list.co.uk/music Previews | MUSIC
AMBIENT/TECHNO VATICAN SHADOW Sneaky Pete's Edinburgh, Tue 2 Jul; Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, Glasgow, Wed 3 Jul ROCK/NOISE/EXPERIMENTAL NAZORANAI Stereo, Glasgow, Wed 10 Jul
Go to Discogs, search for Prurient and feel the next few hours of your life contract as you rifle through their creator’s online footprint to find out exactly what Dominick Fernow has done with his time. Made lots of electronic records is the answer, some on his own Hospital Records imprint, some in limited release batches; almost all charting the territory between ambient techno and a surly kind of industrial noise. He started recording in 1998, although a younger variant with a different name has since taken over. Vatican Shadow is a defiantly unique project. It’s wonderful to listen to, of
course, should your tastes include dense beds of instrumental electronica with a sinister, rhythmic purpose and a fascination with squeezing strange noises into a fog of approaching calamity. It sounds like the gears of the military- industrial complex grinding away beneath the surface of the world. Yet there’s a humanity too, and something near warmth for the fleshy fragility of humankind at its angriest. The other part of his singular style is the imagery. Taking his lead from Muslimgauze, the late Bryn Jones’ similarly conflict-obsessed project of the 80s and ‘90s, Fernow (also keyboard player in Cold Cave and owner of a noise record store in LA) places Hillary Clinton and Saddam Hussein as cover ‘stars’ of his records and uses loaded titles like ‘Chopper Crash Marines’ Names Released’ and ‘God’s Representative on Earth’. How this visual iconography is incorporated into his show remains to be seen. (David Pollock)
From the darkest reaches of space comes Nazoranai, featuring Japanese underground legend Keiji Haino, Stephen O’Malley (above) of avant-metal overlords Sunn O))) and Australian experimentalist Oren Ambarchi. On their 2012 debut, Haino’s bleakly beautiful guitar and diabolical vocals sliced through the creeping mass of O’Malley’s bass and Ambarchi’s minimalist drums. What they have in store for Glasgow, however, is anyone’s guess. ‘I try to keep all my collaborative projects spontaneous and organic, and
working in this trio is no different’, explains Ambarchi, who recently performed alongside O’Malley at Tectonics Glasgow. ‘Stephen and I are incredibly fortunate to work with an artist like Haino. He is one of the towering figures to emerge from the Japanese underground, a maverick whose every performance is marked by his unmistakeable personal touch: a singular, sustained, ritualistic intensity which borders on the mystical.’ Ambarchi has followed Haino’s work since seeing him perform in 1992 and
although his first reaction was confusion, he was soon won over. ‘The guy had created his own personal sound world. It was a revelation! I’ve worked with Haino many times and it’s always different: he likes to pull the carpet from under your feet. There are elements of ritual and the psychedelic, in the truest sense of word, in a Nazoranai performance. Both Stephen and I are “fans” of Haino, so we’re happy to complement his flights as much as we can.’ (Stewart Smith)
POP ICON NILE RODGERS Summerhall, Edinburgh, Fri 21 & Sat 22 Jun; Wickerman Festival, East Kirkcarswell, near Dundrennan, Fri 26 Jul
Nile Rodgers isn’t the most famous person in the world, but he knows plenty of them. These two very special summer appearances on Scottish soil will most likely not sell out as swiftly as, for example, one of his former collaborators announcing a theoretical date at the O2 in London, but for those of us paying attention it feels like the summer of Nile. He’s the dreadlocked one playing guitar on Daft Punk’s ‘Get Lucky’ while his association with old mate David Bowie had people discussing him when The Next Day surfaced. A few facts about Rodgers are indisputable: he produced
and, in a few notable cases, wrote some of the finest pop music of the disco and post-disco era (Sister Sledge’s We Are Family album, Sheila and B Devotion’s sublime ‘Spacer’, Diana Ross’ ‘Upside Down’ and ‘I’m Coming Out’, Duran Duran’s ‘The Reflex’ and ‘The Wild Boys’, and almost all of Like a Virgin). Admittedly, he’s had a hand in some turkeys (yes, we mean Mick Jagger’s She’s the Boss), yet he and the late Bernard Edwards’ transcendent partnership with the mighty Chic, one of music’s most eminently rediscoverable bands, has endured. In collaboration with Belgian artist Jean Pierre Muller, the show at Summerhall will be a premiere spoken word, music and art collaboration featuring Rodgers ‘singing, talking and acting his way through an account of the cultural and social life of Harlem from the time of the Harlem Renaissance in the 20s to the present day.’ Those who were at his Edinburgh International Book Festival appearances last year will know what an unmissable raconteur he is. And those who saw him play RockNess with a revived Chic earlier in 2012 would suggest you don’t miss their excellent show at Wickerman either. (David Pollock)
13 Jun–11 Jul 2013 THE LIST 75
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