Return-Path: From: rsgour@aol.com X-Mailer: America Online Mailer Sender: Reply-To: To: bzs@world.std.com Date: Sat, 09 Oct 93 01:03:42 EDT Subject: Chaos Control #3 part 2 ------------------- MIRANDA SEX GARDEN Miranda Sex Garden have gone through several phases in their relatively short career, but now they seem to have truly found their niche. The group was originally started up by singer and multi-instrumentalists Kelly McCuster, Katherine Blake and Jocelyn West. The debut 1991 LP, Madra, was comprised of mostly a capella madrigals, but the follow up EP, Iris marked a major change in the band and their sound. With West replaced by Donna McKevitt and the addition of guitarist Ben Golomstock and percussionist Trevor Sharpe, Miranda Sex Garden now has a fuller, and even more unique sound. This Spring, the group released their second full length LP, Suspiria, an album that full realizes the potential of the new line-up. While the new Miranda Sex Garden sound is not really more commercial, but it is certainly more accessible and interesting than the band's early work. The rich, almost classical arrangements tailored to the rock format mesh perfectly with the three singers. And most importantly, it is a true "band" situation, unlike the dance track "Gush Forth My Tears," which introduced American audiences to the band several years ago. "At the time it was kind of like 'how can we commercialize this vocal thing'," explains Trevor. "So they got Thrash from the Orb and other people coming in doing all these dance mixes to kind of like get it out to the public. I mean musically, its nothing compared to what we're doing now." The new line-up hasn't really affected the way the band works, since Blake still comes up with most of the lyrics and basic melodies. "A lot of our songs come about in different ways," explains Trevor. "Ben comes up with a lot of the original ideas and then we'll all work on it. It's just a noise or some chords that he's into and I'll put a rhythm to it and then Donna will come up with the Viola line or something, it's just like patching pieces together. Some of the songs start off on keyboards, some of them start off on guitar. We just sort of collect it and try to turn it into an event" Although the wide variety of instruments used on their recordings may make it seem that the music would be difficult to adapt to the live setting, Miranda Sex Garden actually create their music with performance in mind. The live instrumentation consists of drums, guitar and bass with lots of effects, electric viola and two violins. "It's got more of an edge," says Donna. "It's how we originally intended the music to come across. it's quite hard. It's a different experience" Trevor adds that this sound will become more apparent on their next studio endeavor. "We're going to get nastier," he says. "We're going to try to be as intense on record as we are live and try and be a bit more straightforward." The latest LP, which takes its title from the horror film of the same name, is filled with off-beat touches. "Play," for example, features vocals by Blake that start off as sweet singing before evolving into evil sounding yells. There's also some some interesting covers: a version of "My Funny Valentine" and a rendition of "In Heaven (Lady in the Radiator Song) from David Lynch's film "Eraser Head." The album took 6 months to make total, and 14 days to actually record. The band says that they could have got it done faster, but they find working 8 hour days "dull" and say that they are too lazy anyway. Because of their dark and gothic style, the name "Suspiria" is a fitting one for a Miranda Sex Garden album, as the 70's horror film was all about witchcraft. "It's visually really intense. There's a real atmosphere in it, it's like really quite chilling. It's quite stylized. There is a kind of link between the film, or I'd like to think there is anyways. Because it's a great film and we're a great band," says Trevor, laughing. Although in past interviews the Miranda Sex Garden have said that their name doesn't really mean anything and they just took it because they needed a name in the hurry, Trevor and Donna decide to be a bit more creative this time. "It was this girl called Miranda, this friend of ours. She's a bit of a tart, basically, and she kept having sex in our Garden, that's where the name came from," explains Trevor. "She's out there, she's always on the guest list." Donna adds, "She was wearing wellies when she did it." "It was a bit of a muddy garden," agrees Trevor. "She actually had three of them out there on one night. I think that's where the name came from because it was such a notorious event." With their gothic image and their fusion of classical music and guitar rock, Miranda Sex Garden don't really fit into any particular category. But the group enjoys not just appealing to any certain audience. "I could say people who are into classical music, we're aiming things at them, and people who are into horrible guitar dissonance, we're aiming things at them, but there's loads of people," says Trevor. "I met this strange woman in Amsterdam, she was mid-40's, she travelled all the way from god knows where to see us, it was really odd. We don't seem to get typical gig audiences, we get a wide range of people." ---------------- PRAYER TOWER Third Mind Records has always proven to be the home of the most innovative electronic and experimental bands, and this tradition is carried on with Prayer Tower, a new Canadian addition to their roster. The band's hi-tech, ultra-clean sound places just as much importance on