REVIEW: VITAL WEEKLY
Vital Weekly has reviewed Necessity's Flame:
Archive
05/03/2008
16/02/2008
VIDEO: IMMERSION SET
Evan Raskob (Pixelpusher) filmed the Immersion show a week ago.
DivX videos of each set are now up for download, along with a sum-up of the night:
pixelpusher.flkr.com/2008/02/13/immersion-7-feb-2008-wrap-up/
07/02/2008
LIVE: IMMERSION 07/02/2008
Next show is at the Immersion experimental night in East London.
Electronic atmospheres, improvised terrain, sonic experiments and tones/drones.... accompanied by live visuals. Other artists performing are: Con Brio, Gabriel Da Piaz, grohs, SS_R, Suero.
Venue: The Flea Pit, 49 Columbia Rd, London E2 7RG
Time: Performances run from 7 - 11pm.
Cost: Free
02/11/2007
ALBUM RELEASE: NECESSITY'S FLAME
Four years in the making, the album Necessity's Flame is finally released!
Full details on the album, and how to buy it, are here.
28/10/2007
WEB RADIO: LAST.FM
AMS tracks are now available for streaming on LAST.FM:
26/10/2007
VIDEO: RAINER STOLLE AND ALEX MEIN SMITH - DVD EXTRACT
German artist Rainer Stolle has made a full-length video for an AMS live recording. A section from it is here.
22/05/2007
LIVE: MULTIVITAMINS 22/05/2007
Next show is the regular Multivitamins night.
Venue: Pool Bar, 104 - 108 Curtain Road, London EC2A 3AH
Time: 7:30-ish
01/02/2007
LIVE: IMMERSION 01/02/2007
Next show is at the new Immersion experimental night in East London. Immersion focusses on electronic atmospheres, improvised terrain, sonic experiments and tones/drones....seven artists are performing throughout the evening, accompanied by live visuals.
The AMS set will be accompanied by a 30 minute visual projection, created especially by German video artist Rainer Stolle.
Venue: The Flea Pit, 49 Columbia Rd, London E2 7RG
Time: Performances run from 7 - 11pm. AMS set is at 10:30pm
Cost: Free
04/01/2007
LIVE: NO.ZEALAND 04/01/2007 w/ BIRCHVILLE CAT MOTEL, PETER WRIGHT
AMS is performing next with two of the biggest names in the New Zealand experimental underground, Birchville Cat Motel and Peter Wright. Both are well-established, internationally recognised, prolific, and amazing talents! The show is organised by London promoters No.Signal, and is happening at State51.
Venue: State51 Warehouse, 8-10 Rhoda St, London E2 7EF
Time: 8:00
Cost: £6 (or £5 by booking through the link below)
22/09/2006
LIVE: COLLISION 22/09/2006
Next show is at the Collision Festival - a huge three-night arts event.
The Collision event combines performers from a variety of mediums: experimental music, dance, performance art, installation, all in a massive warehouse building in Peckham.
Music rooms are curated by Mavryx and the Gluerooms. AMS is performing in the Mavryx room on the Friday night.....
For full details and line-up, see the Collision website.
Venue: Area 10 Project Space (just behind Peckham Library), Peckham
High St, London SE15
Time: 9:00-ish
Cost: £3
12/09/2006
LIVE: MULTIVITAMINS 12/09/2006
Next show is at the regular Multivitamins night.
Venue: Pool Bar, 104 - 108 Curtain Road, London EC2A 3AH
Time: Somewhere between 7:30 - 9:00pm
27/07/2006
LIVE: MAVRYX @ THE SPITZ 27/07/2006
The next AMS show is part of the upcoming Mavryx night - a cross-genre evening, mixing electronics with live instrumentation. In support of Ad:Art, Kondor and Shadow Orchestra.
Venue: The Spitz, 109 Commercial St, Old Spitalfields Market, London E1 6BG
Time: 8:30-ish?
Cost: £5
11/07/2006
LIVE: MULTIVITAMINS 11/07/2006
Next show is at the regular Multivitamins night.
