THE NECKS :: LONDON VORTEX :: 19 MAY 2008

THE NECKS :: LONDON VORTEX :: 19 MAY 2008

The Necks: three guys from Australia - drums (Tony Buck),upright bass (Lloyd Swanton) and keys (Chris Abrahams). Their music has captured the attention of post-post-rock aficionados and improv-jazz avant-gardistas alike, recently earning them a feature article in The Wire magazine. In it they point out that their music exists under two separate identities - on stage and in the studio.

I saw them play at London Vortex, a small upstairs jazz club in Dalston, on 19 May; a warm Monday night in a crowded bar, a small Antipodean contingent mixed in with the transatlantic accents and experimental facial-hair of the regular London jazzbo crowd.

The audience was easily won over by The Necks’ transportative transformations. Microscopic repetitions of piano figures formed the spine of the music. In locked-groove, the drums and bass interbred in hiccupping rhythmic phrases, cycling through their continual minute iterations like cellular automata.

Having anchored his piano’s sustain pedal for ten minutes or more, Abrahams would suddenly release it, snatching the listener away from open ocean breakers and windswept tundra, and depositing them in seedy claustrophobic heat of night-time alleys.

The other players rode the backswing of each movement in effortless ensemble-mode, taking their turns to lead with impetuous shifts in tempo, key and meter. The band showed impressive stamina, maintaining the weft of their carefully interlocking improvisatory domains over nearly three quarters of an hour at a stretch.

I bought their 2006 CD ‘Chemist’ over the bar, and listened to it the next day on the way to work. True to their word, it was a somewhat different animal from their live act.

The elements were still there, but the repetitive piano figures gave way to more textural accompaniments, ornamented with synthesizers, electric guitar and the occasional use of effects. The studio also provides the opportunity to impose structure, and interestingly ‘Chemist’ uses this to subtly underline the trance-like builds and shifting perspectives of their ensemble performance.

The Necks tap a rich seam of potential in their use of extended improvisation to create head-music of softly-stated power. With their absence of cheap dramatic flourishes and wearying structural complexity, they provided me with a lungful of fresh air after a recent string of somewhat stale London avant-music events, for which I am grateful.

------------------------------------------------- David Borrie 24/06/08

[NO.SIGNAL] PRESENTS :: EXTENSION#6 :: DANIEL A.I.U. HIGGS (LUNGFISH) - GUAPO - ALEXANDER TUCKER

This is another gig review I am re-publishing; no idea why I took these down in the first place, not much of an aspiring Lester Bangs-move though.

----------------------------------------------------- David Borrie, 24/06/08



[NO.SIGNAL] PRESENTS :: EXTENSION#6 :: DANIEL A.I.U. HIGGS (LUNGFISH) - GUAPO - ALEXANDER TUCKER

http://no-signal.net/xtns6/

http://guaponews.blogspot.com/

So it was back to State 51 in Rhoda Street, Shoreditch to see Guapo, an instrumental group consisting of two core members- Dave Smith and Daniel O'Sullivan- drummer and keyboardist respectively, along with a rotating membership of accomplices.

Hewing closely to the math-rock tendencies of Battles or Dillinger Escape Plan, Guapo also sound like they share a spiritual connection with neo-psychedelic acts such as Circle and Ghost. In fact, as they played the references came thick and fast- here a bit of Acid Mothers, there a bit of Can, now some Tortoise. I found myself wondering when I was going to hear something that didn’t have an easy precedent in someone else’s muse, or at least my own record collection.

Their set consisted of very long pieces with heavily rehearsed changes; their playing admittedly was excellent. The bassist and guitarist, both recent additions to the line-up, watched carefully- almost comically, like dogs awaiting a thrown stick- for cues from the drummer at crucial points. The drummer appeared oblivious, ecstatic, pop-eyed and with lips blown out like Dizzie Gillespie as he attacked his kit. This included a three-foot diameter gong which he struck to signal major shifts in tempo, therein reminding me vaguely of The Muppet Show.

These moments lay between bouts of somewhat superfluous guitar-wrestling theatrics- the guitarist, incongruous with his wild shock of dark hair and goth-rockabilly visage, betraying something of a Nick Zinner fetish while the rest of the band looked to be channelling something closer to Amon Duul II.

Their second piece involved some backwards delay effects, with the band-members setting up a loop and then abandoning the stage to wander the audience playing melodicas and banging on fry-pans. The move seemed more a half-hearted attempt art-house theatrics, or maybe piss-take, than out of any real musical intent, and I for one was impatient for them to finish banging the cookware and resume playing their confectionary, enjoyably pretentious music.

Which they did, setting up some impressive heavy metal drones around looping note-clusters from the keyboardist’s Fender Rhodes. Things gradually increased in volume and intensity towards a dramatic final showdown in the last ten minutes, in which the drummer looked apoplectic to the point of turning the sticks on himself, the keyboardist was leaning on his Rhodes like Tom Waits at 5.00 AM, and the bass player visibly bobbed his head. The old crescendo trick seemed to pay off, and after a nearly one-hour set the audience still hadn’t had quite enough.

The [no.signal] event calendar, having it's origins in live electronic performances, revolves around improvised music. This may in part be due to an early compensatory imperative to avoid sequenced compositions on the basis that these pose an existential conundrum to guys who perform while standing motionless behind a computer (e.g., “What the fuck am I doing here?”).

