Higher State of Consciousness

Strobe lights, fluorescent spandex, and bleepy electronic music. Is this a rave? These days, it’s more likely to be a gallery opening. With a growing number of artists using elements indigenous to the club scene, rave is finding new meaning in a “fine art” context, nearly 20 years after its genesis. Paeans to the subculture range from the obvious–Kenny Scharf’s blacklit-and-fluorescent “closets” and Frankie Martin’s videos and performances–to the merely suggestive, such as Jim Drain and Ara Peterson’s hallucination-inspiring installations, but similar themes emerge. Harkening back to the 1960s psychedelic art scene, artists combine sound and visuals to provoke a visceral response from gallery patrons (many of whom probably haven’t experienced a 4 a.m. warehouse party for themselves). Rave ideology–using technology to build a better future, drugs as mind-expansion, collective consciousness, and a DIY spirit–reappears in this work; artists expound on foundations laid by Yayoi Kusama, Fred Tomaselli, and Genesis P. Orridge by referencing and employing modern technologies, including motion graphics, digital video, and the internet. Though you might be expecting a satirical spin on the culture, the art within is an intoxicating celebration of the freedom of rave–or at least an attempt to use the past as an antidote to the present.

Mariko Mori
Mariko Mori’s early work explored Japanese identity in the mid-’90s as it was being shaped by the influence of globalization, technology, and popular culture. Dressing up like manga comic characters and photographing herself in the tech-crazed backdrop of Tokyo’s urban hot spots, Mori’s anime personas explored the edge of (virtual) reality. Her seductively robotic fashion choices in 1994’s Play With Me and Warrior were nearly identical to cyborg fantasy looks being rocked by ’90s techno heads. A year later, Mori personified a Japanese schoolgirl cross-wired with a headphone-wearing candy raver in Birth of a Star; photographs of the piece depict her as a cyberpunk pop star wired for sound, amalgamating references from global pop culture in a way only modern technology could have made possible.

Mori’s more recent works–including 2003’s Wave UFO and Oneness–speak more directly to the notion of “universal connectivity.” Wave UFO invites visitors to enter an interactive “outer space” capsule where they are equipped with brainwave monitors. Abstract projections based on the brainwaves appear on the ceiling inside the capsule; each participant sees their own visual representation as well as how it reacts to the other visitors’ brainwaves while inside the ship. The entire piece nods to one of Mori’s grander themes: technology’s ability to unite individuals, and break down national and cultural barriers. Similarly, Oneness invites viewers to hug sculptures of six life-sized aliens (a favorite image of the ’90s) with their hands interlocked. When squeezed, the aliens emit a soft green glow from their eyes and their hearts start beating. Will peaceful communication with other galaxies soon be possible, or is this just the ultimate chill-out room? You decide.

Frankie Martin
A lot of former candy ravers now sell insurance and have kids and basically deny that they ever wore neon orange UFO pants and 50 million plastic-bead bracelets and see-through purple backpacks with stuffed animals inside. Not Frankie Martin. Despite being possibly too young to have lived the golden years of rave, Martin nonetheless takes the over-the-top utopia suggested by the PLUR (Peace. Love. Unity. Respect.) slogan and applies it to, well, her entire life. Exhibit A is her 2005 installation, One Minute Rave, at New York’s Canada gallery; in a black-lit room full of re-purposed neon afghans, the installation treated viewers to 60 seconds of flashing strobes, a cardboard cut-out DJ, and pulsating videos and electronic music, all with a distinctly childlike, hand-done aesthetic. Collaborations with pop-culture hacker Cory Arcangel yielded 2004’s Cat Rave (a video of a cat put into a tiny, rave-like environment) and 414-3-RAVE-95, a fictitious public-access show where two lanky nerds have a dance party against a background of black-and-white patterns you may remember from the O.G. Apple program MacPaint. Of course, that’s not all. Frankie also customizes sneakers, makes stuffed dolls that look like pizza slices (under the name Puffy Smalls), enlists her little sisters to make psychedelic marker drawings with her, and does performances alongside Milwaukee nerdcore heartthrob Juiceboxxx. You might think to yourself, “I could do this,” but, frankly, you don’t have the balls. You might also be wondering to yourself, “Is this really art?” Well why don’t you ask Space 1026, the agnès b. galerie du jour in Paris, the organizers of the Liverpool Biennial, or the Bergdorf Goodman Men’s Store–all of whom have exhibited her work.

