Recording: Tatsuya Nakatani

Artist: Tatsuya Nakatani

Songs: [two excerpts]

Recorded at Burdock Music Hall (Somewhere There Presents), June 29, 2016.

Tatsuya Nakatani - [excerpt 1] (gong drone)

Tatsuya Nakatani - [excerpt 2]

Osaka-via-Pennsylvania percussionist Tatsuya Nakatani was in town last year, playing the Intersection Festival at Yonge-Dundas Square. Returning to the cozy Burdock could hardly have been more different than a concrete canyon, but there was a similar vibe running through both sets. Inside, the music was definitely more intense — and this was a close-up experience, with Nakatani leading things off by inviting the crowd to move right in to surround him, to soak in the vibrations from as close as possible. That also gave a feeling of more intense listening than in the somewhat random surroundings at YDS, with many in the crowd here closing their eyes and leaning in to focus of the variations of his sounds. A long segment on his orchestral gongs was utterly gorgeous, carefully-modulated ambient sounds that on playback could easily be mistaken for a synthesizer. As he moved to his kit, there was a wide range of tactics, both gentle and loud, that created a huge range of sonic opportunities. Existing so specifically in three-dimensional space, this doesn't render particularly well as a recording — there were some magical moments where the overtones would cause sympathetic vibrations in implements several feet away, creating an almost mystical ghost-energy in the room.

Recording: Nakatani-Aldcroft-Clutton-Pencer

Artist: Tatsuya Nakatani/Ken Aldcroft/Rob Clutton/Daniel Pencer

Songs: [two excerpts]

Recorded at Burdock Music Hall (Somewhere There Presents), June 29, 2016.

Nakatani/Aldcroft/Clutton/Pencer - [excerpt 1]

Nakatani/Aldcroft/Clutton/Pencer - [excerpt 2]

I have heard it derisively said that the "Toronto style" of improvisation is "everyone playing loudly and all at once". I'd consider that to be rather too jaded altogether, but one could sense flashes of a similar train of thought from master percussionist Tatsuya Nakatani during this ad hoc group encounter. A master of ma — the space between the notes — he was definitely pining for a bit more space just as everyone else was interested in collaborative cooking. Almost apologetically, he paused the set to request a series of duets instead of the full-on treatment, and seemed a bit more content closing the set out that way. But there were some tasty frissons on the way there regardless.

Recording: Horseman, Pass By

Artist: Horseman, Pass By

Songs: [two excerpts]

Recorded at Burdock Music Hall (Somewhere There Presents), June 29, 2016.

Horseman, Pass By - [loud excerpt]

Horseman, Pass By - [quiet excerpt] (edited)

This Ottawa/Peterborough duo has a low-key online presence and shouldn't be confused with a couple other bands also lifting the same Yeats reference. The pairing was new to me, but I had caught Bennett Bedoukian (drums and electronics) and Mark Molnar (cello) a few months back as half of Dust Scored Dark. On their own, they generated some industrial rumblings and intense noisebursts in between stretches of tense stasis. Very tasty stuff and a worthy rumble to start a percussive night.

Recording: Endangered Blood

Artist: Endangered Blood

Songs: unknown^* + Faces and Places [composer: Ornette Coleman]

Recorded at Burdock Music Hall (The Music Gallery's Departures Series), June 28, 2016.

Endangered Blood - unknown

Endangered Blood - Faces and Places

This group (Chris Speed, tenor sax/clarinet; Oscar Noriega, alto sax/bass clarinet; Jim Black, percussion; Trevor Dunn, double bass) is a quartet of noteworthy American underground players with plenty of time served in weird-rock groups like Mr. Bungle and Melvins Lite. The vibe here is more straight-ahead jazz, but their whole set was filled with punk-inspired verve. But even their moments of frenzied shredding couldn't obscure the locked-in top-notch interplay that tied together everything they did. Original pieces from their pair of albums were joined by some dips into the standards, from a fairly reverent take on Monk's "Epistrophy" to the blazing Ornette tune they closed with, complete with Black's drum'n'bass blast beats.

Recording: The Mike Smith Company

Artist: The Mike Smith Company

Song: Forced False Setting^*

Recorded at Burdock Music Hall (The Music Gallery's Departures Series), June 28, 2016.

