Ferry Gouw

Ferry Guow is an illustrator and visual artist from London famous for directing music videos and playing in good bands. I was fortunate enough to grab an interview with him in his adopted Kensington about tie ins with T-Shirt-Party, the state of the music industry and his recent (MTV video award nominated) work with Major Lazer that's now expanded into a television pilot for Cartoon Network.

You've just completed a tee for T-Shirt Party, how did you get involved in the project?

I have a feeling that Stan (Still creator of T-Shirt Party) is quite a stalker, laughs, I think if anyoneeven clicks like on the t-shirts, on Facebook, he's just immediately on them, like I said, I was already a fan from the get go, I thought it was a great idea, a great concept. You know surprisingly unpretentious and cheap I was really into that whole side of it. And I had been following it and following it, and finally cause I'd been watching all the t-shirts and all the designs. and finally they got they're website together and had that release party and jaguar shoes and I always thought that it was Daniel Freeman’s thing, a lot of people have been saying that so I turned up to the release party at Jaguar Shoes and Daniel was djing and I was like 'Oh man I’m a huge fan of your t-shirts' and I thought if I buy it hear straight from the guy then not only can I say hi personally but I'll save on postage and packaging. So I turned up and was like‘I love your t-shirts, can I get one?’ and he goes 'oh no this is not my thing' I'm like 'oh really, who's it?' he says 'actually I’ve never met him, I don't even know who this guy is'. In fact there was meant to be a projection today but the DVD broke and this morning I get a knock on my door and there's a DVD on the floor and some guy running down the street! So yeah from then I just said fuck it I’ll buy it online. And yeah I got it in the post and started wearing it, and a friend of mine took a photo of me wearing it on facebook and as soon as I did that...

He liked it?

Yeah! I think he got a sense that I was for real, and then out of the blue he just asked me if I wanted to do it, and you know I think I was telling my friend when I was taking the photo that it was my dream to design for this guy.

So it's a dream come true?

Yeah it's a dream come true, it's amazing. Literally the whole of last week, I gave up all these important deadlines and projects and actually did my t-shirt party design I stayed up till 5 in the morning, I was so excited.

Elgin Marbles Design for T-Shirt Party

So what was your inspiration behind the whole Elgin marbles thing?

I had an idea for a week, week and a half and was thinking about it. I dunno I was trying to get down with the whole urban wit and street whatever and I just had no authority over it, I just could carry it off as well as he could. I thought I shouldn't even try and compete with that world, I should try and see what London is to me. I was just looking up stuff online and I felt the Elgin marbles represented what 'London' is, especially for me coming abroad. it's part of the London history to go the British Museum and check it out, but this beautiful thing is also part of what you feel about London and Britain in general and there's this whole imperialism and this whole history of political rambling and all this darkness in its past.

It’s a little naughty

Yeah, and that is now embedded in what is actually beautiful and amazing about London, that fact that we can just go there and look at this thing but there's always that tinge of guilt and awkwardness and weirdness about it. But also that image in particular of this guy, almost kind of wrestling in a really sexual, gay kind of way with this half-horse, it’s also what is surreal about London as well. The whole thing just felt like a closer sentiment to what London is to me, rather than trying to compete with some kinda urban wit thing which I can't compete.

How did you get in art? How would you describe the art that you make?

I don't really have any agenda apart from what I’m interested in at that particular moment, like the Elgin marbles, that's just what I had in mind at that particular moment. I think that art is always an extension of who you are as a person, and where you are, your development as a person is reflective in what you do. So in that way I don't have an agenda or a concept outside of what I’m interested in at any particular moment of my life. I got into art also because that was a natural thing; I was going to go to business studies school or something, I didn’t want to stay in office and work every day.

I'd say one of the more striking influences with your work would be music, as you said before in that what you create is based on what's in front of you, are you quite inspired to create from the sounds around you?

Yeah, well I was always interested in music, but only started making music when I was at art school, started getting into bands and forming bands and making music that way. And then only recently I started recorded at home, so my grasp of that whole world has only slightly started becoming slightly more sophisticated in the past few years. But it's always an extension of some kind of bigger 'art', which is just another side of how I can express myself and express my interests, if I have interests that translate well to music I’ll do it that way or if it was a mixture of music and visuals I’d try to do it that way. It’s just a pocket of expression, you know what I mean? In the general spectrum of what I’m interested in. But it's in of itself, it's hard to explain but its part of the bigger thing. It also relates to other things, when I was doing this t-shirt, it was not just the t-shirt but also through the video. so in that way a lot of my projects relate to each other like with the Major Lazer stuff it has the print stuff, it has the cartoons, the whatever little toys. Some projects are more extended in that way, some are more just in of them self in that way.

Mazor Lazer - Hold The Line

It’s good how Mazor Lazer has kicked off, even though people do like Diplo, it's taken it to the next level, and part of the attraction of that is the visual aesthetic. Are you happy with what you did there, how did that come about?

Again it's almost as random as the TSP thing, I was hanging with my friends of mine at XL and Diplo was there recording the XX at that time and I was chatting to his manager and my friend was like 'oh yeah ferry is an illustrator' and I just did some drawings for them and they got it and they liked it. From the first few things I did for Major Lazer it seems like our relationship was working out really well, then they started trusting me with more Mad Decent projects, it kinda grew organically from there and now Cartoon Network has picked up Major Lazer as a TV show.

That’s amazing.

I’m working on the pilot now.

Cartoon Network in the USA or UK? That’s amazing.

Yeah USA! The Adult Swim side

Can you talk about the pilot?

Not in its details, I can talk about my role I’ll be creative director, I’m the main designer of all the characters and how it will look. thankfully I won't be sitting at home drawing it frame by frame the way I was doing before, I think they're going to give everything to an animation studio and then I’ll have minions of workers. It’s going to be so amazing, I cannot wait.

Is it going to be a full twenty minute show?

I think so, it's gonna be a series, it'll be a series, if it works out It'll be a series kinda like what I did with the video, a G.I. Joe type you know 80's. I can't wait for the toys, hopefully they'll be merch and all that side of things.

