ANDI THOMA (MOUSE ON MARS)
BRITTEN SINFONIA
LONDON SAXOPHONIC
CLINIC
GRUFF RHYS and BUNF (SUPER FURRY ANIMALS)
LIGHTSPEED CHAMPION
ADEM
PICTISH TRAIL
MAX DE WARDNER and TOM SKINNER
CARIBOU (DJ SET)
FOUR TET (DJ SET)

A glimpse into the world of iconic American composer Moondog (1916-1999), whose music has influenced generations of artists, from Philip Glass and Steve Reich to Charlie Parker, and later devotees like Mouse On Mars, Anthony Hegarty, Damon Albarn and Elvis Costello.



Moondog was the pseudonym of Louis Thomas Hardin (1916-1999), a blind American composer, musician, cosmologist and poet. He spent much of the 1950s and 1960s living on the streets of New York; the Viking costume that he adopted made him one of the most photographed and familiar urban figures of the period. Moondog's prolific works have been sampled, cited and celebrated by generations of musicians, on both sides of the Atlantic.


This unique concert event features a number of guest artists who reflect the extraordinary range of the composer. Before the show, a Freestage set from composer MAX DE WARDNER and percussionist TOM SKINNER will explore the canonical music from the 1970 Moondog 2 album.

The first half will feature the specially–assembled Moondog Choir featuring the idiosyncratic vocals of LIGHTSPEED CHAMPION, PICTISH TRAIL and ADEM; they will perform with LONDON SAXOPHONIC, joined by pianist LIAM NOBLE, percussionist PAUL CLARVIS and others. Stalwarts CLINIC will also perform two Moondog compositions in the Hall before their own set on the post-show Clubstage. In the interval there will be a Clubstage DJ set from CARIBOU.

In the second half the BRITTEN SINFONIA will perform under the baton of ANDRE DE RIDDER of the Viva Orchestra, along with ANDI THOMA (of MOUSE ON MARS), who collaborated with Moondog on the music for Elpmas while the composer was living in Germany. The Britten Sinfonia will perform some gems from Moondog’s classic CBS repertoire as well as previously unheard works.

Alongside Clinic on the post-show Clubstage will be a DJ set from FOUR TET in which DJ Kieran Hebden mixes sounds from all kinds of genres and crosses any musical borders he can find.

In a companion event, Moondog Around Midnight takes place in the beautiful setting of the church of St Giles Cripplegate at 11.30pm on the same evening. US organist PAUL JORDAN, a veteran Moondog collaborator, will play a concert of the composer’s organ music; tickets are at a 50% discount for main concert ticket holders.

http://www.barbican.org.uk/music/event-detail.asp?ID=8740

‘Moondog was as recognisable in the New York City landscape as the Empire State Building’ – New York Times

‘Wonderful music: strange, jaunty, sad, eerie, virtuosic, maddeningly catchy’ – The Independent

Tickets from:
www.barbican.org.uk/
020 7638 8891

Added to the bill at Dingwalls are ABOUT – Alexis Taylor of Hot Chip, Charles Hayward of This Heat and legendary improvisers Pat Thomas and John Coxon, known for their sublime improvisations offer up anarchic piano, guitar and electronics underpinned by relentless, turbulent drums reminiscent of Can, Noi, or Einstürzende Neubauten with the funk of Sly and the Family Stone meets Love.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSXzIkNYg60

Eat Your Own Ears presents
GANG GANG DANCE
ABOUT (Featuring ALEXIS TAYLOR from HOT CHIP)
plus special guests
 
Dingwalls, Middle Yard, Camden Lock, London, NW1 8AB
020 7267 1577
 
Monday June 1st
Doors 8pm
 
Tickets £11.50 (advance)
www.ticketweb.co.uk 
08700 600 100
www.seetickets.com 
0870 264 3333

www.myspace.com/ganggangdance

Emerging from the same experimental scene as Animal Collective and Black Dice,
Gang Gang Dance blend African rhythms, Middle Eastern dance music, industrial, noise, grime and more. Today's skewed pop and eerie vocals are less chaotic than their earlier work, glistening with Arabian synth lines and delayed out shimmer guitar.
 