The Mike Smith Company - Forced False Setting

This group name has hitherto represented more of a concept than a "band", so it was perhaps no surprise to see a rather different cast of supporting musicians bringing some of Mike Smith's recent material to life. Recent co-transcombobulator Jonathan Adjemian was joined here by Bernice's Robin Dann as well as Mike Posen on violin. More pop that previous (in a bubblegum-prog sort of way), the band was bravely achieving some manner of fusion of Henry Cow and Young Marble Giants. After a couple new tunes (including this opening burst of false falsetti with backing vox from Posen and Mike Smith himself) there were some new group arrangements of the Transcombobulation material as well as the poppification of the previously-essayed "Dark Sequin".

^* Thanks to Mike for passing along the title to this one.

Recording: Body Help

Artist: Body Help

Song: [first section]

Recorded at Burdock Music Hall (The Music Gallery's Departures Series), June 28, 2016.

Body Help - [first section]

The funky abstractions provided by Kieran Adams (drums), Josh Cole (bass) and Colin Fisher (guit) were augmented by Daniel Pencer's excellent sax work, sending the group into deep avant-fuzak terrain. With Cole's sequencer-blurt bass tone and Fisher's pedals turning his guitar into shimmering MIDI strings, this sounded at times like the jam sessions that probably took place between takes in an early Larry Klein-era Joni Mitchell session.

Recording: Xuan Ye

Artist: Xuan Ye

Song: [excerpt]

Recorded at Array Space (Solonation), June 25, 2016.

Xuan Ye - [excerpt]

Planned as an ongoing semi-annual series, this night was the brainchild of Audiopollination's Mike Lynn. Whereas that series is centred around the idea of small-group spontaneous improvisation, this night was more about celebrating a wider range of creative musical practices in a quintet of short solo sets.

Xuan Ye took a "solo" turn from her APA project for this set of piano music. She accompanied herself with several varieties of feedback generated from the grand piano's body, sometimes with one drowning out the other and at times with both sounds in a weird co-operation. Although the orthodox response to this might be to treat it like a painter tossing a pot of ink on a finished canvas, the point here seemed to be a reaction against the old-fashioned hierarchicalism that would privilege the piano's melody over the feedback's piercing discord.

The show was also livestreamed and has been archived on youtube. You can check out the full set here:

[APA will be playing at the NASA (Noise Against Sexual Assault) event at Double Double Land on Sunday, July 10th.]

Recording: Aki Takahashi

Artist: Aki Takahashi

Song: unknown^*

Recorded at Array Space (Solonation), June 25, 2016.

Aki Takahashi - unknown

Planned as an ongoing semi-annual series, this night was the brainchild of Audiopollination's Mike Lynn. Whereas that series is centred around the idea of small-group spontaneous improvisation, this night was more about celebrating a wider range of creative musical practices in a quintet of short solo sets.

Aki Takahashi has brought her shamisen to some Audiopollination shows in the past. But here, instead of falling into the sort of roiling mix you might hear at Audiopollination she brought a set of Japanese folk songs rendered in a sort of informal back-porch style.

The show was also livestreamed and has been archived on youtube. You can check out the full set here:

^* Does anyone know the title to this one? Please leave a comment!

Recording: Nicole Rampersaud

Artist: Nicole Rampersaud

Song: [excerpt, in two parts]

Recorded at Array Space (Solonation), June 25, 2016.

Nicole Rampersaud - [excerpt, part 1]

Nicole Rampersaud - [excerpt, part 2]

Planned as an ongoing semi-annual series, this night was the brainchild of Audiopollination's Mike Lynn. Whereas that series is centred around the idea of small-group spontaneous improvisation, this night was more about celebrating a wider range of creative musical practices in a quintet of short solo sets.

As seen in some of her other recent solo work, Nicole Rampersaud deployed a variety of tactics in a seeming attempt to play her trumpet in every way possible — from shaking and twisting it to using a Honeytone mini-amp as a feedback-shrieking mute.

