Archive
Aïsha Devi – Resident Advisor feature
For me the best piece of music is something that could last forever,” [Aisha Devi] says. “That’s why I work with electronic music and software like Ableton. You can play a loop and you can play that loop forever. You can die and it’s still playing, and I love that idea. That’s why the repetition in electronic music is so close to mantras. Repetition is perfection.
In the her most in-depth interview yet, Aisha Devi speaks with Resident Advisor’s Holly Dicker about the evolution of her musical persona and misfit label/collective Danse Noire in Switzerland, her difficult backstory and how she came to meditation, integrating spirituality holistically into her practice. Of Devi, Dicker writes:
To really understand Devi you have to listen to her album, Of Matter And Spirit, which came out on Houndstooth in 2015, and captures the emotional and spiritual journey that began in 2010. It’s a binaural document of everything she’s discovered in that time, condensed into a ten-track excursion of electronic hypnosis, written in a state of meditation and for meditative purposes. It’s healing music, to be consumed in a club, ideally with others—because collective consciousness is the key to happiness, she says. […] she is a radical doing radical things with sound, spirituality and the psychoactive properties of music … Devi’s live shows are visceral experiences that, for a while, can skewer one’s perceptions completely […] nothing beats Devi’s voice live. It fractures time.
Go in deep with Aisha Devi by reading the incredible full feature and come away transformed!
NOW BOOKING live and live A/V. Contact brandon [at] lb-agency.net
A new era for Techno Animal: ZONAL
Everything must come to an end, but for some the end is just a new beginning.
Last week Kevin Martin (The Bug) and Justin Broadrick (Godflesh, Jesu) performed the closing chapter of their seminal collaboration, Techno Animal, at The Bug’s Berlin club night PRESSURE and subsequently announced their reincarnation as ZONAL. The industrial breakbeat duo formed as Techno Animal back in the 1990’s in London and since have worked together in many capacities, always pushing the limits of the studio and on the forefront of the scene.
Now a new path has emerged for the endlessly creative pair. ZONAL’s debut performance will be at Birmingham’s Supersonic Festival on June 17 and it will be a historic moment for a new era.
NOW BOOKING. Contact brandon [at] lb-agency.net
Mondkopf LP “They Fall, But You Don’t” out now
Mondkopf’s latest album They Fall But You Don’t, written in the wake of the 2015 Paris terrorist attacks is the French producer’s most direct and poignant statement to date. It was recorded live with analog synths in his room in Paris on the night of November 13, 2016. They Fall But You Don’t is the singular manifesto of a relationship to electronic music that leaves out the ideas of innovation and genre and more resembles the language of a new folk music; deeply evocative, powerful and free. The album was released January 27, 2017 on In Paradisum.
“Interesting, murky electronics from the depths of the Parisian underground. Crank this one at your next rave in the catacombs!” (Bleep)
“His new album ‘They Fall But You Don’t‘ comes to crown a carefully thought out body of work, showing a musician going for new peaks, through both forlorn and luminous pieces of drone and dark ambient.” (Inverted Audio)
“Far from soulless studio-made electronic discs, “They Fall But You Do not,” a sublime new album by Mondkopf, is a raw, direct, deep and fascinating record.” (Noise Fr)
“Bleak, acrid chamber noise electronics from Paris-based Mondkopf, resonating strongly with the reverberant recordings of Alessandro Cortini or Joachim Nordwall, but better compared with the former for its swelling, emotive grip.” (Bookmat)
NOW BOOKING live and DJ sets brandon [at] lb-agency.net
Emptyset share exclusive mix on Self-Titled
Emptyset’s James Ginzburg and Paul Purgas have prepared an exclusive mix for Self-Titled’s “Needle Exchange” series. The mix contextualizes their recent album Borders on Thrill Jockey and the track list can be found here.
This mix features a variety of production methods—from the electronic to the acoustic to field recordings and vocalization—and reflects a broad range of practices that have connected the use of sound and rhythm with transcendent sonic potential and the ceremonial power of music.
NOW BOOKING live & live A/V. Contact brandon [at] lb-agency.net
Aïsha Devi delivers FACT mix
Heady atmospheres and off-the-wall edits from a unique artist.