strong and catchy songwriting as it does on strange electronic noises and "Hellraiser" samples. With so much of today's electronic music sounding the same, Prayer Tower comes as a breath of fresh air. The debut LP, Halo, is right up there as one of the best electronic albums of all time. Prayer Tower is essentially the solo project of musician Robert Weston. Weston, however, prefers to see the project as a "band," even when it is just him. "It really is a band in a sense, whether it's just myself or five different people," he explains. "Prayer Tower is more of an extension of the music than just calling myself Robert Weston. You don't see very many artists going by their names in the industrial genre of music." Purists will argue that Prayer Tower are not really "industrial," and Weston agrees that the music bears little similarity to the early industrial music. But he is not uncomfortable with the term and repeatedly uses it when discussing the music. One difference between Prayer Tower and some other electronic bands is the content of the lyrics, as Weston prefers to write more personal songs than make music "about the movie Blade Runner or whatever." The debut Prayer Tower release was what Weston describes as a "really horrible" cover of "Warm Leatherette". "The first single I did basically by myself, financed it and recorded in really cheap and cheesy studios and pumped out a white label and spawned some interest from that'" he explains. "I got some backers and at that point went and started working on the Halo album and released "Temptation" about a year and a half ago." Released on CNG, "Temptation" proved to be the breakthrough for Prayer Tower. It garnered good response in Rockpool and Billboard and did well in Europe. At that point, labels starting showing interest and Weston settled on Third Mind. Halo hit the shelves earlier this year on that label. The album, produced by Greg Reely, contains "Temptation," as well as nine other virtually flawless electronic tracks. The CD edition adds remixes of four tracks. Weston is a self-taught musician whose love for keyboards got him further and further into the realm of electronic music. Despite the industrial elements heard in Prayer Tower's music, Weston cites sound track and classical music as his biggest influences, adding that there aren't really any industrial bands that he's followed over the years. And while it is fairly common to musicians in this genre not to have any formal training, creating music has prompted Weston to educate himself further. "I've gone back now and I've studied chord progressions and different classical training books and what not," he says. "I mean I would like to learn how to play classical piano better a lot than I do." To create Prayer Tower's music, Weston usually starts off with a certain sound or sample that he will sketch out on the keyboard, though sometimes he will first come up with the rhythm or bass line. In the beginning, he tended to use a lot of factory pre-set sounds, but now all of the instrument voices are created and programmed from scratch or sampled and manipulated. Weston says that he "really enjoys" sampling and has been having a ball using cable TV as a source. "It could be anything really, just off the television, the 80 different channels that we get here. It's just a wealth of stuff," he says "We've got shows now like 'Vision TV,' 24 hours of evangelists, you know like 'I did too many drugs when I was a kid.' And they're just great, and they have some really bad interview shows. I'll sit there with a tape in the VCR and I'll flip from channel to channel and just stop here and there and pick up the most bizarre things going through." Weston doesn't feel that there is all that much difference between creating electronic and more traditional music, as he sees using a sequencer being no different from composing in a multi-track studio. "You come up with an idea and you're in a sense recording it, to the computer," he explains "A lot of people don't realize that. They think the computer magically writes the songs for the bands. If you talk to people who generally don't like electronic music too much, they're under the impression that you turn the computer on and you can go downstairs and make a cup of coffee, come back up and have a hit." ----------- CLOCKDVA The sense of history behind Clockdva is just as impressive as their music. Since1978,Clockdva has been developing and discovering musical ideas and methods that capture the glowing quality's of each of their works. Now with their thirst for extreme knowledge in technology searching to know the future, the future seems like it just may have to catch up to Clockdva! Their future has no limit! Q.Where did it all originate for Clockdva? A.Clockdva formed in 1978- by Adi Newton and Steven James Turner (R.I.P.). Our intentions were the continual experimentation of electronics/ sonology. DVATION AND EVOLUTION. Initially based in the U.K. but have become independent of time and space. Q.How would you describe the progression of Clockdva through the years? A.The progression of Clockdva is akin to the process of negentropy, in that all factors are relevant to the outcome of Clockdva's recording. Q.What do you feel has been the band's biggest accomplishment over the years? A.I think that we are currently working towards this. The work has only just begun. The past is part of the present accumulation of energies that are being focused on new aims. Q.'Man-Amplified' was such a highly advanced album! When you write songs, where do your ideas come from to create music so