Recording: C. Spencer Yeh

Artist: C. Spencer Yeh

Song: [excerpt from first piece]

Recorded at The Music Gallery ("Burn Down the Capital Showcase"), June 8, 2013.

C. Spencer Yeh - [excerpt from first piece]

Full review to follow. Joined by Nate Wooley on trumpet and Ryan Sawyer on drums, Yeh played some double-bowed scratchy violin and also (as in this segment) produced some vocal sounds that ranged from rumbles to speaking in tongues. A distinctive close to this season's "Pop Avant" series at The Music Gallery — keep an eye out in a couple months for the first announcement of a whole new series with sounds you won't find anywhere else.

Recording: undo

Artist: undo

Song: [excerpt]

Recorded at The Music Gallery ("Burn Down the Capital Showcase"), June 8, 2013.

undo - [excerpt]

Full review to follow. Scritchy electroacoustic rumbles from the duo of Christof Migone and Alexandre St-Onge involved (in this extract) a broken reel-to-reel tape machine and mouth-engulfed microphones. Pushing the limits of this showcase's "pop avant" tag, this was not entirely unlike listening to the shortwave while using the vacuum cleaner.

Contest: Burn Down The Capital Showcase

Burn Down The Capital Showcase

Featuring: C. Spencer Yeh / undo (Christof Migone & Alexandre St. Onge) / Carl Didur

For this year's Pop Avant shows, the Music Gallery has turned to some smart co-presenters to find the middle ground/contested terrain that the series' name implies. There were strong showings from Exclaim!'s Destination Out and Weird Canada, and the series closes out with this night curated by Tad Michalak. Known for his work with Feast In The East as well as many other small-scale weird-outs, Tad is a true community-builder. And though the term is ridiculously over-used these days, he's also an excellent curator, someone whom you can trust to put together something inneresting, worth heading out for even if you don't recognize the names of the acts.

I'm somewhat in that boat myself at this show, as I'm not familiar with C. Spencer Yeh (improvizations for violin, voice, and electronics) or undo, a joint effort from Alexandre St-Onge ("électroniques, voix, contrebasse, percussions, piano, saxophone, guitare, boîtes à rythme et orgue") and Christof Migone (whose recordings are considered "playable at your own risk"). That said, I am a huge fan of analog synth-soundscapist Carl Didur, one of the most fascinating musicians in the city, who is opening the evening.

If you want nostalgia on Saturday, there's a field you can go stand in. If you want to push the limits of your conception of "pop", though, the Music Gallery is the place to be. Expect to find it a little bit abrasive, a little bit noisy, and a little bit beautiful.

TICKETS + MORE INFO

Saturday, June 8, 2013 at The Music Gallery. Doors @ 7pm, concert @ 8pm. Tickets are $17 at the door ( $10 for MG members) or $13 in advance at Soundscapes.

CONTEST

Courtesy of the Music Gallery, I have a pair of tickets to give away.

To enter, shoot me an email to mechanicalforestsound@gmail.com, with "Burn Down the Capital" in the title and your name in the body. I'll randomly draw a name when I get home on Friday night and send word to the winner before I go to bed.