Monday, October 26, 2009

Saccages


LUFF has published a book of French translations of some of my essays and short fiction, entitled Saccages. The book release party was on Oct 14 before The Haters performance that night:



Author and publisher...



Jessica with author and editor...



Jessica with Damion Romero...



...and everyone else...!!!

The Haters live at LUFF, Oct 14 2009

Sunday, October 25, 2009

Ion-Gun re-enactment, Graz Oct 8 2009

Improved transformer and driver assembly.


The actual ion-gun grid hung above.


Graz, Oct 8 2009, Greg Leyh and The Haters reunited for a reenactment of their 1993 Ion-Gun performance. The new ion-gun had an improved transformer and driver assembly that charged the largely unsuspecting audience to over fifty thousand volts. In 1993 the American audience in San Francisco was pretty competitive with one another in seeing who could get the biggest charge in order to dish out the biggest shock. The 2009 Austrian audience, with a stronger sense of community, seemed much more curious in coming up with different ways to make the ion-gun a shared experience. Most people this time were using different body parts to see how the shock would be effected. This lead to people, mainly females, kissing directly under the ion-gun.

In 1993, the decoy performance on stage was seven members of The Haters watching blank static on a TV while slowly cutting up large pieces of cardboard. This time, the decoy was GX Jupitter-Larsen and Jessica King together grabbing onto the same live microphone and pushing it into sandpaper. An old guy was seen running around yelling about the noise scaring away the devil inside him.

Monday, September 14, 2009

Hanson Records just reissued THE HATERS - IN THE SHADE OF FIRE on CD...!!!

HANSON RECORDS is proud to present the first LP from THE HATERS, ‘IN THE SHADE OF FIRE’ reissued for the first time on the CD format AND for the first time in it’s original ENTIRETY. Originally released on LP by SILENT RECORDS in 1986, this digipak CD edition has been remastered by Warn Defever from the original master reels, and includes the full COMPLETE ALBUM as two of the tracks had to be shortened to fit on the original LP issue. Available to order NOW!

“Back during my Bachelor of Fine Arts, one of my fellow students was a woman who was eventually obsessed with the idea, systems, and eventual remnants of ‘process’. One of her key pieces involved hundreds of raw eggs which she carefully emptied, cracked open, and systematically peeled the delicate membranes from inside of the eggs. She carefully laid out the hundreds of membranes as they assembled in a giant area to the side of the studio. I swear that she didn’t even have some grandiose idea for the membranes as the peeling and assemblage system(s) evolved into something that was simply beyond any eventuality and initial idea for the piling skins of the eviscerated eggs. The deconstruction and conception behind the act of pulling apart the eggs into a vast collection of grimy, translucent membrane piles suggested something so much more than even a final constructed piece. Watching her as she realized that the true crux behind the piece was the process alone was astounding as the membranes were laid to rest to represent an almost sudden and powerful eventuality that acted as a piled testament to ‘process’. The harsh sound works of THE HATERS over artist GX Jupitter-Larsen’s long and established career also powerfully bring to mind the idea of process. Most of THE HATERS’ works are ideologies behind something being destroyed or manipulated; the amplified and sometimes distorted sounds of the processes representing a document that exemplifies the acts carried out upon the objects, machines, or otherwise. The act of recording the processes alone is evidence of an eventuality (to possibly be edited further) in the form of a possible final piece of vinyl, cassette, or CD, but the tendencies of THE HATERS’ material also intend the listener to experience the process of the audio lines as they were primarily constructed in the recording area. There is no doubt that GX appreciates the totemic quality of his personal objects’ physical aftermath, that is sometimes documented with video or photographs, but the powerful beauty of a THE HATERS audio piece is the experience for the listener that acts ALSO as a final document of sound that represent clearly the certain idea and sometimes violent act.
THE HATERS’ celebrated early work “In the Shade of Fire” acts a document collection for the listener that also reflects THE HATERS strong textural aesthetic through object manipulation and recording that defines GX’s place in the world of ‘harsh noise’. Listening your way through the material is a studied and defined testament to different representational fragments of heavy sound and source manipulation. The tracks Glsam and Diti are explosive introductory and side concluding / framing pieces that highlight and pronounce the breaking and crashing down of material, all gelled with bass driven strikes whose trails deteriorate into hints of cascading dirty and dark ‘Americanoise’ distortion. Bebas powers through a heavier dynamic with conscious falling apart of source material, but in abstracted waves that suggest the material being rebuilt just to simply fall and crash apart again with a sense of powerful futility. Thuch enhances the textural elements of the explosions and crashing as the sharpness of the strikes are slightly ‘rounded’ at the edges to expose an almost ‘gurgling’ texture that moves and slaps with vicious perplexity. Taisic represents a very early ‘Americanoise’ study of hiss manipulation that is accented with minimalist scraping that bring to mind the force of process on top of the white noise line. Cassas is the album’s meditated example of sharp shot-driven violence; articulated and seemingly layered for optimum cutting and breaking which bring forth sound dynamism from very physical deterioration. Fire 5 is an amazing example of a highly textural ‘wall’ of sound that, to the contemporary fan of gritty and dirty crunch waves, is a primary early example of powerful crackle lines that focus on the inner dynamism of the sound itself. All of the material discussed above is made up of elements of physicality and process, but the tracks Iny 1 and Iny 2 act, for the listener, as the ‘notes’ for the ideology of process and falling apart as they act as a more minimal, subtle, and exacting study of the scraping, scuffing, and hands on work of the artist as he manipulates the deteriorating materials. In essence, Iny 2 is an amazing concluding track that reminds the listener of the core focus and ideology behind THE HATERS’ exemplification of grating sound via concept driven manipulation of tangible sources, the process, the aftermath, and the eventual recording that reflects all of the above sound qualities.”


- Sam McKinlay

Available to order NOW!

Thursday, August 20, 2009

Monday, May 18, 2009

RIP: David Ireland

David Ireland passed away May 18 from pneumonia. I first met him in art school back in 78. He was a huge influence in my life. The pics here are of a CD we recorded together in 99.


Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Sometimes Never, a noise novel, just published!


Sometimes Never is my second novel. Just published by Crossing Chaos. It's about a spy, who while observing Kettleday, reflects on a series of fanatic coincidences that take place on several planets. You can order a copy here: crossingchaos.com


This was a happy little fun time with The Haters. Junk was just pouring out from the gallery's freight elevator. Many in the audience threw the junk right back at the performers. Some even threw themselves into the garbage. New York Aug 24th 1991.

Thursday, March 26, 2009

Amplified aerosol discharging (2009)


GX Jupitter-Larsen and Gil Kuno amplify and treat the sound of an aerosol can to create a live soundscape. The performance begins when the gas in the aerosol is released and ends when the can is empty.

Friday, February 6, 2009