So while [no.signal]'s principal activities have grown to encompass more varieties of improvised music, it was refreshing to see them lay on a heavily structured and rehearsed rock performance for a change. Nevertheless, as pulpy, well-heeled and enjoyable as their music was, it failed to transcend the sum of its influences. As they played, I found myself mentally willing Guapo to just ignore the script and jam.

----------------------------------------------------- David Borrie, 15/03/07

SOTTO VOCE, LONDON, 10 FEBRUARY 2007, FOR THE BENEFIT OF RESONANCE 104.4 FM

I am re-publishing this review, which I took it down ages ago for some stupid reason. The band Aufgehoben since repeated part of this review on their website; it can be found at:

http://fp.aufgehoben.f9.co.uk/live.htm

----------------------------------------- David Borrie, 24/06/08



SOTTO VOCE, LONDON, 10 FEBRUARY 2007, FOR THE BENEFIT OF RESONANCE 104.4 FM

http://www.no-signal.net/sottovoce/stage.php?stagenum=2&artistnum=3

State 51 is an old factory building in Shoreditch, with two main spaces in use for performances. For the purposes of this event, room 1 was used for ‘electric’ performances and room 2 for ‘acoustic’, although more accurately this translated to respectively ‘loud’ and ‘quiet’ areas. I arrived at the venue around 8pm; although the gig had started at four, I was there mainly to see Testicle Hazard and Aufgehoben who were to perform later in the ‘loud’ space.

I still managed to catch a bit of performances by Rhodri Davies & Angharad Davies and James Blackmore in the ‘quiet’ space. The first duo performed pointillist, subtle music, using amplified violin and e-bowed harp to render gentle drones and staccato scrapings. James Blackmore played solo 12-string acoustic; reflective, beatific passages of rapid finger-picking and folksy melody. I’ll admit, this kind of music fails to grab me generally which is why didn’t stick around long for either act; so although both performances seemed well-executed, I won’t inflict my opinions on you beyond that.

Testicle Hazard came on at around 9pm. They’re a Scandinavian ‘noise’ electronics duo; although I’m not a connoisseur of this type of music, I’ve seen a few such performances and this one was no disappointment.

One half of Testicle Hazard is Lasse Marhaug, a bald and bearded Norwegian bloke who releases his own material as Jazkammer. The other one is a Finn called Tommi Keränen. Both dudes were set up on separate tables facing the audience. From my position in the crowd, I could mainly see Marhaug, who was using a cheap Behringer mixer, a couple of pedals, and one of these custom-built boxes: http://www.bugbrand.co.uk/pages/sounddevices.htm#weevil

Both of them seemed to be playing what looked like biscuit tins, or perhaps those flat metal canisters that reels of film come in- er, film-canisters, I think they're called. At one point Keränen seemed to be air-soloing on his. Presumably these were contact-mic’ed and run through the electronics, so the performers were able to generate a horrific din by rattling, banging and drumming on the tins while manipulating the gear with the kind of mock strenuousness typical of hair-metal guitarists.

Early on in the performance I felt compelled to use the ratty old complimentary ear-plugs I had salvaged from an Emirates flight – a little while ago I suffered a bout of tinnitus following a Keiji Haino concert and I was not keen to exacerbate the situation.

The general idea behind their performance seemed to be to reference the volume and ferocity of extreme heavy metal, while completely omitting its structure and ‘musicality’. What you’re left with is a kind of subconscious after-image of that genre- rumbling, growling sheets of howling feedback and (literally) metallic distortion, a waterfall of sheer volume abating fairly abruptly after 30 or 40 minutes.

It was quite something to behold live, but I’m not sure I’d bother listening to this stuff on headphones; after the initial shock-and-awe, there’s not much to hold the attention. Interesting though were the responses of the audience; one or two seemed to be moshing, while a couple of drunken revellers attempted to waltz in the midst of the crowd, bumping into people and getting a few dark looks from the other hipsters. I also saw at least one bemused girlfriend being led away by her partner after the first ten minutes- I don’t know why, but this always raises a grin.

After a hiatus of 20 minutes or so it was time for Aufgehoben to make an appearance. All I know about them is that they’re British despite the name, have been around for ages but seldom perform live, and all seem to be at least in their 40s, which is curiously comforting to me as I am pushing thirty myself and suffering somewhat of an under-achievement crisis.

Aufgehoben consist of two drummers, a keyboardist and a guitarist, the latter of which has the sort of proficiency in making non-musical sounds with his instrument which can only come from decades of obsessive practise. Their music can be described as heavily-deconstructed rock- sort of an abstract-impressionist take on the feel and dynamics of the format, without confusing the issue with songs, chords, lyrics and the rest of that extraneous bullshit.

Their music appeals to me a lot, because although its concerns appear similar to the likes of Testicle Hazard, the execution and dynamics allow for narrative and linear complexity, which to me make for a more interesting and less emotionally disconnected listen. For the same reason, I’m a fan of Norwegian band Supersilent, whose music is not entirely dissimilar- loosely-arranged improvisation, live electronics, and two drummers who gradually abandon any attempt at syncopation as the intensity of the performance crescendos.

Aufgehoben were clearly improvising, but following mutual cues of some sort, whether agreed on before the performance or simply a manifestation of the improvising group ‘mind’. About two-thirds of the way in, a slowly building hiss of white-noise was met by a charging assault of thunderous drumming and frantic dive-bombing guitar which raised hackles in the manner of the best idiot-energy-producing music. This took several minutes to reach its apex before ending suddenly; in all they only played for half an hour, but in the best tradition left the audience baying for more. Thoroughly impressed.

----------------------------------------- David Borrie, 14/02/07