JON ROSE
Perhaps the closest parallel comes courtesy of legendary
Australian left-field composer, Jon Rose.
Most known for his playing of fences in which he takes a string bow to
outback fence lines, Rose has a broader body of work that embraces a range of
violin variations and wacky wavelengths.
In particular, he was commissioned to create a cycling
symphony of sorts to coincide with Canberra’s centenarian celebrations in
2013. He teamed up with inimitable Oz
Rat Patrol (perhaps better introduced as a more recent incarnation as Canberra
Bike Party (https://www.facebook.com/canberrabikeparty))
tp create 100 different bike driven instruments. These were subsequently choreographed and
composed into a live performance. Check
out the Canberra Pursuit below-
LUCAS ABELA
I first encountered Lucas Abela in a sweaty, seedy Newcastle
pub as part of a ‘This is not Art’ festival (http://www.thisisnotart.org/) more than
a decade ago. Suffice to say it was an
evening of high spirits and alternate realities into which was tipped this
screaming wildman who appeared to be hooked up to a life support amplifier that
made him bleed rather than assisting his health. I had walked into a den of vibrating noise,
flying spittle and blood. That moment
will be forever etched (or incised) into my psyche.
Somewhat of a creative genius, Lucas Abela has gone on to
pursue a range of complex, technical, dynamic and poetic sound producing
devices. These often function via layers
of noise altering effects that are variously triggered by actions of audiences. A large number of these use the commonly
understood mode of a pinball machine as an interface for the general public to
both make and experience outcomes.
One of my favourites is his pentagram shaped pinny, Balls
for Cthulu, that features a suite of electric guitar necks as the bumper edges
of play. You can see this one and a
bunch of other wonderful variants in the video below, from a presentation at
Palais de Tokyo titled Temple of Din, in 2015.
Another work that particularly twangs at my heartstrings is
the regionally tuned
Gamelan Wizard, a collaboration with a number of
Yogyakarta’s gamelan masters, presented at MOFO festival, Hobart, 2015.
INTONARUMORI
This is quite a recent heads-up from a muso buddy. The term intonarumori describes a particular
type of instrument created by Italian futurist Luigi Russolo. The Futurists were a bunch of artists of all
flavours, working early in the twentieth century who witnessed technological
developments such as the car and the aeroplane that changed the shape of
humanity forever. Luigi and his buddies
latched onto the significance of these moments and wrote manifestos and made
art that particularly emphasized what they saw as new understandings of speed,
technology, youth and violence.
In this particular instance, Luigi was keen to make an
instrument that he thought would imitate or imply a sense of the industrial city
that he was immersed in. He made the
instruments in a variety of forms and even wrote a specific manifesto called
Art of Noises (manifestos really were much cooler back in the old days). Since his time, many others have looked back
upon Russolo’s work, recreating their own take on the instrument and it’s
potential.
Here’s a tasty little of vid of the legendary Mike Patton
dipping his tow in the intonarumori pool.
Maybe I’ll have a chance to build some pedal powered
versions of these in the future? Big
ones… Makes sense to me…
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