Mazor Lazer - Keep It Going Louder, collab between Gouw and Jason Miller

Are they gonna fly you out there?

No no, that would be more difficult it's actually easier they way it's work they set up this base camp thing, you can set up an online work flow thing, you can post designs and files and it get's e-mailed to everyone

Are you gonna do research for it?

I think it's gonna be mostly cartoons and comics based, just channel my inner 10 year old. Which is the most amazing thing about Major Lazer, I would draw this stuff when I was 12 on school notebooks and her I am getting paid for it.

Are you quite influenced by cartoons and comics then?

Yeah I was always a comic book fan ever since I was kid, never stopped reading comics. In fact, you know when people doodle and most people doodle nothing or penises, every time I doodle Spiderman or Wolverine or Venom.

That’s what comes out naturally?

Yeah, if I was to doodle and not think about anything it would just be dudes with muscles. and to do that and get paid and think of character designs and guns all that crap is so amazing. And Mad Decent and Diplo are the best people to do that stuff for because it's never crazy enough. If you started to draw, you know whatever a kid jumping off a cliff or something, it always end up with 'oh put that thing on a lion' or 'add a snake on it' shit like that. So the whole thing has been the most fun.



With your work for Major Lazer and with other bands, how are you influenced? Do you have an idea that you think would work well, you said Major Lazer give you ideas but how do you work that out?

That’s what's good about it, we seem to have an understanding on a very substantial level, where there can show me one thing and I’ll know exactly what they mean, and the missing element is just like a snake or something.

Is that the same for other bands and artist?

No, to varying degrees obviously; sometimes if things don't work out I’ll stop working with them. I don't want to do shit that I don't like or things that I’m not proud of. So things that don't work out, don't work out, things that do work out usually work out really well and I stay really close friends with them and I trust myself to do more with them, so In that way I've been really lucky.

Who else would you want to work with?, but you're working with Cartoon Network now, that would be enough for most people

It feels like working Roxy Music is pretty awesome, again that just feels totally out the of the blue, Bryan (Ferry)'s son just called me up when I was hanging out in the park, I didn’t know him he just found me and he was all 'do you want to come in and talk about the projections for Roxy Music' I was like 'err... okay!' and they trust me enough to slowly involved me in other things and hopefully it'll be a relationship that'll continue and I got a friend of mine involved and working on his album cover and layout. Everything just comes about organically, through relationships which always is the nicest way to go about it.

Might be a bit of dour note to end on but I feel for there's been a bit decline in the importance of music videos recently, have you been affected by that, do you feel that as well?

My relationship with music and the music industry is a weird one. I’m really happy that people trust me to do music videos and stuff, but with music especially the work I’m doing I have this weird idea that doing art and making money are two different and it's almost by miracle that people have been able to sell music. And in that way that with the advent of the internet is the true nature of music exposed which is, you know, if music is transference of ideas then ideas have no economic value. the economic value comes from withholding the ideas as opposed to the idea itself, but it's just that us as humans beings have to eat and that requires money and the withholding of ideas and become products and then the withholding of these products become currency. So I can see why the music industry is in trouble by trying to sell this product that has no inherent value, inherent economic value. It seems like with changes in anything you just adapt to it, if people don’t' have money to do big budget videos anymore there's always digital cameras. There’s all this technology to still do it on a much smaller scale and still achieve what previously needed tonnes of money to achieve. So in that way creatively I’m not that worried about that, because as long as there's creative people out there work will always be turned out. But whether or not people can eat or whether after the music videos made it'll make any money that's the real concern but that's not a concern for me. if you're actually interested in art or making anything that's artistic that should be just be a sideline thing, once your stomach starts grumbling, apart from that you just wanna be doing good shit. You can start worrying later.

ferrygouw.com

Read more

Fernando Sanchez

The internet's an amazing place to explore, to hide in and to thrive on, due it's ease of use and lack of central authority it's become a place for hundreds of different subcultures, perverse or innocent, to spread in their own way devoid of the usual social boundries. Los Angeles artist Fernando Sanchez is an observer of these niche groups, drawing a lens towards hip hop culture, the Wapanese, sports fans and keggers of yore in inventive ways, presenting them using mixed media and interactive approachs including film montages, photography collages, fake profiles and vlogger-esque monologue videos.


Normally I'd ask people what their background is, but looking at your website your education's all up there (incl a M.F.A in Design and Media Arts from the University of California) what did your art degree teach you?

-Erm... I got very familiar with the internet, so you can see I came from Design Media Arts, which is an art specific field. While I took classes in the great art department, doing conceptual work with them, our department kinda pushed new media down our throats, and while I was there I didn’t really wanna do that kinda work, I rebelled a lot against that style of work. But once I graduated it stayed with me, I didn’t realise I was so involved in new media. Upon graduating I can see it more loosely, I see it more relevant to my life, not really attached to any kind of entities, not really attached to the agendas of the school. So it was just being present and being aware of what's happening in arts and colleagues and peers. That’s what I gained from art school, just being aware.

How would you describe your work?

-I always tend to tell people it's very interdisciplinary, my whole approach to art has always been I do what I want. And the actual execution of how I do things or what medium I go to has never really concerned me. I usually try to do work that's slightly immediate, meaning that I don't have to necessarily learn a specific skill, my own work I would just consider it a hybrid interdisciplinary between pop culture, low brow or high brow.

1 Minute of Ass, 2007-2008
Composed from user-generated dance video. 60 Glicee prints, one for each second broken down by 25 frames

Looking at your work a lot of it feeds off user-generated content, with youtube or flickr, would things work without the internet?

-It would be really difficult, obviously there's a history of found art, you would consider it, but it's such a different ball game now that it's so available and apparent, it's just so in your face. It's such a common thing that most people do is to carry the information that they encounter on the internet it's become a sensibility. So as an artist I’m just trying to follow that sensibility and just isolate certain things.

A lot of looking at people who lead double lives and you yourself creating fake personas (for example the Myspace dream girl in Looking For Michelle and even the name Fernando Sanchez seeming like a Pornstar Pseudonym) do you find it easy to delve into this other world, of a different version of you?

