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The Gate to Moonbase Alpha is a monthly audio shelter for homeless music. So
called ambient, space, psychedelic, and improvisational music, find residence
here. With support from the Foundation at the University of Pennsylvania, and
organized by the Philadelphia Ambient Consortium (Music and Noise), lost sounds
are decorated and given their rightful homage by loving and respectful devotees.
Attendees are encouraged to bring instruments to make noise. Artists are invited
to perform opi of intense beauty or inspired play.
Initially provided as an experimental space above the underground excavations of
the Gate complex to the Phobos Mining Colony, the Rotunda has evolved beyond its
original intent: to trigger the sonic resonance used in the Gate's jaunt
mechanism (as outlined in Bester, 1956). Currently, the Rotunda is thought to
have become itself, through our past sonic experiments, a living architectural
pattern reflecting the ancient designs of the Gate mechanism miles below. In
order for the precious Rotunda organism not to "die", we must "feed" it with our
musical offerings.
This month, offering up to our Rotund Gate, are five artists whose sensibilities
of tone and texture, play and scientific reason, represent our finest and most
sincere gesture to the beast we have invented and grown. Summaries of the
artist's histories, and examples of their music follow. Afterwards, please read
the directions and summary of expectations and rules included for your interest
and safety, located below.
ARCO FLUTE FOUNDATION : http://cenotaph.org/aff/main.html
Featuring members of Meisha, the Arco Flute Foundation (aka "meisha with
beards") have been performing all around the East Coast, embarking on two short
tours already. Harking from nearby Edinboro, PA, the Arco Flute Foundation
collective consists of Jeff Komara (drums, etc.), Mike Tamburo (guitars, etc.),
Matt McDowell (guitars, etc.), Pete Spynda (guitars, etc.), and Rob Dingman
(dijiridoo, etc.). According to AFF: "arco flute foundation have been compared
to, pelt, godspeed you black emperor!, theater of eternal music, hawkwind,
spacemen 3, windy and carl, meisha, and a bunch of other people that really
sound nothing like them." Thankfully, the following mp3s have been made
available from their host label, Cenotaph Records, for your consideration.
Arco Flute Foundation mp3s from the album "the third lesson in new era time"
(Cenotaph, 12.2000)
interlude two:
http://phobos.serve.com/arco_flute_foundation/arco_flute_foundation-the_third_lesson_in_new_era_time-interlude_2.mp3
ghost ship pt. 2:
http://phobos.serve.com/arco_flute_foundation/arco_flute_foundation-the_third_lesson_in_new_era_time-ghost_ship_pt_2.mp3
Those who attended the Gate to Moonbase Alpha concert December 2000, heard
Meisha, but if you weren't you can hear their set in mp3 audio format.
Those with hi-speed connections can listen to:
http://phobos.serve.com/gtmba/20001215/gate_to_moonbase_alpha-live_20001215-set6-meisha.m3u (you
can download this mp3 at http://phobos.serve.com/gtmba/20001215/ ).
a very lo-fidelity version of the recording is available for those with very
lo-speed connections:
http://phobos.serve.com/gtmba/20001215/lo-fi/gate_to_moonbase_alpha-live_20001215-set6-meisha.m3u
TEMPLE OF BON MATIN : http://www.netway.com/~bulb/tobm.html
Featuring most of Philly's improvisational masters, ToBM's LP "Bullet into
Mesmer's Brain" (Bulb, BLB-054) made me wince I hadn't yet heard or at least
seen them perform in the flesh. This is probably an exaggeration, "If a gang of
smelly welding students broke into your house, force-fed you PCP, tore the place
apart, all the while some maniac banging on your doors with two ball peen
hammers, that would have to be Temple of Bon Matin."
