just when you thought i'd be updating once a month, here's a quick update from sydney, where i am being hosted by my new friend and great musician kate carr and her partner tanya.
i had to leave the house in castlemaine around 7am on 10th to drop off the keys to the i.c.u. and then catch the train to melbourne, then got the bus to the airport and printed off my boarding pass. then just checking with one of the virgin australia staff found out there was something up with my flight, as i was booked to fly at 12pm and the pass said 3pm! on complainingi found my flight had been cancelledand although put onstandby for the 2pm flight, had to take the 3pm, which got to me brisbane around 5:15pm. a frantic taxi ride got me to the venue i was performing in at around 6pm. thankfully the excellent sound engineer was ready and we got soundchecked super quick. so th show kicked off at 7 and i played at around 7:10, tentatively at first and then hitting my stride and giving the merzbow fans some melody mixed with more gritty textures and tones! i hope they liked it, although i didn't have too many adoring fans worshipping me afterwards...cured pink followed me, with motors affixed to industrial ducts moving around the audience, and then settling into a gently throbbing spacerock section - nice. a short break and then the man himself (merzbow) proceeded to blast everyone with a caustic set of white noise that was actually a processing of a self-made tin pan instrument played most of the time with a pasta scoop! i sat on the floor to soak up the low frequencies, and made sure my earplugs were rammed in, but even with that precaution my left ear was ringing for a while afterwards!
following the show lawrence english, who kindly added me to the bill, masami and i went to eat dinner - salt and pepper tofu, a mushroom hotpot and steamed greens - delicious! we were then joined by andrew, the driving force behind cured pink, and as masami and lawrence are not drinkers, when they decided to call it a night, i headed to 'the brunswick' with andrew and a couple of friends. it seems this is the place to go on a thursday night, and once again karaoke was on the menu. some great performances, including a rendition of ac/dc's 'back in black' from a guy who looked like thursday night karaoke might be the only time he left the house, and amazingly men at work's 'down under'! seemingly without too much irony!! what a night!
i stayed in a lovely room at the judith wright centre, where the event was hosted, so the following day headed into the city centre to have a wander around. i actually ended up at goma museum of modern art and spent quite a bit of time there.
later on i met with lawrence once again for food (mexican, which was pretty good) and then hung around to see the concert he had arranged. a very nice night and met loadsof very nice people, including greg hooper,who i met the following day for a japanese gyoza lunch. yep, talking great food again!!
we then parted company and i headed to the train station to catch my overnight train (which turned out to be a 3 hour bus ride and then a 12 hour train ride) to sydney.
i must have got more sleep than i thought i had, because all yesterday i actually felt quite fresh! kate had her mum visiting so i killed 4 hours by walking around sydney, stumbling over the opera house within the first hour of being there! after a bit more meandering and a spot of breakfast (the most expensive bacon and eggs i think i have ever had) i met up with kate and tanya, had a spot of lunch and headed back down to the harbour to visit the art museum in sydney, mainly as they had marclay's 'the clock' playing. some really great work there, but only catching 15 minutes of the clock i realised i need to go back and see it for a longer period....
amazing thai food (crispy basil pork belly - mmmm...) and then a couple of beers and not surprisingly i slept really well!!
today instead of going back tothe museum, i headed to chinatown for lunch, darwin harbour for a coffee and people watch, and a walk back through an area of outdoor supplies stores looking for a replacement soft shell and not finding anything under $200 australian. i think i'll stick with the one i have...
Sunday 13 May 2012
Tuesday 8 May 2012
Buenos Aires - La Plata - a 2 day journey + a lost day - Castlemaine
updates are going to be more infrequent as the trip progresses i have realised, mainly because i am flat out busy all the time it seems!!
when i last wrote i was preparing for the performance at alianza francesa in buenos aires with my good friends alan (anla) courtis, juan jose calarco and alma laprida. however i completely missed out the presentation i gave on wednesday 25th at the cia, where we had a room full to bursting of people who listened attentatively to my history, thoughts and work... thanks to florencia and julia at cia, alan and fabiana for making it happen. i had to leave very quickly afterwards with jj and alma to play for a radio station based in buenos aires, which was kind of fun although i couldn't hear a thing through the guitar amp monitor.
the following night i ran a listening workshop from my buddy fernando perales's house - i had 3 participants, which was actually the perfect number for the exercises we did. we spent some time listening to the street from different positions on the roof of the building, then visited a nearby square where the locals were playing what looked like skittles, then tried to record some small detailed sound in the streets of buenos aires, which at 8pm in the evening is a very difficult thing to do! thanks to fernando for setting it up, and he and his partner rosa for feeding me that evening!
