Eric Chenaux
Eric Chenaux experiments with ballads, songs, tunes, improvisations, guitars, very small speakers, The Reveries 1, The Draperies 2, Drumheller 3, Nightjars 4, The Guayaveras 5, The Allison Cameron Band 6, Eloïse Decazes 7, John Oswald 8, Michelle McAdorey 9, Aimée Dawn Robinson 10, Marla Hlady 11 and the curation of the Toronto-based recording label Rat-Drifting co-founded with Martin Arnold in 2002.
Solo recordings on the Montréal-based Constellation:
Guitar & Voice (2012)
Warm Weather With Ryan Driver (2010)
Sloppy Ground (2008)
Dull Lights (2006)
Chenaux has also collaborated regularly and extensively with fellow Constellation artist Sandro Perri, and appears on two of Perri's albums for the label, Plays Polmo Polpo (2006) and Tiny Mirrors (2007).
In the 1980s and 1990s Chenaux played rhythmically demented half-riffs with hoary post-punk band Phleg Camp and later wrote songs with the guitar duo Lifelikeweeds.
About Chenaux’s guitar playing, Carl Wilson writes: “Ornette Coleman might call it harmolodic. Chenaux might call it an amazing background. His strings chime with all those thoughts at once. I adore the way he teases out a melody, never beginning a phrase so much as joining one already in progress. The sound quivers and multiples such that I picture his strings fraying and sprouting into more strings, weeds, nests, marshes, frogs’ tongues, canceled coins, nickel pipes, drainage systems, catacombs, coral reefs…I could pick Chenaux’s guitar out of a lineup within a few woozy notes, because it’s no longer confined to the orthodox pluck, squawk and scrape of [Derek] Bailey-influenced guitar improv; instead it has absorbed Bailey’s open field of possibility into a love of song. And the songs are strong enough to take it”.
1 A psychedelic sweet-lounge trio (with Ryan Driver and Doug Tielli) who sing and play jazz standards with cellphone speakers placed in their mouths to amplify each others instruments. Martin Arnold writes, “experiencing it is like encountering delicate ultra-lounge psychedelia picked up form afar on a static ridden short-wave radio.” Blasé Kisses, Live in Bologna, Matchmakers: The Music of Willie Nelson (Rat-drifting).
2 The Draperies is another trio with Driver and Teilli. Improvise bitter-sweet polyphony.with synth, guitar, trombone and thumb-reeds. L’histoire du Chapeau (Rat-drifting)
3 Drumheller is a jazz quintet with Nick Fraser (drums), Rob Clutton (double bass), Doug Tielli (trombone), Brodie West (alto saxophone). Drumheller, Wives, Glint
(Rat-drifting). 4 Nightjars is a duet of contrapuntal minuets with Jason Benoit (banjo). The Natural Playmate (Rat-drifting).
5 The Guayavera is the national shirt of Puerto Rico, bountiful with embroidered ornaments, running through its characteristic four pockets. The Guayaveras (the band) currently play their tropical adornments with guitalele, toe-synth and thumbreeds, both outdoors and indoors. The Guayaveras (Rat-drifting).
6 Allison Cameron is a composer of mostly chamber music, an experimental performer and an amateur banjo player. While most of this bands music is original, several pieces borrow tablature notation from traditional/anonymous English folk tunes in a non-conformist manner, using re-tuned guitars and banjo, new rhythm, free rhythm and sometimes no rhythm to re-invent and create new pieces out of the old work. The Allison Cameron Band (Rat-drifting).
7 Eloïse Decazes and Eric Chenaux perform French medieval balladry with voice and guitar. Eloïse has been singing these songs for many years and also sings the in the Parisian based duo Arlt.
8 John Oswald is perhaps best known for his work in Plunderphonics but has been improvising with the alto sax for quite some time. This duet with Eric Chenaux has been playing intermittently for over ten years. As an improviser Chenaux has played with Han Bennink, Murray Favro, Michael Moore, Kurt Newman, Pauline Oliveros, John Oswald, Michael Snow, Rachel Wadham and Zack Wallace.
9 Michelle McAdorey is a Toronto based singer-songwriter who once wrote and sang for Crash Vegas. She now writes, lamenting ballads. Whirl (Queen of Cups), Love Don’t Change (Rat-drifting).
10 Aimée Dawn Robinson is an improvising dancer, writer/researcher and musician. Aimée and Eric performed at Tari 07 in Kuala Lumpur.
11 Marla Hlady is an artist who makes kinetic sculptures, sound pieces, video and drawing. Marla and Eric have collaborated on sound pieces and performances that use sound objects. Marla also created the artwork for Chenaux’s Dull Lights and Warm Weather With Ryan Driver.
Solo recordings on the Montréal-based Constellation:
Guitar & Voice (2012)
Warm Weather With Ryan Driver (2010)
Sloppy Ground (2008)
Dull Lights (2006)
Chenaux has also collaborated regularly and extensively with fellow Constellation artist Sandro Perri, and appears on two of Perri's albums for the label, Plays Polmo Polpo (2006) and Tiny Mirrors (2007).
In the 1980s and 1990s Chenaux played rhythmically demented half-riffs with hoary post-punk band Phleg Camp and later wrote songs with the guitar duo Lifelikeweeds.
