Dextrous movements

It is always nice to get an update from sometime Border Community collaborator Dextro: the latest tells of forthcoming EP ‘Zero Circle’, which will see a limited-edition-of-200 12″ release on his own 16k Records label on May 17th. As well as the uplifting original version of Ring Cycle (which will already be familiar to converts to his life-affirming Winded album) and a bonus live version, Dextro auteur Ewan has drafted in a trio of remix support in the form of Numbers‘ TVO, Socco Chico and Anticon‘s Alias (who takes on alternative ‘Winded’ track ‘The Pacifist’).

We’re particularly taken with the accompanying video to Ring Cycle, where a simple mirroring effect transforms footage shot by Ewan’s brother from the Tokyo monorail and “a very smooth bus” on the way to the airport into a series of magical otherworldly floating landscapes. The results are balletic, psychedelic, kaleidoscopic and hypnotic, one minute recalling expensive CGI, the next bringing to mind Fuck Buttons’ signature artwork geometry. I could literally watch this stuff for hours:

Any Polish readers out there (you never know!) might be interested to know that Ewan is bringing his one-man-band Dextro live show to Poland this weekend, to the Bytomskie Centrum Kultury in Bytom this Saturday (25th April). But in the likely event that you can’t make that particular show, Ewan has also made a host of previous live sets available to download for everyone everywhere from the Dextro website. And hopefully there will be more live dates to come that are a little closer to home, provided that Ewan’s recently embarked upon PhD in Sociology doesn’t get in the way…

Oddballs

ODDSAC is the, well, odd name of the industrious Animal Collective‘s forthcoming new 54 minute long “visual album”, where a brand new Animal Collective score is set against the dark and twisted visual imaginings of filmmaker Danny Perez. You may already be familiar with the work of Mr Perez from his intense video backdrops to complement the respective Black Dice and Panda Bear live experiences. If not, this short and definitely not sweet trailer should give you some idea of what to expect:

The DVD is slated for release “in the summer”, but those impatient souls who can’t wait that long can hunt down one of the many screening and Q&A; combo deals featuring the director and members of Animal Collective, and maybe even a guest DJ after party to boot (lucky old Londoners get a DJ set from the Collective themselves). The full bumper list of American sessions is available on the ODDSAC website, whilst Europeans will have to hope they live near one of the locations below:

13th May: ICA, London, UK (18.30, 20.30, 22.30)
14th May: Mint Lounge, Manchester, UK (18.00, 20.00)
15th May: Brudenell Social Club, Leeds, UK (15.00, 17.00)
18th May: Berlin Babylon (Rosa Luxembourg Str. 30) (21.00)
19th May: Uebel und Gefeahrlich, Hamburg, Germany (20.00)
21st May: Smart Space, Amsterdam, Netherlands (20.00)

Meanwhile, those of you eagerly awaiting a hard copy of the truly awesome new Panda Bear material unveiled at his recent date in London (and beyond) will be as disappointed as I was to read that Pitchfork reckons it won’t be out until September (and Paw Tracks won’t give us anything more specific than a will hopefully be released this year), on an album called ‘Tomboy’ (this much is true – and there are T-shirts to prove it). A couple of those songs in particular are just the thing that James has been looking for for his DJ sets; but I guess that he, like the rest of us, will just have to wait patiently until September, contenting ourselves with the ODDSAC Animal Collective visual fix in the meantime. Sometimes life is just not fair.

DJ-Kicks right through the night

As the release date of James Holden‘s eagerly-anticipated DJ-Kicks compilation edges ever closer (May 24th on !K7, in case you were wondering), James is also readying himself to bring the physical DJ-Kicks experience to the people with an extensive programme of worldwide dates throughout May, June and July. As well as some more frequently visited favourite destinations in the UK, Europe and Japan, James will also be making a long-awaited return to Australia (his first since 2006). A comprehensive trip round the US is also on the cards, as he makes good on the first stage of a new commitment to twice-yearly residencies at New York’s Cielo and LA’s King King.

