful album of full-bodied and resistant electro-acoustics rather than the evanescent and whispered school like we otherwise often hear. Their choices are always original and personal. An album not to be missed." (8 out of 10) - BLOW UP, Italy, June 2003
"The distinction between the flowers and the weeds in the fields of experimental improv may be hard to explain but it is not hard to hear. psi is a pleasing reassurance that our belief in the genre is not purely religious." - Tom Worster, www.brainwashed.com
"this is the sort of stuff that could sterilize cockroaches from 50 yards." - AIDING & ABETTING, www.cent.com/abetting/index.html
"psi have that rare gift of a keen capability of holding their horses at the right moment, using their instruments just like nail-files: a unique touch here, an overlap there, and the majority of this genre's habituals gets outmoded all at once. Follow them." - Massimo Ricci, Touching Extremes, www.touchingextremes.org
Gruppe Freie Elektronisch
Ana Balka - violin, guitar
Jeff Bradley - double bass
Scott Burland - pedal steel, keyboards, electronics
Rob Cheatham - saxophones, keyboards
Bob Hulihan - electronics, guitar, theremin, etc.
T. Milt Jones - percussion, etc.
Presented by Euphonic Productions
September 25, 2004 / special / Pscychopathia Sexualis
Open to the public, this multi-media event is a tribute to the volunteers who donated their time and talents to the locally-produced film Psychopathia Sexualis. The evening will include the debut of a 2 1/2-minute trailer of the film (now in post-production), as well as performances by Paul Mercer, Clobber, and DJ Grant Aaron.
PAUL MERCER
The score of Psychopathia Sexualis is written and performed by Paul Mercer, the violinist best known for his work with the acclaimed ethereal neoclassical 5-piece, The Changelings. Mercer will perform selections from his forthcoming CD "Ghosts." Inspired by the instruments themselves, the pieces evoke the individual history of the instrument, whether it be an 18th-century viola d'amore or an early Italian violin that spent part of its lifetime in Colonial India. The compositions feature electronically prepared antique violins, viola, and other "stringed" instruments such as tampura and autoharp.
CLOBBER
Clobber has referred to itself as "the best punk fuckin' rock band of all time that will ever fuckin' be ever." This claim will be tested in a rare appearance of what can only be called one of Atlanta's most notorious "live" acts.
GRANT AARON
Grant has been the driving force behind Lifeform Project, a collective of electronic musicians and multimedia artists from Atlanta. LFP began 4 years ago as an outlet for a group of musicians with a general love of electronic music, which quickly developed into a production entity. This organization has been an integral part of the experimental electronic music scene in Atlanta, providing a means for development and exposure for unknown talent.
THE SHADOW OF SERGEANT BERTRAND
Celebrated puppeteer Jason Hines (co-creator of the Center for Puppetry Arts' recent hit Avanti, Da Vinci!) will present a special live performance of one of the most unconventional sequences in Psychopathia Sexualis. Presented in the fashion of a Victorian-era shadow puppet show, it depicts the life and crimes of Sergeant Bertrand, the notorious necrophile of 19th-century Paris.
Doors open at 7:00, $7 to the public
September 26, 2004 / The Microphones + Woelv + [Wilson+Heath] (speakeasy presents)
The Microphones
"In school one of the outlets I found was music. Making tapes and loud noise and staying up late and getting into coffee and cookies. Anacortes is (to me) in a beautiful place and I have always loved it here, and been creeped out in a really good way in the black forest at night. Once I realized that it was possible to make songs and books and pictures about this sweet creepiness, and not do any other "work", my life got hyperactive.
Beginning in 1995 I recorded tapes by myself on borrowed machines and got deeper into the world. In 1997 I moved to Olympia Wash. and did the same thing and lived among friends who were all older than me. For 5 years I stayed there, living in different houses and always recording at the Dub Narcotic studio in the K compound. The idea that I could also travel around and sing and dance in front of people, and get enough money to live did not occur to me. I traveled around a lot anyway, and I got enough money to live. I ate dinner with my friends every single night. I worked on albums for 1 year each before releasing them, usually beginning work at dawn. I did 4 albums in this way under the band name "the Microphones", and also many other more marginal music projects and books and souvenirs. This all culminated in the "death" themed album "Mount Eerie".
In 2002 I went on an endless tour and stopped for the winter in northern Norway and died. The next spring I returned and pretended I was a different person and a different "band" and "artist" and "singer" and everything. I began calling my songs "Mt. Eerie" songs and working slowly on a new idea: dark mountain, mount eerie, cold songs, grandmother's face, and so on.
I moved back to Anacortes where a renaissance had begun again (finally!). Now I live here and I am enjoying it. I am still constantly traveling, playing weird shows everywhere, and making up songs. I also am recording and releasing records by my friends, whose music I love."
Woelv
woelv is only really one person, me, genevieve, i have had the chance to have my friends helping out a lot with recording and adding an instrument to the nakedness of my voice and simple guitar parts.
Wilson + Heath
Homoerotic noise provocateurs from Cobb County.
Presented by SPEAKEASY PRODUCTIONS
September 28, 2004 / music /Georgian Contemporary Unit / $5
The Georgian Contemporary Unit is a amazing string ensemble drawing from trance, folk and improvisational styles to create a complete immersion, a shifting consciousness. Waves of guitar layered in every conceivable fashion travel from joy to introspection, groove to free association.
GCU is anchored by Hungarian master guitarist S�ndor Szab�. He rarely travels from his homeland to the United States, so this is a special occasion indeed. GCU also features Kyle Dawkins and Brian Smith of the Georgia Guitar Quartet, Atlantan’s Colin Bragg and Blake Helton, and Solponticello founder Erik Hinds.
The group's debut album, "The View You Never Get," was released in 2002 to widespread critical acclaim. This is the only Atlanta appearance for GCU.
Colin Bragg - guitar
Kyle Dawkins - guitar
Blake Helton - percussion
Erik Hinds - Harpeggione
Brian Smith - guitar
S�ndor Szab� - 16-string guitar
contact info@solponticello.com
September 29, 2004 / music /Film + Video Night: Fog City
Public Domain presents "FOG CITY." An essay in sounds and images: Art. Politics. War. Silence. Exclusion. Resistance. San Francisco.
Assemblage/Montage: Chea Prince.
In an era of globalization, our mental maps of cities have become dynamic montages emanating from literature, film, advertisements, news programs, television, and personal anecdotes. Consequently, the image of the city is never homogenous, segregated, or totalizing. In this milieu, the idea of place is a constantly unfolding event scene that simultaneously connects many spaces and levels of abstractions.
Music By: Robert Cheatham & Friends, others
Featured Text: Samuel Beckett, "Text for Nothing #8," 1958. Spoken by Jack MacGowan.
119 mins.
sponsored by Art Papers magazine
Regular Gallery Hours for September 2004 // Wednesdays, Fridays, and Saturdays, noon-5pm
