Live show reports / comments

[MT]

Forgot to mention HERSKA. Debut gig, absolute noisecore madness, drinken violence and injuries. Hard to put in words what I witnessed. But if either of the members don't even remember playing, having glasses smashed, other one broke nose. It says something, hard to say what.

[fetch the rope]

If something standed out on Herska set, it was the guest drummer. Quite sure nobody expected that to happen!!

DEATHKEY: two guys making noise and the main fellow shouting and contributing noise. I feel I need to hear the recording to give final judgement( wink nudge, send me files) but the overall feeling was good. maybe 5-10 minutes longer, they started to sound more coherent midway of set so a little more would have been dandy.

The set was actually supposed to be longer, with two separate parts but because of various reasons it ended up being what it was.

[HongKongGoolagong]

Second day of TOR IST DAS! 2015 experimental music festival.

Todmorden is a Northern English town at the border of Yorkshire and Lancashire which was a true violent scumbag underclass shithole for many years until the 'Northern powerhouse' of young Manchester and Leeds based media workers realised how cheap property prices were here a few years ago. Now it's full of vegan cafes and art spaces and they have regular shows in a Unitarian Church at the top of a hill there.

Some fairly lame underground lazy garbage and some OK stuff throughout the day, but standouts were:

GUTTERSNIPE - touted by more than a few people as the best band in Leeds, a very odd guitar and drums duo played hugely aggressive three-minute long ultra-trebly compositions which tested the boundaries between noise and rock music beautifully, and the girl singer ended every piece with an amusingly polite 'thank you'. I was determined not to be automatically impressed after the buzz these have caused, but I was impressed - truly uncategorisable and incendiary.

CHICALOYOH - a French performer did hugely theatrical semi-spoken vocals and moves over tweaked synth backing tracks - again, peculiar and unique performance and the nearest thing I could think to compare this to would be Nico. Hugely enjoyable.

We were cleared out of the building and forced to wait a while for the headliners:

ANDREW LILES, MANIAC and CARL STOKES - a kind of all-star avant garde/extreme metal one-off trio. Maniac didn't have corpse paint or do anything too crazy but was in great voice and dripped candlewax in his mouth stood at the altar in very memorable style. Knowing Andrew Liles only from his prankster-style experimental music output and involvement with NWW I was surprised what an excellent black metal lead guitarist he made. A short set with a classic BM opening then an unexpected and dramatic Current 93 cover (Good Morning Great Moloch) then a downbeat ending of spoken word. Dry ice pumping throughout, felt like an incredible event and worth every penny of admittance to hear these musicians.

[cantle]

So Tod has been gentrified then?

[HongKongGoolagong]

So Tod has been gentrified then?

Felt more likely to be invited to a drum circle or t'ai chi class than to be randomly attacked by a local. Burnley down the road on the other hand remains unreconstructed to say the least.

[cantle]

Not sure whether that is a good thing or bad thing...?

[Duncan]

Well apparently it's good if you want to see Maniac and Andrew Liles there.

Saw Beam Splitter last night who despite their incredibly duff name are a very interesting duo of Audrey Chen (voice/cello) and Henrik Munkeby Nørstebø (trombone).

Expected something a bit more sporadic and typically 'free improv' given all the people and components involved but this was a far more textural, slow affair.  Maybe it was just the usually horrid PA at the venue, but the grain of voices and cello scrapes matched really beautifully with each other, sounding course and often making it hard to tell where sound was actually coming from.  The trombones were largely gurgling and tonal which also paired up well.  Pretty much a focused exercise in a small handful of ideas which I was far more impressed by than the plinky plonky yelping I'd expected.  Amazingly intimate location too, upstairs at a metal pub with Jane's Addiction blasting through the window outside in the quieter parts.

[AXNAAR]

So Tod has been gentrified then?

