Recording: CHOBO

Artist: CHOBO

Song: [excerpt]

Recorded at Tiger Bar (Arachnids at the Tiger Bar), August 6, 2016.

CHOBO - [excerpt]

A summertime showcase for some "music by and for weirdos" on the Arachnidiscs label, this night brought some ambient noise and noisy ambiance to College Street's Tiger Bar (a cool destination for small-scale indie shows about six-seven years ago and now reactivated). Closing things out with a different sort of sonic flavour was this project from Jessica Cho and Benjamin Boles, applying improvisatory techniques to techno-styled electronic music. Keyb riffs and rhythmic twists would get tossed back and forth between the pair, sometimes being discarded and sometimes woven into the ongoing development of the piece, making it approachable as "head" music (to watch and consider for the realtime decision-making) or just as booty-shaking stream-of-consciousness. [Their Arachnidiscs tape dropped a few months ago.]

Recording: Beard Closet

Artist: Beard Closet

Song: [excerpt]

Recorded at Tiger Bar (Arachnids at the Tiger Bar), August 6, 2016.

Beard Closet - [excerpt]

A summertime showcase for some "music by and for weirdos" on the Arachnidiscs label, this night brought some ambient noise and noisy ambiance to College Street's Tiger Bar (a cool destination for small-scale indie shows about six-seven years ago and now reactivated). Arguably the biggest star of the night, Beard Closet's Phil Hamilton was celebrating the release of a new tape on Arachnidiscs and provided some sonic extremes in a set that began with come delicate deliberations before steering into the noisier territory heard here, with howling momentum resolving into a two-note looped riff behind the shredding.

Recording: Heraclitus Akimbo

Artist: Heraclitus Akimbo

Song: ♐TIGER [excerpt]

Recorded at Tiger Bar (Arachnids at the Tiger Bar), August 6, 2016.

Heraclitus Akimbo - ♐TIGER [excerpt]

A summertime showcase for some "music by and for weirdos" on the Arachnidiscs label, this night brought some ambient noise and noisy ambiance to College Street's Tiger Bar (a cool destination for small-scale indie shows about six-seven years ago and now reactivated). A second-ever live set from this blog's author saw the same floating keyb-loop drift as previously essayed, but this time mixed together with some ambiguously-discomfiting samples from the unexplained phenomenon known as Unfavorable Semicircle.

[The full recording of this set can be found alongside some other home recordings in this vein on a new Unfavorable Semicircle-inspired Heraclitus Akimbo album over on bandcamp.]

[photo by J.P.]

Recording: BABEL

Artist: BABEL

Song: Augustus [excerpt]

Recorded at Tiger Bar (Arachnids at the Tiger Bar), August 6, 2016.

BABEL - Augustus [excerpt]

A summertime showcase for some "music by and for weirdos" on the Arachnidiscs label, this night brought some ambient noise and noisy ambiance to College Street's Tiger Bar (a cool destination for small-scale indie shows about six-seven years ago and now reactivated). BABEL's Jakob Rehlinger (also Arachnidiscs' proprietor) was celebrating the release of four volumes of sacred fire music, and playing this piece for manipulated voice, keyb, xaphoon and sundry small percussion implements. [You can also check out a "studio" version of it over on BABEL's soundcloud.]

Recording: Beard Closet

Artist: Beard Closet

Song: [excerpt]

Recorded at Smiling Buddha ("Blü Print: An Arachnidiscs Showcase"), November 4, 2014.

Beard Closet - [excerpt]

Declaring that this set was less prepared/more improvised than the constructions he normally brings to the stage, Phil Hamilton still brought a wall of drone/noise to back his guitar assault. This soundblast filled the Buddha nicely, driving some of the crowd further back towards the front of the room and was done a bit too soon. There was a poster on the yoga studio next door for a workshop entitled "THE ONLY WAY OUT IS THROUGH", but I'd like to believe this set told me all I needed to know on that subject.

Recording: Colin Fisher & Mike Gennaro

Artist: Colin Fisher & Mike Gennaro

Song: [second piece]

Recorded at Smiling Buddha ("Blü Print: An Arachnidiscs Showcase"), November 4, 2014.

Colin Fisher & Mike Gennaro - [second piece]

Drummer Mike Gennaro can bring a light touch when required, but he's known as a guy that can drive a combo with his propulsive style. When he first started playing sets with saxophonist Colin Fisher, that led to some face-melting shred-offs. That was still hinted at in this set, but what's been far more surprising as this duo has gelled is how Fisher has used Gennaro's rhythmic sensibility to push him into deeper melodic territory, crafting a new and more interestingly subtle chemistry. The development of this sound can be tracked on the new Arachnidiscs tape the pair were releasing at this gig.

Recording: TRANZMIT

Artist: TRANZMIT

Song: [excerpt]

Recorded at Smiling Buddha (Blü Print: An Arachnidiscs Showcase), November 4, 2014.

TRANZMIT - [excerpt]

Besides providing a steady stream of releases "by and for weirdos," Arachnidiscs majordomo Jakob Rehlinger wears several artistic hats. He's most often seen on stages with his Moonwood or BABEL projects, but an open slot at this label showcase gave him cause to make a rare live performance in his TRANZMIT guise. Billed as "EBM sound collage audioscapes meet darkly psychedelic hip-hop constructions", he created a sort of harsh ambient vibe more akin to a radio stuck between stations than anything easily musical. Billed as a one-off appearance at this show, rumours are circulating that Rehlinger might be bringing this back to a stage near you again in the new year.

Recording: The Knot

Artist: The Knot

Song: [end of first piece]^*

Recorded at Holy Oak Café, September 26, 2012.

The Knot - [end of first piece]

Full review to follow. A satisfying night of unconventional music, with the first couple sets celebrating some new releases from the Arachnidiscs label. Improvising cellists Nick Storring and Tilman Lewis offer one side of a new entry in the label's exciting split tape series, and in this excerpt, we can hear them move from stately beauty to squeaking disarray to some plucked treated strings that sound like something from a nightmare version of Bartók.

^* I suspect that this was an improvization without a title, but please leave a comment if you know otherwise!