About Chenaux’s guitar playing, Carl Wilson writes: “Ornette Coleman might call it harmolodic. Chenaux might call it an amazing background. His strings chime with all those thoughts at once. I adore the way he teases out a melody, never beginning a phrase so much as joining one already in progress. The sound quivers and multiples such that I picture his strings fraying and sprouting into more strings, weeds, nests, marshes, frogs’ tongues, canceled coins, nickel pipes, drainage systems, catacombs, coral reefs…I could pick Chenaux’s guitar out of a lineup within a few woozy notes, because it’s no longer confined to the orthodox pluck, squawk and scrape of [Derek] Bailey-influenced guitar improv; instead it has absorbed Bailey’s open field of possibility into a love of song. And the songs are strong enough to take it”.
1 A psychedelic sweet-lounge trio (with Ryan Driver and Doug Tielli) who sing and play jazz standards with cellphone speakers placed in their mouths to amplify each others instruments. Martin Arnold writes, “experiencing it is like encountering delicate ultra-lounge psychedelia picked up form afar on a static ridden short-wave radio.” Blasé Kisses, Live in Bologna, Matchmakers: The Music of Willie Nelson (Rat-drifting).
2 The Draperies is another trio with Driver and Teilli. Improvise bitter-sweet polyphony.with synth, guitar, trombone and thumb-reeds. L’histoire du Chapeau (Rat-drifting)
3 Drumheller is a jazz quintet with Nick Fraser (drums), Rob Clutton (double bass), Doug Tielli (trombone), Brodie West (alto saxophone). Drumheller, Wives, Glint
(Rat-drifting). 4 Nightjars is a duet of contrapuntal minuets with Jason Benoit (banjo). The Natural Playmate (Rat-drifting).
5 The Guayavera is the national shirt of Puerto Rico, bountiful with embroidered ornaments, running through its characteristic four pockets. The Guayaveras (the band) currently play their tropical adornments with guitalele, toe-synth and thumbreeds, both outdoors and indoors. The Guayaveras (Rat-drifting).
6 Allison Cameron is a composer of mostly chamber music, an experimental performer and an amateur banjo player. While most of this bands music is original, several pieces borrow tablature notation from traditional/anonymous English folk tunes in a non-conformist manner, using re-tuned guitars and banjo, new rhythm, free rhythm and sometimes no rhythm to re-invent and create new pieces out of the old work. The Allison Cameron Band (Rat-drifting).
7 Eloïse Decazes and Eric Chenaux perform French medieval balladry with voice and guitar. Eloïse has been singing these songs for many years and also sings the in the Parisian based duo Arlt.
8 John Oswald is perhaps best known for his work in Plunderphonics but has been improvising with the alto sax for quite some time. This duet with Eric Chenaux has been playing intermittently for over ten years. As an improviser Chenaux has played with Han Bennink, Murray Favro, Michael Moore, Kurt Newman, Pauline Oliveros, John Oswald, Michael Snow, Rachel Wadham and Zack Wallace.
9 Michelle McAdorey is a Toronto based singer-songwriter who once wrote and sang for Crash Vegas. She now writes, lamenting ballads. Whirl (Queen of Cups), Love Don’t Change (Rat-drifting).
10 Aimée Dawn Robinson is an improvising dancer, writer/researcher and musician. Aimée and Eric performed at Tari 07 in Kuala Lumpur.
11 Marla Hlady is an artist who makes kinetic sculptures, sound pieces, video and drawing. Marla and Eric have collaborated on sound pieces and performances that use sound objects. Marla also created the artwork for Chenaux’s Dull Lights and Warm Weather With Ryan Driver.
After spending many of the past months over in the old country, the inimitable Eric Chenaux will soon be back on our side of the Atlantic, and he'll be playing a number of live dates in Ontario and Quebec in June and July. See below for the schedule.
We're particularly excited about Eric's appearance at Suoni Per Il Popolo next week, where, opening for Saltland, he'll play as a duo with Radwan Ghazi Moumneh (of Jerusalem In My Heart):
Eric Chenaux and Radwan Ghazi Moumneh's The Sentimental Moves is a cavity-lounge ensemble of analog synths, sequencers, bowed guitars, glass jars, tinfoil, mouth-speakers (small speakers in a mouth), and spinning-speakers (small speakers spinning by their cable overhead). We could say that this is a mouth-music, a playing installation of mouths, displaced, re-installed and mouthing and lip-syncing. What are they saying?
Right!?
| DD/MM/YY | PLACE | VENUE |
|---|---|---|
| 14.06.13 | Montreal, QC | Sala Rossa / Suoni Per Il Popolo duo w/ Radwan Ghazi Moumneh |
| 20.06.13 | Calgary, AB | National Music Center Sled Island Festival |
| 23.06.13 | Montreal, QC | Resonance Café performing w/ Drumheller |
| 24.06.13 | Guelph, ON | Silence performing w/ Drumheller |
| 25.06.13 | Toronto, ON | Tranzac performing w/ Drumheller |
| 27.06.13 | Toronto, ON | Holy Oak performing w/ The Draperies |
| 05.07.13 | Toronto, ON | Musideum performing solo |
| 06.07.13 | Toronto, ON | Gerrard Art Space performing solo |
| 22.07.13 | Montreal, QC | Casa del Popolo performing solo |
| 23.08.13 | Fanø, DK | Sønderho / Free Folk Festival performing solo |
Okay, so it's May in Montreal! Admittedly the volume's been turned down a bit since last year, but the basics are all there: the water fountains are turning on, the Solidarity Across Borders Status For All march is this weekend and the Anarchist Bookfair the weekend after, you can still get arrested every damn time you leave the damn house, because protest is basically illegal now...
