Hello there!
Upset The Rhythm are back at the live music coalface this Thursday with a very special concert for Six Organs of Admittance
at Metronome London (in Whitechapel). Ben Chasny is a master of the
hushed folk idiom, blending in experimental noise and cascades of
fingerstyle guitar with deft skill. In support we're pleased to have Lando Manning with his richly timbred dreamswept acoustica. We are counting the hours, it's going to be brilliant.
Read on for all the particulars. We also outline below our upcoming April events for Evil Sword, Myriam Gendron, Wolf Eyes and a last minute headrush of a show at The Lexington on April 9th for Wendy Eisenberg & Ryan Sawyer.
In our listings you might also spot a newly announced concert for Chris Cohen at The Ivy House on July 31st, and the exciting addition of Good Sad Happy Bad to our Rich Dawson lineup on April 30th too, woah! Exciting times indeed.
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Upset The Rhythm presents... a Drag City showcase featuring: SIX ORGANS OF ADMITTANCE
LANDO MANNINGThursday 27 March Metronome London, 41 Commercial Road, London, E1 1LA 7.30pm | £18 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/Gb5ecad0f987SIX ORGANS OF ADMITTANCE
have built a prolific and diverse body of work over the last 20+ years.
Ben Chasny's project is an experimental amalgam of new folk, drone
music, percussion and strange textures, with Chasny delivering an
outpouring of eclectic releases in the early 2000s for various small
labels before finding a longstanding home on Drag City. In 2003, Chasny
began an association with Comets on Fire, which led to him becoming a
full-time touring and recording member of the band. After recording and
touring extensively with Comets on Fire in 2004, Chasny returned to the
studio and issued the moving and beautiful School of the Flower on Drag
City in January of 2005. Sun Awakens and Shelter from the Ash arrived in
2006 and 2007. After touring and a break in 2008, Six Organs began what
would become a prolific return to force, releasing a further 18
astonishing records up to the current time. First was the release of the
sonically expansive - and very electric - Luminous Night, followed by
the double-disc retrospective RTZ, both of which appeared on Drag City.
Chasny also plays in 200 Years alongside Elisa Ambrogio (of Magik
Markers), with Donovan Quinn (Skygreen Leopards) in the project New
Bums, and is also a member of tightly-wound improv unit Rangda,
accompanied by Sir Richard Bishop and Chris Corsano. Chasny more
recently developed a card-based creative system called a Hexadic for
making music and released several related albums before resuming his
primary project with new work like 2021's The Veiled Sea and the 2024
Shackleton collaboration Jinxed by Being. This year Six Organs also
released a fully solo album Time Is Glass, which consists of haunted,
unsettled rural folk sounds. With Time is Glass, Six Organs of
Admittance is captured once again in the intricate tangle of the
fretboards, soaring in open skies above. Like lens flare cutting through
the speakers; spider-webs cracking the windshield that holds back all
the onrushing reality. Blowing the dust away, cutting a new path for
cognition.
LANDO MANNING is a
Peckham-based acid-dipped folk musician. Lando just released his second
EP ‘Brighter Days’ (Mango Wax Records), a project he describes as “an
affirmation of hope that through dark times there is light.” With a
distinctly dreamy acoustic sound and a gift for subtle poetic song
writing, he has continued to impress with every new song since his debut
single ‘Today’. There is a real openness that comes from Manning.
Without hesitation, deep and raw feelings are put in the firing line.
‘Brighter Days’ finds its inspiration as much in the soundtracks of
Ennio Morricone and the ambient works of Japanese pioneer Hiroshima
Yoshimura, as in the classic works of 70s folk songwriters like Towns
Van Zandt.
NB. Bill MacKay had to call short his European tour and will not be performing at this show now. |
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Upset The Rhythm presents… EVIL SWORD
SHAKE CHAIN
SPLIT APEXSaturday 5 April New River Studios, 199 Eade Rd, Harringay, London, N4 1DN 7.30pm | £8 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/B1970de44fb0EVIL SWORD
are Kate Ferencz and Ben Furgal from Philadelphia, USA. Their chaotic
live shows combine elements of noise, cryptic metal overtones,
performance art, and gallows humor and feature macabre props, flashing
lights, stage sets and costumes. There are hardly any instruments in
this group, but they make such a racket you’d never know it. The bass
and the percussion sound like they’re having a great time, telling each
other jokes. Then the words come in and it all locks together in these
strange, hypnotic rhythms. I just listen to the stories and laugh and
cry and get scared and wonder what they were ever thinking.
Recent album ‘Basket Fever’ (Magic
Pictures, 2023) features electrocuted bells, backwards parts, rusty
horns; I’m pretty sure I even heard a clarinet in there somewhere.
There’s this one part where it all seems to come back around, where they
took some gang vocals from the very first demo they ever recorded and
slowed it way down. When they first started; I thought they were some
goofy kids making music about the end of the world, back when that
seemed a little further away, like it was going to be fun. They were all
laughing and making these funny ghost sounds, but now everyone’s older
and the ghosts are real, a great whoosh of bygone spirits and cold air.
