Gone.

From November 30th:

Woke up this morning from another dream that left me feeling disillusioned and fractured. Another in a recent series of 'what the fuck was that'? dreams. Not bad dreams, not nightmares just the mind dredging up the deepest murkiest levels of the subconscious. Like the peeling away of layer after layer of the things your trying to figure out and understand, getting closer and closer to the core. Impending possible complete emotional collapse, physical turmoil and all the ends that I'm trying to make meet frayed and fucked up and the solutions (?) buried deep in the matter in my skull.

After writing down some brief notes before all the details fade away I get up to another grey day, still wondering how I'm going to pay rent, not to mention all the other bills. I have things to do and have to put some of that aside for a moment. After getting myself going on coffee and nothing else, I do some work on the film for the show tomorrow night, hoping and hoping that my hardrive won't fucking crash as I render the footage. Already ran into problems with the inserts, no copy shop would put the paper I had through a laser printer so i had to go with the inkjet and after cutting, trimming and assembling everything realized the ink hadn't cured properly and I was progressively rubbing it away.

Everything is going to be changing soon. I've played the possible futures over and over in my head, wondering and hoping and fearing what it'll be. It's almost as if I've already put myself through what hasn't even happened yet but fully knowing that no matter what the walls will fall and the impact will be no less no matter what I do beforehand.

Now:

The traces of you are everywhere. I follow them over and over. Every step I use to make is now different. Empty and hollow. Have we let go? Suddenly everything becomes meaningless. There are no suitable words. I'm left in what we had and the ghosts roam the hallways.

dreamweaponfilm

http://www.youtube.com/user/dreamweaponfilm

I highly recommend checking out the link above. It's the youtube page/channel for Ayal Senior's vast archive of all manner of Toronto shows. I've barely scratched the surface but put some selections below. Ayal was responsible for the last Gardenia show and videos in a previous post. These aren't your normal show videos either, he isn't afraid to get right in there and examine the music as it's happening. Most of the video's are fairly intimate and/or expansive documents of the respective events.


NOT THE WIND, NOT THE FLAG


ADIAN BAKER'S LIMINOID


ACID MOTHERS TEMPLE


RUINS I


RUINS II

recent musical discoveries

spent a extremely hungover day chilling out listening to records and exploring around various label websites/blogs/myspace pages etc, following all those trails that lead you off in so many directions. found some amazing music and artists.



Noveller
amazing, amazing, amazing stuff. Double neck bowed guitar, 2 ebows, run through effects and looped and manipulated. Just go listen, take my word for it.
myspace.com/noveller




FERMENTÆ
Again, just amazing stuff. This music gets right to your core. So expansive and brooding. Field recordings, contact mics on acoustic guitars, HEAVY electric guitar&bass.
myspace.com/fermentae




Kvik / Close
CDr on Brise-Cul records from Montreal. Saw Wapstan play last night at an extremely drunk house show. Wapstan is Martin who runs Bruise-Cul and he was traveling with Simon who I met and hung out with several years ago in Montreal. We traded cds and I'm glad I ran into him. Kvik will cure your hangover. go listen to it now myspace.com/kvikdrone





Etude Records
Record label based here in Toronto. Tons of different stuff on this label. Particularly striking cover above of ALFREDO COSTA MONTEIRO's ÉPICYCLE.
etuderecords.com


Also check out LNGTCHÉ
Can't seem to upload the cover but the album Music for an untitled film by T.Zarkkof, demands a listen, and I haven't even heard it yet.
http://www.etuderecords.com/Lngtche/Fragment%20one.mp3

Median Gallery / Matt Durant

http://mattdurant.com/

Gardenia/Glass Tomb footage from The Buddha

Gardenia
camera: Ayal Senior

Glass Tomb
camera: brian robertson

HSII available at Soundscapes

Just dropped some copies of Hemispheres II at SOUNDSCAPES. If you don't know this store you owe it to yourself to check it out. They don't stock vinyl, unless it's of the local variety, but they have a huge diverse selection. Not many stores can have Metal/Jazz/Electronic/etc/etc sections all stacked with wicked music. While your there check out their fucking awesome local section. You can find a eclectic batch of Toronto bands & musicians releases. Anyways, you can pick it up there for about $5 (4.99+tax) or get in touch with me and I'll either mail you one or put one in your hand. 5 dollars, probably just a little bit more to mail.