And of course, it also means that SUONI PER IL POPOLO, the best music festival in the world, is right around the corner!
As usual, the festival will bring dozens of truly amazing acts to the city all through June, and as usual a whole bunch of local CST friends and allies will hit the stages at Casa del Popolo and Sala Rossa. See below for a brief roundup, along with audio and video samples. Have a look, and then head over to the Suoni site to check out the full program.
----------
NICK KUEPFER + LEE RANALDO w/ STEVE SHELLEY
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
June 6 • Sala Rossa • $17/20 • Info/tickets
This year Suoni will host two appearances of Nick Kuepfer, Montreal weirdo genius and master sculptor of rickety, immersive soundscapes built up from guitars and tape machines and piles of scavenged ephemera.
On June 6 he'll open for Lee Ranaldo and Steve Shelley. You know those guys, right? They were in some bands? Anyways, this Ranaldo character is going to play some acoustic stuff of his own, accompanied by Mr. Shelley; should be nice.
MP3 - NICK KUEPFER: "Corpse in the Wildflowers" (from Avestruz)
MP3 - NICK KUEPFER: "Winter 2" (Soundcloud)
----------
OSO BLANCO (COLIN STETSON, NATE WOOLEY, C.S. YEH, & RYAN SAWYER) + HRAÏR HRATCHIAN
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
June 9 • Casa del Popolo • $10/12 • Info/Tickets
His stunning New History Warfare trilogy concluded with the April 30 release of To See More Light, mind-bending saxophone juggernaut Colin Stetson will lend his formidable lungs to Oso Blanco, alongside three similarly virtuosic players on trumpet, drums and violin.
Opening will be Hraïr Hratchian - multidisciplinary artist and performer, past Jerusalem In My Heart collaborator - leading a nine-musician ensemble in a performance of "Bardézoum vartér patsvadz" a 100-year old Armenian folk piece by composer Krikor Dalian.
MP3 - COLIN STETSON: "High Above A Grey Green Sea"
----------
PACHA + NOUVEAU ZODIAQUE + JOSHUA ABRAMS' NATURAL INFORMATION SOCIETY
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
June 11 • Sala Rossa • $10/12 • Info/Tickets
Pierre-Guy Blanchard spent years studying various percussion techniques and compositional modes of Turkish, Balkan and Middle Eastern musics. His project, Pacha, is a thrilling fusion of intense propulsive rhythms and gloriously fried synth lines. Affaires Étrangères, Pacha's debut, was released last year as part of Musique Fragile Vol. 3, and its live iteration is an explosive thing: heady and precise, while guaranteed to get sweaty.
Nouveau Zodiaque is a shifting group of musicians rallied by Les Momies de Palerme's Xarah Dion, pulling on various threads of folk and world musics to form a gorgeous, cohesive and strangely danceable synthesis.
Joshua Abrams - Chicago native, prolific musical experimentalist, co-founder of Town & Country and Sticks & Stones (with Matana Roberts) - has of late been leading ensembles on a unique trajectory of trance-like, slightly psychedelic exploration, pulling from North and West African traditions, minimalism and out jazz. Check out last year's totally killer Represencing to get an idea.
MP3 - PACHA: "L'Aeroport de Charlo"
MP3 - LES MOMIES DE PALERME: "Solis"
MP3 - JOSHUA ABRAMS & CO.: Live Dublab session
----------
SALTLAND + ERIC CHENAUX & RADWAN GHAZI MOUMNEH + WORMHOLES
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
June 14 • Sala Rossa • $11/13 • Info/tickets
I Thought It Was Us But It Was All Of Us, the debut album from Rebecca Foon's Saltland project - "captivating", "modern and mesmerizing", "alluring and intoxicating" - was released this week. For this official release show Foon will join her compositions for voice and cello to ornate, buoyant arrangements for electronics, percussion and contrebass courtesy of Jamie Thompson and Aaron Lumley, and it will be breathtaking.
Eminent guitar handler and heart-rending balladeer Eric Chenaux will join forces with sound engineer, boxer, all-around CST go-to guy and Jerusalem In My Heart musical mastermind Radwan Moumneh for a performance certain to be as affecting and beautiful as it is indescribably abstract.
Wormholes is an audio-visual project of Beirut-based improvisational musicians Mazen Kerbaj and Sharif Sehnaoui. Solo guitar manipulations meet light tables projections with live drawing. We're told by those in the know that this rare performance is unmissable.
MP3 - SALTLAND: "Treehouse Schemes"
MP3 - JERUSALEM IN MY HEART: "Yudaghdegh..."
MP3 - ERIC CHENAUX: "Amazing Backgrounds"
----------
ELFIN SADDLE IN MUSIC TEMPLE + HANGEDUP + NICK KUEPFER
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
June 18 • Sala Rossa • $12/14 • Info/tickets
Emi Honda and Jordan McKenzie have for years been crafting small DIY dystopias and rich, sparkling soundworlds with quiet reverence and humble anger. As Elfin Saddle they've produced three albums of urgent, ramshackle folk (the most recent, Devastates, released last year), a stop-motion film staged over several months in their backyard, and most recently "Music Temple": a multimedia installation at Montreal's MAI gallery involving automated musical instruments, film projections and live performance. An abridged version of the "Music Temple" installation will be brought to this one-of-a-kind performance.
The mighty viola and percussion duo of Hangedup is rolling once again. Since ending a long hiatus in 2010, they've played a handfull of shows in Montreal, kicked our asses around Europe as part of our 15th anniversary celebrations, and released Transit of Venus, an epic, towering collaborative LP with minimalist legend Tony Conrad. Gen Heistek and Eric Craven deliver a clattering, cavernous racket with a soft, graceful touch.
