:: Tuesday, May 06, 2008 :: Goatlab Indoor Festival Rave!!!
Trippmatic Poland's Biggest Breakcore DJ makes his UK debut @ the Goatlab! Trippmatic has been organising gigs and playing at virtually every breakcore gig in Poland for the last two years! He did a wicked mix for Peace Off called "Break Beathoven Got Heroin" and used to live in Bristol! Check out some of his mixes here: www.myspace.com/trippmaticsk.
War Against Sleep Goatlab brings the outdoor vibes to the back room of The Croft with a special set from local festival favourites War Against Sleep. Expect a psychedelic audio-visual feast with a goaty twist.
Michael J Rocks As the 1manarmy collective continue to push the boundaries of live electronica, one act stands out from the rest for both the most intense live experience and for having the best comedy name. Prepare to Rock. To Michael J Rock. s.
+ all the regulars Fri 20th June 08 @ The Croft, Bristol 10pm - 4am £5 Entry
main room: multi core bong ra & mc mike redman [special ‘10 years of bong ra’ set - live] fff [mindbender/planet mu - live] - bristol debut! autopsy [audio damage/deathchant - live] - bristol debut! putsch [no fixed abode - full av live show] - bristol debut! randomoidz [adverse camber - live] bashout allstars [resident badmen] --- upstairs: bass abuse warlock [rag'n'bone] 3d!t [coin operated - live] - bristol debut! arsequake [the blast] stylatron [fire] davey t [dissident] p.r.a.n.k. dancehall clearout --- back room: the bashout lectures audio and visual edutainment, special dj sets, powerpoint displays & more... Lineup TBC (Gusset, Various Bashouteers & More...)
The Gusset Bashout Lecture:
The Matrix: The Pantomime
Abstract: From folk stories and fairy tales to science-fiction and fantasy, western literature has always used metaphor and simile as devices to put across an idea or philosophic argument removed from the prejudices that may otherwise surround it. This lecture will analyse “The Matrix” series of films from the perspective of a traditional British pantomime to draw parallels between the mediums and demonstrate how this abomination of poor story telling, worse acting, and designed-to-date special effects could be better enjoyed with cross-dressing, smut and audience interaction. 'Where’s Agent Smith?' 'He’s behind you!'
I particularly like the above shot as it caught Lou (Syntheme)'s reaction to Dave (Toecutter)'s dick joke and she looks like she's about to spit beer everywhere.
:: Sunday, April 13, 2008 :: Goatlab @ The Croft, Fri 18 April 2008
Syntheme (Planet Mu / WeMe) Lou Wood make's her Bristol debut with her phenomenal fucky acid. If you liked the The Doubtful Guest's acid rinse out at the last Goatlab you don't want to miss this. Another Planet Mu newcomer shows us how it should be done. Rumours abound about her true identity. Want to know more? Come and see for yourself.
Toecutter (System Corrupt / V/VM) - Australia All the way from Australia, Toecutter is the original breakcore mentalist. And it's been a long time since he was last in Bristol. Having shared a house with Candi Hank in 99 and taken his name from the character in Mad Max, the desert sun must have got to him as he became the most frightening and original thing to mash it's way across musical styles in memory. Or is it just "Progressive Progressive Progrsv House"? Either way, he's a long way ahead of the rest of the game. With releases on System Corrupt, V/Vm Test, Digital Vomit, Bruchstellen, Mutant Sniper, and Death$ucker you know this must be quality.
General Disarray (Blunderphonics / Laptop Battle) Matt Jackson one of Bristol's most talented up-and-coming breakcore producers! He is also one half of the Blunderphonics crew, who have organised many a good night down at the legendary Black Swan. He beat Parasite in the first round of Laptop Battle 5 only to be knocked out in the final by house favorite Defazed. His music is raw and full of energy, and he has also been known to play his live set entirely from a game pad using Max/MSP! See for yourself:
Before the Gusset vs Hoonboy set at The Cooler on Thursday Thom and I were setting up and practicing backstage. That turned out to be the highlight of the night as it was sounding good but in the end we didn't get to play. I bailed out at 1am as there was hardly anyone in the place, we weren't due to start until 3am, and the sound was awful for poor Rich Defazed. We tried to get the venue to sort it out put the sound guy had already fucked off home. We were told, "there's nothing wrong with it, it's been set up by professionals." What? Professionals who go home and leave it to run itself? Anyway, I cut my losses and got out and that turned out to be the right more as the venue decided to shut down an 2am anyway. Shame, it was a great line up and could have been a great night, but a Thursday was not the time for it and the promotion could have been better.
