Sorry for lack of posts recently – been busy with broadly Cube related business and pleasure, accounts of which hopefully will appear here soon . . . meanwhile here’s the video I made in place of Tom Bugs performance for the packed out Ivor Cutler tribute night . . .
And once again, I beseech all cube outsiders on the inside and affiliates on the outsides, you are very welcome to post your thoughts here – you don’t need to do it in my intensive words and pictures style, your own individual style & perspective, illustrated or not, brief, or indeed unwieldy if it needs to be, is wanted . . .
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There’s lots on on Saturday ( tomorrow as I write ), with Stitch-Stitch taking over Seymour’s for their jam packed “Se-Da-Bop” all-dayer, Underscore putting on Leif at Cosies, but the one I’m pushing is the open party at The Cube to celebrate the installation of the new cinema sound system – which sounds amazing, by the way, and will feature artwork in the bar by Cube volunteers, including hard copies all the pictures I’ve ever posted on here on the cubelog . . .
. . . of which that is just a small section, and ‘Cutting Up My Friends‘ on a loop on the lounge monitor.
The night will be rounded off with Eraserhead as the Midnight movie to really showcase those immersive cinema sound stylings.
Who the hell do the DLH crew think they are ?
If Skateboarding films are meant to be like porn films, (crap acting, and action shots), then in The DLH crew’s latest offfering “Fuck Off” we may have found the most common factor demonitator between the two artforms.
“Fuck Off” get’s 100 percent (as in the Sonic Youth song) for being Hardcore, that’s for sure. For a representation of some down and dirty local Skateboarders who make the manifestation of Porn magazine
be a reality. Who real and roll and trick in a out all night drinking getting off their heads, smashing up apartments, dropping barbeques from 1st floors and filming each other at the most retro of Bristol’s Skateparks Dean Lane. The Skatepark you wish was better.
But for the DLH, it’s their patch. They can rock and roll on the infamous skateparks terrible
concrete.
But I am afraid girls, the feminist prognosis isn’t that good. With women being only represented when you see their naked bodies, in Hardcore porn or as the teenage girl pest. If you are a women skateboarder would you want to go any where near this gang of goolies? Would you be able to be their girlfriend and discuss
your feminist concerns with them. Or is it all just a ironicism to the word hardcore, should I, we not be taking this seriously. After all it’s not really meant to be.
Quote the director ” This films was a fucking nightmare to make”
One of my favourite parts in the film was when girl skateboarder spectators are being mused at to be in the film.
“Fuck off” they proclaim.
Bit of an experiment, but here’s the first videoblog on the cubelog . . .
. . .the visual is terrible ( it’s basically bad filming of a ( not itself terrible ) still of a dog on the screen, which you can just about make out – it was too dark to get any of the audience ), but the audio gives you an idea of the sheer exuberant rowdiness of the DLH event that took place last night.
This was before the skate films came on, which were interspersed, certainly not to everyone’s delight, with snatches of other ‘hardcore’ such as some of the weirder side of porn and violent and scatological G. G. Allin footage.
For the uninitiated DLH = Dean Lane Hardcore, for whom there is not much web presence, but scroll down some words here for a bit of background . . .
I’ve been summoned East, so I don’t have time at the monet to Blog any of the last three things I’ve been involved with. The good news is it’s musical why I’m heading off.
In the mean time a nice wee taster till I’m back to reveal all:
Even though it fitted in with a general feeling of establishment and build of the overall project, last month’s edition of Movieoke was so surprisingly successful it had me having high hopes for yesterday’s outing which closed March . . .
Despite taking several steps to perfect the formula, like getting the DVD list a week in advance to make up a raft of menus, even getting a laminator to make them splash proof ( though harder to alter when inevitably the actual DVDs arriving on the night don’t match up 100% ), rounding up equipment and people to sound and video check earlier to avoid a late start, fate seemed against us.
The first blow was the non-appearance of our irreplaceable musical genius Colin Smith, for mysterious reasons unknown.
Thankfully, due to the previously mentioned measures there was still time for Bluescreen Chris to rush me home to get my CD decks, mixer . . .
. . . plus a bunch of Library Music CDs, and we were still set up and ready to go for 8:30 . . .
Ready to go but not prepared for the second non-appearance of the night . . .
I believe the word Karaoke literally translates to mean “Empty Orchestra” – well tonight it looked like Movieoke meant “Empty Auditorium”, as for the first few hours, at least, there was no audience at all!
But despite the lack of punters there were none of the understaffing issues of previous Movieokes so the bar was almost full . . .
. . . and as we waited for someone, anyone, to appear we chatted and drank away in a slightly bemused fashion slowly discovering that my poster design had never actually made it off of the virtual world of sparror and into the realm of paper – usually both Movieoke instigator and organiser Tom and our unfeasibly enthusiastic in-house drummer Richie Paradise do an excellent job of printing out and putting up across the city, this time, however, both of them had managed to overlook it – which was even more weird because as we had had an enthusiastic email from a fan who was keen to put posters up herself – I’d presumed a three pronged publicity attack was well in hand . . . oh well.