Aïsha Devi, in 2013 launched her own label Danse Noire, with the Aura 4 Everyone EP. Followed by the Hakken Dub/Throat Dub 12″ in summer 2014, Aïsha has always dedicated herself and her music in a continuous discovery of abstract techno/club structures, combining her Tibetan and Nepalese heritage with an ingenuous use of her machines to transmute deep meditation.
For her FACT mix, Devi has delivered us a total riot, an atmospheric and unpredictable set packed with off-the-wall edits and unreleased goodies from artists like Fis, J.G. Biberkopf and Danse Noire’s IVVVO.
Emptyset “Borders” LP out now on Thrill Jockey
Emptyset composes within a complex set of self-imposed parameters and the results as evinced on Borders, their new LP out now on Thrill Jockey, are at once minimal and visceral. From the very first track one can hear the physicality the instruments have imbued in the sound’s texture. In tracks such as “Border” and “Speak”, Emptyset uses basic rhythmic structures drawn from an array of broad cultural practices, expressed neutrally and without overemphasis on the source. As Empytset’s Paul Purgas in an interview for The Quietus explains:
We were looking at certain non-Western musical settings and thinking about that structure of, quite literally, drums and strings. Within an Indian context that’d be like the tabla and the sitar, or you can go back far further in an anthropological sense. It was useful for us to think about that very reduced way of making music.
Focusing on shifting timbral changes over melody, Emptyset’s work is a true exploration of the relationship between rhythm, texture and space. The critical reception to Borders has been phenomenal:
Treblezine: What Emptyset does is perhaps more art than entertainment—they mold recorded sound into weaponry, sharpening the edges and wrapping them in muddied and bloodied armor. There are beats, and maybe on a very primitive level there are melodies, but the heart of what Emptyset does is manipulate sound itself. […] Emptyset evades easy categorization or consumption, their strength is in building percussive, buzzing elements into pieces of their own.
Tiny Mix Tapes: For a band that defines their sound through heavy constraints, Emptyset always manages to produce something exciting and new.
RA (3.6/5): Once it pulls you into its core, its dissonant sound becomes comforting, and then cathartic. In evoking confusion as to where man ends and machine begins, Borders offers a musical interpretation of a very modern dilemma.
AllMusic (4/5): The music is never less than tense and bracing, but it retains a hypnotic power. Completely dispensing with the conventions of dance music and embracing techniques more in tune with natural human rhythms, Emptyset have created one of their most unique works yet.
Pitchfork (7.4): Emptyset are in a class by themselves when it comes to excavating brutality out of silence.
Exclaim (8/10): Coming across as a viscera-churning blast of pure sub-bass propulsion, Borders demonstrates that while Emptyset’s methods may have morphed, their madness is still intact.
Taken as a whole Borders distills the duo’s inspirations to their essence and the resulting music is a raw as it is captivating, creating a perfect balance with a sound that creates a new definition of distortion. As stated by Emptyset’s James Ginzburg:
Distortion represents something that is in quite complicated relationship to the source sound, and depending on the circuit it has a life of its own and a complexity you couldn’t contrive. It’s a perfect tool for us. I guess there’s a poetic analogy between these relationships between order and chaos… and orderly chaos.
Now booking site-specific live A/V shows: brandon [at] lb-agency.net
Littlebig welcomes Powell – ‘Sport’ out now on XL + new live show
We are delighted to welcome the inimitable Oscar Powell to the fold. Over the last five years, Powell has asserted himself as one of the most distinctive and difficult artists operating in electronic music today. Diagonal, the label he started back in 2011 in London just celebrated its 5th birthday last year at Berghain, having released music by the likes of Autechre, Russell Haswell, DJ Stingray, and Karl O’Connor, and Powell’s own recordings, released via Diagonal, XL Recordings, Mute Records and more, have already become classics. Taking in acid, techno, computer music, punk, late 90s tech-step and everything in between, Powell music is absolutely its own thing — mad, unpredictable, provocative, but always carried by its own infectious sense of groove — and has rightly earned him critical acclaim across both underground and mainstream press. As Pitchfork wrote of debut album Sport which dropped on XL last October: Powell music thrills and mystifies in equal measure . . . and strips dance music of its sophisticated patina, returning some of the rough-and-tumble rush that Powell remembers from his teenage days —taking drugs and dancing to jungle.
