Cuneiform label statement:
A gorgeous late September evening in Washington, DC – the air crisp, the sky clear. Beyond the Embassy’s gates, perched on a wooded hill, a modernist, glass and white marble building gleams behind a fountain. This is La Maison Français, and tonight, Friday 24 September 2010, DC’s Sonic Circuits Festival of Experimental Music & Beyond is presenting one of its headlining acts. The theatre is packed as one of France’s most influential avant garde musicians, guitarist and electronic musician Richard Pinhas, and Merzbow (Masami Akita), father of Japan’s noise scene, walk onstage and take their seats. The two had long admired each other’s work, and Merzbow had long known Pinhas’ work with Heldon, the legendary band that helped blaze Industrial music’s path. And they had played together in recent years in both Tokyo and Paris. But this night was special: their first ever duo performance in North America, the meeting of two sonic titans on neutral ground. Expectant silence. And then it began, stormy waves of electrified guitar and synth washing over the starkly elegant setting. A beautiful evening for beautiful noise.
This excerpt of "Rhizome 2 – 100101000111010" comes from the CD, Rhizome, recorded at Richard Pinhas and Merzbow’s 24 September performance and released by Cuneiform, the Washington DC/Silver Spring MD record label that has released and/or reissued all of Pinhas’s solo and Heldon albums. The first pressing of Rhizome comes with a DVD of the concert.
Richard Pinhas
Merzbow
Cuneiform