“Correct us if we're wrong, but the album of 2008 has just arrived on our doormat. It's called Saint Dymphna, and it's by Gang Gang Dance.  'One of the best albums we've heard all year… astonishing in it's breadth and quality'.
Fact Magazine
 
 “Their sound is natural yet manmade, gangsta yet gentle at varying turns throughout their seemingly improvised sound.”
I-D Magazine
 
“… St. Dymphna spins scattered global sounds into a dance both ethereal and ecstatic.”
Plan B Magazine
 
 “St. Dymphna is a super- produced, dancefloor-ready rebooting of tribal psych… The eclecticism is exhilarating…”
Uncut Magazine
 
“Gang Gang Dance may now ascend to the bona fide league of geniuses.”
NME
 
“St. Dymphna further ups Gang Gang Dance's ritualistic ante and might be their best yet.”
Time Out
 
“… a glorious celebration of sonic excess.”
The Observer
 
“It all sounds wonderful, sparkling and glistening.”
Wire Magazine
 
“Their album is enormous” – Dave Sitek, TV on the Radio
 
”Gang Gang are the sound of some soon to be found tribe lurking in the wigs of forever. Gang Gang Dance seamlessly blend the sound of something so otherworldy while seeming so familiar. The pied pipers of Never Never Land.” – Simon Taylor, Klaxons
 
"Gang Gang Dance are my favourite group going right now – and have been for a few years. Their live shows are incredible, their sound completely unique and inventive. It is rare to hear music so exciting and full of ideas. They've got a good beat, and I can bug-out to it." – Alexis Taylor, HOT CHIP

Eat Your Own Ears presents
ANDREW BIRD
CORTNEY TIDWELL
SNOWBIRD

Monday 11 May 2009
Doors 7pm

Shepherds Bush Empire, Shepherds Bush Green, London W12 8TT 020 8354 3300

Tickets £16.50 from
www.ticketweb.co.uk 08700 600 100
www.seetickets.com 0870 264 3333

http://www.andrewbird.net/
http://www.myspace.com/andrewbird
www.myspace.com/cortneytidwell
http://www.myspace.com/snowbirdwatching

Andrew Bird’s new album Noble Beast released to rapturous applause from all quarters, debuting at a remarkable Number 12 in the US Billboard charts, and in the UK, was Rough Trade Shop’s ‘Album of the Month’. He follows this overdue breakthrough by playing a headline date at London Shepherd’s Bush Empire on the 11 May.

Delivering mesmerizing live sets of utterly riveting songs that work their magic on their own believable terms, without a hint of cloying nostalgia or riff-fueled seduction, Bird plays strings, glockenspiel, wurlitzer and tape loops…

"Bird could be the only performer who's lit up both Lollapalooza and Bonnaroo with a combination of vocals, violin, guitar, glockenspiel and whistling… he uses centuries-old instrumentation to give depth and soul to folk rock."–ESQUIRE "The Masters Are Dead–Long Live The Masters," November 2008
 
“Andrew Bird is a true musical one-off. You really ought to see him.”  5/5 The Guardian

"Like Scott Walker assimilating Sufjan Stevens" 4/5 Uncut

PLUS CORTNEY TIDWELL
Cortney’s unusual and uncompromising approach to her work has resulted in a sound that is quite unlike any other. This is music of fascinating beauty: desolate, country-infused laments sprinkled with subtle flourishes; skeletal, eerie, haunting structures that reach out far beyond their geographic roots. The voice is even more remarkable, an arresting and vulnerable instrument that recalls the likes of Liz Fraser, Hope Sandoval and Leslie Feist whilst maintaining a character all its own.