-Of course, it starts between where I am as a normal user and where I am as an artist. I’ve created a lot of fake identities for several reasons, it's actually through work that I began to really experiment with the idea, you guys can see a certain train of thought between certain marketing tactics and how I started experimenting with all my personas. I think most of us could say that it's really easy for us to put on a persona online, if it doesn’t involve actually visualizing yourself when it stays to the written word. I think that's why so people talk shit on the internet as well. That level of consequence isn’t there.

That ties in with another part of your work, looking at different subcultures and looking how they've managed to breed and exist totally on the internet, because there's that lack of consequence. Do you look at these different subcultures due to curiousity, are you trying to critique it, break it down, what are you trying to do when you observe these little niche groups?

-I think like most artists, we start off with a general curiosity towards something, an inclination perhaps, and it probably just stems from my personality. For example with Bob, I was looking at Yellow Fever, and I was trying to find that specific niche and how to visualize that, and I came across Bob and I thought he was an amazing character so I didn’t know exactly what I wanted from him. I even went to meet him, I still have a video that I've yet to publish and I have vidoes and tape recordings of our conversations and so with that specifically I tried to be careful, especially if it's a central subject and one person, I try not to criticise them. I try to present the subject with a little sense of sensitivity. I'm not gonna be completely objective of course.

Fernando and Bob

With the Niggas project, I guess you could see it as a subcultural thing but for me it was interest of language, and the comedy behind it when you see all the people that use the word and in the third person to describe themselves. So you know it tickled me, I started gathering them and then it made other people laughed and then you added something.




With 9 Fans, I was specifically looking for an event that happens at the same time, so with each project I might have an idea an interest in a certain culture to find how that idea is executed or how I can gather that idea and execute it in consequence of culture. You know whether it niche groups, cultures, a song... so that's kinda how I work.

9 Fans (Super Bowl XLI Kickoff)
Nine video tape recordings of the same American football game by different people in different context, collected via YouTube

Rap music and culture always seems to be there with your work, especially on your music and writing, has it always been an influence?

-Most definitely, I grew up with rap music when I was a younger teen, and then I navigated away into other music, we took a 10 year separation. I think when I was 23/4, I listened to a range of music, but rap kept my ambition going, that whole bravado that it carries, I just didn’t want to hear Bob Dylan, I didn’t wanna hear softness I wanted to hear just barks and rants. I burned a lot of bridges while at school, I had all this bulldog anger right after graduating. I think it kinda matched my personality that whole bravado, trying to see if that energy in itself could be useful in someways. I’m not into it so much anymore but I still have a place for it.

As one of his more meta projects that worked off Fernando's love of hip-hop, the LA ART SUCKS blog saw Fernando assuming the role of a Chinese artist Los Angeles called Song Kwai Li, who spent most of him time either 'attending' gallery openings or complaining about the art and people behind them online. Unsuprisingly the blog attracted considerable attention, notably due to Song's calling out of several contentious and inherent aspects of the Califronian art scene and his half texted half rhymed delivery described by one commentor as an 'Asian Bukowski'... though that was just Fernando talking about himself.

Fernando on Song Kwai Li

The blog, started in 2007 and ended in 2008, may have died a death since then (and is now available as a limited edition book) I asked him about the current state of the art scene in LA, had anything changed?

-It’s most likely not gonna be different, it's something you can tune into or tune out, like the news, you can be aware of it or not. I mean it was for complaining, it more just to make it aware, just to get it out there. I presented that project in front of a crowd in LA, and someone who had been reading the blog said 'you know you basically just say the things that we all think'.

And the writing style, it had to be effective in that kinda grunt-like broken English. It's funny because I almost write like that now. Because our thoughts and our attention spans are so short.

Is it strange for me to ask you about this work, considering it's sometimes 3/4 years old, do you still connect with what you did?

-To tell you the truth, the personas with the rap and Song Kwai Li, I was slightly... yeah I wasn't satisfied with my work. You know I started seeing a lot of people doing similar things, especially with the internet, collections and groupings and just kinda gathering moments. I kinda told myself ‘it's gonna be the same thing why don’t I do something different'. And every time I would see my work I didn’t have the balls, the heart that I have inside me. It was really prickly intellectual, I was still thinking too much. And so with the rap and the writing I started really developing organically and currently for the last year I’ve been pursuing video monologue work and acting.

Actual acting?

-Yeah I’m in an actors studio, and it's given me a lot of ideas for different performative works. I’m gonna be doing a commissioned piece for Bas Jan Ader, he's a Dutch conceptual performance artist, so I’m gonna be doing some works for an opening, as a retrospective of his work.

I wanna work more organically, and when I look at the past, I like the ideas and I'm proud of them but at the same time it's an intellectual me, I’m just not trying to be as much.

Me and My Girlfriend, 2007

A compilation of scenes when people turn and look at the camera during their homemade porn videos - narcissexuals

So with acting and with one of your new projects where you've been editing yourself in pirated movies, what other work are you doing in 2010?

-Yeah I have about three of those that I haven't uploaded or published, I've got a residency, and then I've been rapping or rap/singing. I have a few new songs that I’ve been coming out with and a couple of new music videos, so I’ve mainly been doing that. First it started out as a project, but now I just like it.

Do you make music as well?

-No I can't make music, I just like writing the lyrics, and doing my thing

And are the music videos just for yourself?

-Yeah, just for myself, it's actually a really cool process because I get to write, I get to perform and I get to come up with an idea for a video. And I do some intro acting scenes, I like the whole packaging. I’m writing a screenplay at the moment, eventually I wanna do a movie.

I guess in LA that's the best place to do it...

-You know I've been ignoring it for a long time, because I've been living in this space and I've always ignored the acting, you know oh 'acting’s just a bunch of douchebags'.

It is quite cliché in Los Angeles though

-Yeah it is quite cliche, I've been offered a couple of supporting roles, just in graduate MFA thesis films and really small indie, part of the whole mumble core movement, not sure If you’ve heard of that...

