S C K E – ‘Disclosure’

Following several months of heel dragging, I’m finally very pleased to announce that S C K E’s Disclosure cassette (and digital sibling) is now available. Ben will be receiving his half of the press in the ensuing days, so if you live yonder the Midlands, you can pester him directly.

Ben’s been garnering a lot of airplay round these parts recently. From the moment that Henry sent me a copy of the Nacht und nebel / W>A>S>P>S 7″, I was predictably hooked. Whatever the approach, project, name or equipment used, Ben has an unfathomable ability to eek out a poignancy that draws the listener in: An ice-melting presence in sound, cascading notions of sublimity. Quite the knack, that. Quite the knack indeed.

In case you missed it, only a couple of months ago Steve Cammack showed that the rest of the south west also loves all things Hallatt related. (Highly advised listening!)

So what do we have with Disclosure? We have a finely crafted and exquisitely mixed cassette of vintage synth action. Nominal motions are engaged to maximum effect as we are warmed, dried out and set alight over the course of some 43 minutes or there abouts. I’ll leave the write-ups for the critics, but this is certainly one to be enjoyed alone in a dimly lit room, possibly with a scotch based cocktail for company.

Disclosure comes on a black cassette, if you are that way inclined. A sleeve (designed by Ben) is served in a ‘distressed’ manner inside a matching red case. There’s also a little card in there from little ol’ us with the increasingly over-zealous stamp/type/tape triage.

Wrap up.

Redacted enunciations

Big Uke

With summer’s bleach poured, some bluer hues were found tied off and adrift somewhere near the border line between South and West Yorkshire, possibly between Penistone and Denby Dale.

They followed me home, and I looked after them for forty minutes before they suddenly expired. They showed signs of life, briefly (twice more) thereafter, but ultimately petered out shortly after.

Circumnavigating the soul

“Yoghurt in houmous? Seriously? Weird.” That was my response last night when ordering some food in a Mediterranean restaurant. It worked out well though, as they gave us loads of extra stuff for free. Even still, why would you do that to houmous? Madness.

Anyhow, today is the day where we commemorate the North. To be less partisan, SLI have even encouraged some southern people to come and entertain us with their sounds, so everyone can come and enjoy a diverse range of accents and sounds. Marvellous.

Here is something I recorded this week. God knows what was going through my mind, but I seem to have been overcome by the  devotional residential estates surrounding me, from Springwood to Blackley. Or something. There’s also some electronic sheep floating up to heaven in the background, I swear. They took ages to ascend. I don’t know whether they had a lot of questions to answer at the gates, or whether their cud levels were higher than desirable for the standard metaphysical escalation.

All eight physical copies are shoddily made, constructed from leftovers, with the discs having been sprayed a thematic blue and they’re not strictly real.

Out for Christmas, #1 spot, TOTP etc.

Where textus became textus and how I operated within (on the fabulously named We’re gonna get fuckin’ drunk tonight boys) and Silvered alumnus (on the exquisite Armed Within Movement) are fresh out of the blocks. It’ll be a head-to-head race to the number one spot, but only one of ’em can make it.

The former comprises a series of woven sounds recorded over a finite period of time, all mixed together. There’s a contact mic’d recording of an aeroplane, bowed ukulele, feedback clusters, synthesisers and tapes to boot. In fairness, although this might seem excessive and overwrought, these unfold and overlap of over the forty minute duration of the cdr. It mixes the most claustrophobic and expansive sounds that I could eek out of my tools.

The latter is an altogether different beast, albeit working within similar stylistics. The A side presents an unpicking of one tape loop, stretching it and compressing it, melting it and firing pure square waves right to the core. Dreams of the inner mechanics of magnetism etc., while the B side sticks back together one long evening (sort of) tonal work out. It is re-narrated arbitrarily, and mixed with the darkness of the Huddersfield night sky (I would have mixed the snow from the monument on the cover into it too, but it had melted several months before.)

I’m dead proud to have released these on such ace labels, and they’re cheap as chips too, so see if you can make you pennies stretch that far and send them to the top of the Christmas drone charts.

Catching up, post-ha(s)te

Prepping for Extreme Rituals, I made time [I did not “make time”] to create the ‘Ancient Western Hebrews’ End of fun 3″, as promised.

Also, I have created eleven copies of a mysterious c36 (by ‘Petals’,) Thread dome. The b side of this tape is on the Ilse’s benefit compilation which I urge you to buy. The a side is weird analogue electronics and tape crumble. Dead happy with this one.

Both will be available from 29/11. Oh, and SLI will have the remaining copies of the Daniel Thomas & Kevin Sanders collaborative cdr, which has received praise at both Radio Free Midwich and Idwal Fisher.

Whether to drown (SLI.009)

Leeds’ label du jour, Sheepscar Light Industrial, have just released a new batch of 3″ cdrs into the world. Aqua Dentata, Andy Jarvis and Petals have all had the industrial treatment: collect ’em all!

You can buy the physical beauties, digital files and even stream ’em here. I have a wedge of Petals’ Whether to drown discs which can be purchased or traded with myself. Contact me at kevinjsanders@gmail.com. For fans of ecstatic synths and grumpy violins, creepy electronics and the future ghost of Rick Wakeman.

Ending in reverse

So, that was a fun two weeks off work. There was Supernormal, as described in the previous post. It really was super. The Bang the Bore crew held fast and made everything ace. And boozy.

Then there was a wedding in London. Not just any wedding, but the marriage of James (and now Michelle) Shaikh. Epic dances to Talking Heads led to bruised shins, amongst other things. And a hangover, obviously. (Big thanks to Matt and Faye Adams for putting up with me for so many days, too.)