AND New York electric noise-pop makers TELEPATHE  at 93 FEET EAST

BLK JKS
BASS CLEF
FRIENDSHIP
Wednesday 6 May 2009
Doors 8pm

Bardens Boudoir, 38-44 Stoke Newington Road, London N16 7XJ (020) 7249 9557
Tickets £7.50

www.myspace.com/blkjks
http://www.myspace.com/bassclefbass
http://www.myspace.com/thegoodfriendship

BLK JKS defy description. With a wrecking crew rhythm section, debonair vocals, and guitar concoction of one part shred and two parts soul, BLK JKS shoot an African music sensibility through the tenets of rock.

"The EP brindles dub, psych-rock, ska and mbaqanga – South Africa's Zulu blues tradition – in complex variegation… a joyful, densely abstruse sound." – Plan B4
"Of the dozens of new bands this year, BLK JKS may be the leading candidates for greatness." – Drowned in Sound

PLUS SUPPORT FROM

BASS CLEF “redefines the boundaries of Dubstep. His Dub-drenched analogue sound lies somewhere in between conventional Dubstep and Electronica. It is bursting with a raw, untamed energy that is fresh and exciting.” ATM MAGAZINE

"It takes the sonic palette, the menace and some of the rhythms of grime, and applies to them production techniques learnt from dub and abstract techno. What's really great about it is that, although the bass could probably rupture an internal organ, the groove and the hooks are ultimately so irresistible, you'd still keep moving if it did." INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY

“FRIENDSHIP are utterly, and quite brilliantly deranged. Only a band with the loosest grip on behavioural norms cold open as song with a sunny, calypso guitar hook, only to pulverize it into submission seconds later with evil metal guitars and ominously monotonic Dalek-like chanting. Evil stuff.” ARTROCKER

TICKETS £7.50 FROM
www.ticketweb.co.uk
08700 600 100
www.seetickets.com
0870 264 3333

Eat Your Own Ears presents
OF MONTREAL
LOCAL NATIVES

Tuesday 14 July
Doors 7pm

O2 Shepherds Bush Empire, Shepherds Bush Green, London W12 8TT 020 8354 3300

Tickets £15.50 from
www.ticketweb.co.uk
08700 600 100
www.seetickets.com
0870 264 3333

http://www.myspace.com/ofmontreal
http://www.ofmontreal.net
http://www.myspace.com/localnatives

Of Montreal bring their consumate theatricality to the Shepherds Bush Empire this summer. Their songs soar and weave with energy and goodwill, daring anyone who hears them to walk away without a smile on their face. Listening to OF MONTREAL, you might think that singer Kevin Barnes is missing the angst gene. But the longer you listen, the more you start to realize that maybe missing the angst gene is a blessing. It allows Kevin to explore more fully his crazily creative ideas and to make wondrous music, drawing on influences from the Byrds or even the Mamas And The Papas; the group's songs are all sweet pop ditties, as suitable for campfire-singing as stage performance.

LOCAL NATIVES

Favouring a new breed of energetic, percussion-driven music, this clan of five gentleman craft songs reminiscent of a musical tribe, singing and dancing in harmony, with the eccentricity of Talking Heads and the aura of Broken Social Scene. 

With electrified, sweet melodies, Local Natives were one of the most talked about bands at this year’s SXSW, picking up across the board plaudits for their strikingly beautiful baroque, harmonic pop.

In the age of auto tune and vocoders, Local Natives is one of those rare bands defined by their ability to deliver live. In fact, it has been more of challenge for the group to translate the vibrant and exciting nature of their performances to a recording than vice versa.

