June 13, 2010 -LSR- 8PM – William Basinski + Expo ’70 + Discipline X

WILLIAM BASINSKI

William Basinski is a classically trained musician and composer who has been working in experimental media for over 25 years in New York City, and now Los Angeles. His haunting and melancholy soundscapes explore the temporal nature of life, resounding with the reverberations of memory and the mystery of time. His epic 4-disc masterwork, The Disintegration Loops, received international critical acclaim and was chosen as one of the top 50 albums of 2004 by Pitchfork Media. Art Forum selected The River, his transcendental 2-disc shortwave music experiment on Raster-Noton.de, Germany as one of the top ten albums of 2003. His concerts and installations and films made in collaboration with artist-filmmaker, James Elaine have been presented internationally, most recently at The Venice Biennale of Music, Venice, Italy, Happy New Ears Festival, Belgium, FOCUS ONE Festival, Poland, Filosophia Festival, Carpi, Italy, and Cite de la Musique, Paris, among others. Basinski’s latest albums, 92982 and Vivian & Ondine were released in 2009 on 2062/USA and distributed internationally. The Wire magazine selected 92982 as one of the top 50 releases of 2009.

http://www.mmlxii.com/home/home.html
http://www.myspace.com/williambasinski

EXPO ’70

Expo ’70 is the main driving improvisational essence of Justin Wright. Having started the project in Los Angeles in 2003, Wright has pushed his project to new levels, releasing a number of albums as cdr’s and 2 full-length albums. Expo ’70′s first album “Animism”, which debuted in 2007 on Kill Shaman, is an eclectic mix of krautrock, ambient drone, space exploration and minimal compositions. Comparisons range from Brian Eno, Ash Ra Tempel, A.R. & Machines, SunnO))) and Earth, but not directly sounding like any of those artists in their entirety.

Wright’s recent release “Black Ohms” on Beta-lactam Ring Records brings new life to the term drone. A world of sounds that catches the listeners subconscious and drifts them to alien lands and foreign terrain while maintaining a dreamlike quality with shifting melodies and moods. Mostly comprised of single guitar improvisations, Wright manifests rich textures and brooding low end passages full of energy that tend to sound like long synth compositions akin to early Tangerine Dream and early minimalist composers like Terry Riley.

Expo ’70 recently completed a West Coast tour, playing a sold out show in San Francisco with Wooden Shjips and ARP. Accompanying Wright was Matt Hill, a local Kansas City musician who studied at Berkeley College of music in Boston. Hill contributed bass and analog drum patterns underlying Wright’s ability to work up these long rich drones into what some might reflect a classic rock band. The live shows consisted of the two sitting indian style in front of their amps, forcing audiences to sit along with them while they build soundscapes. With a blast of smoke from a fog machine, the canvas was layed for them to rise up and get into so Pink Floyd and Hawkwind-like sonic psychedelic playing with Hill looping bass lines and Wright catching waves of melodic of guitar soloing.

Wright played Bordeaux, France late 2008 as part of a festival revolved around the celebration of French Psychedelic music which started back in 1968. The 3 day festival included acts from France and all over the world. Some act include Ame Son, Endless Boogie, Steve Gunn, Psychic Ills, The Telescopes, The Skaters, Stellar Om Source and many more. Wright was proud to have Expo ’70 included in this event.

Wright designs and packages most Expo ’70 releases himself building an aesthetic around the project as a long lost relic from the 1970′s underground music scene.

http://www.exposeventy.com/sonicmeditations/artists.html
http://www.myspace.com/expo70
http://www.exposeventy.com/menu.html

DISCIPLINE X

Discipline X is the solo project of Brian Damage, ex-Phycus, ex-Unireverse. The projet was started in 2000 as Phycus was ending. One CDr was released at that time.

Discipline X was revived in 2009. A new download, “Futuric”, was released, based on the live set of the fall of 2009.

When Sun Ra met John Cage, the one thing they agreed upon was that the most important musician trait was discipline. No matter what style of music a musician performs, successful musicians must be devoted to their craft. Sun Ra planned a series of 100 “Discipline” recordings, and eventually recorded far more than 100 of them.

John Cage often composed based on a set or rules, or disciplines. I am also using a set of disciplines to create this music. For the first CD, for example, the rules included that each track must be comprised of several loops running out of phase with each other, there must be minimal human intervention in the creation of the loops, and that each track needed to be exactly 10 minutes long.

For the current version of the project, I have added a second style of composition, with its own set of rules, for example, each sound can only play a single note. Other styles, each with their own set of compositional rules will be added and combined together.

http://www.myspace.com/thisisdisciplinex