Buddha is Smiling

Thanks to the small crowd of friends who came out on a cold and depressing December 1st and gave a bunch of music/sound nerds their time and attention. And big thanks to Ayal Senior for putting together the show and to Glass Tomb for ripping a old school Ennio Morricone'esque jam and blowing the lid off of some long and noisey tones. No collaboration went down and Skull Bong cancelled but hopefully we'll all meet up again in the near future.

Also much appreciation and respect to Winston Hacking for letting me use his Microprojections film again after the near meltdown of my computer and huge amounts of frustration trying to get together my film. Last time I played The Buddha we collaborated and I improvised to the film. This time I just let it play and did my thing. Weird moment when I ended the first portion of my set the dvd stopped at exactly the same moment. ? No idea why, played the second part of my set to The Earth Dies Screaming (old film, not the Tom Waits song 'The Earth DIED Screaming) which turned out some interesting results.

Original plan was to bring the JCM900 AND the Model T, probably would have cleared the room if I had. Just went with the JCM though, and didn't use the gain channel, but it was still plenty. Every Gardenia show has had different pedal set ups and/or amp(s) and I think I want to continue that path. My set was definitely the loudest gardenia has been yet and goddamn I needed it. I finally felt closer to the state of release I try to reach when performing live. A combination of that intimate subconscious level you reach on your own and trying to translate what comes from that to others undiluted. If I can iron out some of the weird performace particularities of this project I'll eventually be able to fucking clear the ground and swim through the frequencies.

some clips from video footage below.

HEMISPHERES II

GARDENIA // Hemispheres II
CD-R in an edition of 45
30 with painted sleeves on brown paper
12 of those with obi strip
15 with various paintings/photocopies
4 tracks / 36:56

Four more tracks in the Hemispheres series. These particular recordings were done last winter (07-08) and represent the noisier and darker side of Gardenia as well as a more mature approach to improvisation. More textural dynamic shifts, tone generating experimentation & loop manipulation, pedals are played as much as the guitar. Still drone but more sporadic ideas weaving in and out of each other. A larger sonic palate is explored, walls of shifting noise, redlining octave doubling guitar, minimal space and a decent into deep frequencies. Some notable influences on this one, Merzbow, Stephen O'Malley, House of Low Culture & Mick Barr.

------------------

I spent a good amount of time on the audio this time (HSI I just wanted to finish and didn't gloss over the tracks very much). EQ, mixing and small amount of mastering. Pretty happy overall, I would say everything has improved. Only snag was printing the inserts, found this awesome double colour cardstock, grey & black, but no shop would put it through their laser printer and I had to go inkjet. The ink didn't set right and some of it can be wiped away if you rub it with your fingers. Fucking hell, but what can you do? Didn't realize it until it was almost done and I wanted it ready for a upcoming show (last night). I may redo some of them if I can find a suitable paper but for now if you get one of these just make sure you don't touch the ink!

------------------

Infinite thanks the following people // Michelle for supporting since the start, putting up with constant noise and letting me borrow her car for every show / Scott Sjoholm for printing both HS cds / Artie for his design advice and input / Karol for photos and helping out with film / Graham for coming out everytime and the magazine article/interview (upcoming) / Bron for audio/mastering help / Scott Sokolski for burning cds / everyone who has expressed interest and/or put forth kind words & the various promoters/individuals {Matt, Vanessa, Ayal, Mike} for giving me some shows.