From London’s Vortex:
Exotic Pylon Festival
Thur 22 | 8.30pm
Old Apparatus
Old Apparatus are a powerful and mysterious East London audio-visual collective releasing unpredictable, ambitious and strange music on Mala’s Deep Medi label. “A complex but still highly accessible synthesis of elements drawn from dubstep, hip-hop, industrial, drone and avant-electronics – imagine Mount Kimbie by way of Kevin Drumm.” (FACT Magazine).
Fri 23 | 8.30pm
Roly Porter
Roly Porter was best known as half of the almost-legendary production duo Vex’d who were crucial in the development of the dubstep sound whilst operating under a much broader and more ambitious sonic manifesto.
Last year Roly returned with his extraordinary debut album Aftertime, blending his command of heavy textural depth with a refined, almost classical compositional skill. Truly intense.
An extraordinarily powerful live act, Cindytalk operate in an entirely improvisatory zone. Cinder, Dan Knowler, Paul Middleton, Gary Jef and Jacob Burn, dissolve genre boundaries in a genuinely original way creating a space of free noise, further distinguished by their ability to move from savage elegance to melancholy poetry in the blink of an eye.
Sat 24 | 7.00pm
Cut Hands
2011’s most staggering eruption – Whitehouse mainman William Bennett emerged with a hugely visceral and equally meditative album, Afro Noise, which combined electronics with percussive instruments from Ghana, the Congo and Haiti – a startling strange and towering achievement. Cut Hands live is a formidable prospect – prepare yourself for a powerful experience.
Dalglish
Chris Douglas has been making some of the most beautiful and strange electronic music of the last decade as exemplified on the utterly superb and undersung 2011 compilation, Benacah Drann Deachd.
This is an extremely rare chance to see Chris perform live, and an opportunity to savour what The Wire called some “of the most striking evocations of the life of the mind that you’re ever likely to hear”.
Ship Canal
Ship Canal is Daniel Baker. “Music For Burning Kebab Houses. Ghost Shops. Flash Mob Rioters with Rabies. Asbocore.” (Kid Shirt). Dole noise. Psychic damage-tech. “The grey concrete crunch of bastard techno and mangled dubstep and seventies TV filtered through damp plasterboard walls.” (Cows Are Just Food).
Wed 28 | 8.30pm £8
Alex Roth Trio
Drawing inspiration from modern guitar masters such as Ben Monder and Marc Ducret, the trio – Alex Roth (guitar), James Opstad (bass) and Simon Roth (drums), is dedicated exclusively to the performance of its leader’s original music, in which grooves, colours, forms and space mingle at the interstice of contemporary composition and improvisation.
Roller Trio
James Mainwaring (tenor saxophone and electronics), Luke Wynter (guitar) and Luke Reddin-Williams (drums), combine contemporary jazz and rock traditions in a blend of conventional and experimental sounds, comprising groovy riffs, thrashy noise and electronic soundscapes.
Thur 29 | 8.30pm £10
Foxes Fox
Launching the ‘Live at the Vortex’ CD. Evan Parker (saxophone), Louis Moholo (drums), Steve Beresford (piano) and John Edwards (double bass).
Avant Music News 