Expanding his signature style, Sport features vocal guests Jonnine Standish (HTRK), Dale Cornish, Melvin Oliphant III and Loke Rahbek (Damien Dubrovnik, Lust For Youth) and is accompanied by videos for ‘Frankie’ by Diagonal’s now ubiquitous designer, Guy Featherstone, and ‘Jonny’, chock full of melon head smashing. The album was cheekily announced via email to a fan after billboards appeared around London encouraging fans to get in touch with him; this followed his previous billboard sharing a particularly virulent email from Steve Albini about electronic music upon requesting to license a sample from Big Black. But as Resident Advisor highlights in their review: ‘Sport’ is far more than an exercise in trolling or deft guerrilla marketing. This is what happens when Powell brings mind and body together in the context of the dance floor. The result is a staggering experience, even if it’s all in your head. At the end of the day, Powell is all about having fun, as evinced in in-depth interview with FACT.
His DJ and Live shows capture the same sense of energy and wild abandon. Part club set, part DIY performance, a Powell show will thrill and bewilder, but always keep feet movin’ and bodies drippin’. As Derek Walmsley, editor of The Wire, wrote: Powell traverses the same spectrum from brilliant to dumb, from super to stoopid as The Beastie Boys circa ‘Intergalactic’, and proposes the same kind of grand unifying theory of funk as Basement Jaxx circa ‘Red Alert’.
Powell invites anyone to traverse the same bonkers spectrum with him every month via his Melon Magic show on NTS Radio, where, in 2017, he will showcase his new approach to playing live by mashing up a wide range of obscure, twisted records with live synthesizers and off-the-cuff sampling in the studio. Listen to the latest episode and get yer freak on. NOW BOOKING LIVE / DJ: brandon [at] lb-agency.net
Littlebig welcomes Emptyset – “Borders” LP on Thrill Jockey announced
London / Berlin by way of Bristol duo, James Ginzburg and Paul Purgas, established Emptyset as a sound art project in the wake of the UK’s dubstep explosion. Founding Subtext Recordings alongside Roly Porter and Paul Jebanasam, they charged themselves to work with the concrete nature of sine waves in physical space, releasing Demiurge and Medium in 2011 and 2012 thus garnering the attention of fellow structuralists raster-noton who released their debut LP Recur in 2013. Their live show which traveled around the world in the ensuing years presented a slow, stark version of techno with visuals from an analog television tube responding directly to the audio signal via magnetic coil on multiple screens resulting in an immediate visceral synergy together with the pounding sound.
For their second full length, Borders, out January 27, 2017 on Thrill Jockey, they have documented one-take performances utilizing their newly self-constructed string and percussive instruments which reproduce their signature sound completely live. The live presentation is bolstered by a site-specific, immersive audio-visual set-up in conversation with the architecture and audience and has so far been presented at Ruhrtriennale in Essen, DE and Unsound in Krakow, PL with many more dates to come. Get more familiar with this “exercise in sublime humility” over at Tinymixtapes and check the first track, “Speak”, below.
Now booking site-specific live A/V shows: brandon [at] lb-agency.net
Eomac’s epic “Temple of The Jaguar” video + 10″ inaugurates Eotrax label
2016 has been an incredibly active year for Dublin techno reinventor Eomac a.k.a. Ian McDonnell. Following Lakker’s ‘Struggle & Emerge’ LP in Summer on R&S and his lauded ‘Bedouin Trax’ triple album + accompanying 1o” “Observe The Vessel Beneath You” this Autumn for Bedouin Records, he debuted ‘Bedouin Trax’ live A/V at Unsound in Krakow and has now launched his own label with an extended belter of a 10″, “Temple of the Jaguar”, and video premiered by The Fader. After a visit to Teotihuacan, Mexico, McDonnell was inspired to tap into his primal nature and the video elegantly illustrates that transformation through movement, exposing the animals within the dancers.