Venue: Pool Bar, 104 - 108 Curtain Road, London EC2A 3AH
Time: Somewhere between 7:30 - 9:00pm
28/05/2006
LIVE: TATE MODERN 28/05/2006
The next Alex Mein Smith show is at the Tate Modern, part of the USB Openings: The Long Weekend event happening there. It's an afternoon show during "Abstract Sunday".
Venue: East Room, Level 7, Tate Modern, London SE1 9TG
Time: 4-5pm
Cost: Free
www.tate.org.uk/modern/eventseducation/musicperform/ubsopeningsthelongweekendnew.htm
02/04/2006
LIVE: OPENLAB2 02/04/2006
AMS is playing as part of OpenLab2 this Sunday at Vibe Bar, Brick Lane.
OpenLab is an all-day audiovisual extravaganza.....running from 4pm until 11pm.
Venue: Red Room, Vibe Bar, 91 Brick Lane, London E16QL
Time: 7pm-ish
25/03/2006
LIVE: VOLTAGE CONTROLLED CUISINE 25/03/2006
AMS has just been added to the lineup for Voltage Controlled Cuisine, a trashed noise/electronic event this Saturday.... Organised by UrbSounds.
Venue: The Square, Occupied Social Centre, 21 Russell Square, London WC1
Time: Anywhere between 9:30pm and 2:00am
21/03/2006
LIVE: MULTIVITAMINS 21/03/2006
Next show is at the regular Multivitamins night.
Venue: Pool Bar, 104 - 108 Curtain Road, London EC2A 3AH
Time: Somewhere between 7:30 - 9:00pm
16/02/2006
LIVE: DE SONIS 16/02/2006
Alex Mein Smith is performing at the next instalment of De Sonis, the monthly event curated by No-Signal. In support of Sebastien Roux (12k/Apestaartje).
Venue: The Flea Pit, 49 Columbia Rd, London E2 7RG
Time: 9pm sharp
For details, and to book tickets:
http://www.no-signal.net/desonis/
02/02/2006
PAST LIVE PERFORMANCES:
All shows were performed as “Little Thief”.
2006:
London, UK:
31/01: Pool Bar (Multivitamins)
2005:
London, UK:
01/10: Jacks (Bipolar party)
22/09: The Foundry (Mavryx)
20/09: Cafe 1001 (MelOTronic)
10/09: State51 (Le Placard Headphones Festival)
05/08: The Foundry (Rehabilitation)
20/07: Anton St (Le Placard Headphones Festival)
02/07: Love Bar (Bipolar party)
30/06: Corsica Studios (Multivitamins)
29/05: Hoxton Bar (Sensonic – for Open Surgery)
00/00: The Foundry
26/05: Corsica Studios (Multivitamins)
04/01: Cafe 1001 (MelOTronic)
Multivitamins, Pool Bar ‘Residency’, on the following dates:
20/12, 15/11 (collaboration set with Transition 02), 18/10, 27/09, 23/08, 19/07, 12/07, 14/06, 10/05, 12/04, 29/03, 08/02, 18/01, 11/01
2004:
London, UK:
Multivitamins ‘Residency’, on the following dates:
21/12 (Exit Bar), 02/12 (Exit Bar), 09/11 (Pool Bar), 26/10 (Pool Bar)
Austin, Texas, USA:
18/03: Sake On Sixth (South By South West Festival)
Wellington, NZ:
11/02: Bar Bodega
2003:
Wellington, NZ:
02/11: Bar Bodega (While You Were Sleeping)
00/00: Happy
25/07: Massey University Great Hall (with Antony Milton)
17/05: Indigo (The Drill)
01/05: The Space (with Hummel)
02/02/2006
INTERVIEW
Conducted 27/5/04
By Belinda Sharp @ Radio 1, Dunedin, New Zealand
via email
RADIO 1:
First off, how was SXSW? Did you find it beneficial?