advanced? A.The process of creation is always for us a different one, in so much as we are continually endeavouring to devise new techniques, applications and methods of composition, production of sound, structure etc. Ideas are born >from other ideas that are in a continual advancement and development, in the course of research one finds more and more and so ideas expand into other ideas. In this process one is always developing all the aspects of Creativity. Q.Does critical analysis get in the way of your creativity? A.I think that critical analysis can be a bonus. In that it can make clearer some of the principles and concepts, and in doing so can illuminate other aspects. Q.Do you hope your music influences people? A.I am very pleased to hear the influence in other people's work. But it's not a primary concern. We are in the process of expansion for our own artistic desires, this is the fundamental, what occurs after this is really secondary. But obviously it's a bonus for us too. Q.What are your favorite pieces on "Man-Amplified" & why? A.'Dark Attractor' and 'Memories of Sound'. Maybe this is partly due to the fact that they are more in the form of sound pieces rather than songs "par se". But saying this I do like 'Axiomatic and Heuristic' and 'NYC Overload'. It is very difficult to mention all the specifics or reasons why but I feel it's such an important intuitive, heuristic thing, in some senses beyond analysis and definition. Q.A new album entitled 'Film' is in the works coming this spring. How will this album differ from "Man-Amplified"? A.I'm afraid the title 'Film' has been dropped at this stage. It was a working title we adopted early as an alternative to the much used expression "T.B.A." since the concepts, theories and research have focused on more specific areas. These being metaphysics, technology, soul and artificial intelligence. Technology as a means to enhance and restrict information, hidden implications inherent in the space program, the questions of extra dimensional intelligence and the written concepts of J.G. Ballard. The album has now been titled "Sign". The album is more to do with feeling and emotions than the clinical precision of Man-Amplified. Q.What is your opinion about playing live? What visible elements is Clockdva using in the shows? A.Currently we are looking at the way we do live performances. We are looking towards new ways and new techniques although the specific details cannot be given at present. We have always used a strong visual element in all our shows from the earliest time - 1978 onwards. Q.How do you want the crowd to feel when they leave a Clockdva show? A.To be visually and audibly lifted to a new realm of perception in all senses. Q.Do you feel Contempo International will further your musical horizons? A.I hope so as now we have been building up the profile for the last two years and Contempo are very dedicated to the success of Clockdva. Q.Now you've put together a video-collection of all your cybernetic clips from, 'Buried dreams' & 'Man-Amplified'. Could you talk about this and how you adapt your music to the video imagery? A.We use a number of techniques when we apply visual images. For us the visual side is a separate element that can be enhanced with sound, but each piece we have worked on takes a specific theme and is developed in this way. The Compilation of 'Man-Amplified' and some of the videos produced for 'Buried Dreams' is entitled "Kinetic Engineering" and will be available in April '93. Q.Tell us more about your side project 'The Anti-Group'? Whats it all about? A.TAG- The Anti Group was initiated in 1985 as a means of diversification >from the format normally associated with groups. The Anti Group can adopt any number of personnel and techniques. Between 1985 - '92 TAG have released four albums, these include t he 'Meontological Series' and 'Digitaria' which is an ambisonic recording. TAG have made a number of live performances which include "The Museum of Contempory Art" - Florence, " The ARS Electronica- (symposium on Virtual Reality)" - Austria and the Atonal events in Berlin. Currently three albums are in preparation including "Burning Water" a 35 minute film and soundtrack that explores the boundaries of visual interpretation. To summarize the work of TAG is to limit its conception. That is that there are no defined limits within the context of art. TAG represents a research and development project, working in areas such as psychophysics and meontological engineering. Q.What was your reaction to the rumors of Jeffrey Dahmer listening to 'Buried Dreams' when he was picked up by the police? A.Initially I was quite surprised but then it occurred to me that as an individual there is no legitimate reason for him not to listen to 'Buried Dreams' or for that matter any other recording that is commercially available. I suppose the context of 'Buried Dreams' opens it to interpretation of any kind. Q.What are your impressions of music in general? A.I think that music in a general sense is ninety-nine percent without content and idea. The remaining one percent is the interesting side of things that is generally ignored and rather more difficult to obtain. There seems to me like a very limited number of groups or individuals that are operating in the field of sound which we could refer to as exploratory and interesting and which is furthering the field of sonology. Q.Where would you like to see the technology of music go in the future? A.I would imagine that sound eventually will reach a new form of sonic realization. Where science augments the introduction