Lack of posters didn’t make the event entirely publicity-less as it was of course listed in The Cube programme, which incidentally has been enjoying particularly beautiful design recently, and eventually a few, but not many, members of the public made it . . .
The first group included original Cube volunteer and distant cubelogger Ben Slater . . .
. . . who it was great to see, though it was tinged with a certain embarrassment that he was making a return visit from so far to witness a decidedly under par event. Hats off to him though, as he did probably the best movieoke of the night with a far from run of the mill ‘Miller’s Crossing‘ . . .
. . . and there were also good turns by Liam, who was also crewing as video tech, as a very fine and very physical Clint Eastwood . . .
. . . Richie really went for it as a brummie Tim Roth at the start of Pulp Fiction, a virtually wordless movieoke of the Jack Rabbit Slim’s dance sequence from the same movie . . .
. . . and many sterling attempts by Tom to warm the place up, but the lack of the usual atmosphere provided by a big enough crowd and Colin’s musical wit left the whole thing a bit lack lustre over all.
Richie filled in his electronic drums with various cheesy preset demos which did the job, but the entertaining layers of meaning that usually emerge from him and Colin, and the movies and performers, just wasn’t going to happen.
Max was beset by technical difficulties with his voice – not unusual – but I felt my performance of him was less than it should have been too, hampered by juggling the DJing ( the finest ( of thin ) moments was a time stretched Windowlicker under Snow White – worked for me anyway! ) and perhaps hampered the most by one too many nervous beers from earlier from when we were waiting for people to arrive.
The real fun exploded when those few people who did come, left . . .
After Movieoke powered down, the considerable crew, containing considerable amounts of alcohol, found themselves indulging in a weird impromptu, virtually bacchanalian, party on stage . . .
Kind of like, um, a sort of karaoke – funny that – though we backed ourselves with some visual larking about too as Tom got improvising on the vision mixer revelling in the cheesy 80’s effects.
So overall a disappointing, but at least not totally joyless evening. Movieoke has so many elements it seems that while you rush to attend to one end everything topples off the other, but still, when it is good it really is good – so hopefully we will establish some sort of stable formula before all around us completely collapses!
Meanwhile the first event I advertised in my previous post, Bluescreen on Wednesday, had an unexpectedly large audience with people standing in the aisles! Hopefully there will be a fuller post on that from Chris . . .
And the ‘Random Festival Of Improvisation’ night on Thursday wasn’t that busy, but there were enough people in the various groups performing to have a reasonable audience. I only caught the end with a couple of enjoyable improvised stories from Hannah Godfrey. . .
. . . who puts on The Cube storytelling nights, and Peter Reynolds’ Absolute Dream Palace trio . . .
. . . who were a brilliant example of rigorously structured freedom. Nice.
EDIT . . . after the recent video blogging experients, here’s a snatch of a version of supergroupextreme back onstage where they belong ( Additional, The Janitor and Extraordinary, where were you!? ) . . .
Dave loved your last post capturing what had been happening at Cube recently, while in some cases not even being there, great! Made me think I should write a little something on the Fonal records night which included Islja and Es and due to illness an unexpected first act.
Fonal Records is a Finnish independent record label established by Sami Sänpäkkilä in 1995 and is a showcase for much of the so called Finnish ‘free folk’ which along with bands like Sunburned Hand of The Man and Magik Markers are making some of the most exciting music at the current time. This night was the final night off a three day tour showcasing some of the many talents currently assocated with the label and due to sickness KIILA had to drop out leaving only Islja and Es from the advertised line up but no matter the first act, whose name I do not know, was a performer who would later play as part of the duo Es. Well unexpected it might have been but a great performer he was and with a Finnish folk tale about the mothers off Lapland on ‘Mothers Day’ who could not be enchanted, to quote another blogger?
As the night progressed Islja, also full of what seemed like a very nasty cold, banged genlty on the Cube’s out of tune piano and slowly moved on to stage with the soft vocals of its lead singer, ending with a toy monkey banging its drum gently into its own stage microphone. I would recommend anyone taken to the this scene to check out their most recent record, Meritie, the packaging alone makes it worth it, not to mention the lovely music.
Finally, the night was closed with Es as the reverb of the catheral rang out from the vocals the sounds of the small keyboards and samplers made one think of Ariel Pink’s Haunted Grafitti although not the low-fi pop vision of LA but rather recast in the mistical land of folk tales.
Well, I’ve been in The Cube a bit more a bit recently, but I’ve also managed to missed a couple of things I’d meant to see . . .
Sadly didn’t make it in time for the many membered The Arctic Circle on Thursday, even after determinedly hot footing it with Amy from an informal film-makers’ meeting at Watershed arranged by Harriet Fleuriot of the Bristol branch of Future Shorts ( anyone interested in joining in email me and I can pass you on . . . ).
So yeah, missed The Artic Circle, but happily added to The Cube’s volunteers’ how-tall-wall . . .
. . . and became part of another impromptu oversized indie supergroup called The Hidesincoats, check us out . . .
. . . no songs to speak of, but the first video’s pretty much done . . .