the friday alan and i arrived early in the afternoon to set up for the concert, then he had to go to work for a couple of hours, and alma and juan jose then set up and sound checked. and it turned out we had a 'green room' where we had snacks, juice, water, and most importantly 2 bottles of wine! thanks to leandro of mamba for that - much appreciated! we had a good sized crowd, and played in a new configuration of the 'active crossover' method of working, so we all played solo sets of around 15 minutes, but overlapped - so juanjo played first, followed by alma, then me, with alan closing - with an excellent bit of screaming into a netbook! after this we hit a pizza place and i had my first proper argentinian pizza - delicious, but so think with cheese i thought i was going to have a heart attack while eating it!!!
saturday i was invited to fernando's once again, this time to try asado - which consisted of chorizo and blood sausage as an entree, and then a huge piece of pork and an even bigger piece of beef, with ribs, and roasted potatoes - absolutely amazing, and i could hardly move afterwards!!
and then alan turned up to take me to retiro (the main bus and train station in buenos aires) to meet jj and alma, and then we headed to la plata, a nearby city, to play in the back room of the great store 'mal de muchas'. jose de diego and cristian carracedo kicked off with sub-bass and scraping metal object on turntable action - a very nice 15 miniute set that entranced the audience, then the four of us once again played a solo set with overlaps session, with alma starting with great performative gestures, then alan blasting everyone's eardrums with white noise, then me and juan jose finishing up in his elegant understated way. i felt the energy was much better than the previous night, even though everyone else felt their set was worse...
and then the dreaded day arrived - i had not only to leave argentina, but also had a 50+ hour journey ahead of me... taxi to the shuttle bus, then to the airport in buenos aires, a flight to santiago, chile; a flight to toronto, canada; an 8 hour wait in toronto airport; a flight to vancouver; a 6 hour wait in vancouver; a flight to sydney, australia; a 4 hour wait in sydney airport; a flight to melbourne; a 2 hour wait in melbourne airport; a bus trip of around an hour and a half to castlemaine... then met by jude and krista of punctum, who showed me to where i am staying while here, and then the space i will be working in (icu).
the lost day in the title refers to me crossing the international date line so i actually arrived in australia a day later than i thought i would!
so far here i have explored the route to and from the house to the icu; been visited by eamon sprod (aka tarab); met another collaborator - jacques soddell - who will kindly be supplying the speaker system for the installation also; visited melbourne with eamon, where i met his lovely family, partner emily and daughter helki; played a show at tape projects alongside tarab himself, jesse scott & alice hui-sheng chang and tim catlin - a fantastic sunday afternoon - evening event that was a pleasure to be part of.
thanks eamon for everything!
and also got to catch up briefly with teresa lane, whom i met in tallin, estonia in 2009 when i was artist-in-residence at the polymer factory.
yesterday (7th may) eamon and i headed back to castlemaine - after some delicious indonesian food for lunch/brunch - to record more material in the icu for our performance and installation pieces. the highlight was a point where i was bowing a metal dustpan with a violin bow and eamon was doing the same with the large round base of a metal post, with a thin rod of metal, creating some incredible tones that bounced around and filled the space - thankfully we have both recorded it so will have to hear the results and maybe combine them!
today lizzie pogson, the fourth collaborator for 'active crossover: seedpod', came to castlemaine from trentham and took us to the dredger near maldon: http://www.maldon.org.au/attractions/DD.html which we had to clamber along rusty cables to get to, but was a playground for the three of us for a good couple of hours!! thanks lizzie!
on returning i managed to get my laundry done - i was completely out of underwear!! - and purchase the next travel book - 'the diceman', which looks pretty dark, but will be a good follow on from 'the adventures of sherlock holmes' which i have enjoyed over the last month of plane flights - although towards the end i couldn't help thinking 'surely you can see where this is going, watson.... even i can!'... still, i love the way conan doyle describes both holmes and 19th century london...
when i last wrote i was preparing for the performance at alianza francesa in buenos aires with my good friends alan (anla) courtis, juan jose calarco and alma laprida. however i completely missed out the presentation i gave on wednesday 25th at the cia, where we had a room full to bursting of people who listened attentatively to my history, thoughts and work... thanks to florencia and julia at cia, alan and fabiana for making it happen. i had to leave very quickly afterwards with jj and alma to play for a radio station based in buenos aires, which was kind of fun although i couldn't hear a thing through the guitar amp monitor.