Temple of Bon Matin / Velocity Hopkins - live at the Astrocade from Sonitus
compilation (7.9 MB)
http://phobos.serve.com/temple_of_bon_matin/templeliv.mp3
Temple of Bon Matin - Breed Love from recent recording sessions (1.4 MB)
http://phobos.serve.com/temple_of_bon_matin/templebreedlove.mp3
You can also read a glowing review of ToBM captured on their host label's
website, Bulb Records, at http://scribble.com/bulb/tobmmail.html
TARA BURKE and friends:
Formerly of Clock Srikes Thirteen, formerly of Ted Casterline and his Perfect
Pieces of Fruit, Tara Burke most recently played the Ruba Club's Fursaxa rock n'
roll circus. A Farfisa, Chord Organist, and Singer, Tara will perform with two friends of hers.
Grant Acker will be playing guitar and a casio keyboard; he used to play guitar
in the Siltbreeze band UN. Matt Shiley will be playing "bells" he makes them
from fire extinguishers that he cuts in half. Tara Burke currently has a cd
called Mandrake that Kawabata from the Acid Mothers Temple in Japan produced and
released.
The short lived Perfect Pieces of Fruit performed at the first Gate to Moonbase
Alpha back in October 1999. We recorded the show and have it available for
listening to at your leisure.
Those with hi-speed connections can listen to:
http://phobos.serve.com/gtmba/19991015/gate_to_moonbase_alpha-live_19991015-set2-perfect_pieces_of_fruit.m3u
(you can download this mp3 at http://phobos.serve.com/gtmba/19991015/).
a very lo-fidelity version of the recording is available for those with very
lo-speed connections:
http://phobos.serve.com/gtmba/19991015/lo-fi/gate_to_moonbase_alpha-live_19991015-set2-perfect_pieces_of_fruit.m3u
STEVEN CURTIN : http://curtin.emf.org
We are proud to invite Steven Curtin, who we met at a space music Gathering at
St. Mary's Church hosted by Star's End dj, Chuck van Zyl. Hearing of the Gate to
Moonbase Alpha's cd project, Mr. Curtin was one of the first to rush his
submission to our reviewer's greedy ears. From all of us, thank you.
His bio reads: Steven Curtin was born April 23, 1960 in Madison, Wisconsin. He
received an MFA in Electronic Music and the Recording Media in 1989 from the
Mills College Center for Contemporary Music, where he studied composition with
David Rosenboom, Anthony Braxton and Arturo Salinas. Prior to this he studied
composition with Salvatore Martirano and computer music with James Beauchamp at
the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, after graduating from the
University of Wisconsin at Madison. While at Wisconsin he studied music,
computer science and engineering and worked at the Industrial Engineering
department and later the Computer Aided Engineering Laboratory as a computer
systems administrator. While at Illinois he studied music composition and
computer science, and worked as a Research Assistant computer graphics and image
processing programmer at the Materials Research Laboratory. He is an Audio
Applications Engineer for the Sirius Satellite Radio project with the
Microelectronics division of Lucent Technologies - Bell Labs Innovations in
Allentown, PA. He works out of the Holmdel, NJ Lucent building, and lives with
his wife Barbara and their four-year-old son in the Monmouth County, NJ area.
Steven Curtin MP3s for review are at:
http://phobos.serve.com/steven_curtin/
THE GREAT QUENTINI :
Performance artist/dancer the Great Quentini, dressed as a yeti or man-bird,
dressed as a stilted alien scavenger, talking to Barbie, performing public
rituals to popcorn poppers, pounding away on pots and styrofoam, and generally
inspiring the genius out of us to go out and make good on the creative prowess
which we might be endowed with, which he makes look so playful, and easy to romp
in. Why is the Great Quentini here? Answer: Greatness. Plus, maybe some day
he'll play Dungeons and Dragons with me. Or maybe he already has, what is the
Gate but a game map superimposed on a simple structure: a Friday night
performance series. Can you see the lines, the symbols, and conventions, the
secret doors, the treasures, the mind-flayer behind the corner? Quentin can. He
is the exoteric game master.
We finally miked the Gate to record one of Quentin's pieces. Captured is the
audio and no video, so you will have to imagine what Quentin is doing when you
listen to these.
