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The dark enigma of the Japanese avant-garde returns to Cafe OTO for another two day residency after last year's heady two days of hallowed blues, noise assualt and spry improvisation.
This visit promises to reveal even more of Haino's multifaceted musical enquiries with a duo on the first day with London drummer Steve Noble who'll be deploying an arsenal of orchestral percussion - two timpani, 36" bass drum, 40" gong/tam tam and an array of smaller sound generators! This will be one to catch even if you've seen him 100 times already with the likes of N.E.W., Decoy, Wadada Leo Smith, Peter Brötzmann or countless other groups...
The second evening will feature an extraordinary rare performance from Haino for solo voice.Â
We're also thrilled to add to each evening two artists of equally uncomprising vision and radical soundworlds. The first evening will open with a long overdue return to Cafe OTO for Heather Leigh (Scorces/Charalambides/Jailbreak etc) and Phil Minton - one of the worlds most physical and compelling improvisors - will open the second evening with his own unique approach to the voice.
KEIJI HAINO
Keiji Haino's 30-year career has encompassed a dizzying range of approaches from wild, guitar-led ensemble rock and near-Neolithic drumming; live electronics, untutored explorations of lute and flute, to voice experiments and extended performances for gamelan and other percussion. He has also collaborated widely with the likes of Derek Bailey, Merzbow, Jim O'Rourke and Tony Conrad. Throughout, Haino has retained a visionary focus upon temporary suspension through noise (and silence) whilst refining a mercurial, highly distinctive method and an arrestingly dramatic on-stage presence that borrows the raiments of performance art.
STEVE NOBLE
Steve Noble is London's leading drummer, a fearless and constantly inventive improviser whose super-precise, ultra-propulsive and hyper-detailed playing has galvanized encounters with Derek Bailey, Matthew Shipp, Ishmael Wadada Leo Smith, Stephen O'Malley, Joe McPhee, Alex Ward, Rhodri Davies and many, many more.
HEATHER LEIGH
The daughter of a coal miner, Heather Leigh was born in West Virginia and raised in Texas and has been active in the underground since the 1990s. These days she's firmly rooted in Scotland, where she's co-run Volcanic Tongue Record Shop & Mailorder since 2004. Her music has been described as "high metal masses for amplified strings and vocals that blow all notions of form and fidelity to pieces." She's released numerous recordings on labels such as Not Not Fun, Family Vineyard, Fag Tapes, Ultra Eczema, Chocolate Monk, Kendra Steiner Editions, Ikuisuus, Eclipse Records, Fonal and her own imprints, Wish Image and Volcanic Tongue. Her main instruments are pedal steel guitar and voice, as well as electric guitar, keyboards, bells, cuatro, psaltery, drums, bass and harmonica. She's toured extensively as a solo artist throughout the US and Europe and has also played/performed/released music with Ash Castles On The Ghost Coast, Charalambides, Scorces (a duo with Chris!
tina Carter), the Dream/Aktion Unit (a group with Thurston Moore, Paul Flaherty, Chris Corsano and Matt Heyner), Jailbreak (a duo with Chris Corsano) and Jandek who she's played live and recorded with in the States and the UK as well as played bass with on the only tours he's ever done in Northern Ireland and Australia. Heather Leigh is also an accomplished visual artist. She was the graphic designer for Pauline Oliveros Foundation Houston prior to her move to Scotland. Her visual art has been included in several UK & US exhibitions and used on many record covers. She's currently recording a new solo album to be in released in 2012.
"All notions of the pedal steel's laid-back, country harmony are shattered as Heather Leigh extols jagged notes and blocks of electric noise that seem to rail against rock, jazz and other notions of freedom music." Dusted Magazine
"She is summoning the spirits of the ghost-women of rock 'n' roll past who were perceived as the sponges of the love-cloaked-violence and guitar-death-gazes of the almighty rocker" Tiny Mix Tapes
PHIL MINTON / solo voice
Phil Minton, born in Torquay, UK in 1940. Both his parents were singers. He learnt trumpet from age 15 and played and sang with local jazz groups, moving to London in 63 to play with Mike Westbrook. From the mid 60's he worked in dance bands in the UK, Canary Islands and Sweden. Rejoining Westbrook in 72 he was a regular member of his Brass Band until 84, playing trumpet and singing extensively in Europe, USA and beyond.
Through the last 30 years he's worked mainly as an improvising singer and sung with most of the worlds leading improvising musicians as well as been a guest singer for many composers music. He collaborated with pianist Veryan Weston on compositions such as "Songs from a Prison Diary" and is a member of improvising groups TooT, No Walls, 5 Men Singing, fORC, Adorno, Speeq and Axon. He also has a quartet with Veryan, John Butcher, and Roger Turner, and plays duos with these three musicians. New working duos are with singers and musicians, Isabelle Duthoit, Maggie Nicols, Audrey Chen, Terry Day, Hugh Metcalfe, Daunik Lazro and Sophie Agnel. He was a Nesta awardee in 2005 and in the last 15 years has traveled to many countries with his "Feral Choir" - a workshop and concert for all people who want to sing.
"Phil Minton's voice also occupies a category apart, a place in contemporary Improv that makes your regular 'sui generis' performer look almost commonplace." Brian Morton, THE WIRE
This residency is a Miles of Smiles/OTO projects co-production, supported by Arika.
Keiji Haino is also performing at the second part of Arika's expanded 2012 festival. Episode 2: A Special Form of Darkness runs 24 - 26 Feb at the Tramway in Glasgow. The events at the festival ask how do ideas of nihilism, darkness, the self, abjection and horror play out in experimental music and performance? Other performers and participants include Junko, Taku Unami, Dawn Kasper, Ray Brassier, Malin Arnell, Deflag Haemorrhage/Haien Kontra, Walter Marchetti, Esther Ferrer, Evan Calder Williams and many more.