Fis’ “From Patterns To Detail” LP out now on Subtext + full stream
New Zealand bred, Berlin-based post-bass music visionary Fis has released his game-changing sophomore LP From Patterns To Details on Subtext Recordings on September 23. FACT’s John Twells digs in deep in this interview and album stream, charting the evolution of Oliver Peryman’s journey from forest soundsystem raves to the mighty, immersive dronescapes he is producing today and performing at acclaimed festivals including CTM, Unsound, Atonal, and Sonic Acts. Peryman also discusses his collaboration with tribal Maori musician Rob Thorne at this year’s CTM which will manifest in Spring 2017 and subsequent album(s). From Patterns To Details was inspired by Peryman’s passion for permaculture which evinced by this list of influences for Hypnotik and track by track breakdown with Wireless.NZ as well as being explored further in this otherworldly mix for NTS. Boomkat has adeptly described the listening experience:
The album’s seven tracks course with a seemingly chaotic, naturally evolving vitality, using an unquantised palette of atomised sounds to model the processes by which nature makes the most efficient use of its surroundings, and its perennial cycle of growth and decay, in a way that we can comprehend beyond verbal communication. Operating on a scale of micro-to-macro pattern recognition, FIS integrates the spirits of rugged landscapes with its flora and fauna in a grittily fluid sort of horizontal gene transfer between personal and external systems … to put yourself thru the process of his album is enlightening in a way that defies words.
The English poet Rick Holland, who has collaborated with Brian Eno and Jon Hopkins, was so moved by Fis’ work that he wrote a poem for each of the tracks which can be read over at Sounds Of A Tired City. Also look out for an interview in this month’s Wire magazine as well! After recent performances including rural festival in Japan and Berghain, Fis will be presenting a new A/V show in Modena for NODE festival on Nov.11 followed by live sets for Bristol’s Submerge festival on Nov.19 and CS13’s Different Circles x Contort showcase at Corsica Studios in London on Nov.26.
NOW BOOKING: live A/V, live, and DJ sets brandon [at] lb-agency.net
Eomac ‘Bedouin Trax’ LP out now / Eotrax label announced
UAE-based techno label Bedouin Records commissioned Dublin’s Eomac (Ian McDonnell) to work with label owner Salem Rashid’s personal archive of Arabic music and the result is the Bedouin Trax double LP released on September 9, 2016. McDonnell discusses the arduous process as well as his reverence and for this source material with Resident Advisor and breaks it down track by track with Ransom Note. Critical praise is already flowing in:
…from clouds of crackle that prick the skin like 10,000 tiny sparks, to breathy roars that seem to emanate from your own torso… – The Wire
Pounding electronics and rhythms clash with those mysterious and magical snapshots of Arabic musical tradition … enveloping their inherent qualities in some of the most forward-thinking production out there at the moment. – Rwdfwd
Taking samples from a bouquet of Moroccan street sounds, Sufi ritual music and Baghdadi dabke, Eomac diffuses and enmeshes their integral, individual atmospheres and sacred geometries in an often haunting, curiously distanced consolidation of acoustic and electronic, east and west sensibilities that’s respectful to the material yet faithful to his electro-techno roots. – Boomkat
McDonnell prepared an exceptional mix of the finished material and his influences for NTS and a subsequent 10″ “Observe The Vessel Beneath You” has already been announced for release in November by Bedouin from which the lead track can be streamed via Inverted Audio. Bedouin Trax live A/V will feature the video work of sYn with projections tracking the movements of a dancer trained in Middle Eastern styles in real time and will debut at Unsound festival in Krakow on Friday, October 21, 2016. And as if that weren’t enough, McDonnell has also announced the launch of his own label Eotrax with a 10″ for the single Temple of the Jaguar dropping Nov.11 and a music video soon to follow.
NOW BOOKING: Bedouin Trax live A/V and DJ sets brandon [at] lb-agency.net
Flowdan’s ‘Disaster Piece’ LP out now on Tru Thoughts
Out July 15 on Tru Thoughts, Disaster Piece is the new album from one of the founding members of UK grime crew Roll Deep, MC Flowdan. Featuring heavy production from Cato, Masro, Swifta Beater, Dexplicit and more, as well as guest vocals from Tinchy Snyder, Manga, and Animai, the album kicks off with the lead single “Horror Show Style” and its video which premiered via SBTV. The project has received overwhelming radio support from Sir Spyro (Rinse FM), Wiley, Logan Sama, Dub Phizix & Strategy (BBC R1), Youngsta (Rinse FM), plus Julie Adenuga (Beats1), Toddla T (BBC R1), DJ Target (BBC 1Xtra), The BBK show (Radar Radio) and garnered high praise from The Quietus, Clash Magazine, Resident Advisor, NME, and even MTV.