Chatting during set-up I mentioned how cool it would be to have a tracker in a VST. Thom pointed out ReViSiT, which does it already. I presumed it would exist but hadn't been bothered to search for one. Cheers, Thom. And sorry you wasted a night coming down from Manchester for a gig you didn't play.
We also have an interesting couple of hours chatting with Juxtaposeur, and have put the breakcore world to rights. Maybe more on that later.
Reminder: Gusset vs Hoonboy Death$ucker mash-up tonight at The Cooler, Part St, Bristol. We'll probably be on 3-4am. Although I'm hoping it wont be that late as I have to be in work tomorrow morning! Oh well, burlesque dancers should make up for it.
Flyers for New Born @ The Cooler on Feb 28th Shows both Sean and myself in the Gusset picture but it’ll just be me playing along with Hoonboy. One hour back-to-back Death$ucker mash-up!
The flyer for the Feb 15th Goatlab @ The Croft, Bristol is below. However, please note that The Doubtful Guest has unfortunately had to cancel. Flyers and posters had already been printed and we are awaiting confirmation from a replacement artist. News here when we get it. More information about who is playing on thegoatlab.com
I've also just agreed to play a one hour Death$ucker mash-up vs set with (against?) Hoonboy at New Born @ The Cooler on Park St, Bristol on Feb 28th. Finalised flyer to follow.
:: Wednesday, December 05, 2007 :: Spreading the gusset marmalade
Knowing you are unlikely to be low on things to do over Christmas and the New Year I though playing a gig for your entertainment was just as likely to clash and interfere with you personal calendar as it was to compliment it. To overcome this problem I have whored myself liberally across as many gigs as possible this festive season. If your winter festivities are shy on Gusset, you may wish to consider attending one of the following. And if you are hardcore enough to attend all of them the sets will be different at each.
Metropolis Music Presents: PORTISHEAD, Bristol Academy Saturday, December 15 at 7:00 PM £25.00
Tickets on sale: Friday, December 7 at 9:30 AM "Tickets are limited to 2 per person, and are only available from Bristol Ticket Shop and Academy Box Office, with a limited amount on Ticketweb. Academy Box Office will be opening at 9.30am, and people paying with cash don't pay any booking fees. We will be asking people to provide ID (as will Ticket Shop) to try to prevent touting of the tickets."
:: Tuesday, October 30, 2007 :: Drop Beats Not Bombs
"Drop Beats Not Bombs ... the bi-yearly anti war event that donates 100% of its profits to the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and Campaign Against Arms Trade.
"Our aim is to educate the people on these important issues whilst they have a good time. So from the start we have made it our mission to put together an event that comprises of a broad spectrum of sounds and styles. From Drum & Bass to Techno to Indie to Hard House, we aim to leave you breathless as we relentlessly seek out the cream of up coming talent as well as established acts/artists. And we hevent even mentioned the incredible visual displays at every event. This truly is a full on assult on the senses."
Next event: The Custard Factory, Birmingham, Sat 10 Nov 2007
(Gusset will be playing after Shitmat in the Medicine Bar)
Tickets are also avalable from the following outlets: Jibbering Records 136 Alcester Rd 0121 499 4551 Swordfish Records Temple St Birmingham 0121 633 4859 Disorder 14 Needless Alley Birmingham 0121 643 2131
SQUAREPUSHER ALTERN-8 BOGDAN RACZYNSKI BONG-RA CEEPHAX ACID CREW DJ REPHLEX RECORDS DJ STINGRAY KID606 KNIFEHANDCHOP KROME & TIME LUKE VIBERT µ-ZIQ RAGGA TWINS AARON SPECTRE SAINT ACID SHITMAT THE DJ PRODUCER THE PANACEA MIKE DRED VENETIAN SNARES KODE9 MALA (DIGITAL MYSTIKZ) CHAS & DAVE DMX KREW REMARC PLAID THE DOUBTFUL GUEST CYLOB DJ SCOTCH EGG CASSETTE BOY
Yeah, the summer lull (also known as the festival season we didn't get booked to play in) has ended and the club nights are starting up with a vengeance. The illusive powers behind the GoatLab have been deliberating whether they want to carry on running the night, so I've stepped in as co-promoter and moved it to a new venue. It won't be restarting until December but will now have a regular slot on the last Friday of alternate months at The Croft. More news as and when.