Yeah, I remember hearing quite a lot about it, isn't it quite old now mumblecore? Is it a turn of last decade kinda thing or am I making that up?

-It probably started last decade but it's still straggling, it's still alive I guess.

It's still mumblin’

-It’s still mumblin’.

Dumb Dick Danglas Directors Cut

Born in Ciduad Juarez, Mexico in 1980, Fernando doesn't shy away from his immigrant heritage, descrbring the 'illegal' in him as a motivation for most of his artistic methodology.

Am I right to say you're an illegal immigrant or is that wrong information?

-Illegal? No... I'm legal now, it's just something I like telling people. I'm not really sure, I have all the documents, but if they were to put me into a room, I wouldn't say I got smuggled into the states, there's no reason for them to know how I got into the United States the fact is now I have all the documents.

I thought it was interesting, because I heard in the news recently about Arizona and how they've had a curb on illegal immigrants, how does it feel having a person like yourself not being allowed into your country?

The thing with Arizona, I think it's just more blank out prejudice, which is just wrong. Just going after people that you suspect. It's good that I don't live in Arizona cause I dress like a cowboy sometimes, I look pretty authentic Mexican. It doesn't affect the way I feel, sometimes I worry for my Dad perhaps, I sympathise with people more I feel, but with myself I'm more stable. I feel like an American, so I don't really associate that much with it.

A lot of Mexican Americans have an interesting identity here in the states, like for myself the longest time I didn’t wanna speak Spanish when people spoke Spanish to me, I had this pride issue, like 'I'm American', but now I’m in charge of everything.


thankgodforconceptualart.com/
Read more

Mark Mcguire

Whether making up a third of ambient psych band Emeralds, collaborating with Oneohtrix Point Never, recording under his own name or several other guises Mark Mcguire is a guitarist characterised by his prolific output and Krautrock inspired drones; creating music that can equally veer off into the shimmering and epic or the sedate and sublime. I caught up with the Cleveland, Ohio native over a series of e-mails to talk about instruments, the creative process and bromances.


You’ve always been pretty prolific with your output, like you’re always creating, what’s changed in the way you perform and record in the 5 years since you started with Emeralds?

-I play music either with Emeralds or by myself almost everyday and am constantly recording, playing, and practicing. There’s so many jams to be made and things to be done I feel like I just have to keep working constantly, there’s no time to waste! All that has really changed since we started is that I’m able to focus a lot more, and I feel like our recordings are a lot more relaxed and becoming more ambitious. I think we’re realizing our potential more and more each year and trying to go for it even harder. I still feel like we’re just getting started.





What equipment, guitars/effects do you use to record?

-For the past five years, I’ve been playing a Gibson Les Paul Studio. I recently bought a new Fender Lonestar Stratocaster, and I’ve really been digging it, such a different feel and sound than the Les Paul. I run it through a cheap distortion, a cheap phaser, an even cheaper chorus and a couple delay pedals. I also use two different guitar-synthesizers.


How much of your work is improvised? Do you spend a lot of time honing sounds and tones or do you work more on melodies?


-A lot of times I’ll just get a riff or a rhythm or a concept or something in my head, and then next time I play I try to get that idea out. It usually ends up sounding way different than planned because once I start going it’s about 90% improvised. Sometimes I’ll have an idea so deep in my head that it comes out just the way I thought, which is nice too! I like to try lots of different methods of writing and composing. Some of my new stuff is a lot more composed and put together than usual, and I’m definitely gonna keep trying out different styles and structures in the future.




Your music seems to lend itself towards the more Berlin side of things, who are some of your favourite Krautrock bands?

-I think more obviously some of my favourites are the early and mid-period Popol Vuh records, and all the Manuel Gottsching and Ash Ra Tempel records, and Kraftwerk is definitely one of the best bands of all time, and TD and Schulze and all the classic greats. That is a really important time and place for music that I respect and admire very much, but to be honest I don’t really sit around listening to that stuff all of the time or anything. Like if I’m driving and I’m listening to something really far-out I get way too zoned and that can get dark! I’m always looking for new music to get into from all different areas of the spectrum.


You collaborate with Daniel Lopatin from Oneohtrix Point Never for your Skyramps project, how do you two influence each other?


-Dan is one of the people we’ve met through our band that we had an immediate connection with as far as musical kinship, and just in general as a dude. We get along really well and I think that’s one of the most important things when collaborating with someone artistically. Being comfortable enough to create something as naturally as if you were doing it alone, and it’s definitely like that with him. Sometimes I think he’s the reincarnation of my estranged first best friend from childhood, it’s cool like that.



You’re from Cleveland Ohio, how has the city influenced you?

-Cleveland is a very unique place to grow up. The Midwest in general is a really specific vibe but Cleveland is totally its own world. There’s a lot to be inspired by here. There’s a really beautiful parks system in Ohio, were right on Lake Erie, and we get a full dose of each season. So in that way there’s a positive charge. Cleveland is also a really poor city, with a lot of people out of work. Major companies have moved out, the Ford plant is hanging on by a string, East Cleveland is really violent and scary. The Cleveland crime rates are double the national average in pretty much every category, and the winters are eternally harsh. People are really depressed here and most of them don’t even know it. They think it’s how everyone feels but it’s really just dark! That’s the negative charge, but it’s also inspiring to want to escape the bleak reality you grew up in. I love Cleveland and it’s always going to be where I call home. But with that said, I can’t wait to get out of here and see the whole world.



Mark can be found online at mcguiremusic.blogspot.com and clevelandwagon.blogspot.com
Read more

Disaro

Disaro Records is a music label from Houston at the heart of the recent 'Witch House' movement. Acting as a Texan umbrella for the current batch of dark, electronic goth acts that mask themselves in pitch-shifted vocals and gloomy synths they've released CDRs, vinyl and cassettes by the likes of Salem, o0o00, White Ring, Modern Witch and Mater Suspiria Vision amongst others.

