To use noise for musical composition is not a new thing. Way before electronic music enter our psyche, noise through repetitive banging on metal, wood and skin has been one of the most important aspect of ritualistic music because it is where the soul find possibilities of trance. The punk, metal and those with thick distortion must acknowledge that the soul seeks to be elevated thus the mind needs to be defeated through chaos.
On another level in the time when sound can be produced by a fallen leaf, there is a dialogue with silence, what we call whispers; The soul is lonely and weary of its existence. To reaffirm its existence in a silent landscape, sounds are made but not necessarily music. If we observe the wolf that wails in the middle of the night, it simply wants to express its existence. A reaffirming sound is made, while everybody else is provoked.
When you hear something provocative, it is not necessary noise.
Why Noise? Open-discussion with Shah Tahir and Zai Kuning
29th April Saturday 4pm, The Substation Gallery
oni at winfood - Conference of the Birds Closing Party
29th April Saturday 7pm, kopitiam opposite The Substation
DJ Kim Seng, Leslie Low, Yuen Chee Wai & DJ Mentor X'ho spins
There are so many events happening in a single day that if you go for 1 you wil miss the other 9. So oni like to thank all who choose to come down for Conference of the Birds opening, we hope we didn't dissapoint you! Now for those who have plenty of reasons for not coming (got the wrong date, car accident, rehearsal, film festival, opening, lectures blah blah blah blah), here's a piece of graffiti in the gallery we like to present to you:
Before we go on a picture whoring, open this link for an excerpt of Dark Vertigo performed on the opening night by Tinniduos, Mindfucking Boy and The Escapist Theorist = Dark Vertigo
TinniduosMindfucking boyThe Escapist Theorist
If you like them, the trio will play again soon in May. I let you guys do your own work to find out. Anyway that night the whole armenian street seemed to be on fire with these guys, hammering the ears on the audience, workers, innocent passers-by and attracting both unwanted complains and chaos gratification. The madness went on for almost an hour and on a very unexpected note that one of the performer had to pee, the gig ended. We talk about spontaneity huh. Then DJ Kim Seng provided us whole night of chill-out music and it almost seemed like Substation was alive again.
Many people asked what was the exhibition all about. oni repeat: it is not an exhibition, it is a space where many different individuals come and see what each other are doing. So when you come to the gallery don't ask "Eh where is the art work??" because it is everywhere, and you can pick up a marker and contribute to what is there, like this:
So Conference of the Birds is about graffiti? No. It is only because the guest star in this conference is the punk community that you will get your chance to fuck those holy white walls in the gallery. No gods, no master, no rules, remember?
But it's not only about drawing freely on the walls. It's also about reading and you know, buying, buying, buying. The punk brought a beautiful array of zines for browsing if you want to brush up on your punk vocab and social activism awareness and wear something not as lame as "You are beautiful", come to the gallery, 4 more days.
X'ho tees for sale Punk zines for sale and browsing
Kumjing Hla with graffiti in The Substation Gallery
Punk is often equated with chaos, perpetuated by decadence, wasted youth and other delinquents of society. It is the bane of society and is filled with social scumbags that are better off dead. It is useless, worthless and pointless. But that is what 'they' want you to believe. 'They' could be anyone from regular folks, religious zealots, capitalist scum, the media and MTV.
Reality check. Real hardcore punkrock is community based, stemming from social to artistic activism. It is a reaction to a withering world. It is and could be neither utopia nor doom. Contrary to popular opinion, punk is indeed productive and has served to be a life-saving outlet for many who don’t quite belong anywhere else.
silkscreen board featured in the gallery
Punk represents ideas as much as art imitates life. So is it all about chaos and disorder? You decide.
local DIY punk community working in the gallery for Conference of the Birds
Punk Culture-What Punk ? 23rd April Sunday, The Substation Gallery
2pm
Silkscreen and woodblock printing
4pm
Open discussion with Shaiful (Prohibited Project) & Seelan(lioncity.diy) Moderated by Zai Kuning
Conference of The Birds 2006.04.21 (This Friday) The Substation Gallery 7pm
Dark Vertigo Performance by Tinniduos, Mindfucking Boy, The Escapist Theorist
Featuring: 0- onistudio 1- X’ho 2- Shah Tahir 3- The Escapist Theorist 4- Kim Seng 5- Sporesac 6- The Observatory 7- Mindfuckingboy 8- Ferret 9- P-10 10- Flux –Us 11- LIONCITYDIY.com 12- Prohibited Projects 13- Thrash Steady Syndicate 14- Azadghei Records 15- Assassination High 16- Epidemic Records 17- My Precious
Bangkok has unleashed the vehemently lethal army that runs deep inside our body. On our supposed last day in the city Zai almost (almost) got defeated by these dark soldiers, but thanks to many unnamed spirits, he managed to fight back and win a victory.
