People Skills (US), S*Glass (US), Silzedrek, Troth, Francis Plagne, YL Hooi (DJ)
Event description
People Skills (US) began in Philadelphia in the mid-2000s as an exercise to document untrained experiments
in improvised song and sound collage using only found, free materials. In practice, the recordings usually
took the form of simple songs, most often employing slow pop formulas to caricature listenable music.
The inner logic however, is informed by deconstructive Situationist, post-structural, and Fluxus theory
and pulls at the space between art and amateurism. From this vantage point the projects blending of
budget collage and negligent songcraft is defined by its inconspicuous unease, more than genre.
People Skills burns dimly as a sonic effigy to the awkward, isolated reflections of the human experience.
S*Glass (US) combines tape music, electronic processing,voice, found sound, and chance operations. Every show uses a different batch of curated audio, mixed live, while the self-produced studio albums are more refined assemblages. The playing of non-musical objects is sometimes incorporated (dental floss, aluminium foil, wind-up toys, metal lunch box, cabbage). Self-shot video is screened during sets, which is mostly textures made with multiple layers that slowly wobble out of sync, jump cuts, and a smattering of primitive animation. The overall effect is one of surreal disorientation.
Silzedrek presents a deeply personal synthesis of time-dilating folk-jazz romanticism, heavy chamber dub and sense of smoked out inner space projected to the outer in cosmic proportions
Troth are nipaluna-living duo Amelia Besseny and Cooper Bowman. They blend elements of DIY synth pop, avant folk, sacred ambience and experimental interventions. They released their third LP Forget The Curse on Sweden's Mamma's Mysteriska Jukebox earlier in 2023 and have a new 12" due on Bay Area label Digital Regress shortly.
Francis Plagne's work integrates idiosyncratic forms of songwriting with a variety of other approaches, including group improvisation, instrumental miniatures and domestic musique concrète
A YL Hooi DJ set is not to be missed. Outsider dub? Minimal pop? RNB with sax? Only one way to find out...