Those with hi-speed connections can listen to:
http://phobos.serve.com/the_great_quentini/the_great_quentini.m3u
(you can download this mp3 at http://phobos.serve.com/the_great_quentini/
).
a very lo-fidelity version of the recording is available for those with very
lo-speed connections:
http://phobos.serve.com/the_great_quentini/lo-fi/lo-fi.m3u
RULES and EXPECTATIONS
If the jaunt mechanism is activated (see above) after 8:00PM and you have not
yet arrived, then you will have missed your opportunity to suck air on Phobos.
So arrive as close to 8:00 PM as you can. Also, if you come late then you'll
miss some rare music by some quite obscure and wonderful artists.
In between sets, you are invited to create cacophony, so bring an instrument of
music or noise.
If you have any opinions on the sound quality or volume which is seriously
impacting your enjoyment of the evening, see Aharon Varady, the fellow in the
orange jumpsuit who seems to demand so much attention before and after each
performance.
Some comestibles will be supplied by the Comet Coffeehouse (located around the
corner on 41st Street between Walnut & Chestnut). Hot Cider, Iced Ginger Tea,
and assorted pastries are all FREE. You should definitely bring your own protein
food though. If you can, bring VEGETARIAN food to share for the potluck.
Artists who are interested in performing at the Gate should bring a demo cd and
get it to Aharon by the end of the evening. The CD itself should be marked with
all the relevant contact info.
All Our Alpha Moonbase Are Belong To You:
The Gate to MoonBase Alpha performance series is funded with a budget from the
University of Pennsylvania and made possible by the volunteer contributions of
the Foundation Crew (a UPenn student run organization promoting cultural
exchange and opportunities in and for West Philadelphia). That means due to the
low overhead all artists are paid and there is absolutely no cover! If you
wish, donations can be made to the Consortium or the Foundation to support
future events. The Foundation website is:
http://www.upenn.edu/philly/foundation/
The Gate to Moonbase Alpha is organized by the Philadelphia Ambient Consortium
(Music and Noise), or PAC(MaN) for short, an autonomous cabal centered in
Philadelphia, PA. It was established in 1998 to unify the city's dedicated
space, ambient, psychedelic instrumental, improvisational, drone, new classical,
and experimental electronic audiophiles by providing a centralized information
resource and the kernel of a community. We hope that through this activity, the
scene may grow strong and large enough to make our work largely irrelevant. But
we remain constantly inspired by our disgust in how typical music cliques will
represent a narrow musical appreciation, pose as a "sub-culture", and even
worse, manifest itself in real generational gaps. The Gate is our attempt to
present an eclectic performance series representing the rich diversity of new
sound artists, young and old, and a wide spectrum of styles. The seemingly
arbitrary nature of the selections is the work of the curator, Aharon Varady (
spaceling@iname.com ), and co-organizer Gina Renzi ( mistsojorn@aol.com ).
ALL THIS TAKES PLACE AT THE ROTUNDA, 4012 WALNUT STREET, FRIDAY MARCH 23RD AT 8
O'CLOCK PM (ends at 12 midnight).
Rotunda Building Information:
http://www.facilities.upenn.edu/mapsBldgs/view_bldg.php3?id=140
A Map for the Rotunda in Philly:
http://www.facilities.upenn.edu/mapsBldgs/view_map.php3?id=85
One last note:
the Gate to Moonbase Alpha scheduled for April 27, 2001 will feature:
Sona, Emit Peels, Akash, and Theater of the Mind
----------------------------
PAC(MaN) is sponsored by the volunteer contributions of its members. While it is
not technically a nonprofit organization by U.S. law, PAC(MaN) does not seek any
gain for its organizing members, and intends to follow the principles as set
forth in Hakim Bey's Temporal Autonomous Zone:
http://www.hermetic.com/bey/taz_cont.html
PAC(MaN) publishes the PAC(MaN) Event Update, administers the philly_ambient
discussion list, curates the Gate to Moonbase Alpha performance series, and
operates the simpletone.com website. For more information, email
spaceling@iname.com , browse to http://simpletone.com or write THE PHILADELPHIA
AMBIENT CONSORTIUM (MUSIC AND NOISE), 512 S. 46th St. Philadelphia PA 19143,
tel: 1 215 349 7725.
