Band on Wall late opening. Nipped across road to pub for a piss. Trickling urinal water mixed with Blondie hanging on telephones. Outside milled younger man Keloid and older man Wand. Soon inside, seven turntable hellraisers from all four corners took up their slip mats. Black Sabbath blared and black curtain backdrop half collapsed to reveal cut up venue name and n the all. This seemed appropriate for the occasion. All went quiet and ears were pricked to pick out minimal scrapings of a compositon from Australian Helltablist Martin Ng. Video feed overhanging courtesy of Ben Drew closed up to objects rendered unrecognisable in their magnification, and was a fitting accompaniment to the microscopic movements characterising Ng's Cageian atomscape.
Friday, May 17, 2002
The 'Zero' emblazoned on Lepke B's T-shirt also seemd aptly descriptive of Ng's low key approach. At the back Janek Schaefer tapped out a tiny rhythm on a turntable arm and New Yorker Marina Rosenfeld swayed sexily. Eruption of Otomo! Cymbal crashed to Otomo's turntable stage right. He lifted the whole thing off the table and shook it with glee sending a knee shaking bass throb from the amp on which he perched. Japanese Helltablist Yoshihide yet again proved himself a master of comedic feedback sculpting. Video resembled a morphing abstracted linescape of the original 'Faust Tapes' sleeve. Then a high droning Janek Schaefer construction to wind down the opening triad. French Canadian Martin Tetreault took the lead for a performance of his as yet unfinished cartridge piece on which he and Paul Hood stood to let rip some well fucked up noises as they dangled the needleless cartridges from their wires and crashed them all about. After bar hopping interval the second half proved to be much more plunderphonic, with Paul Hood conducting everyone for a while as if he was having the time of his life. Tetreault asked the crowd to name a Helltable excursion and misheard some wag shouting, "Bollocks!" as "Boing!" The video fed close ups of the turntables and they'd been smart enough to get Otomo's priceless grin into focus. It was nice to see how Schaefer's legendary triphonic turntable looked. Steve Noble's cut up Shakespeare recordings were rib tickling, but it was perhaps Marina Rosenfeld who really shone with a beautifully arranged emerging soundscape of lost memory shards. As she indicated its end, Tetreault cheekily ran one more loop. Latterly Lepke B played the humour card and beer slopped to the dance floor. I was lucky enough to be able to buy the last copy of the excellent Amoebic 'Turntable Solos' compilation at the well stocked CD stall. Those in the South of England still have a chance to witness the joy of Turntable Hell over the next few days. Check cmntours.org.uk for the itinery.