Nick Kuepfer, once again, is our hero (see above).
MP3 - HANGEDUP & TONY CONRAD: "Principles"
MP3 - HANGEDUP: "Alarm"
MP3 - ELFIN SADDLE: "The Changing Wind"
----------
Of course there are a ton of other highlights: our fearless leader Don taking part in a panel discussion called "Beneath the Surfaces (Discussion on audio formats)", shows with Maica Mia, Avec Le Soleil Sortant de sa Bouche + Oneida & Rhys Chatham, Jen Reimer & Max Stein + Gambletron, Grouper, Jefre Cantu-Ledesma + Le Révélateur, Kevin Drumm, Ratchet Orchestra, and on and on... Really, there's just so much good stuff. Liberate your ears.
The full calendar, with links to buy tickets online, is right here; tickets are also available in the usual shops.
Constellation celebrates its 15th Anniversary with a series of five mini-festivals in Europe this November: the locations are Bern, Paris, Munich, Vienna and Leipzig, in partnership with some of our favourite venues and partners that have supported the label and its artists over the years,
Go here for an at-a-glance round-up of the line-ups, locations and ticket links.
Read here for a longer post about the events.
See below for a rendering of the commemorative screenprinted poster that will be available at the events (being printed by the Dis-patch Collective from Belgrade, Serbia – whose Constellation artwork exhibit will also be on display in Bern and Vienna) and a little video clip we produced for the celebrations.
The Paris 15th Anniversary CST shows are now sold out.
Information about all CST 15th events can be found HERE.
Nous invitons nos camarades français à prendre note des autres concerts en France en novembre, ainsi que de nos événements à Berne et à Bruxelles...
* * *
While we realise it's a bit of an extra journey for the good people of France, we remind everyone that about 50 passes still remain for the CST fest in Bern, Switzerland.
CST Heartland Festival passes for Bern are available here.
The Bern event is a Constellation takeover of the Heartland Festival and represents an expanded 4-day affair, with a CST art exhibit curated by Dis-patch Collective (Belgrade) and performances by several artists who cannot make the Paris weekend: Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Colin Stetson, Hrsta, Nick Kuepfer and Khora.
Details for each night of the Bern event (and single night tickets) can be found HERE.
If you are looking for information about Bern accommodations, we encourage you to contact Dachstock@Reitschule HERE.
* * *
We would also like to note the following Constellation-related concert dates happening in France and Belgium as the label celebrates throughout November with many artists on tour:
DO MAKE SAY THINK
16.11.12 Metz FR Musiques Volantes Festival TIX
SANDRO PERRI + ERIC CHENAUX
15.11.12 Nantes FR Stakhanov
16.11.12 Limoges FR Centre Culturel John Lennon
THEE SILVER MT ZION + MATANA ROBERTS
19.11.12 Tourcoing FR Le Grand Mix TIX
20.11.12 Strassbourg FR La Laterie TIX
COLIN STETSON
14.11.12 Brussels BE Ancienne Belgique VZW TIX
20.11.12 Poitiers FR Confort Moderne TIX
21.11.12 Rennes FR UBU1 TIX
22.11.12 Nantes FR Pôle Etudiant
23.11.12 Gent BE Theaterzaal Vooruit TIX
24.11.12 Rouen FR Le 106 TIX
25.11.12 Tourcoing FR L'Hospice d'Havré - Maison Folie de Tourcoing TIX
DO MAKE SAY THINK + SANDRO PERRI + ERIC CHENAUX
CONSTELLATION LABEL NIGHT @ AUTUMN FALLS FESTIVAL
26.11.12 Brussels BE Atelier 210 TIX
BERN • PARIS • MUNICH • VIENNA • LEIPZIG
As previously announced, this November we're staging some mini-festival events in France, Switzerland, Austria and Germany to celebrate our 15th year as a record label. These have come together really nicely, more artists have been added in recent weeks, and a whole new city (Munich) as well!
Check this page for confirmed lineups and ticket links, and keep reading below for further details and testimonials.
We truly feel the present is a great moment to take stock of what we've done over the past decade and a half. Bands with whom we have some of our longest-standing relationships continue to make music among the most vital and inspiring to grace our ears, while in the past few years we've begun new relationships with artists producing equally jaw-dropping work, whose vision and integrity remind us why we started doing this in the first place.
We've felt an outpouring of warm support from our many friends and allies in Europe and around the world in organizing these events, while back home we've had the privilege of participating in the inspiring and unprecedented (in Canada) popular movement protesting tuition increases and the fraud of neo-liberal "austerity" economics that took over the streets of Montreal this spring. These days we truly feel more connected than ever to the local and global communities we consider ourselves part of, accountable to, and inspired by.
We're deeply grateful to everyone who's found occasional or sustained meaning and common cause with Constellation thus far, and genuinely look forward to spending time and celebrating with everyone that can make it out to these events in Europe.
And it goes without saying, we are utterly humbled and honoured by the support we've received from all of our presenting partners in these five European cities, most of whom we've had a long-standing relationship with in various respects. We set out to collaborate with the people who historically have meant a lot to us and our artists, and could not have hoped for more. Thanks from the bottom of our hearts.
