Great men and grateful pawnbrokers tour
DarK smith
S*Glass
D Harrison
MeIKings
About the Artists
Darksmith (CA):
Tom Darksmith (aka "Darksmith of California") has been releasing music since the mid-Aughts, steadily gaining a reputation as one of the finest crafters of analog muck 'n fuck around. His unique blend of gauzy tape hiss, somnambulistic anti-narrative and dense, dread inducing atmospherics is instantly recognizable, often imitated but never replicated. Inhabiting the grey area between noise, musique concrete and sound art, his work has been published by such celebrated underground institutions as Hanson (US), Chondritic Sound (US), Second Sleep (ITA) and Hasten & Korset (SWE), to name but a few, as well as his own Mom Costume imprint, frequently accompanied by signature claustrophobic pen and ink illustration album art. Although fairly prolific as a recording artist, Darksmith performances were, until recently, very rare, and these upcoming gigs will be his first ever on the East Coast, marking this as an event not to be missed for fans of outward bound sound.
S*Glass (CA):
Seymour Glass is a long time veteran of the psychic wars. Many first came into contact with him via the seminal Bananafish magazine, a venerable outlet for strange audio (and other) activity he edited from around 1986-2004 (an excellent interview chronicling this time can be heard here). In the years since the final issue of Bananafish was published Seymour has, in addition to running the Tedium House distro, been extremely active alongside a close group of friends under the umbrella of the Butte County Free Music Society. Their work was first documented on the brilliant Induced Musical Spasticity archival box set issued in 2009, featuring recordings made in and around California State College during the early 80s. This was followed by a steady stream of vinyl and CD releases of more archival works by the likes of The Conduits, Vomit Launch and Maria Estevez, as well as plenty of new material from BuFMS flapships Glands of External Secretion and Bren’t Lewiis Ensemble. Seymour has toured extensively in various configurations throughout the United States, Europe, Australia/New Zealand and Japan, and his work has been featured on such imprints as Chocolate Monk (UK), Siltbreeze (US), Ultra Eczema (BELG) and Feeding Tube (US).
Duncan Harrison (UK):
Duncan Harrison is an artist from Brighton, UK. Involved for the last 20 years in various poles of international experimental audio subculture, his practice is formed from a knotted mass of recorded sound, texts, performances and imagery. Informed by an unwieldy cross section of 20th and 21st century avant-garde art obscurism, Harrison’s outputs vary wildly in nature, but at their core stem from an approach of abstraction and re-presentation, bound up within nods toward autobiographical symbolism and deadpan delivery. His work in its various forms has been platformed by the likes of Chocolate Monk (UK), Index Clean (AUS), Regional Bears (UK), De Player (NL), Joy De Vivre (ITA), Tusk Festival (UK), Click Festival (DK), Supernormal Festival (UK) and Colour Out of Space (UK). Harrison is also in charge of adhuman - a small press label and mail order established with the aim of beating its head against the twin brick walls of Brexit induced podiatric gunfire and a hopeless obsession with the most awkward, uncooperative musical forms.
Melkings (local support):
The reemergence of duo Jim Strong & Thomas DeAngelo, who's semi-improvised, tape manipulated, failed performance art could most pithily be summed up as "focused ennui". A suite of three cassettes (two on The Gift of Music (US), one on Regional Bears (UK)), CD on Hologram (US) and compilation appearance on Freakdom (US/UK) stand as their recorded legacy to date, as well as a string of performances around the tri-state area. This will be their first live meeting in over five years, and is sure to delight any and all whom regard perfect as the enemy of the good.