Blip Pop Svengali
Dec. 22nd, 2004 11:29 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
imomus'Baroque in Voltage', the new album from the Super Madrigal Brothers, is officially released in 2005, but I'm told initial quantities are available now from Fever Pitch. Super Madrigal Brothers is the 8 bit supergroup featuring Adam Bruneau and John Talaga. Adam lives in Dacula, Georgia (the fabulous graphics he makes for the Super Madrigal Bros website always make me think of Dracula, though) and John is based in Bay City, Michigan. In 2002 I was the svengali who put the group together. I'd heard their demos, and thought that Adam's charmingly controlled 8-bit compositions put together with John's wild and heavy deconstructions might yield something extraordinary. It did, and I unreservedly recommend their Shakestation album to anyone. It's an incredibly adventurous exploration of madrigals played on freaky electronics, a superb balance of control and abandon, melody and texture, music and noise. If you don't believe me (I am, after all, the label boss) read the Pitchfork review.
So why is 'Baroque in Voltage' on Fever Pitch instead of American Patchwork? Well, I froze the AmPatch release schedule when I realised I was paying for launching the careers of new artists with my own record royalties. I wasn't able to afford the press officers and advertisements needed to break new artists, so in some ways the label was a kind of R&D laboratory, designed to put together new acts then let them migrate to bigger labels. AmPatch has now broken even, so there may be a chance to put out records again in 2005. Let's see. Anyway, I'm delighted the SuperMads have released another record. A copy is on its way to me at this moment. From the preview mp3 on their site it sounds as strong as the last one. I'm sure I'll love it.
I worried back in 2002 that the 8-bit movement might be a passing fad, but it seems to have a life of its own, existing, like a retro video game, in a parallel world alongside the musical world we know. The other day the BBC ran a feature about Polish Blip Pop, and if you go to the website of America's best contemporary art centre, New York's PS1, you can hear a radio show in which Malcolm McLaren, the ultimate svengali (he assembled the Sex Pistols the same way I assembled the Super Madrigal Brothers) talks about his own forays into the genre. He even uses the word 'folktronic' in the interview! I know McLaren a bit through his girlfriend, and I can only say that I'm delighted if he's been influenced in some way by my ideas. McLaren albums like 'Duck Rock' and 'Waltz Darling' were certainly an influence on me. I interviewed McLaren a couple of years ago and he spoke non-stop for ten hours without ever once getting boring. What an extraordinary man!
So why is 'Baroque in Voltage' on Fever Pitch instead of American Patchwork? Well, I froze the AmPatch release schedule when I realised I was paying for launching the careers of new artists with my own record royalties. I wasn't able to afford the press officers and advertisements needed to break new artists, so in some ways the label was a kind of R&D laboratory, designed to put together new acts then let them migrate to bigger labels. AmPatch has now broken even, so there may be a chance to put out records again in 2005. Let's see. Anyway, I'm delighted the SuperMads have released another record. A copy is on its way to me at this moment. From the preview mp3 on their site it sounds as strong as the last one. I'm sure I'll love it.
I worried back in 2002 that the 8-bit movement might be a passing fad, but it seems to have a life of its own, existing, like a retro video game, in a parallel world alongside the musical world we know. The other day the BBC ran a feature about Polish Blip Pop, and if you go to the website of America's best contemporary art centre, New York's PS1, you can hear a radio show in which Malcolm McLaren, the ultimate svengali (he assembled the Sex Pistols the same way I assembled the Super Madrigal Brothers) talks about his own forays into the genre. He even uses the word 'folktronic' in the interview! I know McLaren a bit through his girlfriend, and I can only say that I'm delighted if he's been influenced in some way by my ideas. McLaren albums like 'Duck Rock' and 'Waltz Darling' were certainly an influence on me. I interviewed McLaren a couple of years ago and he spoke non-stop for ten hours without ever once getting boring. What an extraordinary man!
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(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-22 10:52 am (UTC)hello sailor!
Date: 2004-12-22 11:19 am (UTC)erik
(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-22 11:44 am (UTC)Is the text of the 10hr interview available anywhere? I'm sure he still throws out mad, interesting, impractical, visionary, opportunistic, creative, influential ideas at a furious rate and I miss more regular media appearances from him.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-22 12:27 pm (UTC)I've posted the McLaren transcripts here (http://www.imomus.com/mclaren.html). It's not all ten hours, because I had a battery failure in my microcassette machine. And it's just a big wedge of text because I can't be bothered to format it. No illustrations either, but you can picture us sitting at a cafe table on the Place St Sulpice sipping beaujolais as the sun sets.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-22 12:53 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-22 02:41 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-22 02:45 pm (UTC)pet cancer boy
Date: 2004-12-22 03:46 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-22 04:13 pm (UTC)'The Nick and Malcolm Xmas Carol' !
Thank you,
Antonio
Re: pet cancer boy
Date: 2004-12-22 04:53 pm (UTC)You can keep up with Phiiliip through his website (http://www.phiiliip.com/). At the moment he's showing art in the Deitch gallery in Williamsburg. His new record is called 'Divided By Lightning' and you can hear samples here (http://www.phiiliip.com/dividedbylightning.html).