• • • • •
While the mighty Siskiyou has sadly had to pull out of any further appearances this year (read a message from the band here), our European mini-fest anniversary shows continue to be anchored by Do Make Say Think and Silver Mt Zion, along with Sandro Perri (backed by a full band), Eric Chenaux, Elfin Saddle and Hangedup. These six artists will be present at all four of our previously announced events in Bern, Paris, Vienna and Leipzig.
We have also now confirmed the participation of Carla Bozulich and Matana Roberts at all four of these events as well - whether as part of the "main stage" line-ups or in interesting site-specific or off-site performances. We're still ironing out a few of those ideas and logistics, but rest assured no performances will be running concurrently.
Additionally, we'll have Hrsta at most engagements, and have managed to yank Colin Stetson out of his crisscrossing solo tour schedule to appear on the final night of the Bern fest.
The Bern weekend will be truly epic, with a minimum of eleven CST bands appearing over four days, and the Dis-patch Art Collective from Belgrade, Serbia installing their wonderful exhibit "Ce côté en haut: The Fragile World of Constellation" - an exhaustive retrospective of the label's album and poster artwork. Looks like there will also be a label-related photo exhibit in Bern, as well as a couple of day shows, art talks and other off-site things going on too.
Also: Munich! The excellent Feierwerk venue in Munich has come on board to host two nights featuring 3-band bills each evening, with DMST, Perri and Chenaux playing on Nov 19 and SMZ, Hrsta and Matana Roberts playing on Nov 21.
Again, click HERE for a re-cap of the main stage line-ups in each city along with ticket links, and/or watch the video clip at the end of this post for a listing of those main stage line-ups at each event.
Other cool things we can tell you about:
It's already pretty darn exciting that Do Make Say Think will be performing their classic album Goodbye Enemy Airship The Landlord Is Dead in its entirety for their live set, but our presenting partner the Viennale will additionally be programming a series of experimental films to be projected during the band's set in Vienna. Since the Viennale is one of Europe's most respected and iconoclastic film festivals, this is sure to be a very special visual accompaniment to a very special musical performance.
Mike Moya was a founding member of Godspeed You! Black Emperor back in the early 1990s but pulled back from the band by the end of that decade to concentrate on Montreal-based projects as well as his excellent psych-folk group Hrsta throughout the 2000s. Moya then re-joined GY!BE when the group came off hiatus in 2010 and has been back in the third guitar chair with them ever since. Hrsta will perform at all the CST European events except Paris, and will be joined by new Godspeed drummer Tim Herzog, GY!BE/SMZ violinist Sophie Trudeau and Musique Fragile artist Nick Kuepfer for these sets.
Carla Bozulich will be premiering new material in a non-Evangelista guise; admittedly the distinction between these two identities has always been somewhat fluid, but we are super excited about the new music Carla has been working on and this will be a first opportunity to hear some of this stuff live.
Jerusalem In My Heart will perform in Leipzig. Date and location specifics have yet to be finally determined, but rest assured this will be very special and very cool. JIMH is the mutli-media project founded by Radwan Ghazi Moumneh, a musician and sound engineer who is a close collaborator of Constellation on many fronts. He has engineered and/or mixed numerous albums in the CST catalogue, has made films and videos for several CST artists, has performed as part of Land Of Kush, and will be helping to stage-manage the Europe events. JIMH now includes experimental filmmaker Malena Szlam, who will join Radwan for the performance in Leipzig, involving multiple 16mm film projections and his totally unique and intense blend of synthetic and organic Arabic-influenced sound.
The Dis-patch album art exhibit will transition from Bern to Vienna and be installed in an anteroom of the Porgy & Bess venue in Vienna from opening night of the first CST show on Nov 21 through to the end of the 4-day Blue Bird festival on Nov 24.
Dis-patch will also be bringing limited edition screenprinted posters and hand-stitched cotton LP bags which are going to be quite lovely. We'll have 100 posters (4-colour on archival A2 size paper) and 50 bags available at each event in Bern, Paris, Vienna and Leipzig (apologies, but these will not be available in Munich). We promise these are going to be really nice items, reasonably priced and, y'know, all commemorative and stuff.
Anyway, we think these are going to be good times for all.
Now watch a video:
We're very pleased to announce a series of 15th Anniversary concerts that will take place in Europe this fall.
We'll be partnering with some of our favourite venues and arts organisations to present multiple-night mini-festival events featuring a diverse cross-section of artists, including newer groups like Sisksiyou and Elfin Saddle, long-standing roster acts like Sandro Perri, Eric Chenaux and Hangedup, and two of the label's best-known bands: Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra and Do Make Say Think.
Thee Silver Mt Zion will be returning to Europe for the first time since touring behind their acclaimed Kollaps Tradixionales album in early 2010, and premiering new material including pieces released as a tour-only 2x7" in the USA earlier this year. Do Make Say Think, one of the most consistently acclaimed and long-standing instrumental rock groups of the past decade-and-a-half, will be performing their classic sophomore album, Goodbye Enemy Airship The Landlord Is Dead, in its entirety.
At each of the two-night events, Do Make Say Think will close one show and Thee Silver Mt Zion will close the other. Exact line-ups for each night in each town will be confirmed and announced later this summer, but every concert will feature at least 4 bands and sets by at least 8 different artists across the two nights.
The event at Bern's Reitschule is unique in that it runs for a full three days, starting on Friday 16 November with the final European date of Godspeed You! Black Emperor's fall 2012 tour (a golden opportunity to see the group in a smaller, grittier venue with some truly awesome natural room compression).