Enlightenment
Enlightenment had already showcased their work at Paris’ Colette store and Tokyo’s Parco Gallery by 2000, but it was their inclusion in the Takashi Murakami-curated Superflat exhibition (Los Angeles MOCA, 2001) that brought them the glory.

The four-member Japanese collective–led by graphic design powerhouse Hiro Sugiyama–is best known for a cross-media approach that combines computer graphics, digital painting, and video work to address the boundaries between reality and fantasy. As some of the most in-demand graphic designers in Japan, they are just as likely to work on a cell-phone ad campaign as a gallery installation, blurring the line between their commercial work and “fine art.” In summer 2006, this manifested itself in a carnival-esque installation (part of Deitch Projects’ After the Reality show) that combined playful digital prints of mirrors, skeletons, and monkeys (set against a purple vinyl backdrop) with a surreal, looped video piece and a music video of vibrating abstract shapes set to pulsing dance beats.
At an after-party for the gallery show, Enlightenment really loosened up, doing a VJ set with music from erstwhile collaborator Towa Tei, the Japanese DJ/producer best known for his involvement in Deee-Lite. This laid their rave influence bare, making it apparent the impact that modern software and VJ techniques–namely mixing seemingly random visual elements together into something with a whole new meaning–has had on their output.

Assume Vivid Astro Focus
Before superstar DJs were gods and raves were like rock concerts, the rave scene was thought of as a collective effort–the most obvious manifestation of this were party crews, from techno travelers like Spiral Tribe to more market-driven “rave organizations” like Fantazia and Universe. assume vivid astro focus (the name a riff on a Throbbing Gristle’s Assume Power Focus album) is Rio de Janeiro-born Eli Sudbrack’s attempt at creating his own post-modern party crew–to the extent that he dislikes claiming leadership of this amorphous collective. Nonetheless, it was his original idea to spread avaf’s cultural virus via large-scale installations that incorporate video art, neon sculptures, porn drawings, and decal stickers. Though copious notes are kept of both the influences and outcomes of his installations, his sensory-overload projects are meant to be ephemeral and ultimately destroyed–a none-too-subtle nod to the idea of the “temporary autonomous zone,” posed in 1991 by anarchist writer Hakim Bey.

Avaf’s absorption and digestion of cultural detritus often incorporates elements of dance music and its attendant (often sexually charged) culture. Sudbrack (who now lives in New York) also frequently collaborates with Honeygun Labs’ Bec Stupak, who began her career in video art by VJing raves at the (Washington) DC Armory. For the 2004 Whitney Biennial, the pair reclaimed public space with a site-specific installation at the rollerskate circle at Central Park (using music from L.A. band Los Super Elegantes); in 2005, the duo tried their hand at pop, making an unofficial music video for Yoko Ono’s Walking on Thin Ice. Most recently, avaf collaborated with Brazilian baile funk proponents Tetine–themselves no strangers to cultural sampling–during the 2006 Tropicalia show at London’s Barbican Centre. And, like the ravers of yore, Sudbrack has left room in this recombinant utopia for mass consumerism–a line of LeSportsac bags printed with avaf designs is out now.

Jim Drain & Ara Peterson
A forest of giant pinwheels. A fluorescent kaleidoscope hallway. Rotating geodesic spheres. A soundtrack of buzzing analog electronics and alien disco from Spacemen 3/E.A.R. genius Peter Kember (a.k.a. Sonic Boom). Jim Drain & Ara Peterson’s 2005 show at New York’s Deitch Projects gallery was a hallucinatory scene somewhere at the intersection of Willy Wonka’s factory, the party sequences of the ’60s B-movie Psych-Out, and a particularly well-done campsite at Burning Man. Named after a word for “lucid dreaming” (the surreal state between being asleep and awake), Hypnogoogia challenged viewers to reach altered mental states via intense optical onslaught (LSD-spiked punch optional).

