January activities

Of course, January began in Portland, but there have been many activities to date:

On Jan. 6 at the Hemlock in SF- Bitcrush and Run_Return-

Bit crush is Mike Cadoo - who was in the evolved "industrial" band, Gridlock, back in the day. Bitcrush's sounds builds on the dark atmospheres of industrial ambience and the broken and jagged beats of the darker days of drum 'n bass.
Run_return, a local, Oakland band, has a undefinable sound. Shall I say, very groovy- a good live show.

Jan. 7- at Lobot gallery in West Oakland- art reception- "There is Nothing to See" - a collection of sound installations- the press release says it best-

"LoBot Gallery presents There is Nothing to See- a sound-based group show that explores the outer limits of sonic experience.

Running the gamut from the unsettling (Joe Colley's sculpted mouths that emit animal distress calls) to the sublime (Peter Regli's broken glass symphony), There Is Nothing To See is an aural train wreck of colliding techniques and processes.Angel Sanchez-Borges resurrects Miles Davis and Jimi Hendrix for a virtual jam session. Sarah Filley translates EEG readouts of a brain in the throes of a seizure for her composition, Cerebral Score. Jorge Boehringer's record (fashioned from a felled redwood tree stump) grinds endlessly through the locked grooves of the tree's growth rings. Tom Grimley's exquisitely handcrafted instruments play themselves, as do Albert Ortega's Wal Wart(s). For a more intimate experience, stick your head inside Sandy De Lissovoy's audio cone or crawl inside Jacqueline Gordon's sound-gathering geodesic dome. Betty Jo Costanzo's tin can phones provide the lo-fi/no-tech counterpoint to the entire (dis)array."

My favourite was T. Grimley's constructions, I guess I like watching the little gears shift around accompanied by unpredictable noise expulsions.

Jan. 11 - Lecture/reading/signing- Jared Diamond on his new book Collapse
Following his pioneering book, Guns, Germs and Steel, Diamond spoke about how civilations fall into ruin. He tried to positive and and hopeful, but as eluded to in my last post- I know, we're doomed.

The weekend of 1/13 & 1/14 was a double header at the 21 Grand Gallery in Oakland.

Jan. 13-Jiffy Scuttler Presents: Greg Davis/Sebastien Roux, Birdshow, Gregg Kowalsky

Overall- pretty good show, ranged from the extra-European noisey- Greg Davis/Sebastien Roux; to the more sweetly melodic and improvised- Birdshow.

Jan. 14- Jiffy Scuttler presents: Semiconductor (UK) + Antimatter/ Tim Perkis/ Wobbly

The Antimatter/ Tim Perkis/ Wobbly part was droney and improvised.

I have been waiting to see Semiconductor all week. A duo based in the UK, they're doing a residency at UC Berkeley's Livermore Space lab- they combine computer graphic films with sound. The Inaudible Cities piece was my favourite- check out their blog here. This was their last show before they head back to the UK, I was very glad I was able to see them.