we drove south out of karlsruhe as the gloomy rainy weather began to set in and followed the autobahn with the throne burning spire of cathédrale notre-dame de strasbourg and the dark extents of the schwarzwald laying ominous in the east, the observatory and japanese guy to detail the ongoing soundtrack of the droning road and the steady concrete skyline of zürich with its fields of cranes ready to greet us as we finally rolled into the city under heavy rains, the prime tower looming resplendent in its shimmering hues as we found our way to the mism zürich headquarters and the wonderfully cosy residence of the ever-magnificent captain manu and his incredibly kind-hearted girlfriend lena. how they welcomed us in out of the rain, immediately had earl grey brewing and detailed the plan for the evenings schedule over the warming brew.
before long we took to the street once more and made our way down to the klubi under the steadily-building rainstorm to load in our equipment and set about the soundcheck process. the venue can certainly be described as something very special indeed. a cavern sunken in a tree-lined spot below the abandoned trailines running beside the river, an old carriage still standing lifeless above a small cavern-club replete with open stone walls and mysterious hieroglyphs in the water-etched granite walls. we soon got some really great sound happening with the aid of the marvelous patrick and also quickly managed to exchange the glad-hand with the mighty borut savski, with whom we would be sharing the performance along with ueli the super-nice manager of the site; a marvelous set of gentlemen indeed.
with all in hand we made our way back to manu's place under what had become incessant rain, the dark of the night already threatening to set in and a cool chill within the breeze that had us think we were being drawn back into the autumn once more. still, how lena, now accompanied by the wonderful alicia had set about preparing us such a fantastic vegan dinner for us all which i could not hope to do justice to with these humble lines. needless to say we took our fill, along with a host of always fascinating and illuminating conversations, our anticipation building for heading back to the venue, taking in the work of borut, not to mention our own humble performance. we wrapped ourselves up against the dismal elements and returning to the klubi on foot and under umbrellas and the blanket of the night having since fallen.
how the sanctuary of the atmospheric location seemed doubly so as we finally made our way out from under the downpour and into the dark, smokey cavern of the venue, darkly-lit and so welcoming. gladly, goodly number of close friends and strangers began to arrive, and in time to catch the fascinating work of borut savski, who treated us to a peformance and brief lecture on a suitably mind-bending audio-visual project he had been crafting in isolation as an experiment and was demonstrating the principles of for those of us lucky enough to be in attendance. he was essentially using randomly generated audio elements to trigger two-dimensional geometric visual elements to build an ongoing, and very-much trance-inducing sensory experience. fascinating work indeed.
after the hallucinatory depths of borut's work, dyxz, martin and i were ready to take to the stage to invoke some suitably dark sounds for those assembled within the stone walls of our temporary compound and directly set about a forty-five minute set of blackened-drones, monolithic doom-walls and spectral moments of frozen still; creating as atmospheric and enthralling world as we could summon within the limits of our confines. it was an absolute delight to perform indeed and how the kind audience were so very attentive and stayed with us along the course of the journey and offering such kind applause upon the final, grim culmination. a roaring success indeed, and one that we are already so very keen to repeat.
with the live performances handled and the merch-table manned for an adequate amount of time, it was time to spend the rest of the evening propping up the bar, listening to the mighty manu spin endless classic vinyl on the 1210's and chatting cheerily with those dear folk still assembled. but the time raced by as always and how the night slowly began to draw itself to a close. we slowly began to gather our weary selves up and take one last walk back through the still heaviest of rain to the apartment to start to think about falling into the dreaming once more. not before another round of earl grey at the kitchen table, of course. but how we were soon ready to fall back into the sleeping, to dream blissful dreams of drone-lands and sound-fields stretching out into clouds of radio-waves sailing high above farm-lands of antenna masts.
the morning greeting us cheerily, and with perhaps a little respite in the rain situation. we gathered together around the kitchen table and took an ample breakfast together before having to think about heading quickly back to the location to packed our gear into the car and starting the journey towards the mism bern headquarters, luana headquarters and the residence of the utterly-legendary mich moser. all was very much in hand and how we were in good time to take to the road as we bid farewell to the mighty manu and the wonderful lena. how they had been such impeccable hosts and how it had been such an absolute pleasure to visit them in their beautiful apartment and to get to share such a splendid time together; a really wonderful time indeed.