Drain and Peterson have been practicing this art-punk shamanism for a while, though–notably as part of Forcefield, a Providence, RI collective birthed from the Fort Thunder warehouse (the same “scene” that also brought you Lightning Bolt and Black Dice/Soft Circle’s Hisham Bharoocha). Like the love children of Ken Kesey’s Merry Pranksters and The KLF, Forcefield’s show at the 2002 Whitney Biennial was a techno-hippie fun fest: A throng of humanoid sculptures, clad in fluorescent knitted suits, glowed, pulsed, and emitted synthesizer sounds created by the Forcefield band, which is composed of Peterson (a.k.a. Patootie Lobe) and Drain (known as Gorgon Radio), plus friends Meerk Puffy (Matt Brinkman) and Le Geef (Leif Goldberg). A closer listen to the installation’s soundtrack, released in 2002 as the album Roggabogga (Load Records), reveals a sonic overload of broke-down booty anthems and intense, staticky noise made with analog gear, crazy oscillators, and fog horns. Post-modern electronic noise “happenings”? Hippie rave 3000? Sign up here.

New At INCITE Online, Feb 13

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The Blow – Although electro-pop is usually the label slapped on these two, Portland’s Khaela Maricich and Jona Bechtolt have reissued their shiny, not-for-the-radio Poor Aim: Love Songs, an album that defies all genres.

Machinedrum – Travis Stewart makes fractured, mutated hip-hop that hasn’t quite escaped the influence of IDM; but hold off on those Prefuse 73 comparisons. This multi-instrumentalist rewards the careful listener with subtle tempo shifts and unexpected sounds.

Mike Relm – An accomplished turntablist, Relm marries his skills on the decks with his mastery of numerous instruments and forms of media. The fact that “Body Rock” includes appearances from Gift of Gab and Myron Glasper, as well as Michael Belfer, is just icing on this delicious cake.

Iaka – Starting with acid beats in 1993, the Hamburg, Germany native’s sound soon evolved into leftfield breakbeat tracks, and it’s this versatility and willingness to grow that keeps him one of his city’s most popular DJs and producers.

Eternals – This Chicago-based trio wields its own specific brand of tropical, dubby funk that reveals the Windy City’s dark underbelly. Having previously recorded with John McEntire and Casey Rice, The Eternals now release Heavy International, their first self-produced album.

Ghislain Poirier’s African Hip-Hop Mix

Montreal’s Ghislain Poirier earned the title “king of bounce” from his numerous bass-heavy remixes for everyone from Lady Sovereign to The Editors, and this, along with his uncanny ability to deconstruct hip-hop, has put him on the map as a diverse and able producer to watch.

Poirier recently graced Mary Anne Hobbs’ radio show on BBC Radio 1, with an African hip-hop mix full of heavy bangers and dirty beats that call up comparisons to grime and crunk. Never mind if you missed the show. Poirier’s made sure you can download the mix, then get bouncin’.

Grimey Land Tracklisting
1. Smockey “Intro”
2. X Plastaz “Hiyo”
3. Dakar All-Stars “Cafka Mbed Part 2”
4. Positive Black Soul “Xoyma (Version Wolof)”
5. Awadi “Sunu Société (Ghislain Poirier Edit)”
6. Teba “FCK (Raw Mix)”
7. Purple Simba & Shyam + Ben Sharpa & Terror MC “Eyes to the Sky”

Still Doin’ It

Chicago dance label Still Music, founded by Groove Distribution employee and club DJ Jerome Derradji, has announced a new division called Past Due, which will explore the roots of underground dance music. The imprint will feature singles and remixes that cover the gambit of early house, deep boogie, underground disco, modern soul, jazzy funk, dancefloor R & B, and even psychedelic rock.

Derradji revealed the label’s first release, by Mobile, Alabama artist Visions Of Tomorrow. “’Galaxy’ is a wicked disco sci-fi tune that gets re-edited by top-notch producers Charles Webster and Francois A,” he explains. The release has received early acclaim from the likes of Fabrice Lig, SUMO, Franck Roger, and Chris Duckenfield.