Marc Veira, the man behind the Flowdan alias, grew up in East London’s Bow. The album is heavily influenced by his upbringing and area, and Marc wastes no time in introducing you to his ends as he greets you under a tower block and menacing skyline on the cover shot. “Calling the album Masterpiece would have been a liberty”, Flowdan states. “I feel like I’m coming from disaster. Like my area. I witnessed disaster from just a needlepoint. It just felt like it fitted.”
On stage, Flowdan’s unmistakable voice and dominating presence is joined by his DJ and the entrancing counterpoint of Animai.
NOW BOOKING: brandon [at] lb-agency.net
Fis’ “From Pattern to Details” LP on Subtext – new A/V show in Autumn
Breaking out from New Zealand’s soundsystem scene with EPs on Samurai Horo and Tri Angle which established him as a producer with a unique vision, FIS follows up last year’s “The Blue Quicksand Is Going Now” LP on London’s Loopy (which made yearend lists from FACT, The Quietus, and Bleep) with an LP “From Patterns to Details” on Subtext September 16, taking his organic textures and engulfing drone washes to a whole new level.
Inspired by his work as a permaculture designer FIS takes “a self-occurring pattern like the veins of a leaf, contour lines, or the spirals of water” and “draws from the sense of a deeper underlying order.”
It sees continuity between environment and individual, continuity between external bodies and the internal emotional landscapes that music can communicate beyond the affordances of language. The album embraces technology as something that is not in conflict with the organic processes of nature. Technology is treated as life in a different state. Human beings are gardens in a different state; all temporary forms of the same thing. From Patterns to Details imagines states of alignment with all, and harmonious design, a complete integration between personal and external systems whether organic or technological.
The album is accompanied by a new A/V show which will be debuting in Autumn.
His recent performances at Berlin Atonal, Unsound, and commission for CTM were highlighted by Electronic Beats, Juno Download, and The Quietus. Dig into his world with this recent interview podcast: Fis in conversation with Mumdance for Boiler Room.
Now booking live A/V, live, and DJ sets: brandon [at] lb-agency.net
LB welcomes Miss Red – ‘Murder’ 7″ + ‘Fever’ video
Rising to the spotlight the past few years under the wing of The Bug, the young Israeli-born, Berlin-based dancehall MC Miss Red is locked and loaded to blast on to the scene in 2016 with a 7″ on her own RED LABEL distributed by Boomkat which features highlight tracks ‘Murder’ and ‘No Guns’ from her breakout 2015 mixtape ‘Murder’, including production by Mark Pritchard, Andy Stott, Mumdance, and Evian Christ in addition to The Bug. The 7″ is accompanied by a darkly psychedelic video for ‘Fever’ directed by Hiroo Tanaka, and kicks off a string of singles to follow on Soul Jazz, Dubstuy and Mungo’s Hi-Fi.
Miss Red is available for solo dancehall sets as well as well ‘The Bug ft. Miss Red present ACID RAGGA’ and The Bug live sets. Now booking: brandon [at] lb-agency.net
Littlebig welcomes The Bug – “Iceman” feat. Riko Dan on BBC Radio 1 & 6 shows
We are very excited to welcome The Bug back in to the fold! Following the classic “London Zoo” with his massive LP “Angels & Devils” in 2014 on Ninja Tune, supported by a world tour including performances at Sonar, ATP Iceland, MELT!, Unsound, and Glastonbury, and subsequent EPs “Filthy” and “The Bug vs Earth” in 2014 and “Zim Zim Zim” in 2015, The Bug is set to storm 2016, just having leaked his ferocious new single “Iceman” feat. Riko Dan to DJs, springing up clubs across the UK as well as in Mary Anne Hobbs’ “Recommends” BBC Radio 6 show and BBC Radio 1 residency shows from James Blake and Kode9 in the past week. Exciting new releases and collaborations are in the works, and The Bug is as active as ever bombing stages everywhere with MCs Flowdan, Miss Red, Riko Dan, Manga, and Lady Chann! Lakker’s “Struggle & Emerge” out now on R&S – documentary + interactive read
On May 13 R&S released Lakker’s “Struggle & Emerge”, a maxi-EP commissioned by the Netherlands Institute of Sound & Vision’s RE:VIVE archival remixing project, about the “complex relationship between the Dutch and the water that surrounds them – unyielding, colossal, industrial.”