ALEX MEIN SMITH:
It was a weird mix of being fun and a huge learning experience, as well as quite disillusioning.
The thing it opened my eyes to the most was the nuts and bolts of the music industry, the ‘business’ of the music business. I mean, it’s a convention and a trade show, that’s what it’s about. So basically it was a bunch of business people trying to hustle and sell stuff to each other, in between drinking at parties. So. It boils down to being about money. It’s a ‘convention’ for an ‘industry’. I didn’t quite expect this.
SXSW makes a big deal about inviting unknown or up-and-coming bands from all around the world to play….therefore, one thing I did expect was more of an independent community than there was. I thought that if so many indie/DIY/unsigned acts were going, there would be a real focus on grassroots level networking, bands/managers/booking agents/whatever swapping information, panels on how to best do things for yourself, how to get your music out there. (Things I need to learn). I thought there’d be an emphasis on trying to hook people up with people.
Instead, it was much more big business oriented…...in place of a ‘musician’s community’ to be a part of, there was a trade show full of businesses trying to sell pointless, expensive crap. I went to a lot of the panels/talks during the day, and some were kinda useful, but most were beyond the level of someone trying to do things themselves, ie. my level. It was ‘Here’s Mr Lawyer for the big major label, listen to him talk about how he’ll construct your contract when you are signed’, and ‘Here’s Bob Ludwig, ask him about how he’ll master your record’. I will never be on a major label (have you heard my music?), and I can’t afford to get Bob Ludwig to master my records.
Before I bitch on too long though, I should point out that I appreciated this experience, because, as I’ve said, it really opened my eyes to the state of the music industry at present. You read about ‘consolidation’ in the industry worldwide – about how it’s become so much more streamlined and viewed as a business that has to have profits…...ie. music that actually has any merit or is unusual in some way no longer has any place in the scheme of things because it’s unlikely to sell as many copies as a ‘conservative’ pop record. I knew this already, but I didn’t realise quite the astonishing hold money has over everything. It’s literally everything. Music as art has no value anymore to the business as it currently exists. I was amazed.
You hear about the expanding gap between the rich and poor around the world, about how the few rich are getting mega-rich, the poor masses are expanding and getting poorer, and the middle classes are shrinking and disappearing (most of them falling off into the poor). I feel like that’s what’s happening in the music industry.
So, SXSW really taught me where I fit in this scheme of things: in the ‘poor’, in the great mass of musicians who have no option but to do it for themselves. I think that up until SXSW I’ve had some vague hope that perhaps one day I could be on an indie label…..but it seems most indie labels of any repute have either been bought up by majors or have gone out of business…..they are the ‘middle class’ of labels….and don’t really seem to exist as they used to. All that is left in terms of indies these days seems to be the musicians themselves, doing it for themselves. So I am one of those. I mean, I always have been, but now I know I always will be.
On another note, SXSW was tons of fun…...
The streets were packed at night with thousands of people, I hung out with the helpful folks from the NZMIC, Meterman, the Coolies, I got to see the Dillinger Escape Plan (twice!), Liz Phair, many others, and Austin is beautiful.
RD1:
Do you have a distribution deal or record company backing to help you out?
AMS:
No.
RD1:
Do you prefer the live experience or the recording process? What are things you love about each?
AMS:
Overall I prefer the recording process, but both have their particular appeals.
There’s something about just tinkering away at home, recording stuff….gradually piecing tracks together. It’s normally a very slow process. There’s kind of a zen solitude about it, it’s meditative, despite the hell amount of noise involved…..It’s the perfect escape from everything, you forget about the world outside, and even forget your own thoughts…..ideal if you have a fretting mind that needs a break from itself.
I’ve realised that I don’t find this state of mind to be passive or relaxed – it is highly concentrated, active, a focus of energy.
Of course, you can get a bit lost inside yourself if you do this too much. That’s where playing live comes in….it gets you out into the world of other people, which is always healthy. This is perhaps the main thing I like about playing live, and the main reason I do it – for the social life! The other thing I like about the live experience is that it has a certain spontaneity that can be lacking in the ‘studio’....a freshness and rawness. And, it’s really intense, overwhelming. Again, a concentration of all your energy. But in a different way.