Eat Your Own Ears presents
JON HOPKINS
TUNNG DJS

ICA, The Mall, London SW1Y 5AH 020 7930 3647

Wednesday 1 July
Doors 7.30pm

Tickets £10.50 (advance) from:
www.ica.org.uk
020 7930 3647
www.ticketweb.co.uk  
08700 600 100
www.seetickets.com  
0870 264 3333

www.jonhopkins.co.uk
www.myspace.com/jonhopkins

Jon Hopkins is a musical shapeshifter: a composer, pianist and a self-taught studio wizard. He makes affecting, bold electronic music using walls of synths, lustrous melodies and amorphous bass rumbles. As such his two albums have seen him labelled by the likes of ambient patriarch Brian Eno as an electronic innovator while an impressive sweep of artists from Herbie Hancock and David Holmes to King Creosote and Coldplay, have called upon his handiwork as a producer and composer.

New album Insides will be released on Domino on the 4th of May.

Plus TUNNG DJS

TICKETS FOR RESCHEDULED DINGWALLS SHOW WILL BE VALID AT THE ICA

More information on Jon:
Coldplay were so taken with Light Through the Veins – which is earmarked as the first single from Hopkins’ new album Insides – that they used a reworked version to bookend last year's bestselling Viva La Vida and persuaded the 28-year-old Londoner to spend the last six months of 2008 opening their live shows across the USA and Europe.

Insides is more confident than its predecessors, showcasing Hopkins' intriguing musical aesthetic to brilliant effect. His ethereal compositions transcend genres, melding digital coldness with subtle, bucolic textures; veering from simple elegance to strange, unsettling sonic depths. Hopkins' artfully constructed palette of rhythmic loops and treated piano can be partly explained by his unusual adolescence; he was a child piano prodigy before discovering the bleeps and beeps of dance music. In his west London bedroom he balanced a teen obsession with acid house, early hardcore and grunge alongside weekend piano tutorials at the Royal College of Music. At 16 he flitted between the twilight stoner world of drum'n'bass pirate radio and German label Recycle or Die's hypnotic electronica, and the classical discipline of playing a Ravel piano concerto.

His first album, 2001's Opalescent, was written in a Wembley bedsit while he jobbed as a session musician. Although he was still naive about rave culture and its comedowns, Opalescent unwittingly tapped into a cultural shift as rave morphed into a more downtempo sound. A collection of instrumental songs with an escapist feel, it earned him a cult following among the electronica cognoscenti.

His second outing, Contact Note (2004), was more enticing still: a cinematic, layered work with a harder experimental edge, it earned Hopkins comparisons to, and praise from, Brian Eno. An introduction to the sonic alchemist lead to sessions that were later released as part of Eno's Another Day on Earth, and subsequently to Hopkins working alongside Eno as an additional producer on Coldplay's Viva La Vida. A stint producing Scottish folkie King Creosote's Bombshell lit the touchpaper for the genuinely exploratory electronica of his forthcoming new album.

Insides moves on from the cold clinical accuracy of earlier, more rigidly sequenced work, to a drifting, wordless electronica that has a seductive intimacy. Opener The Wider Sun is a slow, layered violin lament that conjures a rural idyll, gently melting into softly pulsating electronics. The likes of Vessel and title track Insides have a more ominous quality, infused with a particularly British strain of melancholy. Their delicate melodies mutate into bass heavy oscillations that wouldn't be out of place at an east London dubstep night, or even accompanying avant-garde choreography – the first half of Insides formed the score to Wayne McGregor’s recent contemporary dance production Entity, which has been touring the world since its premiere last year at Sadler’s Wells.

As each track segues seamlessly into the next, thunderous claustrophobic frequencies are offset by familiar sounds – the submerged noise of cars on the street, birdsong – and cold currents of melody that open a window and let the day back in. First single, Light Through the Veins (27th April 2009), is all but perfect: drawing the listener in with each pure, serpentine note. None of which is to say that Insides is cerebral music for art boffs. It's hardly even a dance record. Instead it's about juxtaposition: natural, arcane textures welded to uneasy rhythms, beautiful acoustic melodies set against jarring bass. Above all, Insides is an audacious album which boasts a magical aura all of its own.

Plus guests