how the sanctuary of the atmospheric location seemed doubly so as we finally made our way out from under the downpour and into the dark, smokey cavern of the venue, darkly-lit and so welcoming. gladly, goodly number of close friends and strangers began to arrive, and in time to catch the fascinating work of borut savski, who treated us to a peformance and brief lecture on a suitably mind-bending audio-visual project he had been crafting in isolation as an experiment and was demonstrating the principles of for those of us lucky enough to be in attendance. he was essentially using randomly generated audio elements to trigger two-dimensional geometric visual elements to build an ongoing, and very-much trance-inducing sensory experience. fascinating work indeed.
after the hallucinatory depths of borut's work, dyxz, martin and i were ready to take to the stage to invoke some suitably dark sounds for those assembled within the stone walls of our temporary compound and directly set about a forty-five minute set of blackened-drones, monolithic doom-walls and spectral moments of frozen still; creating as atmospheric and enthralling world as we could summon within the limits of our confines. it was an absolute delight to perform indeed and how the kind audience were so very attentive and stayed with us along the course of the journey and offering such kind applause upon the final, grim culmination. a roaring success indeed, and one that we are already so very keen to repeat.
with the live performances handled and the merch-table manned for an adequate amount of time, it was time to spend the rest of the evening propping up the bar, listening to the mighty manu spin endless classic vinyl on the 1210's and chatting cheerily with those dear folk still assembled. but the time raced by as always and how the night slowly began to draw itself to a close. we slowly began to gather our weary selves up and take one last walk back through the still heaviest of rain to the apartment to start to think about falling into the dreaming once more. not before another round of earl grey at the kitchen table, of course. but how we were soon ready to fall back into the sleeping, to dream blissful dreams of drone-lands and sound-fields stretching out into clouds of radio-waves sailing high above farm-lands of antenna masts.
the morning greeting us cheerily, and with perhaps a little respite in the rain situation. we gathered together around the kitchen table and took an ample breakfast together before having to think about heading quickly back to the location to packed our gear into the car and starting the journey towards the mism bern headquarters, luana headquarters and the residence of the utterly-legendary mich moser. all was very much in hand and how we were in good time to take to the road as we bid farewell to the mighty manu and the wonderful lena. how they had been such impeccable hosts and how it had been such an absolute pleasure to visit them in their beautiful apartment and to get to share such a splendid time together; a really wonderful time indeed.
still, we were not quite through with zürich yet, and had one more stop to make before taking the autobahn south-west to bern. a complicated route through the city lead us to the compound of the mighty epilog of the magnificent son kas and postrap familia. he had marvelously managed to find himself in attendance at the show the night before and simply insisted that we must stop by before leaving the city, an offer impossible to refuse. so we soon found ourselves ensconced in his apartment, sipping tea and being stunned by an ongoing series of musical works-in-progress which took in his new collaboratory project with other rappers, his new solo works, self-produced and otherwise, and culminating in an auditioning of the viciously-shocking postrap supergroup armageddonendzeitstress, and how there is nothing quite as shocking as unexpectedly having your faced chewed off by soda as an end-point. this all too brief and all too shocking had to come to a close though and, with farewell hugs aplenty we found ourselves back on the road, back towards the impossibly-staggering beauty that is the city of bern.
might we once again take a moment to offer our most warmest thanks to captain manu, miss lena, ueli, patrick, alicia and the klubi family, the mism family, the postrap family, the whole extended zürich family and indeed captain borut, how it was a magical experience and how we so very much look forward to next time indeed.
jamesreindeer,
mülheim an der ruhr, deutschland
18th june 2013
might we once again take a moment to offer our most warmest thanks to captain manu, miss lena, ueli, patrick, alicia and the klubi family, the mism family, the postrap family, the whole extended zürich family and indeed captain borut, how it was a magical experience and how we so very much look forward to next time indeed.
next field report - eight-hundred years on the banks of the aare
jamesreindeer,
mülheim an der ruhr, deutschland
18th june 2013