-----
Here's the plan:
NOV 16-18 • Bern, CH • Dachstock Reitschule
Presented by Heartland Festival and Dachstock
3-night passes available now HERE and HERE
The Constellation event in Bern is a full label takeover and collaboration with Heartland Festival, in conjunction with the Dachstock collective who administer an awesome 700 capacity live room at the Reitschule complex - where many a fine Constellation memory has been forged over the years (and often then half-obliterated in the ensuing post-show massacre of brain cells at the bar).
NOV 17-18 • Paris, FR • La Maroquinerie
Presented by Volume
Running concurrently with the Bern weekend, these two nights at La Maroquinnerie will be anchored by Do Make Say Think and Thee Silver Mt ZIon respectively, with three other bands each night. La Maroq has been a favourite venue of Constellation artists over the years, and the site of beautifully raucous yet wonderfully attentive packed houses for several of the label's artists. Despite the club's literally subterranean and cave-like setting, the full range of Constellation sounds have always gone down perfectly there, from the quietest and most fragile moments to galloping punk-rock explosions. La Maroq brings out the passion and devotion of music-hungry Parisians who don't mind getting a little down and dirty to achieve sustained experiences of musical immersion, levitation and physicality. This will be good times!
NOV 21-22 • Vienna, AT • Porgy & Bess
Presented by Viennale and Blue Bird Festival
Constellation has had a very special and heartfelt relationship with the Viennale (Vienna International Film Festival) in recent years, beginning with their production of filmmaker Jem Cohen's "Empires Of Tin" project. We are very proud to be celebrating its 15th Anniversary in conjunction with Viennale's 50th Anniversary this year, and excited to be partnering with the Blue Bird Songwriter Festival as well, which will be expanding to a four-day event with the first two days devoted to Constellation.
NOV 23-24 • Leipzig, DE • UT Connewitz
Presented by UT Connewitz and Southern DE
Another venue and local promoter collective that is close to Constellation's heart, UT Connewitz is a glorious old theatre space that has hosted countless of the label's artists over the years. Like Paris, this will be 4-band bills anchored by Do Make Say Think and Thee Silver Mt Zion each night, in one of our favourite settings, booked by some of the very best people. Simple as that.
-----
Stay tuned for more information and finalized lineups in the coming months. There will be also be special collaborations and other little surprises at various events, for which we will supply more information down the road (or, regarding the surprises, maybe not, so that they in fact remain surprises). In the meantime, here's an assortment of MP3s to tide you over:
MP3s:
Do Make Say Think • The Landlord is Dead
A Silver Mt Zion • Thee Dirty Olde Flag
Hangedup • Klang Klang
Siskiyou • This Land
Elfin Saddle • The Wind Come Carry
Sandro Perri • Love & Light
Eric Chenaux • Dull Lights (White or Grey)
Ahead of a string of live dates in the UK, Switzerland, Austria and Italy, we're happy to let out two new videos from Eric Chenaux, both for "Put In Music," from Guitar & Voice - his elegant and heart-wrenching fourth album. The first of the pair joins "Dull Lights" and "Amazing Backgrounds" in the series of Chenaux songs put to video by the magnificent Eric Cazdyn. The second was recorded live at beloved Montreal venue Casa del Popolo, during the Suoni Per Il Popolo Festival last June, and offers the uninitiated a glimpse of Chenaux's truly mind-blowing guitar virtuosity.
See below for both videos, and tour dates.
More info on Guitar & Voice is available here.
| DD/MM/YY | PLACE | VENUE |
|---|---|---|
| 03.05.12 | Paris, FR | Point FMR |
| 13.05.12 | Bristol, UK | The Cube w/ Esmerine |
| 14.05.12 | Norwich, UK | Arts Centre w/ Esmerine |
| 15.05.12 | London, UK | The Lexington w/ Esmerine |
| 16.05.12 | London, UK | The Gallery Cafe The Local presents: Gallery Chapel series |
| 24.05.12 | St Gallen, CH | Palace w/ Sandro Perri |
| 26.05.12 | Innsbruck, AT | PMK w/ Sandro Perri |
| 28.05.12 | Vienna, AT | Rhiz w/ Sandro Perri |
| 30.05.12 | Ravenna, IT | Hana Bi |
With Guitar & Voice - "unquestionably one of the best albums of 2012" according to Said the Gramophone - now available in stores, we're pleased to announce a handful of live appearances for Eric Chenaux. He'll play twice as part of Beirut's Irtijal festival in April, and support Esmerine for three of their upcoming show in the UK in May. See below for dates, or check our tours page.
| DD/MM/YY | PLACE | VENUE |
|---|---|---|
| 05.04.2012 | Beirut, LB | Metro Al-Madina Irtijal Festival |
| 07.04.2012 | Beirut, LB | Yukunkun Irtijal Festival, w/ Radawn Ghazi Moumneh |
| 13.05.2012 | Bristol, UK | The Cube w/ Esmerine |
| 14.05.2012 | Norwich, UK | Arts Centre w/ Esmerine |
| 15.05.2012 | London, UK | The Lexington w/ Esmerine |
| 16.05.2012 | London, UK | The Gallery Cafe The Local presents: Gallery Chapel series |
With about two weeks remaining until the release of Eric Chenaux's stunning new LP, Guitar and Voice, our friends at The Quietus have launched a new video for Eric Chenaux's "Dull Lights (White or Grey)", while Said the Gramophone has the song as an MP3. The video, directed by Eric Cazdyn (also responsible for the video for "Amazing Backgrounds"), perfectly compliments the soft, subtle confidence of "Dull Lights", "a song of heartache, bruise, trampled love," according to Sean at Said the Gramophone. He went on to describe Guitar and Voice as "just that, just those perfect things...coaxed & shattered & sublimated & splintered & mirrored & burned to ash."