Interview with label founders Robert Disaro and Jim Owleyes

-What were you influenced by when starting Disaro, did other labels inspire you, or was it more about wanting to get music out there?

Robert Disaro did do some work with another Texas CDR label, only he started branching off into a sound that did not fit with the old label, and what he would eventually turn into Disaro.

-With Disaro, there's a certain visual aesthetic associated with the label, was this always the intention?

Of course, the image plays such an important part of how the music is initially catalogued in the cerebral cortex. We started off at first with Robert collecting the sound while I started creating images that we wanted associated with the label. A lot of the artsists on the label make their own art as well, which we like a lot.

-How was your SXSW this year, was it interesting seeing Disaro related acts play, did you discover any new music or is it not really like that?

Texas is the place! We both are from there so we get screwed and chopped. It was a family reunion of sorts. The gathering storm is in full swing there.

o0o00 - Seaww. Video by Daniel Lopatin (Oneohtrix Point Never)

-What new releases can we expect from Disaro for the rest of the year?

We are actually doing a lot of new projects in LA at the moment.

-What's your take on all the different buzz words that are thrown at some of your acts, genre names like Witchhouse and Drag?

Witchhouse is a great name, we love it. Only once a name comes about to define a vibration, it becomes a solid, the word takes form and shapes reality, for better or worse.

White Ring - Roses (Fan Video)

-Apart from Disaro, are they any other projects that you're involved in, you do artwork for the label but do you create outside of that context?

The owleyes is a working graphic artist in LA, also we have been working with the Showcave night gallery in LA, developing it as an alternative space to explore ritual in art and music:

http://immortalmortal.com
http://www.showcave.org

We are only agents for the unseen forces that carry the charge of the spirits of the air.

"Storm the Reality Studio. And retake the universe." -Burroughs

Disaro Records can be found online at myspace.com/ffdisaro
Read more

Bicep

Feel My Bicep is one of the fastest emerging music blogs on the internet. Formed by 5 old school friends from Belfast last year as a way of sharing their love for anything with a danceable beat; their posts range from classic and obscure Disco and Detroit techno to yacht rock gems and current house sensations.

With a Diaspora spread across the globe, I met up with London based contributor Drew who along with fellow member Matt, currently in Dubai, makes up the musical wing of the outfit.

When asked about the origins of the Feel My Bicep (the name itself a playful homage to the continued influence of gay culture on Disco) Drew, 22, explained how he had been enamoured with the sounds of Detroit and Berlin from an early age, being conditioned by Tim Sweeney’s Beats In Space and years of weekend attendances at a small Belfast clubnight called The Shine.

-We’re five friends who all went to school in Belfast, and when we were 15 we went to this club called The Shine. We’d go see people Laurent Garnier, Richie Hawton, Green Velvet, Underground Resistance. The guys who run that club night have got a real Detroit influence, they loved the harder side of techno, I think we grew up with the harder side of Detroit techno . Like when Tiga was playing back there, he used to play pretty hard tunes, I used to love that back then.

It was a really good club night in a city that didn’t have much else. And they used to put on people like Josh Wink, we didn’t have a clue who he was at the time. I look back at some of the flyers and some of the line ups and you’ll see Richie Hawton in one room, then upstairs you’ve Green Velvet and Tiga back to back. It’s like shit, that kinda line up, you’ll never get that again. They kinda mixed up the fundamental guys, not a lot of clubs do that anymore. The Shine’s moved away from that, it’s a bit different now to get more of an audience inside. Back then it was really quit, they didn’t get big turnouts, but all my friends were really into it.

It’s really quite strange actually everyone in Bicep likes different music: there's Rory and James in Glascow, David in San Francisco at the minute and Matt who’s in Dubai, so we’re getting all this weird influenced music out there at the minute. With James he’s really into punk and post-punk and David he’s perhaps more band influenced and with me I like lots of proto-house and proto techno so it’s quite a good mix of things.

It is interesting, and it’s always being updated...

-Yeah it’s not a thing of just trying to update it, with other blogs the quality control wasn’t good, I don’t want to name names but it’s a couple that we know. But they don’t keep to it, and we listen to so much music, you know with a DJ, you’ll listen to this new set and pick out the songs you love, that essentially what we do constantly. If you look at my music and my influences it’s all singles.

Not a single album?

-I don’t download albums. I do have a few albums but not very many: Andres II, a couple of Moodyman albums, couple of Theo Parrish, couple of Stevie Wonder's. I don’t really listen to albums that much cause I get bored half way through. I can’t really remember the last album I enjoyed throughout. That album by Andres II is a pretty cool album, it’s very hip hop.

Do you spend a lot of money on Vinyl; do you use it to DJ with?

-I play on Serrato, but yeah I buy all the music I love on vinyl. I work just two minutes away from Phonica and BM in Soho that’s where I get most of my records from. Same with Piccadilly Records in Manchester I used to go there all the time, they‘ve got a really good selection. I got some really good Italo records quite cheaply the other day, it’s like Bicep’s guilty pleasure, Italo.

You say it's a guilty pleasure but it’s still a pleasure

-Oh no I love it, some songs are amazing, Italo’s hard to do well, and it’s really hard to replicate so that’s why you don’t here a lot of it now, but yeah I do love it, some people just can’t stand it.

It’s a really cool genre, we always say Minimal Techno is 99% shite, but that other 1% is amazing, and it’s true, same with Italo Disco. That 1% is outstanding.

313 by bicep

Now receiving over 70,000 hits a month, Bicep have attracted a considerable international audience, ranging from label attention from around the globe, having their records mastered in New York to DJ sets on the continent and a two week tour of China at the end of April

-Yeah that’s the coolest thing about it, we didn’t realise what it would do when we started it last October. It wasn’t a published thing and we built up the archives. We had a really slow start. It’s really amazing though I remember when it started, you’d get people commenting from Lisbon and Sweden. Now it’s got to a point where you can make a real connection with people.

With DJing, do you have to go see a DJ to be inspired by them or can you hear bits in mixes or is it a mixture of things?