the following night i ran a listening workshop from my buddy fernando perales's house - i had 3 participants, which was actually the perfect number for the exercises we did. we spent some time listening to the street from different positions on the roof of the building, then visited a nearby square where the locals were playing what looked like skittles, then tried to record some small detailed sound in the streets of buenos aires, which at 8pm in the evening is a very difficult thing to do! thanks to fernando for setting it up, and he and his partner rosa for feeding me that evening!
the friday alan and i arrived early in the afternoon to set up for the concert, then he had to go to work for a couple of hours, and alma and juan jose then set up and sound checked. and it turned out we had a 'green room' where we had snacks, juice, water, and most importantly 2 bottles of wine! thanks to leandro of mamba for that - much appreciated! we had a good sized crowd, and played in a new configuration of the 'active crossover' method of working, so we all played solo sets of around 15 minutes, but overlapped - so juanjo played first, followed by alma, then me, with alan closing - with an excellent bit of screaming into a netbook! after this we hit a pizza place and i had my first proper argentinian pizza - delicious, but so think with cheese i thought i was going to have a heart attack while eating it!!!
saturday i was invited to fernando's once again, this time to try asado - which consisted of chorizo and blood sausage as an entree, and then a huge piece of pork and an even bigger piece of beef, with ribs, and roasted potatoes - absolutely amazing, and i could hardly move afterwards!!
and then alan turned up to take me to retiro (the main bus and train station in buenos aires) to meet jj and alma, and then we headed to la plata, a nearby city, to play in the back room of the great store 'mal de muchas'. jose de diego and cristian carracedo kicked off with sub-bass and scraping metal object on turntable action - a very nice 15 miniute set that entranced the audience, then the four of us once again played a solo set with overlaps session, with alma starting with great performative gestures, then alan blasting everyone's eardrums with white noise, then me and juan jose finishing up in his elegant understated way. i felt the energy was much better than the previous night, even though everyone else felt their set was worse...
and then the dreaded day arrived - i had not only to leave argentina, but also had a 50+ hour journey ahead of me... taxi to the shuttle bus, then to the airport in buenos aires, a flight to santiago, chile; a flight to toronto, canada; an 8 hour wait in toronto airport; a flight to vancouver; a 6 hour wait in vancouver; a flight to sydney, australia; a 4 hour wait in sydney airport; a flight to melbourne; a 2 hour wait in melbourne airport; a bus trip of around an hour and a half to castlemaine... then met by jude and krista of punctum, who showed me to where i am staying while here, and then the space i will be working in (icu).
the lost day in the title refers to me crossing the international date line so i actually arrived in australia a day later than i thought i would!
so far here i have explored the route to and from the house to the icu; been visited by eamon sprod (aka tarab); met another collaborator - jacques soddell - who will kindly be supplying the speaker system for the installation also; visited melbourne with eamon, where i met his lovely family, partner emily and daughter helki; played a show at tape projects alongside tarab himself, jesse scott & alice hui-sheng chang and tim catlin - a fantastic sunday afternoon - evening event that was a pleasure to be part of.
thanks eamon for everything!
and also got to catch up briefly with teresa lane, whom i met in tallin, estonia in 2009 when i was artist-in-residence at the polymer factory.
yesterday (7th may) eamon and i headed back to castlemaine - after some delicious indonesian food for lunch/brunch - to record more material in the icu for our performance and installation pieces. the highlight was a point where i was bowing a metal dustpan with a violin bow and eamon was doing the same with the large round base of a metal post, with a thin rod of metal, creating some incredible tones that bounced around and filled the space - thankfully we have both recorded it so will have to hear the results and maybe combine them!
today lizzie pogson, the fourth collaborator for 'active crossover: seedpod', came to castlemaine from trentham and took us to the dredger near maldon: http://www.maldon.org.au/attractions/DD.html which we had to clamber along rusty cables to get to, but was a playground for the three of us for a good couple of hours!! thanks lizzie!
on returning i managed to get my laundry done - i was completely out of underwear!! - and purchase the next travel book - 'the diceman', which looks pretty dark, but will be a good follow on from 'the adventures of sherlock holmes' which i have enjoyed over the last month of plane flights - although towards the end i couldn't help thinking 'surely you can see where this is going, watson.... even i can!'... still, i love the way conan doyle describes both holmes and 19th century london...
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