The full ball-busting tour schedule runs as follows, so with a bit of luck Mr Holden will be passing by your way very soon:

May 2010
21st Lux, Lisbon, Portugal (DJ-Kicks)
22nd Silo, Leuven, Belgium (DJ-Kicks)
27th Melkweg, Amsterdam, Netherlands (DJ-Kicks)
28th Liquid Lounge Club, Cork, Ireland (DJ-Kicks)
29th Alter Ego, Verona (DJ-Kicks)

June 2010
4th Übel & Gefährlich, Hamburg, Germany (DJ-Kicks)
5th We love Sonique @ Grande Halle de la Villette, Paris, France (DJ-Kicks)
11th Village Underground, London, UK (DJ-Kicks)
12th Watergate, Berlin, Germany (DJ-Kicks)
18th The Loft, Barcelona, Spain (DJ Kicks)
19th Fabrik, Madrid, Spain (DJ-Kicks)
26th Awakenings Festival 10 years anniversary, Amsterdam, Netherlands

July 2010
1st Supperclub, San Francisco, USA (DJ-Kicks)
2nd King King, Los Angeles, USA (DJ-Kicks)
3rd Neumo’s, Seattle, USA (DJ-Kicks)
8th Cielo, New York, USA (DJ-Kicks)
9th Smart Bar, Chicago, USA (DJ-Kicks)
10th The Vault, El Paso, USA (DJ-Kicks)
17th Womb, Tokyo, Japan (DJ-Kicks)
18th Triangle, Osaka, Japan (DJ-Kicks)
19th Mago Club, Nagoya, Japan (DJ-Kicks)
23rd Villa, Perth, Australia (DJ-Kicks)
24th Chinese Laundry, Sydney, Australia (DJ-Kicks)
25th Lot 33, Canberra, Australia (DJ-Kicks)
26th Revolver, Melbourne, Australia (DJ-Kicks)
30th Nachtdigital # 13 Festival, Olganitz, Germany
31st Field Day, London, UK

Peace Offering

Describing PEACE as “the first music atlas in the net” is definitely underselling it: what it actually is is a bumper selection of 180 mp3s collected from across the globe and available for as-good-as-free download in return for a very modest (€5 – €25) donation to the Catalan wing of Amnesty International.

And these aren’t just any old mp3s either, as coordinators Buffet Libre have managed to coax contributions out of a seriously impressive selection of international names. Donators of particular note include the truly mighty Mogwai, future electrician Dan Deacon, fun-personified in the form of Stereo Total, the delicate textures of Austria’s Fennesz and his Japanese mate Ryuchi Sakamoto, old Hefner-man Darren Hayman, the glossy electro-pop of Greek birds Marsheaux, Belgium’s new wave legends The Neon Judgement and France’s own dabblers in the same direction Black Strobe, our own friends from Catalunya The Requesters and Undo, the polite twinkles of Finland’s Jori Hulkonnen, beat poet for the computer generation AGF/Delay, Brazilian nut jobs Bonde Do Role and the naive electro-rave of South Africa’s Mujava feat Nonsense. Not to mention the USA’s Micah P. Hinson And The Pioneer Saboteurs, Marissa Nadler, A Place To Bury Strangers, Asobi Seksu, The Spinto Band feat. The Beast Pageant, Dent May & Cowboy Maloney’s Electric City and Jeffrey Lewis; Canada’s Buck 65 and Malajube; Venezuela’s Kid606 feat. Barbara Panther; the UK’s Marc Almond, 4hero, Patrick Wolf, Dubstar, Si Begg, Gyratory System, Cicada and The Boy Least Likely To; Norway’s Ane Brun; Germany’s Ascii.Disko, Console and Jeans Team; France’s Tahiti 80, The Toxic Avenger and Amélie-les-crayons; Italy’s Dusty Kid; Iceland’s Amiina & Kippi Kaninus; Sweden’s I’m From Barcelona; Netherlands’ Don Diablo; Switzerland’s Heidi Happy feat. Paul Niehaus (Calexico) and Low Motion Disco; Israel’s Nico Teen; and Australia’s Operator Please.