-I keep thinking about that myself recently, because I don’t understand this whole culture, at the minute of, of booking producers to. Like they’ll book Aeroplane off the fact that they’re good producers, but that doesn’t necessarily translate to them being good live.

There’s some natural born DJs, like Erol Alkan is a natural born DJ, he was mixing House and Indie records when he was 18. There’s a big difference between a DJ and a good producer.

Who would you say are your favourite DJs?

Omar S definitely, I spent £40 on one of his records ‘Do Me Right’

Man, it’s not even a good cover

-I like it, that 90’s cheesy house style, I checked the record prices today and it’s going for £25.

In terms of producers Gavin Russom from Black Meteoric Star, Theo Parrish is a really cool DJ, cause he’s got amazing taste and again DJ wise it’s Moodyman, it’s odd I like songs by some guys but not all. Omar S is one that I like most of his stuff

Strawberry by bicep

The other component of Bicep is their original output as musicians and producers. With 12” releases on labels Ghost Town and Traveller, Andy and Matt make tracks as a creative output for their diverse influences, much like the blog they can come out with driving techno inspired tracks or take on a James Brown sample just as easily.

What’s your approach to making music, what do you use, what are you inspired by?

-Most of our stuff we want to edit to play live, we don’t necessarily want to release everything we edit, because the edit culture at the minute overwhelmed with people putting out shit edits. And there’s so much debate on it, I’m just open to any edit that takes a different turn on things. There’s so many good editors people Mark E, The Revenge, Floating Points. These people are good at twisting tunes and turning them into something completely different, almost like daft punk did back in the day. It’s a new wave of good stuff, but the other stuff is shit. So we’re at the stage where we wanna be doing something different, we’ve got 35 tunes that we edited, because we want to have our own take on it. But we’ve got this style, that’s really rigid, be want to make it more funky and stuff.

To explain our production first we’ll draw up an idea on things like Ableton, and then we’ll record everything live on analogue, we use analogue equipment for everything, we redo everything in analogue, most of the drums we’ll start off on MPC where we’ve got drum machines like Roland 909’s, just standard drum machines.

It’s a slow process because Matt, my main production partner is in Dubai. He’s really talented at making things blend and putting them together. He’s very meticulous; he’s a graphic designer by nature so the tiniest minutest parts are important to him.

It’s quite hard because we’re associated with the blog but we want to also create our own music, not specifically be taken serious for it but we want to makes tunes and spend time with them and think about the approach to them because we want everything on vinyl. We’ve got like 4 tunes for one EP (a vinyl Fine Art Records to be confirmed) and an edits EP (a commissioned vinyl by Untracked), it’s just such a slow process with Matt in Dubai, slight tweaks are just endless.

With the dance side of things covered, Drew mentioned he might have leave the Bicep name behind, a least for a while, for a more band influenced project

-In terms of influences it's pretty much Gavin Russom from the production side of things, kinda laid back, really simple. I'd love to get something going like that.

I think we’re gonna go under a different name for the Housier stuff we’re doing and keep Bicep more fun, because I think the last EP was a bit too serious. It was more to get the name out there I think, it’s gonna be more streamlined now. So we’ll have a name for the Housier stuff and edits, because we’ve got lots of Italo Disco and stuff that we want to put out and lots of really heavy arpeggiated stuff.

We’ve got so many tunes it's tough to know which ones are good, you’ll think you're good then you’ll listen to something like an amazing funk and think this is so weird and mine is just a straight up 4/4 Techno tune this is terrible. It’s trying to get that balance right

And that’s the thing about Feel My Bicep, and the impression I got from talking to Drew in general; the music they make and post isn’t done so in a pretentious way to impress or mark territory but for their love of dance music, any dance music and for others to discover and enjoy. Similarly to when DJing he says ‘it’s all about trying to educate and entertain... it’s more about getting their attention, I think that's the hardest thing about it’.

feelmybicep.com
Read more

Fluffy Lumbers

It's wierd, think I e-mailed Sam Franklin from Fluffy Lumbers around last December asking about an interview. Though that never came about initially, we re-arranged things to fit in for February with Sweet and Sound magazine. I'd pretty much forgot about it until last night when an e-mail popped up in my inbox with all these lovely answers in them, pretty much been to listening to Todd Rundgren since.

-You always have a rifle to hand in your press shots, are you into all that kinda stuff or is it just a look you're going for?

That's actually a BB gun. I wouldn't say I'm "into" that kindof stuff per se, it just turned out that this set of photos are the only I have of myself which were taken with the intent of representing this music. Do they represent it well? Eh. The label (Weird Hug Records) that put out the first 7" was asking me for a cover photo so I decided to base it loosely on the backyard photos of Lee Harvey Oswald taken by his sister. I was living in Massachusetts at the time and couldn't get my hands on any gun, BB or otherwise, so my friend Travis and I drove to a Wal-Mart in Salem that was authorized to sell guns of all kinds. I bought the cheapest BB gun I could find and Travis bought a machete. On the way home we passed a huge carnival that I told myself I would attend the next weekend I had some free time. Unfortunately, it disassembled and moved on within the next few days so I never got to do that. Anyway, a week or so later I put on a collared shirt and my friend Katie took a bunch of photos where I was standing on the neighbor's roof with the gun and a newspaper. If I could do it all again, I wouldn't be on the cover and the photos of me that circulated would be a bit more straightforward but what can you do! One of the upcoming 7" covers features a drunk cameraphone picture of my friend Luka so you can tell that I take my image very seriously.

-Your music really has a happy and carefree feel to it - what songs do you listen to yourself when you're in a similarly energetic mood?

What's strange is that most people seem to be under the impression that these are happy songs written during happy times, which is never the case. All of the songs have almost exclusively been written during/about uncomfortable, nervous, confused or just plain unhappy emotional situations. The lyrics are usually buried or obscured in some way though so I guess it is my fault that everyone thinks they're happy and carefree. In truth, I am a bundle of nerves. As far as pop songs I've been listening to recently while feeling good, here's a few I'd recommend...

