Tag Archives: Kranky

COLIN STETSON and JUSTIN WALTER at DREAMLAND, Thursday, March 27th

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The New Media Project and The Other Side of Life are proud to present:

COLIN STETSON(Montreal, QC; on Constellation Records)

and

JUSTIN WALTER(Chicago, IL; on Kranky)

Thursday, March 27th
at DREAMLAND
810 E. Market Street (in the alley behind Decca Restaurant)
8 PM Doors*
$12 advance tickets available here: http://www.ticketfly.com/event/500253-colin-stetson-louisville/
$15 day-of-show

“Stetson demolishes clichés to unleash fresh, unexpected energies. It’s like being inside an enormous brass tunnel full of windy byways and slamming valves, at once exhilarating and frightening.” – Pitchfork

COLIN STETSON was born and raised in Ann Arbor, Michigan and spent a decade in San Francisco and Brooklyn honing his formidable talents as a horn player, working extensively live and in studio with a wide range of acts including Tom Waits, Arcade Fire, TV On The Radio, Feist, Laurie Anderson, Lou Reed, David Byrne, Jolie Holland, Sinead O’Connor, LCD Soundsystem, The National, Angelique Kidjo, and Anthony Braxton. Meanwhile he has developed an utterly unique voice as a soloist, principally on saxophones and clarinets, his intense technical prowess matched by his exhilarating and emotionally gripping skills as a songwriter. He settled in Montreal in 2007. In 2008 Aagoo records released Colin’s debut, the first in his New History Warfare album cycle. New History Warfare Vol. 2: Judges arrived via Constellation in Spring 2011, kicking off a hectic year of solo engagements and year-round touring as part of the Bon Iver band. The album met with universal acclaim from critics across a spectrum of jazz and indie rock/pop cultural spheres: “pure revelation” according to All About Jazz, the album was shortlisted for the Polaris Music Prize, and landed on year-end lists at Pitchfork, Tiny Mix Tapes, SPIN and the Village Voice. His frequent appearances on stages at SXSW, All Tomorrow’s Parties, and countless stops on the international jazz festival circuit cemented his reputation as a versatile and virtuosic player while bringing his solo work to a broad international audience. Colin’s astounding physical engagement with his instruments (chiefly bass and alto saxophones) produces emotionally rich and polyphonic compositions that transcend expectations of what solo horn playing can sound like. Stetson is equally at home in the avant jazz tradition of players who have pushed the boundaries of the instrument through circular breathing, embouchure (i.e. Evan Parker, Mats Gustafsson) and at the nexus of noise/drone/minimalist music that encompasses genres like dark metal, post-rock and contemporary electronics (i.e. Tim Hecker, Ben Frost – both of whom have mixed or remixed Stetson recordings). April 2013 saw the release of New History Warfare Vol. 3: To See More Light via Constellation, completing the conceptual and narrative arc of the series and constituting a definitive realization of his unparalleled musicianship and stunning skill as a composer. It has been received with exemplary recognition and was shortlisted for the Polaris Music Prize.

Watch the video for Colin Stetson “In Mirrors” + “And In Truth” from Constellation Records on Vimeo here:

JUSTIN WALTER was born and raised in Ann Arbor, Michigan in the United States. His most recent explorations are centered around the Electronic Valve Instrument, a rare wind-controlled analog synthesizer. After spending a few years exploring the instrument at home and on the road, he saw two releases for the Life Like label. First was the WALTER double cassette (2012) and then the Dark Matter 12”(2013). His most recent release with this project is Lullabies & Nightmares, out on Kranky May 27, 2013. In addition to developing and releasing his own material, Walter has worked with many bands and artists over the last decade, including Nomo, Iron & Wine, Wild Belle, Sinkane, His Name is Alive, Saturday Looks Good to Me, Skeletons, Megan Byrne, AUNTS, Scott Gwinnell, and Randy Napoleon.

Listen to “Dream Weaving” by JUSTIN WALTER here: http://music.justinwalter.net/track/dream-weaving.

Check out the Facebook invitation here: https://www.facebook.com/events/664890593575932/.

*A QUICK NOTE ABOUT THE DOOR TIME FOR THIS SHOW: On the same night, just down Market Street at the Green Building (732 E. Market Street), the lovely and talented SUSANNA and RACHEL GRIMES will be performing! We found out about each others’ events and are very pleased to announce that we are staggering the set times so that both audiences will able to enjoy the bulk of both shows! The door time for the Susanna and Rachel Grimes show will be at 7 PM, with music to follow, while the door time for the Colin Stetson and Justin Walter show will be at 8 PM, with music to follow.