And that is just the artists I have heard of: the hard-drive filling bumper stash also includes plenty of random play surprises you didn’t realise you liked yet hailing from pretty much all over the world – Mexico, Cuba, Chile, Columbia, Bolivia, Argentina, Greenland, Denmark, Ireland, Hungary, Serbia, Portugal, Russia, Turkey, Tibet, China, Hong Kong, Republic of Korea, Indonesia, India, Iraq, Palestine, Thailand, Singapore, Senegal, Tunisia, Algeria, Ghana, Mali, Uganda, Bikya, Mozambique, Congo and New Zealand. There ought to be something amongst that lot to expand even the broadest of musical horizons, so set the downloading and unzipping marathon in motion here.

The Buffet Libre team who have put together this mammoth undertaking have their fingers in many pies, mainly mp3 flavoured: the multi-platform site includes the Spanish language mp3 blog Continental Breakfast, a 150-strong series of downloadable cover versions in their Rewind division, and the typically ambitious remix competition project Batidora which gives access to remouldable parts from the likes of Cut Copy, Shitdisco, The Go! Team, Holy Fuck, The Bravery, Ladyhawke, The Teenagers, Does it Offend You, Yeah?, Passion Pit, The Mae Shi, Infadels, The Rumble Strips, Dragonette, Wolf Gang, Stereo MCs, Don Diablo, Munk and Frankmusik. That ought to keep you busy for a while.

Sonique Boom

With lighting technology getting cleverer, cheaper and ever more accessible, it is clearly time for live performers to up their game. And it seems that everyone is at it: our own new recruit Kate Wax is currently readying her new light-and-sound set-up for its Mapping Festival debut in Geneva (May 7th), the ever-adventurous Caribou‘s new live show has an advanced new visual component (as previously reported here), and latest Crosstown Rebels addition Deniz Kurtel comes from a full-blown light-and-art installation background.

Our old friends We Love Art (previous hosts of the lovely We Love Border Community summer extravaganza) are predictably right behind these evolutions in technology, commiting to a pair of forward-thinking light presentations sandwiched either end of this year’s Villette Sonique festival in Paris. The main festival runs between 31st May and 6th June and features performances from Joanna Newsom, Owen Pallett, Young Marble Giants, Atlas Sound, Manuel Gottsching, Oneohtrix Point Never, Acid Mothers Temple, Wolf Eyes, Growing, Fuck Buttons, Oneida, Washed Out and Blues Control.

Proceedings are officially launched by the We Love Art crew on May 8th with the only French outing for Richie Hawtin‘s much-hyped new Plastikman multimedia live show, supported by usual suspects and Minus cohorts Magda, Troy Pierce and Marc Houle. The whole light and sound extravaganza is complemented by a special Plastikman iPhone app called SYNK, which links up with the live visuals and a camera showing what Richie can see, and probably explains why so many people are waving their phones about in this sneak preview clip from the Timewarp festival a couple of weekends ago. For a moment there we thought perhaps someone had invented a lighters-in-the-air app for the iPhone (they have, as it happens – 16 of them!).

And then on June 5th the series of events draws towards a close with homegrown hero Vitalic‘s own take on cutting edge live electronic performance, using a system of LED screens and mirrors put together by “stage design architects” 1024 to seemingly epic effect:

The bonus here is that the support team at this particular happening also comprises our own James Holden (on the promotional trail for his new DJ Kicks compilation), with Danton Eeprom and Cassius providing some extra French weight.

Claiming to present the future of the live electronic music show, both ambitious We Love Sonique events take place in the impressive Grande Halle de la Villette: get your tickets now (priced at €29,50 each, or €48,50 for a pass giving entry to both events) from Digitick.