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voltage spooks

Skull-Valley details a few related shows...

on Thu, 2011-12-15 00:26

Embedded image, on Photobucket

Local blog, Skull Valley, wrote up some nice descriptions of shows that Host Skull and Oryx Horns played this past fall. The first show saw the saxophone/guitar/drums trio version of Host Skull open up for Michael Johnsen and The Voltage Spooks. This was one of my favorite shows of the year. The Voltage Spooks was incredible, mainly by being incredibly patient with the layers of sound they concocted. I'd give Host Skull a B on our set. We played three pieces that utilize some form of "head" that anyone in the group can trigger. The rest is improvisation. This was the first time we played a set like this. I think it was more magical when we did a similar set last month at the new Mr. Roboto Project.

The next show (the following night - both at The Shop) saw Oryx Horns (Gregg Weber and I for this show) play with locals Carousel, Brown Angel, and an incredible set from Deadrider. This show also happens to be a highlight from the year. Previous Oryx Horn setups were saxophone/guitar/drums, but this one was for drums/electronic drums/laptop. Anyway, check out the blog below:

http://skull-valley.blogspot.com/2011/12/small-september-update.html

9/14 The Voltage Spooks/Michael Johnsen/Host Skull

on Sun, 2011-09-11 14:02

For Host Skull's Wednesday performance, we will be drawing on some pieces written for a silent film score for Cecil B. DeMille's The Golden Bed. Host Skull will be premiering this music September 30th at The Warhol Museum alongside the film. The music is set for saxophones, guitar, and percussion and includes scored music and improvisation.

 

More information
an evening of (mostly) improvised electro-acoustic and electronic sounds featuring

THE VOLTAGE SPOOKS [legendary English guitar improvisor Keith Rowe of AMM, Rick Reed and Michael Haleta]
MICHAEL JOHNSEN 
HOST SKULL [David Bernabo, PJ Roduta, Brandon Masterman]

all-ages
8pm-11pm
$8

The Shop
4314 Main St.
Pittsburgh, PA 15224

THE VOLTAGE SPOOKS
KEITH ROWE:
__________
Keith Rowe is an English free improvisation tabletop guitarist and painter. Rowe is a founding member of both the hugely influential AMM in the mid-1960s (though in 2004 he quit that group for the second time) and M.I.M.E.O. Having trained as a visual artist, Rowe’s
paintings have been featured on most of his own albums. After years of obscurity, Rowe has achieved a level of relative notoriety, and since the late 1990s has kept up a busy recording and touring schedule. He is seen as a godfather of EAI (electroacoustic improvisation), with
many of his recent recordings having been released by Erstwhile Records.

www.erstwhilerecords.com

RICK REED:
_________
Rick Reed (born 1957) has been creating audio compositions since the early 80's. His works are intuitive studies of electricity, frequency fluctuations, and improvised "on the fly" solutions to symmetry problems in electronic sound. Since 2000, he has centered his live
work on using a synthesizer processed with various effects devices to create complex macromal drones with a surface of aesthetic elegance and beauty. Reed, currently based in Austin, Texas, has performed throughout the United States and Europe. Recently, he appeared in 2009 at the UK's prestigious Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival in ensemble alongside Keith Rowe and former Austinite Bill Thompson. His music has been used by filmmaker Ken Jacobs in three of his experiential films, Spiral Nebula, Mountaineer Spinning, and Capitalism: Child Labor (which won the grand prize at 2006's Curtas Vila de Conde film festival in Portugal, Spain). He also appeared live with Jacobs at Lincoln Center during the "Views From the Avant Garde" portion of 2007's New York Film Festival. His audio works are available from the labels Elevator Bath, Ecstatic Peace, Pale Disc Japan, Bremsstrahlung Recordings and Beta Lactam Ring. A new double LP record will be released by Elevator Bath in early 2011, which should coincide with a short tour of the east coast.

www.elevatorbath.com

MICHAEL HALETA:
____________
Michael Haleta (born 1978 in Princeton, NJ) is an intermedia artist living and working in Atlantic Highlands, NJ. He studied the cello from an early age up until the guitar, effects pedals and free form improvisation peaked his interests in the raw generation of sound. “Everything starts from a dot.”-Kandinsky. In terms of visuals, he
graduated in 2001 with a BA in information design from the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA). Recipient of Issue Project Room's 2011 IPR's Emerging Artist Grant and a 2009 American Music Center Live Music for Dance Grant for sound production in Yanira Castro's Center of Sleep. Haleta has worked with numerous composers, artists and musicians, including: Paul Neidhardt, Stephan Moore, Shaun Flynn, 2673 (Kevin Winters), Jason Urick, Jeremy Sigler, Keith Rowe, Kasper Toeplitz, Scott Smallwood, Seth Cluett, Dan Deacon, Zbigniew Karkowski, Jeff Donaldson, Andrya Ambro and more. He has released audio for Alienation, Raw Special Effects (RSE), Carpark, Antiopic and Hoss records. Michael also runs a small edition label by the name of Raw Special Effects (RSE) which is scheduled to release much new and free material in 2011.

www.rawspecialeffects.com
www.backbreakerneckbrace.com
www.futuristictexturesfromthefuture.blogspot.com

MICHAEL JOHNSEN:
____________
Drawing on the rich American tradition of experimentation and cobbling, Michael Johnsen has built up an integrated menagerie of devices specifically for live performance, whose idiosyncratic behaviors are revealed through their complex interactions. His work is characterized by a relative lack of ideas per se, and an intense focus
on observation, the way a shepherd watches sheep. The extensive patching of large numbers of devices produces teeming chirps, sudden transients and charming failure modes; embracing the dirt in pure electronics.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tx36qq1oEKI

HOST SKULL:
____________
Host Skull is the duo of David Bernabo and Will Dyar that also utilizes the skills of many others including Brandon Masterman (saxophones, voice) , Liz Adams (voice, double bass), Ben Montgomery (trumpet, percussion), Kerrith Livengood (flutes, piccolo), Jeff Berman (vibraphone, percussion), Herman "Soy Sos" Pearl (modular synthesizer), Jim Siders (trombone), Vince Camut (pedal steel), Josh Verbanets (voice), Christopher James (bass), and Darcy Trunzo (voice).