Sometimes solo sets can be duos — or at least I attempted to demonstrate that with an overlap "remix" of this set on my soundcloud. The show was also livestreamed and has been archived on youtube. You can check out the full set here:

[Nicole Rampersaud will be playing a duo set tonight (July 5th) with Colin Fisher at Track Could Bend #16.]

Recording: Kayla Grant

Artist: Kayla Grant

Song: [excerpt]^*

Recorded at Array Space (Solonation), June 25, 2016.

Kayla Grant - [excerpt]

Planned as an ongoing semi-annual series, this night was the brainchild of Audiopollination's Mike Lynn. Whereas that series is centred around the idea of small-group spontaneous improvisation, this night was more about celebrating a wider range of creative musical practices in a quintet of short solo sets.

One of two song-based sets of the night, Kayla Grant presented an extended piece that revolved around the use of her voice, looped in the background into percussive murmurs and pitch-split in the foreground to present her own voice as a multiplicity.

The show was also livestreamed and has been archived on youtube. You can check out the full set here:

^* Does anyone know the title to this one? Please leave a comment!

Recording: Heidi Chan

Artist: Heidi Chan

Song: [excerpt from an improvisation]

Recorded at Array Space (Solonation), June 25, 2016.

Heidi Chan - [excerpt]

Planned as an ongoing semi-annual series, this night was the brainchild of Audiopollination's Mike Lynn. Whereas that series is centred around the idea of small-group spontaneous improvisation, this night was more about celebrating a wider range of creative musical practices in a quintet of short solo sets.

Leading things off, Heidi Chan used recordings of her own flute practices as raw material to send through her modular synthesizer. The timbres of the flutes and the synth-tones were similar enough that it wasn't always easy to tell when one began and the other ended — but whether the processing sounded like beautiful blipbloops or whistling birdsong, this was excellent stuff.

The show was also livestreamed and has been archived on youtube. You can check out the full set here:

Concert Listings Roundup #156

You can read more about why I'm doing listings here. Long story short: This curated and decidedly non-comprehensive list contains nothin' but shows that I am going to/would go to if I had more time.

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Gig of the week:

Feast In The East 58 (feat. Doomsquad with Not The Wind, Not The Flag / Isla Craig / Pantayo) / Prairie Drive Park 2016-07-09 (Saturday – outside! free! all ages!) [FB event]

This is one of those mind-bending, head-shaking summer weeks where the sheer amount of stuff going on in the city is truly perplexing. There's a veritable heap of awesome shows, making it tough to just put one thing here. But out of it all, I'm probably most excited to hop on the subway to Scarborough to celebrate this free outdoor show being put together by Feast in The East. This show is a part of the TAF's Arts in the Parks initiative, bringing cool events to green spaces all across the city and spreading culture beyond the normal downtown cloisters.

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This week's noteworthy shows:

Track Could Bend #16: unc_RLed (feat. Germaine Liu with Jonathan Adjemian and Matt Smith / Nicole Rampersaud with Colin Fisher / Allison Cameron with Jason Doell and Stephen Parkinson) / Dundas Video 2016-07-05 (Tuesday – PWYC!) [FB event]

Communism / The Cameron House – front room 2016-07-06 (Wednesday – PWYC! early show, 6 to 8 p.m.!) [FB event]

Submutations [Piney Overton/Justin Haynes/Ryan Driver/Brian Cram/Jason Clarke/Blake Howard] / La Revolucion 2016-07-06 (Wednesday) [FB event]

Invocation presents (Dirty Inputs [The Runcible launch party!] / Cares / Memorex) / Array Space 2016-07-07 (Thursday) [FB event]

Jordaan Mason [album release!] (Little Kid) / Holy Oak Café 2016-07-07 (Thursday) [FB event]

Nicole Dollanganger (Chastity / Drofnosura) / Smiling Buddha 2016-07-07 (Thursday – all ages!) [FB event]

The Scenics [T.O. first-wave art-punks!] (Fat as Fuck / The Two Koreas) / Rivoli 2016-07-07 (Thursday) [FB event]

Os Tropies / Harbourfront Centre – Stage in the Round 2016-07-08 (Friday – free!) [more info]

Invocation presents (feat. Nite Jewel / New Chance / Tenderness) / The Garrison 2016-07-08 (Friday) [FB event]