Re: pet cancer boy
Date: 2004-12-22 06:10 pm (UTC)buy it, because it will make you dance.
ps: thanks for posting that mclaren interview, nick. i love the idea that he is influenced by you, since i'm certainly influenced by both of you.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-22 06:57 pm (UTC)I'm not even sure if Supermad qualifies as 8-bit anymore, in fact I know it doesn't! There's 4-bit, 2-bit and 16-bit, samples now, and there are many more techniques that could have never been done on any of those systems. And my bits are less linear, I think it's a more human record a lot of ways. It reminds me of love.
It feels like I've been hearing this music for years now so for me it gets tiring, especially when I hear the purists (and there seems to be a lot in the scene). A lot of people use these programs that emulate the original sound systems to a T, but we've never done that. It's much more texture, orchestral, and more like a Magic Eye poster than anything else.
Eternal thanks to our Svengali for our origin! I was just listening to the Gongs a few days ago and was reminded of how much those Ampatch records blew my mind.
Adam
(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-22 07:15 pm (UTC)Re McLaren + chiptunes, have you read Micromusic.net's open letter to him?:
http://micromusic.net/public_letter_gwEm.html
(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-22 07:32 pm (UTC)Adam
(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-22 08:17 pm (UTC)Going back to the t-shirt, I'd like to think it encouraged me to seek out loves of my own - it's a while ago but I think I had a pretty good idea a few of the references were more than a bit dodgy even then. I remember being so relieved when groups like the Subway Sect and The Pop Group emerged from the margins of the punk scene, intelligence stopped being a dirty word and there was at least the attempt to make music that moved away from the deadly 1-2-3-4.
There have been a number of people in my life - including McLaren - who have provided prompts and pointers that have led me along whole chains of interests, I like so-and-so, they say they like so-and-so and they say that they're influenced by etc. You come up with variable results but that is half the fun of the journey. There've been a whole list of things I've followed up as a result of your posts too I might add.
The Black Boxes
Date: 2004-12-22 09:16 pm (UTC)rather too much lace
Date: 2004-12-22 11:12 pm (UTC)"And so, on this April morning, Andre Lhery was once
more alive to the incurable anguish of having scattered
himself over many lands, of having been a wanderer over
the whole earth, attaching himself to more than one place
by his heart strings. Dear heaven! Why must he now
be so bound to two native lands: this, of his birth, and that
other, his oriental home?"
nick, do you know pierre loti's work/life?
question mark and mystery
Date: 2004-12-22 11:17 pm (UTC)erik
(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-23 12:05 am (UTC)To start, in your article in November 2003's Wired magazine you make the statement "then I discovered chip music". Chip music existed since even before 1977...
You know, 'I discovered chip music' does not mean 'I invented chip music'. These people are chip monks. Or, in Adam's phrase, 'chip rockists'.
Re: rather too much lace
Date: 2004-12-23 12:09 am (UTC)No, just know the name. But didn't he write the original 'Bilitis', which became a David Hamilton film and and Francis Lai soundtrack, and then a track on my album with Laila France?
Re: rather too much lace
Date: 2004-12-23 12:10 am (UTC)Re: question mark and mystery
Date: 2004-12-23 12:30 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-23 12:44 am (UTC)hahahahahahah
Adam ROTFL
(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-23 12:46 am (UTC):D boom boom
But I guess it's only to be expected that people get funny about this kind of thing when someone comes along and plants a flag on their genre/scene + declares it 'discovered'! :)
Re: The Black Boxes
Date: 2004-12-23 01:05 am (UTC)www.fashionflesh.com
www.supermadrigalbros.com
louys est un autre.
Date: 2004-12-23 06:52 am (UTC)pierre loti, he was quite mad. (why can writers look like this anymore?)
erik
Re: louys est un autre.
Date: 2004-12-23 08:13 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-23 08:29 am (UTC)i am definitely getting that when it comes out...definitely.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-23 08:37 am (UTC)Re: louys est un autre.
Date: 2004-12-23 09:37 am (UTC)Re: louys est un autre.
Date: 2004-12-23 09:57 am (UTC)Re: rather too much lace
Date: 2004-12-23 11:39 am (UTC)As this piece (http://www.saudiaramcoworld.com/issue/199204/the.orient.of.pierre.loti.htm) mentions, he introduced himself to Sarah Bernhardt by being rolled up in a Persian rug and getting himself delivered to her room. Shades of Carry on Cleo. He was fond of dressing in local mufti and, for an intriguing cross-cultural look at this practice at the time in the Japanese context, there's a good piece by Christine Guth in this book (http://www.frontlist.com/detail/0822364905) on cultural cross-dressing.
This is the general academic line (http://wwwsshe.murdoch.edu.au/intersections/issue8/lyne.html) on Loti in the Japanese context.
Marxy's a huge fan, I hear...
(no subject)
Date: 2004-12-24 05:31 pm (UTC)i was addicted to castlevania at one point in my life..