24.-25.8. H:KI, FIN: Roihika Noizufest (YANA, Circle of Shit, MRKPH, tyhjiø etc)

Started by voidhead, August 22, 2018, 01:47:44 PM

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voidhead

Fri 24.8
Woe Gamala
tyhjiø
[ówt krì]
Fell Hand
Andrea Camporotondo

Sat 25.8.
Atrophist
MRKPH
Satanoid
Electric Hobo
Circle of Shit
YANA

Doors @ 18.00, ends 22:00

Cafe Rio -> Roihuvuorentie 9, 00820 Helsinki

Voluntary cover charge, proceeds will be split between the artists.

https://www.facebook.com/events/363000814233929/

Ernpe

Friday I arrived when tyhjiø was already playing. Most notable thing was low volume: talking people in the audience where a lot louder than the noise, so where sounds of kids playing nearby also. Some parts of the set sounded nicely crude noisy industrial but asking the audience how much the clock is and whether to continue or not is by far not the coolest thing to do when playing noise.

[ówt krì] played ambient landscapes with guitar and effects. Not kind of stuff I would listen at home, but at outside venue with some rain falling just during the set, it just quite had the right atmosphere for such gloomy ambient.

I wasn't familiar with Fell Hand but he turned out to be the best of the weekend...at least of those who I saw playing. Buzzing electronics, nice little distortion, slowly moving from phase to another while keeping eye on detail.

Andrea Camporotondo played electric guitar as an instrument. Actually picking notes, looping himself and playing around with echo and delay pedals. Nice music if nothing more, quite far from the "noizu" theme though.

Saturnday I managed to get to Roihuvuori even later. I did actually had an intention of missing first three acts since I have not wound neither MRKPH or Satanoid too interesting. Well, missed Electric Hobo also, his set ended just about when I arrived. Circle of Shit suffered from extremely low volume. Acoustic sound of the metal plate was louder than the thing coming out of speakers. Never before I've seen a gig where mixing guy is actively pushing the volume down each time something louder happens on stage. As resault, most of the sound didn't seem actually come out at all.

YANA suffered from both low volume and technical difficulties. Two guys on stage, other playing electronics, other banging a large piece of metal. Electric sounds of metal were either buried into mix or lost due unconnected cables leaving electronics guy a bit orphan. Nice unapologizing stage approach, hopefully they will play more gigs with better luck in near future.

I thought I had missed Atrophist since he was scheduled to open the event Saturday. Better for me this way, Atrophist set was way superior to the ones I have seen before. Distorted electronics played with no hurry, giving sounds a time and then doing just little adjustment, yet still managing to sound interesting and alive. In a darkening evening the set worked very well.

So all in all, those who played more quiet stuff worked quite nicely while actual noise stuff was buried way too low in the mix. I understand that one cannot blast noise like a keränen when playing outside a block apartment but between full blast volume and whisper-like thing we heard this weekend, I believe there could be some compromise. Especially as it didn't seem to be about the decibels but about the sound: the harsher artist played, the more silent it went. If I understood right, next time there will be another venue with possibilities to actually play louder than background ambient is.
Noise & other underground reviews in Finnish: http://box-is-record.tumblr.com/

Atrophist

Thanks for the comments. Since I'm the main organizer I might as well add a few things.

Quote from: Ernpe on August 26, 2018, 11:26:32 AM

Andrea Camporotondo played electric guitar as an instrument. Actually picking notes, looping himself and playing around with echo and delay pedals. Nice music if nothing more, quite far from the "noizu" theme though.

Have you seen the new series of Twin Peaks? The one where every episode ends with some formally dressed people performing ethereal sounding music in a somewhat orherworldly setting? That's what Andrea's set, with the multicoloured light bulbs and the backdrop simulating a velvet curtain, reminded me of.

Andrea is a cool guy and a genuinely talented musician, but what he does is indeed quite far removed from the general (itself quite vague) theme of the event. He was there replacing Denkimushi, who entirely coincidentally is another guitar guy originally from Rome, Italy. Denkimushi's approach is quite a bit more experimental. Last November I saw his perform some guitar drones combined with field recordings which I enjoyed enormously. Hopefully we can collaborate again in the future.

Quote
So all in all, those who played more quiet stuff worked quite nicely while actual noise stuff was buried way too low in the mix. I understand that one cannot blast noise like a keränen when playing outside a block apartment but between full blast volume and whisper-like thing we heard this weekend, I believe there could be some compromise. Especially as it didn't seem to be about the decibels but about the sound: the harsher artist played, the more silent it went. If I understood right, next time there will be another venue with possibilities to actually play louder than background ambient is.

The volume issue is definitely the one thing that bothers me about the weekend. In fact, it has been the cause of not-insignificant self-recrimination in the last couple of days: what the hell was I thinking booking some harsh, filthy noise based on feedback and abuse of contact mic'd junk metal on the terrace of a hipsteri-ish cafe in a quiet, lefty suburb?

Eventually I'd like to move the noisier acts into the Japanese park on the other side of Roihuvuorentie, but that requires money and demanding levels of bureaucratic BS. Since last year we had no trouble at Rio, I figured we'd be okay this time around too.

The problem is that some old biddy who lives in the same building has made it her life's mission to get the cafe closed. Anyone who lives in an apartment building in Finland, or who knows someone who lives in an apartment building in Finland, will probably know the type of person I am talking about. Any signs of life and human activity are intolerable to them, but especially the idea of someone actually enjoying themselves makes them apoplectic.

Well, the thing is that during Satanoid's set, this person called the police, or threatened to call the police, or something. The owner managed to defuse the situation, but this nevertheless led to some rather heavy paranoia about the volume for the rest of the evening. The place has one written warning already, and another will mean the end of their business.

In fact during CoS's set we took a break and considered whether to abort and go home, or to limp along as best we can to the finishing line. I guess it's up to others to decide whether we made the right decision.

The search for venues in noise and other type sof marginal/experimental music is never-ending. Practically all solutions are imperfect somehow. What you have to decide is whether or not the level of imperfection you must work with is tolerable or not.

Very near to my home in the wastelands of eastern Helsinki there is an old artificial cave, built into the side of a hill sometime during WW1, I believe. It's part of an abandoned network of trenches, bunkers, etc. in this part of the city. I plan to go scout it with a friend later this week, to see if it could work as the setting of a noise show. If anything, it'll be worth the trip just to see this folk art honoring the eldritch horrors lurking in the East Helsinki catacombs.