-"She's Just My Style" by Gary Lewis & The Playboys
-"Under The Light" by R. Stevie Moore
-"That's How Much I Love You" by The Manhattans
-"Two Steps" by Home Blitz
-"Move" by The Plugz
-"I Am Free" by The Kinks as well as the cover by Hospitals
-"Break The Ice" by The Scruffs
-"No More Tigers" by Martin Phillipps
-"Wild Weekend" by The German Measles
-"I'm In A Different World" by Dave Stewart & Barbara Gaskin

-You list Todd Rundgren as a influence; Unlike in the US he's relatively unknown in the UK, his songs and persona have always been pretty baffling to me - what do you like about him?

Todd Rundgren is relatively unknown in the UK? Wow! The UK is missing out! I should start by saying that I have only listened to his discography up to A Cappella (which is pretty unbelievable by the way). Reviews that I've read of the successive album (Nearly Human) make it sound pretty interesting but I'm just not there yet. I haven't really left my comfort zone of writing rock and roll songs yet but I hope to someday branch out to a musical palette as broad as Todd's. Whether through my Dad playing his records when I was growing up or actively listening to him on my own after getting into "Can We Still Be Friends" in middle school I've been a Todd Rundgren fan for a while now and am still consistently surprised by the versatility of his body of work. Compare, if you will, these two performances (both from the 80s, no less):





Unbelievable that one man can do such disparate styles so well! Nilsson is the same way. I've been really into his A Little Touch Of Schmilsson In The Night record recently and had a bit of a nerd heart attack upon finding out that Frank Sinatra downer-arranger Gordon Jenkins had arranged it. One day I'd love to have dabbled in half the genres they dabbled in.

-What equipment do you use to record?

So far I've used various Tascam 4 and 8 tracks (except for the "Cruisers" song which was recorded on my computer). For the eventual full-length record I plan to use some better equipment but we'll see if I can pull that together. Instrument wise, I use any number of guitars, drums, keyboards, etc.

-Pop Punk or Indie Rock?

I guess Indie Rock? Those are two very broad genre classifications but I would say that I listen to more '80s and '90s indie rock than '80s and '90s pop-punk so I suppose I'll lean towards the latter.

-How long has the F.L project been going, how does it fit into the grand scheme of things?

I've been making recordings under the Fluffy Lumbers name since my freshman year of collegiate education but only really settled on somewhat of a consistent sound in the winter of my sophomore year (December '08/January '09) after having learned to play guitar that summer. I'm in and involved with a handful of other bands but Fluffy Lumbers is the project which is most important to me.

-Are there plans for some further 7" releases?

Following the sorting-out of some unforeseen setbacks, the Harry Dolland's 7" should be released by Group Tightener relatively shortly and Transparent Records will be releasing a Fluffy Lumbers/Big Troubles split soon after that. There may be some more 7" releases in the works but I plan to dedicate my time to recording a full-length record once this semester is over.


http://www.myspace.com/fluffylumbers

Photo by Aubrey Stallard

Read more

Giulio Ghirardi

Twenty something Giulio Ghirardi is a student at The University of Parma who currently divides his time between studying for a degree in Architecture and being an amateur photographer. Having been commissioned by magazines such as Pig, Magnificent, Italian Vice and Iris Giulio also documents his own life through an ongoing series of sun-drenched portraits of friends, buildings and the wonders of natural selection. Interview here and at Sweet and Sound.

-How were you introduced to photography, what kept you interested in it?

I was introduced by my father to photography. Since he was young he liked to take photos, in particular architectural photography and portraits. I like them very much! He left me a lot of cameras (best one is a full accessorized pentax lx that he re-bought after having lost the first one on the stepway of montmartre in paris and tought me the importance of having an artistic vein to feel lucky in my life and to appreciate its beauty. My first film I did was in 2002, I was 15 while I was travelling around the state of N.Y. with my family. I consider it my first approach to photography. I kept the camera with me all journey long and I shot a lot. One of those photos was taken in Niagara Falls photo and me and lot of people consider it my greatest pic.




-Do you have a background in fashion, what do you prefer about that style of photography?

I really like fashion but in particular the art connected with it. All the people surrounding fashion for me are more interesting than fashion itself.

I like that glamorous and hype atmosphere, the scenographic scenarios, that only a fashion shooting can create but for me is very important also that fashion "stories" seem very natural, like a personal project. I prefer natural light and poses, everyday situations mashed with a touch of nice styling instead of a studio shooting with calibrate lights and unnatural poses. I find it very repetitive and even if you can add some external element in the background and simulate something, the result for me is every time boring.

I like photographers like Nacho Alegre, Jonathan Leder and Skye Parrot and for extension Ryan McGinley and Teller. They can develop a fashion story or advertising very well but they don't suffocate the client of their picture with something too exaggerated and even if they use some escamotages, they seem to remain quite natural and they emanate this sense of tranquillity, beauty and ingenuity that I'm searching for in my projects.



-You often get commissions from magazines, are you given quite a lot of artistic freedom with these or is it more predetermined?

Yes, sometimes they pick me up for a fashion shoots like they did for Vice Italy and Pig Magazine. They inform me just about the general theme of the issue I have to work with, but I felt lucky cause they gave me liberty of expression without any predetermined scheme.

I like working with magazines ‘cause I don't have a lot of time to dedicate to photography. I'm studying architecture and it’s very useful when someone asks you to work, organizing all the logistics that waste a lot of time. I need just to work on an already chosen time and place and models. Then I put my personal interpretation of the situation with my choices of the camera, light and gestures.




-Female figures are a recurring theme of your work; would you say the human shape is an influence for you?

Yes, it is. I started my "photographic approach" shooting landscapes, buildings and little and particular things in everyday life but I suddenly recognized that they seem like dead photos. I started to appreciate the human figure while I was taking photos and I had the fortune to find very nice friends to portrait when I started to take that type of pic. I like to take portraits of female subjects ‘cause I find them more attractive then common people chosen "from the street". I think models or nice people in general can improve a photo very much.



-Your holiday pictures and commissioned pieces seem to go hand in hand, giving the impression that you're constantly taking photos - do you always have a camera with you?