of systems that will enable (music) in its broadest sense to be experienced and felt in a physiological and psychic way. Q.As we must all go forward, how do you analyze the future of Clockdva? A.I see Clockdva in the pursuit of this sonic realization described above. Interview by Bobby Silver. Orginally published in For Crying Out Loud issue #3. For more info on Clockdva and their related projects send two international reply coupons to Anterior Research or their label Contempo: Anterior Research Contempo international P.O. Box 684 Corso de tintori 6 Sheffield S6 2EP 50122 Firenze United Kingdom Italy ------------ 808 STATE When 808 State toured America in 1991, techno and rave music was still very much underground here and the group's shows provided many people with an introduction to the music. But when the group returned this spring, headlining a package tour with Meat Beat Manifesto and Supreme Love Gods, it was a different situation entirely. Sitting in their tour bus prior to their show in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the three members of 808 State took the time to talk about their band and the state of dance music in general. "We've noticed a difference because it's got a foot in the door now, where as when we first came over it was a little bit novel still. Now everyone knows about it and has an opinion." explains Graham Massey on how techno has caught on in a big way since their last visit.. For the 808 State, touring means more than just plugging their latest LP, Gorgeous. The group feels that it is important to get out into the clubs and see what is going on. Audiences in different areas respond differently to various styles of rave and dance music, and observing what is going on will have an impact when the band returns to the studio to work on new material. For their live shows, 808 State rely on DATs for the bass and drum parts. They do have some sequences coming straight off a computer, but the groups says that this is too risky to make a big part of the sound, especially in America. Another reason for the DATs is that it's difficult enough getting some of the older equipment into the studio without it breaking down, so bringing it on the road is out of the question. The group uses keyboards, guitar, sax, and percussion triggers to play the live parts and in the future hopes to also use a vocorder. "We've got it to a point where it's completely different every night," explains Graham. "It's quite interactive now." While intense hardcore techno is still being overplayed, 808 State have chosen to slow things down with Gorgeous. Feeling that style has been overdone, the group is going back to the more house-oriented sound that originally inspired them back in the mid-80's "It's coming down. It's hit a peak. It couldn't get any faster, it couldn't get any more annoying or aggressive," says Darren Partington. "And that's it, forget it now, let;s try and go somewhere else." "It's going back underground as well to a certain extent," adds Graham. "Which is a good thing. Techno is now pop music. It's official, it is pop music. I think Gorgeous is a back lash against some of the aggressive, 180 bpm. We were making Gorgeous while that was being played in the clubs and in the big raves." That type of techno is often made by DJs or rave kids who get together, string together a bunch of samples and emerge with a white label. Graham says that in England several pirate stations emerged that play hours and hours of music that sound like it was being played at the wrong speed. "That was dragging anything remotely good down in everyone's eyes," he says. The members of 808 State explain that is the Djs and record store owners who control the direction of dance music. The import shop owners can decided whether or not they want to order a track and pass it on to the Djs, and the Djs themselves are prone to sometimes starting trends that go against good music. But the group says that some of the major DJs have been kicking in with good music over the past year and are back on track. "It's at the point that I like which is that it doesn't have a name at the moment; something's going on and no one's given it a label yet," says Graham. "And the minute they do it will probably be over and then everyone just follows the formula and does it. That's the way it goes. Its good when it's in turmoil and it is at the moment." While 808 State's music is primarily instrumental, they have used such guest vocalists as Ian McCullough, Bernard Sumner and Bjork Gutmondsdottir. In 1990, the group collaborated with Manchester rapper MC Tunes, first on the single "The Only Rhyme That Bites" and then on his full length album, The North at Its Heights. 808 State recently worked with Robert Owens (Fingers Inc) on a cover of "Gimme Shelter" for a charity compilation. Most of the time, it is the singers who approach 808 State, and the group refuses to do collaborations just set by record companies for purely commercial reasons. "It's too C+C Music Factory., That's not what we're about," says Darren. "Yeah, we're dance music, but we like to be a little bit on the edge, we like to play around. It would be somebody taken out of context." 808 State are following up their tour with Meat Beat by going out on the road in America with fellow Manchester band New Order. Once all the touring is done, they will put the finishing touches on their own studio. The group admits that the amount of writing they have done in the studio in the past was "a bit foolish really," so setting up their own facilities will give them even more freedom.