It’s bone chilling. There’s plenty to be upset about, but it’s not
really an Evil Sword song until that grimace has been twisted up into a
smile.
https://evilsword.bandcamp.com/album/basket-feverSHAKE CHAIN
have been busy demolishing audiences and expectations for the best part
of the last five years. Vocalist Kate Mahony sets that standard by
anything from crawling through the audience’s legs in a bright yellow
raincoat to crying and washing her hands in a nearby toilet, as the rest
of the band start the set. The four-piece from London are completed by
Robert Eyres (Synth/Guitar), Chris Hopkins (Bass/Synth/Samples) and Joe
Fergey (Drums). Shake Chain are built of nervy bass lines, twitchy
guitars that jolt and jerk and tack sharp drums, overridden by
screeching vocal slurs and sampled television. Kate’s singing is a
unique embrace of flights of atonal fancy, head-first repetition and
ecstatic frenzy. Opinion-dividing arguably, but singular in making Shake
Chain dauntingly brilliant. The band’s debut album ’Snake Chain’ was
released by Upset The Rhythm. https://upsettherhythm.bandcamp.com/album/snake-chain SPLIT APEX
are Jussi Palmusaari (guitar, electronics and percussion) and Peter
Blundell (voice and bass). On their self-titled cassette (out now)
release they combine restless sonic textures, oddball phrasing within
barely-contained song structures held together by moth-woven threads.
Seemingly governed by an unknowable gravitational pull that tugs hither
and yon, the duo lays out their statement of intent through a brief
suite of intimate nocturnes. The release marks the first work for
Palmusaari since leaving his native Finland where he played with the
band, Preesens, in the late-90s/early-00s. For Blundell, this new
project exists adjacent to his current work with Dominic Goodman as
Komare and previous endeavours in the band, Mosquitoes. https://tinyurl.com/n8cf2jhf |
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Upset The Rhythm presents... MYRIAM GENDRON
THE MEMORY BANDMonday 7 April Grand Junction, Rowington Cl, London W2 5TF 7.30pm | £18 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/B9332cba32bbMYRIAM GENDRON
is a Montreal-based songwriter, guitarist and singer. Mayday is the
third LP by Gendron, it follows her earlier, critically acclaimed
albums, Not So Deep As A Well (2014) and Ma délire – Songs of love, lost
& found (2021). Prior to her debut album, Myriam's primary musical
focus was busking in Paris Metro stations, performing the songs of
Leonard Cohen and others, accompanying herself on guitar. Through her
day job, working at a Montreal bookstore, Myriam discovered the poems of
American writer, Dorothy Parker, who was better known for her cutting
wit than her verse. Inspired by Parker's words, Myriam wrote music to
accompany a suite of them, then recorded the results in her bedroom.
These recordings were issued as her debut LP, and continue to delight
listeners who discover them, with their freshness, clarity and humor.
After a brief hiatus, Myriam began
exploring the complex folk traditions of Quebec (and beyond), recording
the 2LP, Ma délire, which combines traditional and original songs
(largely in French) with arrangements that make space for avant-garde
musical interludes by such folks as guitarist Bill Nace (Body/Head) and
renowned jazz percussionist Chris Corsano. Mayday is an even more
syncretic fusion of these elements. Most of the songs are original, in
both English and French, and blend traditional and avant elements with
abandon. Additional players this time include drummer Jim White (Dirty
Three), guitarist Marisa Anderson, Montreal bassist Cédric Dind-Lavoie
(a fellow fan of trad/avant dynamism), Bill Nace and saxophonist Zoh
Amba (whose horn actually gets the final “word”). Mayday is a thoroughly
thrilling effort that manages to create new vistas of sound while
maintaining a feel that is both intimate and familiar. Beautiful work. https://myriamgendron.bandcamp.com/
THE MEMORY BAND have been
navigating its own path through the folk music landscape of the digital
age since 2003. Led by producer Stephen Cracknell with a fluid cast of
collaborators The Memory Band blend songs and instrumentals, the
traditional with the modern and the sacred with the profane. Their
two decade adventure has produced six studio albums as well as side
projects such as The Balearic Folk Orchestra and The Accidental. They
have a long history of performing music from Paul Giovanni's soundtrack
to The Wicker Man as well as other film and archive related projects. In
2024 The Memory Band released 'Never The Same Way Twice and 'A Common
Treasury' two volumes of unreleased archive recordings on their own
Hungry Hill label and in 2025 make their return to live performance. https://thememoryband.com/ |
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Upset The Rhythm presents… WENDY EISENBERG & RYAN SAWYER
KIRAN LEONARDWednesday 9 April The Lexington, 96-98 Pentonville Rd, Angel, London, N1 9JB 7.30pm | £12 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/G8802b91cafeWENDY EISENBERG & RYAN SAWYER
came together seemingly by fate. The duo originally came together in a
dream Eisenberg had, and not long after, were brought together in
reality as substitutes for a show at Union Pool, where they instantly
fell in step. Both artists’ work traverses genres from jazz to noise,
all sorts of avant substrata and delicate songs, each placing a special