Each Past Due release comes in an eye-catching sleeve, reminiscent of England’s Blood & Fire, with old photos and graphic elements used to mimic the look of a well-worn record from the crate. Forthcoming releases include DIT “Let’s Start Dancin’,” with reworks by Alex From Tokyo and Rondenion, and a classic by Greyship Davis, “Get Up And Let Your Body Pop,” with German heavyweights Jazzanova and Henrik Schwarz providing additional mixes.

Meanwhile, parent label Still shows no sign of slowing either, with singles and mixes from international dance acts Attias, Carl Craig, Paul Randolph, and Markus Enochson on tap. Such growth and direction from Still echoes another great Chicago label, Guidance. Until recent financial troubles sidetracked it, the latter charted new territory for underground house, with a great ear for melodic and complex songs. Guidance has reemerged as a digital imprint with distribution from iTunes and others, and looks to be back on track.

Tomas Palermo

Optimo Releases New Mix

After fusing every possible track with manic dance beats on How to Kill the DJ Vol. 2 and tripping us out with their Psyche Out mix, the Glasgow duo Optimo sends us wandering through far darker territory with a limited Japanese release titled Walkabout. The mix stands as the inaugural release for Endless Flight, a new label from the folks at Mule Electronic, intended for music that flirts with several genres at once. Optimo, then, is an apt choice for kicking things off.

Tracks by Philus, Marc Houle, and others ensure the mix has some toe-tapping beats, but Walkabout is more a showcase of Keith McIvor’s and Jonnie Wilkes’ personal tastes than the result of a couple DJs anxious to get their paws on hot dance tracks. The mix meanders through Throbbing Gristle before droning with Grungerman and dubbing it out with Pan Sonic. The eclectic, and often ponderous, nature of the tracks says the guys are using this opportunity to play exactly what they want.

Walkabout is out March 26, 2007.

Tracklisting
1. Throbbing Gristle – “Walkabout”
2. Grungerman – “Grungerman”
3. Pan Sonic – “Hapatus”
4. Databrain – “Electrofrogs (Pin Up)”
5. Like a Tim – “Aibe Stracie”
6. Lennr Dee & Nicolai Vorkapich – “The Virus”
7. Philus – “Kuvio 3”
8. Shane Berry – Fillertet 2”
9. Boris – “My Machine”
10. Godsy – “The Grass Runs Red”
11. Suicide – “Radiation”
12. Eventell & Metaboman – “Control a Zoid”
13. Thomas Brinkmann – “Momomexico”
14. 6K – “Tighten”
15. Marc Houle – “Bay of Figs”
16. Herbert – “Moving Like a Train (Smith n Hack Remix)”
17. Radio Sampling in Nagoya
18. Black Dice “Manoman”

Brother Ali The Undisputed Truth

Brother Ali, Rhymesayers’ righteous albino wordsmith, is a powerhouse who spits tricky rhymes with the force and consistency of a steel piston. He revels in his work and his craft, and it’s no coincidence that a few of the blues-based beats he raps over on The Undisputed Truth, his second proper album, resemble work songs. A perfectionist obsessed with his own struggle and skills, Ali’s favorite subject, as he makes clear on “Take Me Home,” is himself. On The Undisputed Truth, Ali delves deeper into the tricky topic of the self, making the physical dressing-down he did on “Forest Whitiker” (from 2004’s Shadows on the Sun) seem skin-deep by comparison. Considering his battle-rap history, it’s not surprising that Ali spends plenty of time verbally assaulting a nameless other, usually a clueless MC or some stylized major-label-created thug. But after hearing his newfound confessional side and workaholic boasts, that “other” could easily be his own reflection, so serious are his drive and standards. Ali never applies criticism he won’t direct at himself, and on The Undisputed Truth, the title itself a goal. He needs to “Kill the devil where he resides/Even if he’s in me/He has to die,” he warns on “Freedom Ain’t Free.” During the gap between this album and Shadows, Ali got divorced and became a single father, and it’s clear the process sparked a serious period of self-reflection and recalibration for the devout Minnesota-based Muslim. The track that directly addresses the break-up, a laid-back jam called “Walkin’ Away,” sounds happy, except for lyrics like “If you didn’t try to kill me/I’d have stayed for the kid.” Ali still has his pride and puffs his chest a bit, but on “Faheem,” where he imparts wisdom to his son, he deflates a bit. (“You have a genuine goodness inside you/Wonder if I was ever like you,” he confesses to his boy.) Combine that with the track “Here”-on which Ali turns the process of putting a house up for sale into a clever metaphor about letting another person see his imperfect inner-self-and it’s clear he’s been processing his pain. But Ali never loses his earnestness, and despite some lyrical bricks and a few weak tracks (like “Listen Up”), he avoids sappy melodrama, instead reflecting a depth of feeling with universal appeal. Producer Ant is once again at the boards on Truth, perhaps a thankless job due to Ali’s dominating vocal presence. The tracks strut by without much fanfare, and while the old-school hip-hop samples get old quickly, they help create economical, pre-fab frames ready to be filled with solid lyrics. It’s not that Ant lacks creativity-he just provides lean, muscular beats that do the trick, like the blues march of “Letter From the Government” or the background riff on “Puzzle.” Complimenting Ali’s style, Ant avoids excessive flash and experimentation, getting maximum return on the small snippets of blues, soul, and reggae he taps for raw material. Ali isn’t strictly focused on himself, though. “Letter From the Government,” an anti-war screed told from the perspective of a weary soldier called to duty in the Middle East, skewers without resorting to hyperbolic rallying cries. Addressing his anonymous enemy on the battlefield, he questions, “Putting one in his brain/Like something will change?” That bluntness may be Ali’s real strength as an MC, whether it’s applied to conflicts overseas or the ones inside his head.