MP3: "Dull Lights (White or Grey)"
VIDEO: "Dull Lights (White or Grey)"
Guitar and Voice - about which The Wire said, "Songs hover above the ebb and flow of Chenaux’s unhurried guitar – there’s a stillness at the album’s heart, like watching harbour lights at midnight...Chenaux has produced his best work yet" - is available March 6. Get more info on the album here, or go straight to the pre-order page.
Out 06 March 2012:
ERIC CHENAUX
Guitar & Voice
CST088 CD / 180gLP/ DL
PRE-ORDER HERE.
With this fourth album for the Constellation, simply and aptly titled Guitar & Voice, Eric Chenaux - one of Canada's most respected and long-standing experimental guitar players and songwriters - has made what in a literal sense can be called his first solo album. The recording features only his playing and singing; no guest or supporting musicians, minimal overdubs, and a rigorous structure that alternates back and forth between longform, mostly vocal-based tunes and shorter, cacophonously harmonious bowed-guitar instrumentals.
Chenaux sees the entirety of Guitar & Voice as balladry. The album's four tunes with singing are clearly ballads, but filtered through Chenaux's uniquely distorted, refracted, genre-defying lens. With the exception of "Sliabh Aughty" – a beautifully fried 8-minute Hendrixian workout (were Jimi channeling Braveheart rather than "home of the brave") – all the album's instrumentals are miniatures of a sort. Each is a bowed guitar piece, recorded acoustically, re-amplified through Leslie speakers and re-recorded as installation pieces in the studio. Each shifts and slides along a stream of harmonic consonances and dissonances wherein melodic motifs are continually subject to slippage, and each is intended to frame and expand the sentiments (and sentimentalism) of balladry that inform the album as a whole.
For the full run-down check our release page. See below for a gorgeous new video for album track "Amazing Backgrounds", shot by Eric Cazdyn.
We've remodeled our website a bit (perhaps you've noticed). Among the changes is a new video interface on our Audio/Video page, onto which we've loaded a few (mostly) new videos of Eric Chenaux, Esmerine, Siskiyou, Khora and Colin Stetson.
We highly recommend you check them all out here, starting with Eric Cazdyn's gorgeous treatment of "Warm Charleston" by Eric Chenaux, also below:
Yes, it's June, and yes, Suoni Per Il Popolo has started again, and we're excited/overwhelmed as usual. Among the long list of truly amazing shows at this year's festival, consider checking out some of the following:
KHÔRA + NICK KUEPFER + SILENT LAND TIME MACHINE
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
June 10 • Casa del Popolo • $9 • FACEBOOK
2/3 of the first installment of Musique Fragile kick off a month-long tour with Silent Land Time Machine, from Austin. Download MP3's below and check out video of a Khôra performance in Toronto.
KHÔRA - "Body Aperture"
NICK KUEPFER - "Corpse in the Wildflowers"
Khôra (Live 11/19/10) from The Momo Art Law on Vimeo.
COLIN STETSON + HANGEDUP
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
June 17 • Sala Rossa • $12 • FACEBOOK
People keep saying Colin and his saxophone are "a force of nature"; Said the Gramophone said his new LP is "like being struck by a comet." It's all true.
Hangedup returned this past winter from a long hibernation, having lost none of the power that gave us all such beautiful, beautiful headaches in the early 2000's. Drums and viola and all kinds of heavy. MP3's and video below.
COLIN STETSON - "The stars in his head (Dark Lights Remix)"
HANGEDUP - "Klang Klang"
Colin Stetson: The stars in his head (Dark Lights Remix) from Constellation Records on Vimeo.
ERIC CHENAUX + DEAD RAT ORCHESTRA + Ô PAON
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
June 20 • Casa del Popolo • $11
Eric Chenaux, our beloved Torontonian guitar sage - whose Warm Weather with Ryan Driver was described as a "quiet victory of subtlety and refined musicianship" by Line of Best Fit - returns to Montreal with a pile of friends and some truly breathtaking tunes. Check out a gorgeous new video for Eric's "Warm Charleston" below.
ERIC CHENAUX - "Warm Charleston"
ERIC CHENAUX - "Old Peculiar"
Warm Charleston - Eric Chenaux from Constellation Records on Vimeo.
The full calendar, with links to buy tickets online, is right here. Tickets can also be purchased in Montreal at L'Oblique, Phonopolis and Cheap Thrills.
Following his week of album launch dates in the UK in September, Eric Chenaux returns to Europe for a run of 14 shows in Italy, Switzerland and Benelux, ending with a Paris date on Nov. 19. Eric will be joined by his primary collaborator (and lynchpin of the latest Chenaux album) Ryan Driver for the first three shows of the tour. In both duo and solo settings, Chenaux's voice and uniquely fried and signal-bent nylon string guitar combine for a highly original, astute and intimate display of modern balladry.
Stream the latest from Eric Chenaux, Warm Weather With Ryan Driver.
Check all tour dates after the jump...
