June 9, 2010 – LSR – 8:30PM – RADIAN + CHRISTOF KURZMANN & MICAHALA GRILL + DIDI BRUCKMAYR & HYENA HIVE + MARTIN BRANDLMAYR & CHRISTOF KURZMANN
RADIAN
When you listen to music, you’re recognizing harmony, feeling rhythm, relating to its mood. But sometimes you’re also doing something much more primitive — as when you hear a sharp yell or a squeal of tires or glass breaking. You’re thinking: What was that sound? And how close is it to me?
Radian, a trio from Vienna, creates music that plays with your sense of aural identification and aural distance. It goes in hard for little sounds we make when we’re not quite yet “making music”: the tiniest flop and swish of wire brushes on a drum-head, the quick pop of a plug entering a socket or a circuit being switched, the sound of a finger depressing a computer key. On “Chimeric,” its fifth album, those little noises pan across the speakers or create a compound rhythm, arranged by post-editing into elegant, complex syncopation, each portion of the rhythmic cycle expressed with different volume or compression or room tone.
Since the band’s beginnings, the timbre, shape and resonance of Martin Brandlmayr’s drums have been its trademark. (He’s a wonder: a drummer with a beautiful sound and feel who pushes back against his own virtuosity.) Those human touches, his perfectly timed, rhythm-conscious strokes and rustles, are surrounded by all kinds of other incidental noises, both handmade and digital.
There are also sounds on “Chimeric” that imply grandness and distance, and push you away. Where before it had only used drums, synthesizer and bass, now Radian suddenly has a guitar fetish. This instrument, as played by Stefan Németh, can produce dry, unamplified strums, as on the piece “Subcolors.” Or scrubby, slate-gray clouds of distortion, heaving across your field of sound, as in “Git Cut Noise,” and coming close to the twinkly ambient-doom of bands like Nadja or Jesu.
What is this group up to? Radian’s music can sometimes sound like free improvisation, but it’s composed at microscopic levels. It can have a sense of rock dynamics, building a big emotional crescendo toward the end of “Feedbackmikro/City Lights,” but on the whole it has little in common with rock. It uses some crowd sounds and attunes you a bit to its process, but it’s not really musique concrète. It’s alive with interlocking clicks and hums that can approximate dance beats, but it falls short of body-oriented funk. It’s always a stone’s throw from a recognizable style.
BEN RATLIFF/NEW YORK TIMES
http://www.thrilljockey.com/artists/index.html?id=10037
http://www.myspace.com/radianvienna
CHRISTOF KURZMANN & MICAHALA GRILL + DIDI BRUCKMAYR & HYENA HIVE + MARTIN BRANDLMAYR & CHRISTOF KURZMANN
CHRISTOF KURZMANN
Christof Kurzmann, born in vienna/austria, presently lives in buenos aires.
musician between electropop, improvisation and “new music”. sometimes soloist, he prefers to be part of an collective or an working group. played concerts in all continents with the exception of australia. organizer of various events in the music- and media-genre. labelowner of the small independent label “charhizma” (http://www.charhizma.com) – which at the moment only exists as a plattform to present musicians from around the world in various live settings.
conscient objector of military- and civil-service, he still is politicly active and/or interested. he likes to travel, go to the cinemas and concerts, likes to read, even emails and messages. (but he doesn’t reply all the time).
bands he’s in:
b.fleischmann & c.kurzmann, my kingdom for a lullaby, schnee, the magic i.d., el infierno musical, 4rooms, qmince, hammerriver, …
most recent musical partners:
toto alvarez, martin brandlmayr, john butcher, eden carrasco, sebi ciurcina, werner dafeldecker, fernanda farrah, bernhard fleischmann, michaela grill, kai fagaschinski, margareth kammerer, leonel kaplan, fernando perales, eva reiter, marina rosenfeld, burkhard stangl, michael thieke,clayton thomas, ursula rucker, ken vandermark, …
MICHAELA GRILL
Born 1971; has studied in Vienna, Glasgow and London. Since 1999 various film/video works, installations and live visuals. Lives and works in Vienna.
DIDI BRUCKMAYR
Dr. Didi Bruckmayr
born 5.4.1966
lives in Traun/Upperaustria
Doctor of economy. Dissertation on the nationalsocialist welfare-system in Austria 1938-1945. Work in national and international archives for several years.
Since 1985 singer, actor and performance-artist. Several shows and festival appearances in Europe, Australia, USA, Brasil and Japan (for instance What is music/Sydney, Meltdown/London, Soundfield/Chicago, Ars Electronica, File/Rio, Transmediale/Berlin, Taktlos/Bern, Impakt/Utrecht, Luff/Lausanne, Unsound/Krakow, Wien Modern/Vienna, Donaufestival Krems, Siggraph/San Diego, Moving Patterns/Nyc etc.) solo or with the notorious multimediaperformance group FUCKHEAD.
Actor at Burgtheater/Vienna, Theater im Rabenhof and Landestheater Linz. Extreme vocalist for contemporary composers like Peter Androsch and Maurizio Squillante/Rome and for orchestras like Klangforum Wien and RSO Wien in various pieces.
Digital arts since 1999. Specialises in realtime 3d environments. Currently working with VVVV! Main award for the clip “Ich bin traurig” at Diagonale festival 04. The multiple screenings of his work include festivals in Hamburg, Berlin Odense, Rotterdam, Barcelona, London, Weimar, Vancouver, Dundee, Helsinki, Austin, Chicago, Philadelphia, Seoul, Kairo and Viennale/Vienna. Videoclips are on several international DVD compilations including Sonar/Barcelona, ZKM/Karlsruhe.
In his solo vocal performance work bruckmayr is making trips into the subconscious. Hyperventilation, throat and overtone singing and various strange voices are the proper equipment for these expeditions.
www.fuckhead.at/bruckmayr
www.myspace.com/bruckmayr
HYENA HIVE
It is a known fact that hyenas are always hungry. The insatiable hunger of HYENA HIVE from one live performance to another is also another fact that people are getting more and more aware of. Born from ashes, this Montreal two-headed beast definitely struck the right nerve at their latest live shows. Within a limited amount of time, they cast a noise spell that draws elements from pure evolutionary noise and power-electronics traditions; saturated acoustic sounds topped with harsh undulating grooves and fierce vocals make the trademark sound of the HYENA HIVE. A limited 7’’ inch on ANGLE.REC.