Capital D Return of the Renegade

In this young man’s rap game, the odds are stacked against Capital D: he’s over 30, a lawyer, and married. But on his third album, this Chicago veteran proves that nothing can keep him from remaining relevant. Atop blazing uptempo beats, Cap effortlessly kicks “street sense with degrees to boot” (“Street Knowledge”) and makes “the downtrodden wanna get down” (“Ups & Down”). When not dropping uplifting gems, he flexes his superior storytelling skills on the funk-filled “Game the Mic,” a vivid portrait of a bustling day in Cap’s native Hyde Park ‘hood. It’s hip-hop that nearly anyone can enjoy.

CéU CéU

On her MySpace page, Brazilian vocalist CéU claims that her sound is “like nothing you’ve ever heard before,” and she’s not kidding. Her debut uses samba as a platform, but the direction she takes it (with the help of excellent producer Apollo Nove) is completely fresh. The sonic backdrops pull from jazz, Brazilian percussive traditions, Afrobeat, and bass-heavy midtempo electronics-and merit a record of their own. There is something universal in this young vocalist’s melodies, perhaps the reason Starbucks selected her to be the first international artist in their Hear Music series-a contemporary nod akin to being read in Oprah’s Book Club. Whether in her inviting English (she takes Bob Marley’s “Concrete Jungle” to a whole new level) or native Portuguese, she’s quick to captivate. CéU’s long, sensuous syllables atop the dubby bassline on “Roda,” and upbeat bursts of poetry on “Rainha” are this disc’s true diamonds.

Chris Watson & BJ Nilsen Storm

Mother nature can really bring the noise. The latest collaboration between English sound archivist Chris Watson (formerly of Cabaret Voltaire and The Hafler Trio) and Swedish sound artist BJ Nilsen (Hazard) finds the two seminal field-recordists chasing a storm system on their respective North Sea shores. Edited but unmodified, the sounds they brave the elements to collect ebb and swell through the album’s three rich, mesmerizing tracks: fierce winds, stinging rains, wild beasts, and black waves roar under heavy skies. Rage on.

Calla Strength in Numbers

After eight years weathering NYC’s punishing rock scene, Calla’s dark indie rock feels as fresh as ever. Strength in Numbers takes inviting strides towards mass appeal: pretty, ethereal notes help temper Calla’s blistering guitars and despondent vocals, tapping into something rugged and forlorn. Aurelio Valle’s breathy tones add a sensual touch to his band’s brooding moods (“Malicious Manner”), while Strength’s catchiest tune, “Simone,” is Calla’s most Snow Patrol-esque-a big, showy ballad, rife with noisy guitar and exuberant energy, showing why sometimes, aiming at the masses can be the most creative option of all.

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