Other than that…there’s a lot of hassle involved in playing live that is just a drag, all the laborious prep and practice that has to be done at home, lugging all the blasted gear around, dealing with nerves before going on…...
RD1:
Are you for or against genre labels/scenes? Do you think “scenes” are beneficial for artists or do they just make it easier for journalists to generalise?
AMS:
I guess the best answer to this is a quote from a friend of mine: “Enthusiasm is cool. Militarism is not cool”.
To clarify, here is a definition of ‘scene’ that I am for:
You’ve got a bunch of bands in a town. They roughly use the same instruments, and play music that is vaguely similar in style. Some of them know each other and have mutual friends, some do okay at creating public awareness of their existence, but mostly it’s all a bit vague as to what they are doing and within what context. Then one day a journalist comes along and puts out a magazine profiling all the bands. All of a sudden, you have a scene. All the bands find out about each other, the public finds out about all the bands, everyone finds out about the magazine and the journalist, everyone wins. It all comes into focus. Everyone gets exposure, and knowledge that allows them to further opportunities for themselves…..etc etc.
This is enthusiasm.
Here is a definition of ‘scene’ that I am against:
You’ve got the bands, the journalist and the magazine. Everyone is getting exposure and opportunities. Somewhere along the line, they get a bit too attached to these things and start getting protective…..through insecurity or whatever. They start defining rules of what the scene is about, and use those rules to shut out people of equal merit and talent, who make the mistake of being different. These rules extend not just to the style of music you play, but also to your code of dress and behaviour. The scene began out of a sense of open-ness, but then just kind of…..closes.
This is militarism.
(This is a being a bit black and white about it, but you get the idea.)
I think for the most part scenes are like maths, in that they are imaginary concepts that exist only on paper. So they are invented by journalists, but as far as they aid promotion and opportunities for artists, they are a good thing. The problems come in when people start thinking that a perceived style of a scene is a ‘rule’....instead of new acts trying to define their own style, and create their own ‘scene’, they try to copy the rules of an already existing scene in order to fit in and gain access to the opportunities, social acceptance, etc. People stop being themselves, and start trying to pretend they are something else. This leads to dishonest and crap music.
If you look at all the innovative bands that ‘defined’ a scene, they are fairly unique unto themselves. They came before the scene, not the other way around. The scene was built up around what they were doing, in parallel with their peers at the time. Inevitably, over time the scene persists with a ton of dishonest, average copy-cat acts playing by the ‘rules’.
RD1:
[Depending on your answer] Is there a big goth/electronic scene, and is there a lot of support for it?
AMS:
In Wellington or NZ….? Although, it kind of amounts to the same thing. The NZ goth scene is tiny….probably a few hundred nationwide I guess…..in terms of people who are fairly intense about it. There is next to no support for it. The only people who seem to go to the goth shows in Wellington are the dedicated minority, the ones who are totally into it. Which is normally the organisers and their friends.
My involvement in the Wellington ‘dark end scene’ was always relatively minor. I kind of gravitated toward it out of default because there wasn’t much alternative. In Wellington the big scenes are dub/reggae, rock, and dance – my music didn’t fit in with any of these, so it fell down the cracks in between, and that’s where the goths hide.
Although over the past year I’ve also been involved with noise/improv artists, various art-rock bands, and the While You Were Sleeping electronica thing has come along. I think my music belongs as much with these groups as it does with the goths.
RD1:
Is it a conscious decision to combine violence and beauty in your music? Does it just happen to come out that way?
AMS:
Beauty is harsh…...it just comes out that way.
RD1:
Do you see your music as experimental?
AMS:
Yes, it is experimental, but I also see it as very accessible. I think my stuff differs from most experimental music in that there is a fair amount of pop sensibility in it.