I’m looking forward, as David Hidesincoats, to being invited to do obscure unmixed guest dj sets at indie clubs across the land . . .
The second thing I missed was the Plug58 nanoplex on Saturday – I was out of The Cube, but with ( some ) Cube people again – this time at Spike Island for a few talks and a few free pies. The final talk was given by Hogge and Kate . . .
. . . both talking generally about The Cube, including some interesting ideas about what the unpaid structure and what word the ‘amateur’ can actually mean in terms of the ‘professional’ ( or presumed no- or un- ) and the passionate – with it’s original meaning deriving from ‘amor’ Ã love, The Cube’s relation to Artists’ practice, Artists’ practice in relation to it, and specifically about Kate’s Feral Trade project, which was later in actual action for the evening Plug58 portion, which I did make . . .
Apperently there was a bit of a hoo-hah at the earlier Plug58 Nanoplex event for the kids – Patrick Duff and Duncan Fleming‘s contribution was deemed too scary for some – I heard reports from Patrick ( not happy to be asked to comprimise ), Kayle ( uncomfortable but confident in her actions ( as event manager the onus was on her to ask them to tone it down ) ) , and Jem ( as a parent he, and more pertinently Milo, were at ease with a bit of scary in a kids’ story – though wary that some were under the 5 years and over suggested in the programme ).
As I wasn’t there it’s hard to tell what it was like, but hopefully it won’t scare off parents and kids from future Nanoplexes as I reckon it’s a brilliant, and in my experience, well executed idea.
I’m presently trying to work out how to work in some Singing Science for some future one ( I’m really love to see them performed by Tom Bugs in his labcoat, possibly as part of an ‘educational’ nanoplex, along with Fránçois teaching basic French ).
Like the earlier reports, the evening ‘adult’ audience were in for a bit of a, potentially scary, surprise too – while the predominate theme of the night seemed to be singer-songwriters with semi-acoustics with Leila Music, Joe McGann ( with Sam Kidel ) and Simon Breed . . .
. . . all performing intricate, beautiful, and in Simon Breed’s case quite funny, songs with a bit of that plug58 dark undertow, I wondered how was an audience that visibly flinched and audibly gasped at a bit of a click when swapping guitar leads would take to the mighty Team Brick when he took to the stage . . .
He wasn’t playing a semi-acoustic. Admittedly there was a bit of guitar in the mix, but his most impressive instrument, after his voice of course, was a contact miked wooden plank and file . . .
. . . too much for a few, but admirably most enjoyed it, if somewhat open mouthedly.
Well, that’s what I did and didn’t see recently – acutally I made the Fonal records night too, which was good – enchanting in fact – but I’m tired now and the pics I took weren’t too hot, so won’t say any more for now.
As always, I’m keen to encourage anyone involved in The Cube, at any level, including ‘mere’ audience members and long distance blog readers to contribute their perspectives on this place, so please comment if you have something to say, and also comment/email me if you would like me to set up a login so you can do some blog posting proper . . .
Oh, and there’s much coming up with Bluescreen on Wednesday, a night of improv involving the Orchestra on Thursday, and the unmissable Movieoke on Friday . . . all of which looks like it will be interesting, though what I/we will make or make of it we’ll have to see . . .
Sorry for lack of recent posts ( now, how’s that for a familiar starter for ten ? ).
Uncharacteristically I haven’t actually been at The Cube too much recently, and last time I was, for the bi-annual Sparror Users meeting, I was so flustered by the impressive words of the tech team that I, very uncharacteristically, forget to photograph!
Broadly things discussed were whether the sparror server, from which you’ll be accessing this very page, should stay physically in The Cube now it could be cheaper and more efficient for it to be external, and as something needs to be done now the user group has grown with more demands for mp3, video and pics – basically it needs to be symmetrical rather than asymmetrical.
We decided it is better staying within The Cube ( while it lasts – one point by practical catastrophist Heath was how sparror will survive after the inevitable expiration of The Cube – only as inevitable as in all things eventually move to their end – burt even so we talked about what to do if this little misspelt bird’s death doesn’t come first ).
I’m glad to report that sparror will be kept inside The Cube, one reason being, “because it’s cute” ( (c) Dani Landau ).
Coming up inside The Cube we have March’s Movieoke . . .
. . . last one was a blast, for the audience at least ( which is of course the key, or one of the keys ). Hopefully with a bit of well placed prep we’ll have everything in place for all the team to fully enjoy it too ( I’m alluding to poor Hog who had to cue DVDs using a DV camera as a monitor – heroic, but hellish – I mean just think about that for a moment, it’s hard enough spending a night searching a succession of entire movies for particular scenes under pressure but when you can see what you’re doing and menu buttons aren’t just a couple of pixels wide, sheesh! ).
And coming up outside The Cube, outside Bristol even, our Lady Lucy has her drawing show at The Drawing Room . . .
. . . so carloads of capital supporters will be heading down ( or is it up ), hopefully including me . . . and my camera . . .
Oh, and in a me-mail stance, I was flattered to be described as a potentially professional level stuntist by our friend in the very north.
(Krissy) and Richie Paradise
