The Portal
Stewart Home's Portal
October 2013
The novelist and writer of The Wire 357's Epiphanies article talks Italian social commentary, fascism, the many worlds of Chus Martinez, and where partying and politics meet.
Columns
Bell Labs: Drum Roll, Please
October 2013
Clive Bell takes a look at the Tweets, the column inches, the bitching and the I’m-above-all-this-nonsense that music competitions attract.
Columns
Bell Labs: Flutes In Crisis
September 2013
Who gives a toot about the flute anymore? A panegyric by Clive Bell on the once potent pipes of Pan, and some green shoots of hope for this currently degraded wind instrument.
Columns
Composers Anonymous: Populist Trimmings
August 2013
Philip Clark visits the Proms and witnesses a clash between New Music and the fancy-dress patriotism of populist classical music culture.
The Portal
Holly Rogers's video art primer
August 2013
The musician and author curates a primer for The Portal, ahead of her talk on the history of video art at September’s edition of The Wire Salon.
The Portal
Rob Mazurek Portal: Light and Energy Towards the Idea of Universal Opera Dynamics
August 2013
The Chicago Underground musician and visual artist shares online glimpses of his research in preparation for a new audiovisual opera titled (The Book of Sound (Android Love Cry)
The Portal
Portal: Artist Emma Hart
August 2013
The visual artist currently exhibiting at Camden Arts Centre shares her current reading and viewing habits, and how Daffy Duck can be an antidote to austere minimalism.
The Portal
Helena Hauff's Portal
July 2013
The Hamburg based DJ and musician shares her favourite links to tales and projects on the seen and the unseen, spectograms and unheard sounds.
Columns
Bell Labs: In praise of a one trick pony: the music box
July 2013
Clive Bell on the continuing appeal of the music box, from inventive Polish packaging, high street trinkets and grown up toys like the German Polyphon.
Columns
Music in the gallery: Chin-stroking at the Noise dudes
July 2013
Nathan Budzinski on the ascendency of art galleries as music venues – pleasure at what cost?
The Portal
The Durian Brothers Portal
July 2013
Sound poet and lecturer Marc Matter, furniture designer and musician Stefan Schwander and artist Florian Meyer meet for a day at a time to record as The Durian Brothers. The trio, releasing on Fat Cat Records and featured in the July issue of The Wire, share an index of manifestos, neologisms and more.
Column
Composers Anonymous: Where's London's New Music?
June 2013
Philip Clark asks why London has always been "re" rather than "pro" active towards trends in composed music.
The Portal
David Novak’s online sound archives Portal
June 2013
The author of Japanoise: Music At The Edge Of Circulation and lecturer in the upcoming Music, Digitisation, Mediation conference in Oxford (11–13 July) shares his favourite online sound archives.
Column
Bell Labs: Improv Will Eat Itself
June 2013
"Retail is retail, whether it’s a cup of coffee or an Eliane Radigue CD" says Mark Wastell to Mr Bell.
Essay
Collateral Damage: Numero Group on the vinyl bubble
June 2013
The recent boom in vinyl merely reflects business’s desire to extract maximum commodity value from ‘manufactured rarities’. But, ask Numero Group’s Rob Sevier and Ken Shipley, what happens to the music when the bubble bursts?
Essay
Collateral Damage: Numero Group on the vinyl bubble
June 2013
The recent boom in vinyl merely reflects business’s desire to extract maximum commodity value from ‘manufactured rarities’. But, ask Numero Group’s Rob Sevier and Ken Shipley, what happens to the music when the bubble bursts?
The Mire
Mother Motherland & The Last Post
During a recent visit to Kiev as part of a selection panel for a
call for sound and art works made by the ECAS network , I visited the Ukranian
capital's World War Two memorial. I made my way through the Soviet
era metro and out to the hills overlooking the wide Dnieper River,
with clusters of imposing looking tower blocks beyond its opposite
banks. After passing through a park, the gold-domed Pechersk Lavra
and Memorial To The Holodomor Victims (the Ukrainian
“terror-famine” in the early 1930s) I enter a pedestrian boulevard.
At the head of it sit kiosks and cafes, with small groups of
visitors escaping from the hot weather, sipping beer in the shade
of umbrellas.
The broad boulevard stretches out under the hot sun for nearly a
kilometre. I hear the muffled sounds of distant music being played.
Suddenly, a loud and mournful male voice starts singing in
contrabass right next to me. The entire boulevard is...
The Portal
Maria Chavez: A Portal for turntablism, sound art and more
June 2013
The New York based sound artist and experimental turntablist shares her favourite online resources on turntablism, sound and visual art.
The Mire
Listen And Learn
The listening session, where writers are herded into a company
office to get the first spin of a new album, is now an everyday –
yet still clandestine – event. Big independents and major labels
are paranoid about their precious new albums leaking through
journalists (anecdotally, most leaks happen before it even goes out
to the media) so they operate an odd nannying operation whereby you
can come along and hear the album... but there's no chance of
getting it into your own hands.
There’s two types of listening session. The first and the most
excruciating is where a PR is detailed to sit in with you, giving
tedious behind-the-scenes gossip on how the artists got their shit
together, all the while trying to keep a sneaky eye on your
response to the music. It's like a waiter in a posh restaurant
painstakingly explaining all the ingredients to you, constantly
checking whether you enjoyed it, and asking if there's anything you
need,...
The Portal
The Portal: Mississippi Records's Eric Isaacson
May 2013
The reissue label boss (featured in The Wire 352) introduces us to his selection of underfunded independent cultural institutions: "Bear in mind I rarely surf the net for anything beyond movie showing times. Still, I happen to know these organisations are worth keeping an eye out for."