Lisa McKendrick and Tim Drage present an evening of music which pushes the boundaries of noise songwriting and fringe genres such as Avant Pop and Dungeon Synth. Both approach music as an arena to explore ideas relating to electronics, circuit bending and uncouth approaches to sound exploration. They do this by creating and designing their own synths, making field recordings and integrating open source technology. They share a somewhat rebellious nature when it comes to music/noise and also perform together under the project Isn’tses. They each have a solo project where they take quite a different approach to music.
They will perform a solo set each from the projects NNJA RIOT and Disgusting Cathedral.
(Note: They will also hold an electronics workshop, 24th November) (link)
7:30pm – doors open
Performances:
8pm – Disgusting Cathedral
9pm – NNJA RIOT
NNJA RIOT
NNJA RIOT is the solo project of New Zealand-born artist and composer Lisa McKendrick, now living in the UK. Based in London, she is a multidisciplinary creator, working as a graphic designer, painter, musician, and synth designer. Her creative drive is to push against established norms and to celebrate music which is visceral, intense and energetic.
Her music is a journey into the potential of electronic beats and song composition using musical instruments recorded as samples, modular synthesis, auditory fragments, and vocals. Her live performances incorporate an amalgamation of textures, beats, melody and noise. On stage, she likes to approach the concept of art as a ritual, employing custom-made costumes and headdresses. When playing live she likes to allow the music to take on a new life for each performance, while maintaining a framework to create and improvise with. She incorporates visuals into her performance which are her own footage of forests, stone circles and land art performance.
She has recently released a new studio album “Violet Fields” in February 2024 with Cruel Nature Records. Using her skills as a songwriter and her love for noise she has crafted seven new tracks which hint at the shamanistic disharmony inherent in human evolution, the futility of war and the disconcerting horror of current global events. She explores these themes amongst disparate and poetic lyrics where she conveys her own feelings of being a human struggling to make sense of a fast changing world intent on its own destruction. As if a scholar of sound she records her memoirs through beats, field recordings, noises, rhythms of the city and nature. As if viewing the contemporary world through the eyes of an alien she observes and dismantles, then rebuilds through the fullness of sound, creating a story that can only be told within the realm of music.
Recent performances were at: Expanded Music, Until We Catch Fire, Baba Yaga’s Hut, Berlin Modular Society, Tides/Gossamer Fog, Chaos Theory, Sharp Noodle Bristol, Weird Garden Lincoln, EVTV, Hot Freaks, Ealing Extranormal, IKLECTIKA, Plastic Infinite, Nosiemas, Earworm Presents, Skronktronic, Exit Points Canada, Corpora Aliena, Piksel Festival Norway, It’s Her Factory, Dronica Festival.
She was featured/reviewed in Plastic Mag, The Quietus, Sun 13, Fighting Boredom, Resonance FM – Hello Goodbye Show/Bad Punk, Independent Music Podcast, Uptown Transmission, Loose Lips blog, MusicTech magazine, Noods Radio, Dronica Podcast, Female Pressure Radio Podcast and ZRadio.
Links
https://nnjariot.weebly.com/
https://www.instagram.com/lisa_mckendrick/
https://youtu.be/cNYcoTR2C1s
Disgusting Cathedral
Disgusting Cathedral is the dungeon synth project of UK-based electronic musician, animator and circuit-bender Tim Drage, who has been prolific in the UK and international noise scene. His projects have an absurdist approach rebelling against the often dour aesthetic of noise music and he makes extensive use of modified and home-made instruments.
Taking the most lo-fi and disjointed aspects of ‘dungeon synth’ to their extremes, Disgusting Cathedral mutates the genre’s traditional black metal and videogame music influences with elements of harsh noise and doom. Ominous and disturbing fantasy soundscapes are created using handcrafted electronics, Casio keyboards, eurorack and Nord modular synthesisers, magnetic tape, open source hardware such as Monome Norns Shield, and obscure, esoteric music software on obsolete devices including Nintendo DS, Game Boy and Macintosh Plus.
Disgusting Cathedral has performed live at IKLECTIK, Earworm and Noise Shed events in London, and at Sharp Noodle events in Newport and Bristol. As well as a number of self-published albums the project’s debut “Adventurers Despised and Rejected” was released on cassette by vaporwave label Rei Records.
Links
Bandcamp: https://disgustingcathedral.bandcamp.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/timdragenoise/
https://youtu.be/qcZ1K8Q_BUU