ERIC CHENAUX - EUROPE 2010
| DD/MM/YY | PLACE | VENUE | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10.11.2010 | Vevey * | CH | Heartland Festival |
| 12.11.2010 | Milano * | IT | Leoncavallo |
| 13.11.2010 | Pegognaga * | IT | Arci Cashbah |
| 14.11.2010 | Padova | IT | Mela di Newton |
| 18.11.2010 | Caserta | IT | Jarmusch |
| 19.11.2010 | Senigallia | IT | Gratis Club |
| 22.11.2010 | Geneva | CH | L'Usine |
| 24.11.2010 | Gent | BE | Vooruit |
| 25.11.2010 | Utrecht | NL | Le Guess Who |
| 26.11.2010 | Tilburg | NL | Cul du Sac |
| 27.11.2010 | Brussels | BE | Beursschouwburg |
| 28.11.2010 | Brussels | BE | Sounds And Emotions |
| 29.11.2010 | Paris | FR | Java |
*w/Ryan Driver
OFFICIAL TOUR POSTER
This Wednesday, 22 September, Eric Chenaux will stop by the Rough Trade East shop in London, England to play an in-store show before his engagement at Cafe Oto later that evening.
Eric's stint on the island will begin tonight in Bristol, and continue through to the 23rd in Coventry (accompanied for several shows by Dead Rat Orchestra).
Confirmed dates below.
| 17 Sep | Bristol | GB | The Croft |
| 20 Sep | Oxford * | GB | The Wheatsheaf |
| 21 Sep | Colchester * | GB | Arts Centre |
| 22 Sep | London | GB | Rough Trade (in-store) |
| 22 Sep | London * | GB | Cafe Oto |
| 25 Sep | Coventry * | GB | Tin Angel |
* with Dead Rat Orchestra
The debut album by Siskiyou and the latest from Eric Chenaux are hitting the streets this week (13 September in Europe, 7 September everywhere else). They are both extremely sublime and lovely records.
We have now uploaded all tracks for both albums in streaming audio players on the release pages for each title. We also still have some posters left for each release as part of a mail-order exclusive: order the CD + Poster for $14.00 (or $12.00 for the CD alone). The deluxe LP editions naturally include the poster as a matter of course...
Check the store for more.
A nice little interview with Eric Chenaux in this month's issue of Exclaim – Eric speaks with Vish Khanna about his shift to nylon string guitar as his primary touring instrument (the main axe on his upcoming Warm Weather With Ryan Driver record as well) and his impurist approach to wrangling sweet and fried tones out of it.
Chenaux launches the new record September 11th with a hometown Toronto show at The Music Gallery, joined by Mr. Ryan Driver himself (who is launching a new album as well).
Eric Chenaux will play half a fortnight's worth of dates in the United Kingdom in mid-September to celebrate the release of his third Constellation album on those shores (UK release date of Warm Weather With Ryan Driver is September 13th). We'd also like to say Eric will be throwing his guitar in the boot of a lorry to traverse the heaths via motorway, except that he'll likely be traveling by rail, as he is wont to do in Europe. And probably the back of a lorry is not called a boot. But the excellent British group Dead Rat Orchestra have helped organise many of these shows and will be joining Eric in several towns – they might very well have a lorry.
Confirmed dates below.
| 17 Sep | Bristol | GB | The Croft |
| 20 Sep | Oxford * | GB | The Wheatsheaf |
| 21 Sep | Colchester * | GB | Arts Centre |
| 22 Sep | London * | GB | Cafe Oto |
| 25 Sep | Coventry * | GB | Tin Angel |
* with Dead Rat Orchestra
| DD/MM/YY | PLACE | VENUE |
|---|---|---|
| 14.06.13 | Montreal, QC | Sala Rossa / Suoni Per Il Popolo duo w/ Radwan Ghazi Moumneh |
| 20.06.13 | Calgary, AB | National Music Center Sled Island Festival |
| 23.06.13 | Montreal, QC | Resonance Café performing w/ Drumheller |
| 24.06.13 | Guelph, ON | Silence performing w/ Drumheller |
| 25.06.13 | Toronto, ON | Tranzac performing w/ Drumheller |
| 27.06.13 | Toronto, ON | Holy Oak performing w/ The Draperies |
| 05.07.13 | Toronto, ON | Musideum performing w/ John Oswald |
| 06.07.13 | Toronto, ON | Gerrard Art Space |
| 22.07.13 | Montreal, QC | Casa del Popolo |
| 23.08.13 | Fanø, DK | Sønderho / Free Folk Festival |
Live in Beirut - by Tanya Traboulsi
Live in Beirut - by Tanya Traboulsi
BACKSEAT - Myriam Van Imschoot
ERIC CUBED - Self-Portrait
MUSIC FOR DANCE - Eric Craven
LIVE - David Waldman
PORTRAIT 2012 - Pam
Guitar & Voice
Eric Chenaux CD / 180gLP / DL
Eric Chenaux "Put In Music" (Live)
Eric Chenaux "Amazing Backgrounds"
Eric Chenaux "Dull Lights"
Eric Chenaux "Put In Music"
Eric Chenaux "Warm Charleston"
Eric Chenaux "Lavallière"
ALBUM TRACKS
- Amazing Backgrounds
Guitar & Voice - Dull Lights (White or Grey)
Guitar & Voice - Warm Charleston
Warm Weather With Ryan Driver - Old Peculiar
Sloppy Ground
 | Guitar & VoiceEric Chenaux CD / 180gLP / DL |
CST088
 | Warm Weather With Ryan DriverEric ChenauxCD / 180gLP / DL |
CST068
 | Sloppy GroundEric Chenaux CD / 180gLP / DL |
CST052
 | Dull LightsEric Chenaux CD / 180gLP / DL |
CST043