HAVN Records split VHS release [music + live visuals!] (feat. DF / Versa) / The White House 2016-07-08 (Friday) [FB event]

Afrofest (feat. Beyond Sound / New Tradition / Nhapitapi / Nati Haile / Toto Guillaume / Black Parents / Djouna "Big One" Mumbafu & Moto Tia) / Woodbine Park 2016-07-09 (Saturday – free! outside! all-ages and family friendly!) [more info]

Orlando Julius and the Afro Soundz / Harbourfront Centre – Concert Stage 2016-07-09 (Saturday – free!) [more info]

Not Dead Yet (feat. Crazy Spirit / S.H.I.T. / V.C.R. / Prom Nite / Tashme) / Soybomb 2016-07-09 (Saturday) [FB event]

Tonkapuma (Worst Gift / Alpha Strategy / WLMRT) / The 300 Club 2016-07-09 (Saturday) [FB event]

Molly Nilsson (Scott Hardware / Katana) / Double Double Land 2016-07-09 (Saturday) [FB event]

Vallens [Consent LP release party!] (Casper Skulls / Yi [Jessica Upton Crowe's new project feat. members of Rolemodel]) / Smiling Buddha 2016-07-09 (Saturday) [FB event]

Audiopollination #44.1 (feat. Xuan Ye/Brian Abbott / Kayla Milmine/Celia Larocque / Ryan Kinney/Jamie Thompson/Yusuke Frutate / Bill Gilliam/Karen Kaeja/Allen Kaeja) / Array Space 2016-07-09 (Saturday) [FB event]

Afrofest (feat. Ijo Vudu / Madagascar Slim / Bamako Quintet / Lynda Thalie / Emmanuel Jal / Ruff N Smooth) / Woodbine Park 2016-07-10 (Sunday – free! outside! all-ages and family friendly!) [more info]

Music at Tibet Kitchen (feat. Simone Schmidt / Valueblast [Josh Cole/Matt Pencer/Thom Gill] / Blunt Chunks / Karen Ng) / Tibet Kitchen & Garden 2016-07-10 (Sunday – excellent patio vibes! afternoon show @ 2 p.m.!) [FB event]

Somewhere There's Second Sunday Series: New Music for Saxophone Quartet (feat. Bea Labikova/Kayla Milmine/Paul Newman/Karen Ng [works by Brian Abbott, Kayla Milmine and Paul Newman!]) / Array Space 2016-07-10 (Sunday) [FB event]

NASA [Noise Against Sexual Assault] (feat. Baby Cages / Doom Tickler / Eyeballs / SlowPitchSound + Brigitte Bardon't / APA / Hexzuul) / Double Double Land 2016-07-10 (Sunday) [FB event]

For Esmé (Saxsyndrum / Blunt Chunks) / The Silver Dollar Room 2016-07-10 (Sunday) [FB event]

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Add these to your calendar:

Reminder: This post only contains this week's updates — the full listings can always be found over on the right-hand sidebar!

Aurochs / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2016-07-12 (Tuesday – early!) [FB event]

The AMBiENT PiNG (feat. NOiNO / North Atlantic Drift) / Ratio 2016-07-12 (Tuesday) [FB event]

Aldcroft/Davison/Denison/Lynn / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2016-07-13 (Wednesday)

Different Strings (feat. Undulation / Clara Engel / M. Mucci) / Holy Oak Café 2016-07-16 (Saturday – early!) [FB event]

Surinam [album release] (Soupcans / Frustrations / Retired) / Owl's Club 2016-07-21 (Thursday) [FB event]

Wavelength 708: Pop Off Tour & Camp Wavelength Warm Up (feat. She-Devils / Un Blonde / Secret Sign) / Monarch Tavern 2016-07-22 (Friday) [FB event]

Camp Wavelength (feat. Operators / Jef E. Barbara's Black Space / For Esmé / M.A BEAT! / MATROX / Wolf Saga / Latasha Alcindor a.k.a. L.A. / Brendan Philip) / Artscape Gibraltar Point 2016-08-19 (Friday)