Alongside the EP RE:VIVE has produced a short documentary (below) and interactive long-read (here) to dig into the fascinating research and development process, including historical site visits and expert consultations, involved in composing the music and accompanying A/V show from the archival material. Additionally you can read their insightful interview with The Ransom Note and hear their abstract mix for Self-Titled.
“Struggle & Emerge” A/V debuted at Rewire festival in The Hague on April 2. Resident Advisor beamed:
The result was a complex and circuitous route through sunny, bass-heavy dancehall into harsher more abstract noise and techno. But as ever with Lakker, melodies prevailed, made, in this case, from noise. It was another masterful live performance from the duo.
Pop Matters said of the subsequent A/V performance for Denovali Festival at St.John’s in London:
The set is virtually flawless: heads follow the beat, eyes stuck on the source, queues dissolve between ambient segments and techno variations, and silence anticipates the audience’s final roar. Energy and ecstasy.
You can stream and purchase the full EP here.
NOW BOOKING: S&E A/V, Tundra A/V, live club and DJ sets. brandon [at] lb-agency.net
Holly Herndon supporting Radiohead’s EU/UK tour this month
Holly Herndon has been invited as the main support for Radiohead at their European shows later this month.
Holly will join Radiohead for the entirety of their sold out 8-date tour. Herndon’s critically acclaimed album Platform married emotional and political critique with innovative club music. The interactive and ecstatic experience of her live performance has now evolved into a group which includes the artists Colin Self and Mat Dryhurst. The trio plan to work on new Holly Herndon material, due later this year.
Holly Herndon will also be appearing at festivals in the UK, Europe and US this summer.
HOLLY HERNDON LIVE DATES:
May 20 – AMSTERDAM, Heineken Music Hall (w/ Radiohead)
May 21 – AMSTERDAM, Heineken Music Hall (w/ Radiohead)
May 23 – PARIS, Zenith (w/ Radiohead)
May 24 – PARIS, Zenith (w/ Radiohead)
May 26 – LONDON, Roundhouse (w/ Radiohead)
May 27 – LONDON, Roundhouse (w/ Radiohead)
May 28 – LONDON, Roundhouse (w/ Radiohead)
June 1 – LYON, Les Nuits des Fourviere (w/ Radiohead)
June 3 – BARCELONA, Primavera Festival
June 4 – PARIS, We Love Green Festival
June 8-9 – PORTO, Primavera Festival
June 11 – LONDON, Field Day
July 16 – CHICAGO, Pitchfork Festival
July 17 – CHICAGO, Constellation
July 18 – ST. LOUIS, Luminary Center for the Arts
August 5 – AMSTERDAM, Dekmantel
August 12 – HELSINKI, Flow FestivalAisha Devi’s “Of Matter & Spirit” remixed by Lakker, Throwing Shade, Killing Sound++
Last October Aisha Devi released her shamanic electronic debut LP “Of Matter And Spirit” on Houndstooth and on March 18 it will be subjected to the remix treatment from the likes of Lakker, Throwing Shade, Killing Sound ft. Rider Shafique & Bogues, and Mind:Body:Fitness. Dummy, Electronic Beats, Zweikommasieben, and Mixmag have been kind enough to share the streams below and Resident Advisor has already given it a 4.2/5 review!