Space for both performances is extremely limited so we encourage patrons of both shows to buy tickets in advance. $15 advance tickets for the SUSANNA and RACHEL GRIMES performance go on sale exclusively at Guestroom Records, 1806 Frankfort Avenue, on Saturday, February 15th. $12 advance tickets available for COLIN STETSON and JUSTIN WALTER at DREAMLAND here: http://www.ticketfly.com/event/500253-colin-stetson-louisville/

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Some Music We Missed in 2013

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While we’re waiting and working on some (hopefully) awesome shows for you in 2014, we thought we’d take a moment to mention some excellent records from last year that we overlooked in our best of. While record reviews have taken a backseat to booking/promoting shows here at The Other Side of Life, there’s still some great stuff we’d like to tell you about. So here goes…

LETHA RODMAN MELCHIOR, Handbook for Mortals LP (Siltbreeze)

Way back in the 1990s, Letha was one of the guitarists in Ruby Falls, which was one of our favorite bands. Since their untimely demise, she’s explored other musical regions, sometimes without guitar, under the name Tretam. This year, under her own name, she released Handbook for Mortals, and it’s fantastic. Inspired by what I would call the “quotidian audio collage” style of Graham Lambkin (whose Salmon Run is a classic in the not-quite-genre), there’s everything from re-appropriated musics by other composers, spoken dialogue that at least seems vérité, video game interludes, you name it, all carefully constructed with a fine balance of pathos and bathos.

Over the past two years, Letha’s been dealing with health issues related to cancer treatment, and with every sale of Handbook for Mortals, a portion of proceeds will be donated to her. You can also buy the album direct — as well as make a donation — here: http://melchiorfund.blogspot.com.

Additionally, if you’re in New York City, there’s a BENEFIT FOR LETHA RODMAN MELCHIOR this Saturday, January 18th at Secret Project Robot. Endless Boogie, Crystal Stilts, Love as Laughter, The Rogers Sisters (wow!), and more will be appearing — more information here: https://www.facebook.com/events/721038087915201.

CHRIS FORSYTH, Solar Motel LP (Paradise of Bachelors)

 We kinda slept on this one, not really sure why, but while it’s not our favorite “guitar band” record of the year (that’d probably be Time Off by Forsyth’s label mate Steve Gunn), it’s still really awesome. Imagine the members of Television trying to play alongside one of Glenn Branca’s guitar orchestra, attempting to steer the musical dialogue from sheer blistering-and-bludgeoning rock to delicate moments of melody. Something like that, yeah.

Chris Forsyth’s SOLAR MOTEL BAND will be in Louisville on Wednesday, February 19th — more details here soon as they become available!

HELADO NEGRO, Invisible Life 2LP (Asthmatic Kitty) —
One of our favorite electronic releases of the year, Helado Negro’s Invisible Life has been on constant rotation in our house since it came out last March. So why did we leave it off our best of? I have no idea. Stupid oversight, most likely. Sweet soul mixed with (almost) club bangers in a syrupy, sweaty stew. Hell, just the track “Dance Ghost” is worth the price of admission. Killer fun live show, too.

SIGHTINGS, Terribly Well LP (Dais) — We were with heavy heart when we heard that Sightings, one of our favorite New York bands of all time, called it quits in 2013. But if you’re gonna go out, might as well go out on top, and Sightings did with Terribly Well, their ninth album. Despite the many that try, there’s not many bands out there that really capture truly terrifying intensity — and in a post-Sightings world, we’re not sure anyone should even try.

COPPICE, Big Wad Excisions CD (Quakebasket) — The first release on Tim Barnes’ resurrected Quakebasket label (which you might remember from those incredible Angus MacLise reissues in the late 1990s) isn’t a reissue at all, but a new work by a Chicago electro-acoustic duo who put the whomp back in free improv. Highly recommended if you like early Merzbow, early Wolf Eyes, but not early mornings.

MDOU MOCTAR, Afelan LP (Sahel Sounds) — A late entry, because we slept on this July, 2013 release all the way until December, and we really wish we were tipped off earlier! Mdou Moctar’s Afelan has the heaviness we also heard in the debuts by Group Inerane and Bombino, recorded entirely live on location in Niger.

REISSUES:

U.S. MAPLE, Long Hair in Three Stages LP (Skin Graft) — We’ll be honest: the first time we saw U.S. Maple play (at the Skin Graft “Irritational” in Chicago in January, 1995), we thought they were terrible. Couldn’t figure ’em out, honestly weren’t sure where they fit, even within the non-specific post-no wave aesthetic that Skin Graft was minin’ at the time. But then, a year or two later, it clicked and Long Hair in Three Stages was a must-have! The original 1995 LP was just about impossible to find, though, and even if you could find it, it had a pretty hefty price tag, since it came only in a sheet-metal sleeve. Thankfully, this past year the fine gentlemen at Skin Graft reissued the album, in multiple with-steel-or-without formats, so even if you weren’t there, you can pretend you were.

RODAN, Fifteen Quiet Years LP (Quarterstick)
LABRADFORD, Prazision LP 2LP (Kranky) — Two of the most important bands to me in the early 1990s were Louisville’s Rodan, and Richmond, VA’s Labradford, and their debut records (1994’s Rusty and 1993’s Prazision LP, respectively) both have had a profound influence on how I think about music to this day. Fifteen Quiet Years compiles Rodan’s odds-and-sods, which — while certainly gratifying — exudes a melancholy sense of longing for what they could’ve achieved had they stayed together. Meanwhile, the Prazision LP reissue is a perfect re-casting of what was, for me, a gateway to entirely new sonic palettes. Both of these releases are essential!