Camp Wavelength (feat. Cloud Nothings / Odonis Odonis / Moss Lime / LAL / Spek Won / Casper Skulls / Hex / Guerilla Toss / Petra Glynt / Scott Hardware / Nhapitapi Mbira) / Artscape Gibraltar Point 2016-08-20 (Saturday)

Camp Wavelength (feat. Young Galaxy / Lydia Ainsworth / Bruce Peninsula / Bart / Michelle McAdorey / Castle If) / Artscape Gibraltar Point 2016-08-21 (Sunday)

7th Annual Toronto Bicycle Music Festival (feat. Jason Collett / Nhapitapi / Moon Runners Dance Battle / more TBA) / Evergreen Brick Works to Prairie Drive Park 2016-09-10 (Saturday – free! family friendly! mobile concert! pedal powered!) [FB event]

The Inbreds [vinyl re-release show!] / Gladstone Hotel 2016-09-29 (Thursday) [FB event]

Recording: Isla Craig

Artist: Isla Craig

Song: There Is A Hole^*

Recorded at The Tranzac's Southern Cross Lounge (Wolf's Nacho Wednesdays), June 22, 2016.

Isla Craig - There Is A Hole

This outing saw a different lineup behind Isla Craig than she'd been playing with in her occasional shows over the past year or so — and with Brandon Valdivia and Mike Smith on hand, it felt a bit like a new Continental Drift, which probably made it no coincidence the set opened with "Marbles" from back in those days.

After that, though, it was new material all the way, from the groove of "The Becoming" to the subtle reggae lilt of "Out of a Dream". (The Weather Station's Tamara Lineman was called up out of the audience to add some backing vox to that one.) After it was ascertained that the fire trucks that pulled up out front of the venue weren't there because the band had set the building on fire, things closed with this psych-tinged gem, containing not only some satisfying synth wig-outs from Jonathan Adjemian (who'd been sitting in for the whole set) but also some cool e-bow licks from Craig — like the continents drifting right on out into the further cosmic zones.

[Isla Craig will be playing at the surely-awesome (and free! and all ages! and in a frickin' park!) Feast In The East at Prairie Drive Park on Saturday, July 9th.]

^* Thanks to a commenter for passing along the title to this one.

Recording: Brodie West Quintet

Artist: Brodie West Quintet

Songs: Untitled #4 + Afro Blue [composed by Mongo Santamaría, arr. John Coltrane]

Recorded at The Tranzac's Southern Cross Lounge (Wolf's Nacho Wednesdays), June 22, 2016.

Brodie West Quintet - Untitled #4

Brodie West Quintet - Afro Blue

Once again reinforcing his recent fascination with rhythm, this newly-formulated quintet saw saxophonist Brodie West flanked by a pair of percussionists: Phil Melanson (heard here on the left) and Nico Dann (on the right). A quartet of new (and yet-untitled) pieces gave them plenty of chances to explore the sonic possibilities, whether creating a languid mood in the first piece with hypnotic in-phase/out-of-phase cymbal washes or starting off the last of them (as heard here) like a chase scene in a cartoon. Tania Gill (piano) and Josh Cole (double bass) provided the musical grounding while West would sometimes close his eyes and nod to the rhythms and at others climb on top of them to play like a log roller at work. The set closed out with a nod to Coltrane at Birdland in a rollicking run through "Afro Blue".

Recording: Rob Clutton

Artist: Rob Clutton

Song: [excerpt from a solo bass improvisation]

Recorded at The Tranzac's Southern Cross Lounge (Wolf's Nacho Wednesdays), June 22, 2016.

Rob Clutton - [excerpt from a solo bass improvisation]

Like finding out who cut the barber's hair, it's a useful bit of local musical knowledge that Rob Clutton is the bass player that other local bassists go out of their way to see. Leading off a double-header of great music on a Wednesday evening, there were several of his peers on hand to watch his delicately-thoughtful playing. Though unafraid to throw in some knotty clusters of knocking and plucking when required, most of his playing hewed to the softer side — in a couple moments it looked like he was merely miming bass playing, like a singer mouthing the words to a song, implying something the ear's incapable of grasping. I'd tried to capture Clutton's solo bass work before, mostly to no avail given the quietness of the music and the limits of my gear, but this time I believe I have something with reasonable fidelity to honour the musicianship here.