Devi premiered her live A/V show ft. Tianzhuo Chen at Berghain for CTM on Feb.4 to an ecstatic full house. Juno Download had to say this about it:
Aisha Devi, ever the show woman, delivered a dynamic live performance of rich vocal chants that rode high over her esoteric arrangements of electronics danced to on stage by Chinese Butoh dancer Beio, truly mesmerising. Featuring the support of Tianzhuo Chen’s visuals of avant-garde psychedelia too, what we saw referenced an array of religious symbolism; Magick, Sadhu ritualism, androgynous clowns and dwarves. It’s not often you witness something like this.
She recently supported Oneohtrix Point Never, including his sold out show at Heaven in London, and played a string of dates in Munich, Prague, Budapest, Amsterdam, Ghent, and Lyon. Devi will appear at these Spring events + much more TBA very soon:
3/25 Geneva, CH – Electron Festival @ Rez
3/27 Cervia, IT – Modulo Festival preview
4/9 Bordeaux, FR – Les Semaine Digitale @ Le Rocher de Palmer
4/15 Mannheim, DE – Jetztmusik
5/21 Brighton, UK – The Great Escape: The Quietus @ St. GeorgesNow booking live and live A/V shows: brandon [at] lb-agency.net
Lakker’s “Struggle & Emerge” out May 13 on R&S – stream ‘Maeslantskering Gating’
Lakker will release “Struggle & Emerge”, an 8 track EP following last Summer’s “Tundra” LP, via R&S on May 13. The material was commissioned by the Netherlands Institute of Sound & Vision’s RE:VIVE archival remixing project, with the task of representing “Dutch and water”.
R&S describe it as “a tense soundtrack to the machine driven mid-20th century that captures the complex relationship between the Dutch and the water that surrounds them – unyielding, colossal, industrial.” Get the full details via FACT and stream the lead track below.
Lakker’s “Struggle & Emerge” A/V show will debut at REWIRE in The Hague on April 2.
Now booking live, live A/V, and DJ sets: brandon [at] lb-agency.net
Samuel Kerridge’s “Fatal Light Attraction” out now – full stream via The Wire
Samuel Kerridge debuted his “Fatal Light Attraction” A/V show last August at Berlin Atonal, with the custom light set up by Andrej Boleslavský and Mária Júdová, and together they flayed all those in it’s gargantuan path. Now finally, the recorded material is out for your listening punishment via Downwards and The Wire are streaming it in full here.
The Quietus review sums of its spirit nicely: No longer are we cocooned in drones of sinking sand, instead every element is locked into a demonic groove, circling, taunting and enticing the listener to become a part of this obscenity.
Kerridge has a brand new infernal mess of a mix out on XLR8R and his recent Boiler Room Berlin DJ set is causing quite a few heads to turn, and keep turning…
“Fatal Light Attraction” A/V is confirmed for Artefact Festival in Leuven, BE on Feb.28 and SAVE Festival in Moscow on Mar.7 with more dates TBA soon. Samuel is also generally available for live and DJ sets, as is his new live soundtrack piece narrated by Taylor Burch of DVA Damas entitled “The Mysertious Other” after Jean Cocteau, which premiered at LiveSoundtracks in Barcelona on Jan.19 and can be presented as a performance, screening, or installation in theaters, galleries, and exhibitions. brandon [at] lb-agency.net
Littlebig welcomes Fis to the fold
New Zealand born, Berlin-based, Oliver Peryman a.k.a. Fis, was ushered on to the global stage by Tri Angle Records in 2013 with two outstanding EPs hot on the heels of his 2012 Samurai Horo debut.
London’s Loopy have released his debut LP “The Blue Quicksand is Going Now” this past May to critical acclaim. Of the album, The Wire had to say:
… it’s exultant. As before, the crudest of percussive motions hobble forward underneath it all, bits of driftwood clacking in the mistral, like the furthest extremes of that heavily compressed hip-slop style from the likes of Brainfeeder. Here, the roof is ripped off and above are the deepest skies. Sonic glimmers with long tails duck and weave through the haze as Fis fuses claustrophobia and vertigo into the same sensation. Groundless sounds, neither up or down.
Peryman commanded the main stage at Berlin Atonal in both 2014 and 2015 with masterful A/V shows, and he was most recently a stand out surprise guest at Unsound last month. There’s no lack of love for his live shows as evinced by these reviews in The Guardian, The Quietus, and Electronic Beats.