It depends, there were weeks when I used to have my compact camera with me everyday and others when I don't. But now I want to plan my projects better so I feel having my camera with me everyday isn’t useful cause I risk to take an excess of unfocused and unthoughtful photos.




-You also experiment with collages and drawings as well, do you turn to these mediums when photography can't get across what you want or is it something that you go with when the mood takes you?

I make collages and drawing cause it's a way to create an imaginary world that in nature doesn't exist. Usually I create when my inspiration for taking photos comes less or when I'm at home and I'm inspired. It’s one of the two artistic expressions that I like and remain to me.



-What are you planning to do with rest of the year, is it easy to find work in Italy?

First of all I'd like to finish university ‘cause photography, for me, can be just a passionate hobby for the moment. When I finish university I'll have much more time to plan and concretize my projects that for the moment remain just virtual ideas. As a second step I'd like to enter in a photographic agency ‘cause I hate planning shoots and public relations. I need to candidate myself in every time: sending emails with my cv and portfolios and I'd like to have someone to do that. I live for the moment in a small city and it’s difficult for me to meet people interested in my work and real artists. I'd like to live in a big city and meet real artistic scenes, curious figures that can improve you with their knowledge and to give you the incentive to work more. I think an artistic surrounding can influence you very much and I hope to move one day in a big city for that reason.

Giulio Ghiradi can be found online at giuliorojerghirardi.blogspot.com, tumblr, carbonmade and flickr



Read more

Balam Acab

Balam Acab is the moniker of Ithaca University Student and Pennsylvania resident Alec Koone. With BA he creates haunting and frozen downtempto drones that seem to almost cough up melodies onto a sludge of looped synths and echoed drums.

A recent signing to the XXFG affliate, Tri Angle Records (o0o00, Creep) - Alec granted me his first ever interview about Balam Acab for both here and UK Arts and Music Magazine Sweet & Sound.

-You started BA almost two years ago, has it undergone a kind of reboot lately?

Yeah Balam Acab started out two years ago when I was really into drone and back then I was making pretty noisy drone music under the name. I tried reviving it again once in between now and then as a less noisy and more spacey type of drone project but then that fell through too. Now I have "rebooted" the project, so to speak, after creating a few songs and needing to put the songs under some project. So I decided to use this one because I like the name.

-Were you in other bands before or is this your first?

I've been in all sorts of bands and I've made a bunch solo music before the reincarnated Balam Acab. Lots of ambient and post-rock music, some noise, some folk, some rock (in the vein of bands like Pavement). Currently I have another active project called Etherea that I'm pretty into as well. It's hip-hop.

-All your songs use pitchshifted vocals in a really hypnotic way, who does the vocal parts for BA?

My dream girl. She's quite the diva.

-How do you approach recording? Do you work with samples and computers or is it a mix between that & home recordings?

I work with samples and computers. Just cuttin' stuff up and whatnot.



-Do you have any intentions of ever playing live with BA?

I'd like playing live with Balam Acab, just as of right now I'm not really sure how I'd play a good set that was fun for me and the audience. If I can figure that out then I'd love to. But I don't wanna just play mp3's through a PA system, ya know?

-I'm always interested in the environment and surroundings that artists live in, how does Pennsylvania suit you?

My immediate response would be that the PA (more specifically Harrisburg area) music scene is awful, but being away from it (I go to school in Ithaca, NY) has made me realize that although it was small there was a pretty decent and tight-knit music scene from around the area. And this is because I feel like I haven't experienced or been made aware of anything similar in Ithaca. The music scene in Harrisburg is mostly centralized around a non-profit organization called Moviate that hosts killer shows, be it music, film, or whatever else. I feel like there are a lot of good people and bands involved with the Harrisburg-area scene that work diligently together to create a nice little music scene in an environment that, in general, isn't very receptive to arts and especially more experimental and independent art.

Now in regards to PA physically, I'd say its pretty nice in the area I live. Of course, the suburban sprawl and whatnot isn't, but once you can get outside that, there's lots of nice outdoor places that are good to be in.

-What are your plans for the rest of 2010? Any physical releases/other projects?

I've got some plans for 2010. The most important thing is getting a live set together, I think. I really want and need to start playing shows as soon as possible. I'm also planning to release an EP through Tri Angle Records sometime in 2010. I'm currently working on brand new songs for that release. I have another project called ETHEREA but that is sort of on the back burner now compared to Balam.

Balam Acab can be found online at myspace.com/thebalamacab
Read more

Tania Leshkina

Artist Tania Leshkina was born into The Soviet Union in 1990 and was raised in its aftermath until moving to London. She's exhibited at group shows in Malaga, Groningen, London, Milan and Venice as well as solo exhibitions in Hermosillo and Paris.

Her photos have a minimalist, almost-improvised quality to them that show off a natural eye for capturing moments and letting subjects and colours blend into each other. I interviewed her recently about her work, projects and whereabouts.


-When did you first know you wanted to pursue being a photographer?

I don't consider myself a photographer. I make work and use photography as a medium now but it doesn't mean I will in future.

-What equipment do you use? Do find yourself using one camera predominately?

I don't own any cameras. When I'm working on a project or a job I borrow all the equipment from colleagues.

Voidentity

Take Courage Gallery Exhibition

-How has your move from Moscow to the UK changed your photography?

I've changed and keep changing which means my work changed as well. It's only partly because of geographiс location.

Self-Portraits

-I think on flickr someone compared your Voidentity series to Erwin Wurm's One Minute Sculptures, has he been influence on you is it more just a coincidence?

He was among others. Couple years ago there was a big show of his work in Moscow and I guess I was really impressed by it.

Balance

-You've started creating film and videos as well, is this a natural progression for you?

Absolutely. I actually went to a film school for three years and always wanted to create my own videos.

Stills from two separate video projects

-What are you doing with the rest of 2010, any more exhibitions/zines?

I just did a video for Maaike Mekking's AW10 show on LFW. More to come, check updates on my flickr or website.

Tania Leshkina can be found online on her website and flickr
Read more