In addition to this Gusset will be playing at the anti-war fundraiser Drop Beats Not Bombs at the Custard Factory in Birmingham on Saturday 10th November. The line-up will look something like this, although is still subject to change: Wrong Music Grott Bag Acid Experiment, STIG Noise, Mully(Acid/House), Demon Cabbage (Fill Room Full on Rave!), Teknoist, Vex Kiddy, Shitmat VS Shitnat, Gusset, Comp Winnder Set! and Wrong Music DJ's. All of this will be in the Medicine Bar and there will be loads of other stuff going on across the rest of the complex. Plus the Gusset set will include a rare live appearance by Spokesy!
The official website hasn’t been updated yet. I'll update as things come together.
P.S. Remix album release is imminent. The meeting to finalise track order and artwork is this weekend. Rush your gusset pictures in now if you want a chance of appearing on the cover!
:: Wednesday, May 09, 2007 :: Ashton Court Festival Benefit Gig
Gusset have agreed to play at an Ashton Court Festival benefit gig at Timbuk2 in Bristol on 15.06.07. I've always been a fan of the festival (also known as the Bristol Community Festival), and thanks to my parents enthusiasm too I went from an early age. This photo is from 1977 I believe:
The festival has always struggled financially and are very open with their predicament, which seems to have them teetering on the verge of bankruptcy year on year. A whole bunch of people are campaigning to raise funds through various means to help ensure it's future.
The line up for the benefit gig is as yet uncertain but it looks like a highly varied line-up of exciting local talent ...and Gusset. More news as I get it.
Room 2 - Front Room: 10:00 - 11:00 Nim Chimpski 11:00 - 11:45 Punksi 11:45 - 01:00 Jay Nom 01:00 - 03:15 Dub Boy b2b Ironside 03:15 - 04:00 DJ Ruk
Room 3 - The Lab (Access via far end of Main Room) 12:00 - 01:30 Descend 01:30 - 03:00 Gusset - Mrs P's 7 inch Collection Set!!! 03:00 - 04:00 DJ Goat Bot
:: Saturday, March 31, 2007 :: Laptop Battle Debriefing
Yey hey! Out in the first round by a unanimous judges decision!
Congratulations to Headphobe and Defazed (Ned and Rich) for a deserved win, they trounced everyone in every round, there was no doubting they were going to walk away with it.
By extreme ill fortune we were drawn against them in the first round, which we had been dreading. They really hammer hard with their live drum triggering rather than loop based play. We thought we might be able to compete with them in one of the longer later rounds, as Parasite thought they were struggling to keep it up that long when he saw the last battle. In the two-minute opening round it's very very hard to prove yourself and we had no chance against them.
Michael J Rocks was cruelly knocked out. He was the only person who played two two-minute tunes with a beginning a middle and an end (like they teach you at school). Everyone else just kept making noise until they were told to stop. It leave the crowd wanting more but it's not quite as satisfying as a whole.
I think we could have gone further with a different draw but that's life. Was still great fun and the night in all was great. All the neigh-sayers who think its just a geek fest really should see it; there was a brilliant vibe, the crowd were well up for it (there was almost a mosh pit at times) and no beardstroking in sight. Well done to everyone involved and thanks to the promoters for putting it on.
At least I squeezed in a DJ set early in the night so I did play for more than four minutes, and I got to have a little jam with DJ Asian Hawk (UK DMC champion and 2nd in the world, apparently), which was fun.
I've learnt a lot about software and performance though doing this and my normal live sets will improve for it too. It's been a valuable learning opportunity. For the technically minded the advice I received is mostly in this Mu thread. The exception was an email string with Steve Milanese who adviced me not to try to learn software (when I mentioned Pd) in a short space of time, "practise drumming shit a lot and not worry too much about using mad software." It worked for Ned and Rich, as they were much tighter than I've ever seen them before last night. The practice pays off. Well done guys.
:: Sunday, March 25, 2007 :: Impersonal Singular Gesture 5
Shawn Greenlee, Gusset, Bulimic Sideburns @ El Perro, Madrid, 15.03.07
Thanks to JC for sorting out the gig while I was over in Madrid. And thanks to everyone else for making me feel so welcome. Cheers, guys. Especially to Gabi. It's great to work with someone who takes the integration of visuals with the music so seriously. I know you wanted to prepare more and that my freeform, 'don't know what I'm going to play next' attitude to live sets doesn't help, but I think it worked out nicely. And also thanks to Roland. Sorry I couldn't make it to your radio show, that would have been great fun, but time and laptop problems did not permit.