Fis is set to take on 2016 with an exciting new EP and brand new collaborative performance, details both TBA very soon! Now booking live and DJ sets: brandon [at] lb-agency.net
Samuel Kerridge’s ‘Fatal Light Attraction’ LP out Jan. 2016 on Downwards
Samuel Kerridge returns to Downwards in January 2016 with a mean third LP, ‘Fatal Light Attraction’ featuring seven tracks composed for his debut A/V performance of the same name at Berlin Atonal in 2015. The show was conceived together with Andrej Boleslavský and Mária Júdová who controlled an audio-responsive system of live coding, triggering an array of frenetic light bursts around Kerridge which projected his massive silhouette in a dance across the whole expanse of the immense Kraftwerk location.
Eomac previews Bedouin release and drops Electronic Explorations mix
Following his “Frozen Souls” EP for Inner Surface in May, which can be streamed in full via FACT, Eomac is hard at work on his exciting new project for Bedouin – check the previews on his Soundcloud.
His second mix for Electronic Explorations went live in August and showcases his expansive musical knowledge and skillful blending across genres. Get some insight into his work as 1/2 of Lakker in his latest interview for Data Transmission.
He just performed at the Stroboscopic Artefacts showcase in London at Village Underground and will be joining them again at Berghain for a live set later this month as well as upcoming sets including Concrete in Paris.
Aisha Devi’s debut LP ‘Of Matter And Spirit’ announced for October release on Houndstooth
Aïsha Devi follows last month’s ‘Conscious Cunt’ EP (stream here), re-examining contemporary portrayals of femininity, with her debut LP ‘Of Matter And Spirit’ on Fabric’s Houndstooth this October. The album takes its name and inspiration from the book by her grandfather, a CERN physicist, with whom she’d conversed deeply on the topics of “sound, vibrations, and the parallels between physics and spirituality.” Furthering her personal practice of and interest in meditation, mantras, shamanism, and healing frequencies she is aiming to “trigger a social and spiritual awareness through music” with the album. Stream lead track ‘Mazda’ below. “It’s about burning the ego and finding inner peace. It’s a meta love song.”
Now booking new live show: brandon [at] lb-agency.net
Holly Herndon Autumn tour dates announced
Holly Herndon’s universally lauded sophomore album ‘Platform’ released May 19 via 4AD / RVNG has tapped directly into the Zeitgeist – the conversation around how we construct and protect our online identities and the communities we build to design our collective future has never been more present in art and the world. After sold out launch shows at XOYO and Berghain and festival appearances including Sonar this Summer Herndon’s ever-evolving ‘Platform’ A/V live experience has a fully booked tour this Autumn with more dates soon to be announced.
Selected Reviews
Pitchfork give ‘Platform’ Best New Music 8.7:
‘Platform’ may turn out to be the most thought-provoking experimental electronic music release of the year.
The Guardian 4/5: gloriously avant garde and fiercely inventive.
The Quietus: this album feels genuinely new.Selected Interviews
The Guardian: Queen of Tech-topia
Pitchfork: Fix The Future
The Fader: 10 Radical Ideas
BBC Radio 6 w/ Maryanne Hobbs
SPIN: Trying To Find New WaysUpcoming tour dates
14/08/15 – Øya Festival, Oslo, NO
15/08/15 – Only Connect Festival, Oslo, NO (Talk)
20/08/15 – Kampnagel Summerfest, Hamburg, DE
17/09/15 – Dublin Fringe @ Spiegeltent, Dublin, IE
02/10/15 – Denovali Fest, Essen, DE
03/10/15 – ZKM, Karlsruhe, DE
09/10/15 – L-Ektrica, Rome, IT
10/10/15 – roBOt, Bologna, IT
15/10/15 – Unsound, Krakow, PL
23/10/15 – Liverpool Music Week, Liverpool, UK
24/10/15 – Simple Things, Bristol, UK
04/11/15 – Illuminations @ Oval Space, London, UK
06/11/15 – Club2Club, Turin, Italy
29/11/15 – All Tomorrow’s Parties, Prestatyn, UKNow booking 2016 festivals and special events: brandon [at] lb-agency.net