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World Listening Day @ Aberystwyth, Ceredigion Museum this 18th July
Salutations Friend of experimental and visionary music.
For World Listening Day we offer twin guitar explorations from Ash Cooke and Simon Proffitt. Ash has recently published a compendium of current underground Welsh music, Simon-most recently providing live visuals for Rhodri Davies. The pair have teamed-up for a new release via seminal micro label Linear Obsessional. Concert starts a little later at 8pm and tickets available on the door. Micro listening, attuned to some hermetic strange version of tonality, this concert is a must for aficionados of experimentalism.
Breaking with the pattern of things, we have another concert lined up for August 14th which is very thrilling. I have been a long time fan of the data bending computer chamber music of Finnish composer Jukka Pekka Kervinen, sporadic social media contact has led to his Welsh debut in Aberystwyth and to add to this, we have a hybrid performance with (another long term favourite from another extreme), Ceri Rhys Mathews will collaborate and perform with pibgorn. So, expect a blend of modular, electronic chamber music and Welsh bagpipes. Another 8pm start at the museum, hope to see you there
All the best
Dafydd
https://jukkapekkakervinen.bandcamp.com/
Other News:
Exemption form Meaning-the CD/Booklet with Toshimaru Nakamura is now available-as digital download with hard copy booklet. Already picking up rave reviews, and with a creative documentary on the way now is the time to get your copy (recorded in Llanon and performed live at the museum)
https://listentothevoiceoffire.bandcamp.com/album/exemption-from-meaning
Limited edition T Shirt
The LVOF T shirt, water soluble ink screen printed on 100% organic cotton, Pythagorean design- available here with avant garde music downloads enticement £14.99
Buy this T shirt and get download code for a massive collection of Our glassie Azoth tracks going right back to first ever released track in 1992 and encompassing Oggum cdrs, 7″ tracks and digital streamed releases. And feel happy-you’re supporting Listen to the Voice of Fire plan ahead for more weird eared drone fodder with your psych noise friends.
https://ourglassieazoth.bandcamp.com/merch/listen-to-the-voice-of-fire-t-shirt
Coming Soon- October 2019- March 2020: Unland
Ltd Edition Organic Ethical Waterbased & …alchemical
Hi All,
Not so long to go until my two nights of psych folk drone noise…mine and yours too. Tickets are beginning to shift, this is always a scary bit, I am not doing this for spondoolicks, but for the love of the musick and long may these occasions continue. A few more ticket sales would steady the nerves, though-don’t leave it too late!
What better way to show you’re in with the in crowd than to don the Listen to the Voice of Fire T shirt!
Proceeds will help keep me able to pull more psyche noise improv together, and you will look cool about town too.
I’ll add a PayPal button pretty soon, there are only a handful of these so it would be ultracool to see swathes of your bodies in Aber clad in this 100% Organic Cotton Waterbased ink Screen Printed Etthically Printed unisex T (S,M,L), postage to the back of beyond will be added.
Here’s a snip from my phone, let me know if you fancy, where you are in UK (or o’er seas) and with some luck can be yours before we convene on Friday 15th!
February Update
Five weeks countdown to 2 evenings of excellent experimental music in Aberystwyth. Multiple tech issues-my incompetence have delayed and frustrated and it seems time is slipping. Key Message-plan ahead, and Key Message two-this is going to be two great nights and any of you characters in the Mid Wales, borders DIY scene should trek out to stay awhile amidst the rakish charm of Aberystwyth and tune into these exceptional acts. Heck, wherever you are it’s going to be worth it to see these acts wrapped up in one beautiful shimmering haze.
Anyhow, we have been busy in other capacities….finishing off the CD/booklet with Toshimaru Nakamura, from last years visit and project -I’m hoping copies may be available just in time for March and it would be super if you wanted to bag a copy then, all goes into the coffers to try and make more of this experimental stuff happen in our part of the world!
For the fashion conscious I believe that the latest on point garment is the Listen to the Voice of Fire T-shirt! A limited edition, details to follow….
Tickets available Now!
Ecstatic drone and psychfolk noise descend on Aberystwyth. Tickets available in advance for this dream ticket from the pockets of the global DIY underground
I am so excited to have these people come and play at LVOF, more than a gig it’s growing network of likeminded audience and players, and on these two nights we have the pre-eminent avant aesthetes of recent years, esoteric hauntologists and melancholy folk tinges. If you are in Wales, West Wales, the borders, the back of beyond-this is your chance to catch these people, some of whom have never played in Wales and who are rightly beloved of Ptolemaic Terrascope, The Quietus, The Sound Projector, TQ, The Wire and more.
Tickets are £10 each night (with booking fee from Eventbrite), some are available on the night for £12 and I hope we can clear the hall before then. Come and meet your psychedelic noise drone heroes
Merry Christmas and Coming Soon——-
Nadolig Llawen/Happy Christmas to all attendees and supporters for Listen to the Voice of Fire past, present and future!