emphasis on vast dynamics, textures, and moods. Their performances ebb
and flow between long, improvisational pieces and composed songs from
each of the artists' repertoires, setting the sonic intersection between
Blaze Foley and the New York Art Quartet. The duo has previously opened
for caroline at National Sawdust. Ryan also plays on Wendy’s new
single ‘I Don’t Miss You’ (Joyful Noise Recordings). Wendy has
previously played for us solo, and as a member of Editrix and Bill
Orcutts’s guitar quartet, and their recent album ‘Viewfinder’ was
described by The Guardian as “unexpected shifts in pace mix with
Americana and jazz, with the singer-songwriter’s distinctive guitar
sound driving a song cycle like no other”. Ryan Sawyer has played drums /
percussion for Tv On The Radio, Marshall Allen, Susan Alcorn, Gang Gang
Dance, At The Drive-In and collaborates a lot with John Dwyer. https://www.wendyeisenberg.com/https://ryansawyer.bandcamp.com/musicKIRAN LEONARD’s
unique and ambitious body of work spans more than a decade of releases
on labels such as Moshi Moshi and Hand of Glory, limited-run noisy DIY
fare, and everything in between. The adolescent guitar/chamber prog of
early records such as ‘Bowler Hat Soup’ (2013) and ‘Grapefruit’ (2016)
earned praise from Pitchfork, the Guardian and the Quietus, and produced
several BBC 6Music-playlisted singles. More recent work has seen Kiran
attempt to synthesise interests in situated/home recording, collage, his
live practice, and a combination of songcraft with graphic scores, as
documented on the monumental (i.e. two-hour-long) and abstract ‘Trespass
on Foot’ (2021) and ‘River Holds Peace, Some Live’ (2023), a collection
of new and old material arranged for an ensemble of multiple electric
guitars, cittern and double bass. Last year, After half a decade of
songs without choruses, Kiran released ‘Real Home’ on Memorials of
Distinction, which was named by the Guardian that summer among the best
albums of 2024 so far. https://kleonard.bandcamp.com/ |
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Upset The Rhythm presents...
WOLF EYES
SLY & THE FAMILY DRONE
SOBORGNOST
Thursday 10 April The Underworld, 174 Camden High St, London, NW1 9DL 7pm | £15 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/qa5f170d34a7WOLF EYES
have spent 25 years fusing together DIY electronics with the
avant-garde sensibilities of Fluxus and the granite of dreary Midwestern
life. Their new album 'Dreams In Splattered Lines' is a surreal
dreamscape of disorienting sound collages, where hit songs are
transformed into terrariums of sonic flora and decimated fauna. As if
pulled from a fever dream, the surrealists of the 1960s converge with
alien electronic blues musicians in an underworld of mystery. The air is
thick with car wash radio white noise, crackling and fizzing like a
toxic elixir, spoken word poetry transmissions as absurd and cryptic
phrases. Each corroded aural environment is a microcosm of chaos, honed
to razor-sharp precision. Swept away in a whirlwind of thirteen
perplexing narratives, each one an unpredictable journey through
subterranean worlds, a sonic trip of reality folded into itself. Wolf
Eyes have released three albums recently ‘Dreams In Splattered Lines'
was preceded by the compilation of collaborations 'Presents Difficult
Messages', and the band followed this up with the release of 'Wolf Eyes
w/ Spykes', bringing a much sought after early release to vinyl for the
first time, documenting a recording session pivotal to the ongoing
development of the group’s sound. Alongside this has been the usual
steady stream of lathe cuts, side hustles, art and inzanity. A new LP is
due out soon charting Wolf Eyes’ recent recordings with Anthony Braxton
too, look out! https://wolfeyes.xyz/
SLY & THE FAMILY DRONE are a
primal orchestra of drum rhythms, radiophonic oscillator noise and
electronically-abstracted vocals. They forge hypnotic, textural workouts
in the vein of Black Dice, Shit & Shine and Crash Worship. Given
their freeform nature, every set they play is fresh and different. The
band prefer to play in the round, rather than onstage, transforming the
audience from passive observers to active contributors, creating a
dynamic and evolving soundscape. This egalitarian approach propels
audience and band together into a shamanistic setting of catharsis and
anarchic celebration.
Originally formed by Matt Cargill
as a cassette manipulation project. Since then, Sly have expanded to
incorporate layers of electronics, clattering live drums and saxophones,
placing them somewhere between noise music and free jazz. Imagine a
Boredoms score for an experimental noir thriller and you might be
getting close. The neo-jazz wreckin’ crew continue to scorch their own
path, recently teaming up with UK charitable label Human Worth on the
release of their new record ‘Moon is Doom Backwards’.
https://familydrone.bandcamp.com/SOBORGNOST
is sci-fi dance punk at the intersection of vaporwave, minimal wave,
disco dub, industrial, EBM, proto-house, drone and noise. Using a
hardware sampler to emulate dub mixing, looping post-punk style
basslines with chuggy, lo-fi beats. Warped analogue textures are added
with cassette tape manipulation, electro magnetic frequency
transmitters, shortwave radio, harsh noise generator and dub sirens.
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