Then I went to Whitby to stay in a Bram Stoker / Dracula themed room overlooking the Abbey and the sea. That was very nice. And Sandsend is a lovely place to wander to if you’re ever in the vicinity.

Then my brother was over, so we had a family get together, which was fun. And involved more booze.

Aside from such dalliances, I managed to record about 10 new sessions. Below is a limited tape which documents a minor portion of this. There will be more though, including a collaboration with Sheepscar Light Industrial‘s main man, Daniel Thomas. This will be a 50+ minute cdr which will be available from next weekend. It is also excellent, and took literally hours to bloom from seed to fruit.

Oh, and my twitter account was attacked by some wormy, tacky crap, so if you received any DMs from me containing a link, or anything like “wtf”, “omg” etc, just delete it. I didn’t send it. Apologies, and all that.

Making a story history

Following the exquisite birthday bash of Mr. Pete Cann and the excellent photojournalism of Team Radio Free Midwich that documented it, I have decided to show your ears what I did. Or what intended to do. [Photo credit: Rob Hayler]

This was recorded on March 18th 2012 as a ‘practice’ of the set up.

Unjoy.

Live: John Butcher & Gino Robair (duo), Paul Hession (solo), Seth Cooke, Clive Henry & Kevin Sanders (trio)

Left Bank, Leeds: John Butcher, Gino Robair & Paul Hession
Line up: John Butcher & Gino Robair (duo), Paul Hession (solo), Seth Cooke, Clive Henry & Kevin Sanders (trio)

8pm – 11pm, Thursday 3rd May 2012
Left Bank, Cardigan Road, Leeds, LS6 1LJ
£8.00 on the door or from bangthebore.org
Tickets available with 10% booking fee from Jumbo Records, Leeds

Bang the Bore is proud to present its first concert in Leeds, in conjunction with the Left Bank arts centre – three improvisers of world renown, playing in one of Leeds’ most visually and sonically evocative venues.

CLICK HERE TO SHOW FULL EVENT INFORMATION

John Butcher
Winner of the 2011 Paul Hamlyn Foundation award for his work as a composer, John Butcher has arguably achieved more than any other contemporary saxophonist in redefining the limitations of the instrument and extending the contexts in which it can find relevance. Through free improvisation, open composition, multi-tracked studio experiments, use of feedback and site specific performances that exploit the acoustic idiosyncrasies of unique environments he has broadened the range of the instrument into previously unheard territories of timbre, polyphony and resonance. Over the last thirty years he has played with AMM, Derek Bailey, Polwechsel, Fred Frith, John Stevens, The Ex, Christian Marclay and hundreds more; at Left Bank he’ll be playing in a duo with Gino Robair.
www.johnbutcher.org.ukGino Robair
Improviser, percussionist and composer Gino Robair has performed and recorded with many of the most consistently adventurous musicians working today, including Tom Waits, John Zorn, Anthony Braxton, Fred Frith and Terry Riley. His opera, I, Norton, has been performed throughout North American and Europe; he has composed for the ROVA Saxophone Quartet, gamelan, MTV, Comedy Central and the CBS animated series The Twisted Tales of Felix the Cat; and he is one of the ‘twenty five innovative percussionists’ included in the book Percussion Profiles (SoundWorld, 2001). At Left Bank he’ll be improvising on percussion and electronics, describing his strategies and equipment ‘energised surfaces’ and ‘voltage made audible.’
ginorobair.comPaul Hession
Free drummer Paul Hession has perhaps done more to expand local interest in improvised music than anyone else in Leeds, whether as curator the much missed Termite Club, organiser of the Improvised Music Workshop or founder of Improvised Music Leeds. The breadth of his collaborators is equally inspiring, including Peter Brötzmann, Squarepusher, Evan Parker, Lol Coxhill, Otomo Yoshihide, Marshall Allen, Derek Bailey, Alan Wilkinson, Mick Beck and Harry Pussy’s Bill Orcutt. At Left Bank he’ll be performing solo on percussion and electronics.
softdrum.comSeth Cooke & Clive Henry
Seth Cooke and Clive Henry have been collaborating for the last eight years in ensembles including Hunting Lodge, Masterly! & Farewell, the A Band, Hákarl and the BtBarbershop Quartet. They’re also the founding members and self-described janitors of the Bang the Bore collective. Seth plays drums for UltraHumanitarian and Defibrillators and performs and records solo under his given name and as Ganbatte. Clive now performs and records under his given name after years of activity as Little Creature, runs the Journal of the Belgae Folk Club label and plays as part of Boduf Songs’ touring band.
soundcloud.com/seth-cooke
clivehenry.orgKevin Sanders
Kevin Sanders relentlessly performs and records solo and in collaborations under his Petals moniker, releasing his work on the Beartown and Striate Cortex labels as well as his own Hairdryer Excommunication imprint. His various modus operandi include mixing any combination of vocals, electronics, field recording and amplified/treated objects.
hairdryerexcommunication.wordpress.com

bangthebore.org
leftbankleeds.org.uk

//

Tickets purchased via PayPal can be collected on the door on the evening of the show. Make sure to include the full name of the purchaser.

Time waster

I waste time. As a hobby. I waste time. I waste time. As a hobby. I waste time. I waste time. As a hobby. I waste time. I waste time. As a hobby. I waste time. I waste time. As a hobby. I waste time. I waste time. As a hobby. I waste time. I waste time. As a hobby. I waste time. I waste time. As a hobby. I waste time. I waste time. As a hobby. I waste time. I waste time. As a hobby. I waste time. I waste time. As a hobby. I waste time. I waste time. As a hobby. I waste time. I waste time. As a hobby. I waste time. I waste time. As a hobby. I waste time.I waste time. As a hobby. I waste time. I waste time. As a hobby. I waste time.