It’s been an awesome year, every concert has been a pleasure to host and been a discovery.
Of course the project and performance with the great Toshimaru Nakamura visiting wet West Wales (DEBUT) was a long term ambition and came together in stupendous fashion.
It was humbling, touching, overpowering to be honest to see so many of you characters thronging to the Ceredigion Museum for the concert with Nakamura. I was blown away.I am working on the CD now and this should be available in the first quarter of 2019.
The music on the night-wow- Jenn Kirby amazed, Ed Wright dazzled, Barret’s Dottled Beauty transcended, Arai Tatsuru—stupefied, Andrew Leslie Hooker howled and the trio of Nakamura, Rhodri and Angharad Davies-smacked gobs with nuance, space and edge. Meeting up with the marvellous Ed Pinsent was another high point-thanks for coming Ed and for your sketches of us all 
Yes-we have this night on audio and must do something with it in due course.
There are tooo many to thank but a few whilst I remember. John Whatling and Les Wilkins- you jumped into deal with issues whilst I crumbled-thanks both. And Ed Wright thanks too, as I faltered you were calm!
We’ve kept to this odd routine of March, July and November-and performances at all of these have made my year-thanks for coming, for creeping out of the woodwork and sharing my sort of music. Dear Duncan Chapman-a long term supporter of LVOF brought his collaborator Mike McInnerney (sp.,) along, and together they conjured deep layers of shakuhachi and electronic haze. It was a pleasure to meet you and for our dinner discussion at the Treehouse the day before. And we were joined by the rather excellent Richard Craig.
Richard’s whole approach has been personally very affecting. This was a subtle and understated performance which capitalized on attentive listening, space, speaker location intimacy and fractured tonalities. Good humour and intelligent insightful discussion, a good Indian meal was had before hand-thankyou Sir.
Steve Moyes destroyed his cello and the electroacoustic phase from Audiomulch wizzadry was fantastic. Steve-you have been a long term supporter of LVOF-it’s been great to hear you play and I am looking forward to more collaboration in the future. It was a hazy summer’s night in July and what can I say-thanks all.
For me this business of LVOF is a personal journey of reconnecting with myself-if that makes any sense., and I very much enjoyed meeting Richard and the discussions we had, at the Light of Asia and the Treehouse with Duncan and Mike-and of course the concert and approach. Thanks! And for those of you who did not make it, it was another blinder.
November seems a year ago. Ffrwd-dropped into my horizon I think thanks to Malcolm Gwyon, and I am so glad he did-this was-captured perfectly by Felix’s photos-overwhelming avant musique concrete with Cymric twists, we must have this fellow back-Nord, Power Tools, Welsh hymnody and Nord modular-what is not to like.
I knew we were going into modular heaven with Subversive Frequencies, encroaching on Hawkwind-ish levitational powers this tech heavy set was super saturated with psychedelic but unsettling visuals and imagery swirling and projected behind this troupe, with the silhouetted attendees in the stalls it made the whole evening very surreal, until Ffrwd appeared and twisted us off to another dimension. . Marc Snell manned this ship and also provided much technical solutions on the night-big thanks Marc.
Susan Mathews and Ian Holloway-thanks for bringing another dimension to what we try to do with LVOF. Dreamy piano Satie-esque impressionism, with drones and home made devices-kitchen bowls’ inharmonic frequencies never sounded so good. Their set was the perfect antidote and I hope we meet again soon.
So where does this leave us now, oh yes-Merry Christmas.
And set your diaries for the weekend of Friday 15th and Saturday 16th of March.
Friday 15th: If all goes according to plan we shall have a 1 day symposium at the National Library of Wales “In a Strange Garden” addressing hermeticism, acoustic ecologies and sound process, with concert and exhibition of rare alchemical texts. Participants to be announced soon-expect some surprises!
Friday 15th: Evening a fantastic spread of essential psychedelic noise drone visits Aberystwyth. You cannot get these characters normally and here they are coming to visit, please tell your friends and do not miss out on this.
itdreamedtome—-legendary obscure haze ambient drone
Laura Netz——– harsh ambient experimenter
Bell Lungs——–Scottish psychedelic infused songstress
Sharron Krauss—–Folk horror legend
Saturday 16th:
Ashtray Navigations—–the premier DIY underground aesthetes, they’ve long been in my dreams to play at Aber, descend and expect to be thrilled, if you have any interest in independent minded and inspirational DIY underground legends beloved of The Wire and Thurston Moore-you must attend this.
Kitchen Cynics—-another legend, a marvellous singer of finely poised songs, who plays psychedelic and folk related compositions and has been a long time player on the DIY underground, pre internet tape swapping labels of yester year, but so what—his music remains direct, emotionally charged and spellbinding- you must not let opportunity this slip!