And so we are back in Singapore but our corpses remain weak.
Nevertheless due to the beauty we have experienced (even in the event of sickness) this Bangkok trip cannot be left untold.Bangkok remained as the icon of life-li-ness for many of us and this trip was more significant because it was the period where ‘people power’ brought an acute change to ‘Thaksinomism’. Even though we didn’t make it to the demonstrations (hence cannot put up images to share) here are some flyers that went around in the sound performance that so::on orgainsed:
ok some information about so::on. The main person behind this collective is Koichi, whom you should be very familiar with by now. Koichi shares a very intimate relationship with the sound artists here in Singapore and hence exchange actively takes place between Bangkok and Singapore sound art scene. Last year Koichi brought The Observatory to a festival gig that So::on organized and this one that we just attended was to feature Chee Wai, Jazzkammer, Zai, a Thai punk rock band called LATE and Koichi’s own band Space Buccha.
So::on plays the role of a fervent organizer which pushes standard of sound event in Bangkok and from the features we gathered from magazine, they are really coming up strong. Oni and so::on have plans of collaborating so we wait and see what happens na.
Aboutcafe. This is a two storey building where exhibitions, forums, gigs take place. Apart from its unfortunate location of being sandwiched between busy roads, this is a place of envy for onistudio. Zai will write more about this place and oni’s ideas in a later post, for now I present you some picture whoring:
That’s Koichi in picture, setting up for sound checks.
Zai tired of waiting for his turn to play (he was sick btw)
John and Lasser checking out their gadget shopping for the day.
Chee Wai seemingly indifferent to their display of geekiness (Chee Wai had toured with Jazzkammer for a week and half also to Guangzhou, China)
Apart from Lasser’s trance spasm and John’s evil child-like grin during their incredibly loud noise performances, this trip, together with the last gig I Have Even Escaped Myself at 72-13, really got us to know our friends from Norway better. For one Lasser is never smokes nor drinks (even coffee) his entire life (Lasser you must be really sick of this comment) and John once had long waist-length rocker hair. Well, apart from these personal facts one of the most precious thing is the great spirits and madness towards noise-making they brought to us and vice-versa. Lasser and Chee Wai recorded a duet jamming and so did John and Zai. We advise tinniduos out there who constantly seek higher decibels to keep a keen look-out for the release.
The Show! (video is kind of fuzzy from the digital camera)
Really fun cross between metal and hardcore punk rock! Koichi and I love them.
Zai on acoustics banging his last might on the guitar.
It doesn't sound loud here but I could hear Chee Wai and Lasser from duck kway teow stall across the road.
Jazzkammer. This will probably just sound silly on our small speakers. Always go live!
Space Buccha. Noise, electric guitar, saxophone trio.
The guys were so jealous that so many girls were at the event. (sorry no pics but you can catch glimpses in the video) We’re not saying that there are no cute girls when we organise event in Singapore but hey seriously we have waay too many men! A striking difference in the crowd was that the Bangkok scene (from this event alone) consist of mainly 20-25s wheares in Sg our audience is older in their late 20s to early 30s. All these said means we have to work harder to make local alternatives a good and available choice for young people.
Anyway by the time the whole affair ended it was 1am and everybody’s pretty zonked. That night we went to Silom for supper and back to the hotel. Zai went to a wrong room, knocked for a minute and a white guy wrapped in a white towel opened the door. We thought it would be the end of his manhood but luckily the man could still run in his drunken state.
So much for this post. We’ll tell you more about Shimizu shabu-shabu (which Chee Wai can give up a performance for), the beloved Aree neighbourhood which sells everything from umbrellas to underwear to umbilical cords (kidding) and Zai will personally recount his conversation with ‘death’ and himself.
onistudio was initiated by Zai Kuning in 2003 as a small café space where individuals could present works at a minimal scale. In 2006, it was revived as an organiser of art projects ranging from theatre, dance, music, performance art, visual arts and dialogues between creatives.
We wish to engage artists as well as the public in questioning the importance of independent and improvising attitude towards the developing and presenting of art works.