Felt more likely to be invited to a drum circle or t'ai chi class than to be randomly attacked by a local. Burnley down the road on the other hand remains unreconstructed to say the least.

Burnley will always be a shithole, even the 'alternative' crowd there are fucking psychos and long may it live!

[cantle]

So Tod has been gentrified then?

Felt more likely to be invited to a drum circle or t'ai chi class than to be randomly attacked by a local. Burnley down the road on the other hand remains unreconstructed to say the least.

Burnley will always be a shithole, even the 'alternative' crowd there are fucking psychos and long may it live!

Good to hear... though I thought League of Gentleman was a documentry when it was first broadcast....

[AXNAAR]

Always loved how every UK town or village says the next town over is full of inbreds etc!

I'm on holiday in Otura, Spain they have some good sayings about the next village over "the one that isn't a whore, has a limp" and "you can find all the women there up trees showing off their cunts" haha!

[impulsemanslaughter]

Saw Merzbow last night at the incubate festival. No laptop, just pedals & a homemade guitar.. Nice surprise!

[softmachine]

Saw Merzbow last night at the incubate festival. No laptop, just pedals & a homemade guitar.. Nice surprise!

wow :)  and I bet he blew everyone away with just those too

[softmachine]

^
googled it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bs-C6SNWyYM

wow!!!!

[vomitgore]

WILL TO POWER ELECTRONICS (21.11.2015) - S.T.A.B. Electronics, Kristoffer Oustad, Am Not, Singular Cleansweep Operations, SHIFT

This took place in the same venue as the great "HEAVY ELECTRONICS" festival, in a run-down suburb of Mannheim (which is already pretty run-down as it is). Due to a very low-profile announcement strategy, there were pretty few people there (maybe 40 or 50, at best?), but line-up was marvellous!

S.T.A.B. Electronics was up first. Very good set with the heavy sounds known from the latest album "Day of the Male". Strong, emotional vocal performance and constructed layers. A video of pretty painful BDSM, fisting and ballbusting was shown in the background. Although it wasn't extraordinarily "brutal" for fetish pornography standards, pretty much everyone was appaled and many left the room. Heard some people complaining ferociously, heh.

Only got some impressions of Kristoffer Oustad, as that type of Ambient Noise (?) isn't really my bag, but response was pretty positive - much to my astonishment. Am Not was to follow and totally killed. I was expecting nothing but greatness due to the sheer brilliance that is "Unpunished" and was not let down at all. Great synthwork and a constant level of highest possible skill and vocals that ranged from spoken word to dominating screams. Just imagine the last album presented live in the best possible fashion and you know what this was like. Knocked everyone out cold!

I needed my time to get into Singular Cleansweep Operations. At the beginning, the sound seemed too soft and going nowhere (I had the same feeling when listening to their album), but it ended up growing on me to an extent that I actually liked it! Enjoyable Industrial, not very noisy, but pleasant! Not bad, but not very memorable, either.

SHIFT was the final act and entered the stage pretty late (2 am or so, if I remember correctly?). Set with two musicians, front-man doing synth and main vocals and his "assistant" using a second synth and doing some back-up vocals. Strong, brutal and punishing. Atmosphere of total hatred and violence anddedicated execution. As with Am Not, the quality level of the last album was perfectly captured and enriched by the loud live situation.

All in all, this was a really great event. The Unrest crew, especially Am Not and Shift, demonstrated why they are such prominent characters in the contemporary Heavy Industrial / PE scene. Shame that so many people missed out on this!

[Andrew McIntosh]

Looks like a great gig. Very happy to read Am Not were good live, as that album really does raise expectations and, I would expect, put a bit of pressure to perform.

And ten points to STAB Electronics for revolting people. But I've got to ask, who goes to a fucking Power Electronics gig and ends up being offended by the visuals?! "Oh, look Martha, this concert called Will To Power Electronics featuring acts called STAB Electronics and Singular Cleansweep Operations looks like fun, let's take the kids".