Great music from everyone, all night. The DJ sets at the end were a breath of fresh air. Hearing medieval pieces mixed in with breakcore and booty is brilliant. A very open minded audience you have there, I wish it was like that everywhere. "Theremin boy" (I never found out his real name) was good too. As I discussed with Shewn, it's amazing how simple an instrument still holds so much fascination. Although you can argue the same about guitars or bongos or anything else. Within electronic music it has a unique place.
Shawn Greenlee's set was superb. He wanted to limit it to 40 minutes, joking that people can't take much more of it than that, but I would have gladly listened to more. (Thanks for the CD too btw.) His homebrew interfaces (the drawing tablet and the battered and hacked-up keypad) made for an inspiring visual performance. These were input devices anyone watching could understand and using the laptop purely as a display of the audio visual interaction between the controls and the music means he creates perfectly entwined abstract visuals at the same time. It's difficult to explain. Just look at the pictures and imaging the visuals projected on the ceiling are constantly evolving and changing with the aural onslaught.
The GoatLab 3 gig last Friday went well. Well, went OK at least. My photos have been added to this Flickr set. (Also includes GoatLab 1 from September).
Once again I played so early in the evening there was no-one there at the start of it and when asked to extend it as the place filled up I dropped some of the early material in again. I don't think the recording is going to sound very good.
Hunting Lodge provided a hilarious does of guitar based noise. They were tight, their guitarist was good, their bassist kept trying to trash his base but forgot that it was attached to his neck, the vocals were unsurprisingly unintelligible, but their drummer made the band. Wielding nothing but two sticks, his underpants, and a sweaty hairy beer gut full of attitude, he stole the show. This is male bonding music. As long as the bonding consists of pushing and shoving, shouting and generally trying to intimidate and embarrass your mates.
Acrnym lived up to the sales pitch of sounding like "Venetian Snares on crack." At least, I'll buy that description, without having ever taken crack. His three quid CDR was a bargin too. Incidentally, I noticed a poster advertising the film Outlaw this morning. The quote from lads rag Nuts called it "Football Factory with guns!" Yeah, because any film can be improved by adding guns to it, can't it? At least it makes a change from the tired journalistic cliché of simply adding "...on drugs" to the end of everything. The above adage only proves that promoters are just as guilty of falling into the same literary hole.
Mad EP played a great, dark and heavy hip-hop influenced set. It seemed to throw people again, in the same way Milanese did at the same venue. What is it with Bristol breakcore fans and there 300bpm ears? Sometimes it's good to slow down now and again. Maybe just not slap band in the middle of the evening I guess.
Patric C / Candi Hank was one of the founders of the breakcore scene, back in the Digital Hardcore days, but someone I knew embarrassingly little about. His set showed he is still at the top of his game. It much harder (and with less Germanic rapping) than the example set I linked to last week. The most impressive thing about it was that huge chunks of it were played live out of a GP2x handheld Linux console (link) and an old Commodore Amiga running a tracker that was projected onto a giant screen. Best crowd reaction of the night too.
Jason Forrest played a thumping happy hardcore tinged DJ Donna Summer set, which seemed to keep everyone happy. I think would have preferred a live set of his own prog-rock influenced disco madness personally. The inclusion of the Beastie Boys Girls made me smile in particular. Like his DJ set I linked to here some of the material looses its intensity and starts to sound silly when played that fast. Am I getting old?
Ironside finished off with a one-deck Final Scratch DnB DJ set that was only marred by me rummaging through cables behind the booth and accidentally cutting his power. Sorry about that.
Unfortunately technical problems – failed sound system – in the back room means the eagerly anticipated 'Mrs P 7" Collection' DJ set didn't happen. I'll keep that for the next GoatLab on 4th May. Also playing at the next one will be Hecate*, Cdatakill, Soundbytes (of Prodigy mash-up fame), and Gareth Clark.
Let's hope having Hecate and Gusset on the same bill doesn't curse the night. We've been booked to play with Rachel twice in the past and both times the night has been cancelled. Really looking forward to actually seeing her live finally. Third time lucky, eh?
"We visit a re-enactment of musical mayhem originally staged more than 20 years ago by cult German group - Einsturzende Neubauten. Take a look at the pictures or listen to the interview." [RealAudio]
:: Tuesday, February 20, 2007 :: Gusset Take Madrid
Gusset will be playing live at Impersonal Strike in Madrid, Spain on 15th March, along with Shawn Greenlee (a.k.a. Pleasurehorse) and "more audiovisual carnage."