[Text by Aaron Tate; from the Ithaca Times] In the world of noise-related music, there are few rising stars more accomplished or prolific than John Wiese. In addition to intricately crafted solo works such as last year’s Soft Punk (Troubleman Unlimited), Wiese has collaborated and toured with a number of internationally recognized artists, not the least of which would include Wolf Eyes, Sunn 0))), Merzbow, Evan Parker, and Carlos Giffoni.
In the past clutch of years Wiese has toured the UK, Japan, Scandinavia, Europe, and the United States in a dizzying array of projects, solo performances, ensemble work, and collaborative duos. This Thursday, Ithacans will have the opportunity to experience Wiese’s live presentation for themselves for the first time locally, when he performs at No Radio Records in an all ages show that begins at 7pm.
On the bill with Wiese will be two theatrical and highly entertaining acts from Rochester, N.Y., Tumul and the Bloody Noes. Fans of humor-tinged noise-laden mayhem will take great pleasure in the former, while connoisseurs of costumed mystery and anti-music-bordering-on-performance art will adore the latter. Also on the bill will be Ohioans Ryan Jewell and Zac Davis, who join forces in a recently formed duo while traveling westward after recently touring in the northeast.
Although there has been somewhat of a reaction against the use of laptops in live performance since the glitchy days of the late 90s, John Wiese has found a voice for his musical ideas by staying true to his old Macintosh G3 in conjunction with modest amounts of gear (a mixer, oscillator, contact microphones, hand-held microphone, and the like). His recorded work moves from detailed and highly edited constructions to relentless explorations of the many contours and variations on white noise.
The music tends toward the ecstatic end of things, and is prone to all manner of explosive and surprising soundbursts, yet large swaths bear a recognizable Wiese-like sonic signature. It’s for these reasons, alongside his scorching live sound, that Wiese has become one of the most sought after collaborators in the world of noise and experimental music today.
In the late 1990s John Wiese moved from St. Louis, Mo. to the west coast in order to study graphic design at Cal Arts. While there, he developed a proficiency with digital sound processing and began using the powerful software program known as MAX/MSP in order to realize his musical conceptions. Fusing the possibilities made available by the software with a refined but decidedly underground DIY sensibility, Wiese soon found himself playing and recording with frequency in the company of his most admired musical peers.
A survey of Wiese’s recorded work reveals sonic ambitions ranging from the spiky and dense to the drone-and-static end of the spectrum. When I ask him about the relationship between his Dionysian live aesthetic and the highly edited recordings, Wiese responds by email with a very clear articulation of his working methods: “My desire with music has always been the cut. It moves time/space forward in a way that has always really appealed to me. I’ve used computers as a live consideration for basically my entire career at this point, so the notion of improvisation and digital sound processing are pretty integrated for me,” he writes.
Wiese is a busy fellow these days. Currently in the middle of a two-month tour that has already covered the Midwest and northeast United States, Wiese will soon conclude with shows in the Pacific Northwest before heading to Japan for two weeks of performance, sound installation, and workshops in Tokyo. He’s also putting the finishing touches on recordings with C Spencer Yeh, Aaron Dilloway, Evan Parker, and other notable figures — recordings which are all slated to appear later in the year.
Rochester has for the past decade and a half harbored one of the healthiest music communities in upstate New York. The center of gravity has been Carbon Records, which will celebrate its 15th anniversary next year. Carbon’s founder, Joe Tunis, also happens to be one of the most active musicians in the city’s musical life. His noise duo, Tumul, with Cameron Farash, comprises an exuberant and politically inflected chaos-machine. Formed in March of 2007, Tumul has already released two CDRs on Carbon Records (Tension Management and Awaken This Light).
Surely one of Rochester’s more ‘out’ projects currently in operation would have to be the Bloody Noes. This male-female duo gather performance art strategies, found sound, object manipulation, and cheap synthesizer technology into a highly compelling, and challenging, live act. Their highly stylized combination of costumes, absurdity, and tightly composed musical gestures have resulted in what surely must be one of the areas most successful, and truly avant, musical acts.
Recently added to the bill but no less rewarding will be Ryan Jewell, an up and coming percussionist who returns to Ithaca with Lambsbread guitarist, Zac Davis, to play for a second time.