Hawthonn- a commanding and striking combo, whose deep astral folk and electronic esoterica will spin you to another place. Phil Legard you will know from his many releases and academic writing on occult matters is joined by Layla Legard, after last year’s Red Goddess release one of the Quietus’ albums of the year), this is the icing on the cake, for the curious and for those in the know, please come along and tell your friends, never to be repeated at these time space co-ordinates.
Tickets will be available on the door and for those attending the conference a batch deal., subject to me pulling my finger out.
So last year was awesome—-next year will be ultra, ultra—– draft poster attached to pass around to your friends. Blog to be updated soon, follow me on Twitter-it’s the easiest way for me!
Anyhow, rest up, don’t eat to much and see you on the flip side
Dafydd
Subversive Frequencies
Someone described my music as like Hawkwind gone wrong-but in a good way, and the comment snuck away at the back of my mind for years…until last Thursday. Subversive Frequencies descended on the Ceredigion Museum with a shed load of gizmos, audio and video processors and on more than a few occasions- the ether cleared. This clip doesn’t capture the audio so well, its pulsating dystopian waves, nor does it get the visuals. You can thank me for the ad hoc camera work. Levitation levitation levitation- kept ringing through my mind, although really this was a mostly dark set, of throbbing electronica and irregular and textural improvisation, spiralling out of control in all the right ways. Just what we needed.We hope to see these back again!
Coming Soon…Thursday 1st November
Musique concrete for toothbrushes Nord modular noise and drone…an evening with your new friends at LVOF. Tickets on the door, opens up at 7.30 for an approximate start thereafter.
Richard Craig
Hailing from Clydebank, Scotland, Richard Craig has come to establish himself as one of the leading performers of new music. He has performed alongside ensembles such as MusikFabrik Köln, Klangforum Wien, and as a soloist he has been the dedicatee of many works for flute. As a composer/improviser he has been involved in an ongoing project with feedback called AMP/AL. His discography includes two monographs (INWARD and VALE both released on the métier label), and he has performed in numerous radio broadcasts for the BBC, WDR Köln, YLE Finland, Radio France, Radio Nacional de España, Swedish Radio, ARTE and Icelandic RUV. His own music is available on bandcamp.
The Sound Projector
Very interesting review from the mighty Ed Pinsent of the last Listen to the Voice of Fire. See here: http://www.thesoundprojector.com/2018/03/17/heat-light-and-fire/
Insightful comments regarding the split of noisy to introspective in the program as well as the reckoning of the (over) long AV piece, spell binding but whatever happened to agreed fifteen minutes, some imbalance perhaps.
Ed came all the way up to back of beyond Aberystwyth, well as did many of you, and suffered the regular as clockwork hitches on Arriva Trains Wales. But, what a pleasant fellow and we all enjoyed the Light of Asia on the night before. Great company and surprisingly tasty food.
Ahh, let’s do it all again…
Exemption from meaning
This project is supported by Daiwa Anglo Japanese Foundation and the Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation .
The pitch was to make a new piece of sound work, based on the Japanese ceramics contained in the Aberystwyth University School of Art. And to bring experimental and improvising artists together with Toshimaru Nakamura who makes his Welsh debut here in Aberystwyth in 2018-a few weeks away now!
You can see my trace here in this photo which I snapped, visiting by chance, at Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge before Christmas. The pitch had been made at this point but there was someting very pleasing about seeing this particualar example.
Kyokusul no en i is a song reading festival conducted in Spring (currently held on the first Sunday of March at the Dazaifu shrine), where poets compete in their skills to create an original verse before a Japanese wine-cup which has been placed over-stream passes through its strecth on a narrow river branch. Historically, this festival was believed to have been held by the high-court members of classical China from 300 BC as a festival to wash away the impurities of spirit. It became popular in Japan from around the Heian period (794-1868).
This provided me with a burst of confidence in the project which would see several improvisers collaborating with Toshimaru Nakamura. Each would select an item from the collection and this be the basis of the ‘object score’. Amongs the collaborators are: Rhodri Davies, Greg Bevan (film) Adrew Leslie Hooker, Jenn Kirby, Mary Jacob (poet), Ed Wright, Dafydd Roberts & Toshimaru Nakamura.
With a few weeks now to run each of the collaborators choose an item from the collection to work with/respond to. With a bit of luck-respondents respond speedily (albeit at short notice) collaborator items will form the basis of an exhibition at the Aberystwyth Arts Centre in March.
So the idea now is to begin to capture some words and document some of the process.
I have not decided which pot i will use, but one of the best things already has been becoming aware of just how much we have in the collections and its quality and diversity inspires.
I started -re reading Barthes’ Empire of Signs as a prelude to this project and even though this is not of istelf a research project, finding contexts and texts about this process is something I will try and capture as well-but as I am in haste this may all come afterwards. I come from a point of naievety so you may provide links and text that I should refer to. Especially around creating object and graphic scores, Barthes, improvisation and sonification.