AUX Performance Space
October 13, 2013, 8pm
Philadelphia Sound Forum Presents:
Barry Weisblat, Andrew Lafkas and Marcia Bassett (electronics / bass / guitar)
Eric Laska and Timothy Leonido
Jenny Gräf
Barry Weisblat was born in Brooklyn in 1975 and remains one of the unsung heroes of deep and investigative Sound. Thought. Beyond a long-running commitment to participating in the underground’s underground of improvisation and a dynamic sense of musical conversation, Weisblat has extended his reach and pool of knowledge beyond rubbing the surface of the black box of sound to designing and implementing his own systems. Translating light into sound, sound into action, action into thought, and thought into light, Weisblat’s ceaseless curiosity and simultaneous obsessive desire to participate and join in dialogue has pushed his output farther out than most people can see or conceive of. Some collaborations include work with Michael Bernstein, Margarida Garcia, Andrew Lafkas, Toshio Kajiwara, Matt Valentine, Theo Angell, Otomo Yoshide, Mattin, Tim Barnes, Greg Pope, Toshi Nakamura, Sean Meehan, Dion Workman.
Andrew Lafkas is a musician living in New York; his primary instrument is the doublebass. He is currently focused on developing pieces that encourage group intuition; this interest was greatly inspired and influenced by experiences working in groups led by Milo Fine and by Bill Dixon. He has performed at venues and festivals including The Walker Art Center, The Living Theatre, Experimental Intermedia, The Vision Festival, and The Seattle Improvised Music Festival.
Marcia Bassett is an ambient noise artist. Although legendary for white-hot guitar and vocal brutality, Zaimph’s recent recordings and performances infuse cracked-raga song structures with dense electronic and synthesizer drones to create soundscapes where a lurking apocalypse is eclipsed by shimmering, meditative beauty. As a co-founder of Philadelphia’s shambolic psychonauts un and tectonic drone pioneers Double Leopards, Bassett is deeply entwined with the American noise underground, and has mapped regions still only dimly understood by subsequent sonic travelers. From 2003-2008, Bassett joined Matthew Bower in Hototogisu, where her mastery of cacophonous eardrum shred achieved monolithic proportions. During the same period, she explored American underground psychedelic folk-improv music with Steve Gunn and Pete Nolan in GHQ, and with Tom Carter in Zaika.
In addition to her solo project Zaïmph, Bassett is a frequent collaborator with a wide spectrum of musicians including Helen Espvall (Espers), Samara Lubelski, Margarida Garcia, Jenny Graf (Metalux), Taylor Richardson (Infinity Window), and Barry Weisblat.