Then again, it always felt a bit too out-there as part of the popular music scene in Wellington…..but then it felt too mainstream in the underground free noise/improv scene as well….
It seems to strike a weird balance, in that it sits well as part of several scenes (eg. ambient, noise, industrial, art-rock), but simultaneously doesn’t belong to any of them.
RD1:
How does your live set-up work? Is it difficult to transform your recordings into a live experience? Have you ever been tempted to have a live band helping you out with your live show? How is being a solo artist compare with a band situation?
AMS:
The live setup is based on improvising around stripped down versions of ‘studio’ tracks.
The hardest part of transferring the music from studio to public performance was figuring out how to do the music live as a solo electronic act and actually keep it interesting to listen to, as well as genuinely making it ‘live’. Once I had some good ideas about that, I then had to figure out how to technically make them a reality…which was also a long process of thought and work. But once that all came together, the rest was just going through the motions of actually doing it.
The hardest part about the live experience for me is actually the social part, the networking and necessary contacts involved to make it happen. A manager would be a good idea perhaps…..
I’d love to attempt live band versions of this music, it would be really interesting, but this is low on my priority list at present. It would be a lot of work, and there’s more important things to attend to…..
The one big problem with being a solo artist is that it’s harder to have the charisma that comes with being in a band. Bands have a kind of social gravitational pull that draws people to them…..I think it’s easier to create a buzz about what you do if you are in a group.
Then again, a solo artist is small and mobile, and can quickly make decisions and act on them in a way that a band can’t.
RD1:
Why the move from Wellington to an overseas base? Why London?
AMS:
I left as much for personal reasons as for musical ones.
But the musical reasons influenced where I went. London seemed like a fair choice, at least to begin with, as it is the main centre of Europe, where electronic/experimental music has the largest profile and presence in the world. I want to see what’s out there, and see if if there is a place for me in it.
I could have stayed in NZ and spent the next few years working to build up a profile (I realise my music is virtually unknown in NZ), playing live as much as possible around the country, self-releasing a new record with proper distribution, and so on…..but somehow I get the feeling that even with years of work and personal expense, I’d still only get to a point where I’d sell maybe a hundred records, and get 50 people at my shows…...
The kind of music I have chosen to do will never be popular…..being fairly experimental guarantees this fate….(SXSW especially drummed this into my head). But the experimental musicians I idolise, from Europe, manage to sell maybe 3000 copies of each of their releases, and occasionally tour. I realise that this should all be about doing it for yourself and not caring who likes the music, but at the same time music is a social/cultural phenomenon, and has no meaning without an audience. In NZ, the potential audience is practically nil, whereas overseas it isn’t much, but it’s something. For my music to mean something to me, it has to mean something to an audience, and this isn’t something I currently feel is possible in NZ. At least, not to a scale I believe is worth the amount of work involved, and the amount of work I’ve already invested in it.
I dunno….I’m just trying out an idea. Perhaps I will one day be happy with what is possible in NZ…..but to do that, I need to check out Europe first.
RD1:
Do you still consider yourself to be part of the Dark Habit crew even though you are now based overseas?
AMS:
No, not really. With Dark Habit I just played CDs at their DJ nights, and went to the odd DJ meeting….and then one day my profile shows up on the Dark Habit page! Huh? Uh, okay, sure….
It was fun but I can’t see myself continuing it if I come back. I’d rather just put the energy into playing live shows…..
RD1:
What are your plans for the future? Are you in the process of preparing new tracks for a new album?
AMS:
Um. The only definate plans are to gradually put together a new album, and play live as much as possible. I’d like to tour eventually. Whether this takes place in NZ or Europe is something I am still figuring out.
I’d finished about a quarter of a new album before leaving NZ. It’s currently on hold, attention is being given to the logistics of making it possible in the UK…..I need to lock down, settle into a stable, comfortable position, and then things will come into focus.
I often think of making music being like having a baby – you have to kind of be a ‘responsible parent’ in order to nurture it, make it possible for it to stay alive. It’s constant work, and you have to sacrifice things.