April 2018
Green Door Store
Innixi Fix
To start the evening is Innixi Fix, billed as a three piece but playing as Jack on his own (he found out at 5:30 in the evening that this would be the case). So he set up on the floor with his guitar and electronics array. He starts by banging a loop of a clobbered string percussion part into the kit, supplemented with small flourishes giving it a clockwork feel. Before fattening out with balalaika twangs, reverb and then haring off down a blind alley of plics and ant-scurry thuds. Which devolves into a series of radiophonic space ping echoes. This goes on for not quite long enough before a tube train smashes through it. Which in turn gives way to an almost acoustic sounding passage of single noted loveliness which again evolves into some radiophonics mixed with gratuitous delay tweaking. It settles down into a more reflective passage before we get the Foghorns and heavy goods trains.
Andrew Greaves
Andrew Greaves was also supposed to be playing with others in this case the percussionist was ill so Andrew fell back onto his electronic percussion along with organs and delays. The percussion ticks while Andrew played I think two pieces from his new album, which are long semi improvisations in some scales based on Indian Raags, played with extraordinarily long delays, and the occasional bass tone. The organ parts repeat, almost, slowing down and speeding up. Hypnotic is about the only way to describe it, I was quite in phase with the whole room by the time the first piece ended. He wound it down quite nicely and did the changeover to the second part pretty seamlessly. This continued the arpeggios and riffs style but with some longer, slightly slower parts woven into them. Both hands working together along with some suspicious looping technology and some more prominent action from the bass. Although again, it wouldn’t be called foregrounded. About a third of the way into the second piece the hi-hats tip over into woodblocks and rim-shots. Towards the end they trickle out just leaving the dynamic stasis of the organ figures worming into your consciousness.
Map 71
So Map71. A real drummer and one poet. Lisa Jayne, slight, static, book of words glanced at, pages thumb flicked occasionally. Andy Pyne a perpetual movement machine, elbows, knees, sticks, head, feet. The first track is drums and words alone, a circular patter around the kit, around the kit, around the kit. Anti-noise. The second is an older song. Starting with a cheap synthesiser riff before Andy and Lisa kick in. The electronic insistence rises during the song. The third song starts like “Summer breeze” closed hi-hats in threes, uneasy words. The fourth song is new I think too, starting with a staggered snare pattern “freak radar collision” Lisa’s word come at you in obsessional bursts. Every few bars everything stutters. Another new song follows, slight piano echoes, brushes occasional Kick yr ass drum. Lisa less declamatory than usual. The rhythm is still in her voice. Back with the favourites “controversial dance moves should not be attempted” buzz bass, half speed drums. A song about shopping. Hah. Lisa speaks between songs, I think this is a new thing. They still are the most charismatic act to grace the GDS stage. The final song is a tightly wound arpeggio that takes an age before the drums kick in. The tension mounts constantly, even when parts drop out. Insistence.