We’ve had some great reviews already including The Times naming Supersonic as ‘Excellent’ with 4/5 stars and the Arts Desk giving us 5/5, The Quietuswrote ” Supersonic 2014 was a revitalising and refreshing weekend of challenging – and incredibly good fun – music in excellent company, and a pleasing air freshener against the stench of nostalgia one all too often encounters elsewhere. Here’s to 2015?” Nine Hertzclaimed “there’s nothing like it in the world.”
We will start posting up our Supersonic Collective memory over the next few days, so feel free to send your comments, let us know what your highlights were, blog post links and photos to us. Supersonic photos should be added to our Flickr group (if you could tag them with band name & supersonic 2014)
A massive thank you to all the artists, our incredible team, especially the amazing Supersonic volunteers and of course our audience for making this years Supersonic Festival Ltd Edtn a truly remarkable event. It is always such a pleasure to welcome back old friends and make new ones. Thank you & we hope you enjoyed it as much as we did.
SUPERSONIC QUESTIONNAIRE
We know that people who come to SUPERSONIC are a knowledgeable and opinionated lot so we’d like to ask for your assistance to develop and improve the next festival by answering a few questions about you and your experience. This should take no more than a few minutes of your time, and your feedback is greatly appreciated.
Your answers here will aid us in keeping our work going and in making sure new and interesting artists will keep coming to the festival – so your input really does matter in making SUPERSONIC work.
Lisa Meyer, Capsule/Supersonic director was Stuart Maconie’s guest on the BBC 6 Music’s the Freakier Zone on 7 June.
“Birmingham’s Supersonic Festival occupies an exalted position at the vanguard of the festival circuit. And rightly so. Since its inception over ten years ago, it has maintained a staggeringly focused and intelligent curatorial policy, transcending the music and art worlds to present a programme teeming with invention, audience participation and a certain amount of unpredictability. It’s also a bloody good knees up.”
The Skinny
***Remember***
Cash Points There is only one cash point on site and they charge for withdrawals but there is one located at Digbeth Coach Station
Food & Drink
Friday:
Gourmet Pizzas in Alfie Birds + Supersonic Tearoom
Supersonic Bar – with Purity Ales + Plantation Rum
Alfie Birds cocktail bar
Saturday:
Gourmet Pizzas in Alfie Birds + Supersonic Tearoom + Mexican Bean + Canoodle (Pan Asian Street food)
Supersonic Bar – with Purity Ales + Plantation Rum
Alfie Birds cocktail bar
Setting off on a UK tour, Melt Banana have decided to share a new video for ‘Lefty Dog (Run Caper Run)’. Yako explains:
“The song title is ‘Lefty Dog (Run Caper Run)’. It is the second music video from our album ‘Fetch’. It was directed by Iroha who does VJ for our shows in Japan sometimes. Like the first video ‘The Hive’ it is very colourful and we like how it looks very much”
Melt-Banana are a noise rock duo (vocalist Yako & guitarist Agarto) hailing from Tokyo, Japan. The twosome are well known for playing extremely fast grindcore and noise music mixed with experimental, electronica and pop-based song structures.
We’ve traced some rather shaky footage captured by a member of the audience from the last time Capsule put on Melt Banana… all the way back in 2008! Were you there? If so, here’s a chance to reminisce ahead of seeing them play again this May 27th at Rainbow Warehouse. Tickets here.
With just over a week away to this year’s Supersonic Festival , we’re super excited to have our new merch arrive – this is our brand new Supersonic Ltd Edtn tea towel – ‘For Curious Audiences’ designed by the very talented David Hand.
For more of our merch check out our shop
There are a handful of tickets left now via theticketsellers.co.uk or via Milque & Muhle
Capsule are partnering with this exciting project as part of the Frontiers Festival.
CALL OUT!!!
We’re looking for participants to take part in A Secret Rose for 100 Guitars by Rhys Chatham – information about the piece, and the most recent performance in California last November, is here. Chatham was a pioneer of No Wave music in New York in the mid/late ‘70s, and from the late ‘80s onwards has been making these large-scale ‘guitar orchestra’ pieces. There’s a Pitchfork review of his work here, also listing some of the many guitarists who’ve been performed in his pieces in the past from Thurston Moore to Modern Lovers’ Ernie Brooks.
We’re planning the first UK performance, for Birmingham Town Hall on 7 June. Rehearsals on 5 & 6 June. It will be a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and we have guitarists coming from across the world, from Baltimore and Buenos Aires to Balsall Heath. Alongside Rhys, the section leaders include Seth Olinsky (Akron/Family), Tobin Summerfield (Never Enough Hope, Crush Kill Destroy etc), and David Daniell (San Agustin, collaborator with Fennesz / Tony Buck etc); and the rhythm section has Laurence Hunt (Pram, Modified Toy Orchestra) and Sebastiano Dessaney.
Participation is voluntary for what amounts to a unique gig. You need to be a competent guitarist with at least a rudimentary comprehension of standard musical notation, and be available for rehearsals on the late afternoon / evening of 5 & 6 June, and for the performance on 7 June. The sign-up page is here: http://birmingham-secret-rose.frontporchproductions.org/
Earlier this month we posted Melt Banana‘s cover of Queen’s ‘We Will Rock You‘. Listen to that here.
Melt Banana seem to like the occasional cover (who doesn’t?) and we’ve found Banana-fied versions of songs from Devo, The Damned, The Beach Boys and even Bing Crosby with, you guessed it, White Christmas. But up for your delectation now is their spectacular version of Kraftwerk’s ‘Showroom Dummies‘ off the Krautrockers’ Trans-Europe Express album, see track below.
Get your tickets now to see the weird and wonderfully original Melt Banana. Tickets here! Melt Banana play Digbeth’s Rainbow Warehouse on May 27th with support from…
Glatze – Glatze is all about attention grabbing, energetic live performances so draws influences from the likes of Henry Rollins, Afrirampo, rave DJs such as Sy and Slipmatt, and of course Melt Banana! Glatze is Sam Underwood‘s alter ego.
Thrilling Headgear – Thrilling Headgear is all about libidinous acts of creation, getting hyped off of hype stoked off of stoke. Features current/ex- members of Stinky Wizzleteat and Opium Lord.
Buy Advance Tickets, cheaper than on the door! That’s extra pennies to spend on merch!
Melt Banana will be with us in just over two weeks! They play May 27th at Rainbow Warehouse, Digbeth… get your advance tickets here.
With drum and bass sections now replaced by sequenced samples, the band’s live sound is more left-field than ever. There aren’t really any bands to compare Melt Banana to, that’s how unique, weird and, frankly, ‘out-there’ they are. The best we can do is attempt to describe their sound. Imagine Tommy-gun style drum beats, ear-piercing riffs and sound effects that range from the chaotic to the hyper-catchy. Ichirou Agata emits sounds from his guitar that seem to defy logic, whilst Yasuko Onuki’s energy and vocal style is something to observe in awe.
Get the idea? Well if not here’s some really recent footage of the Japanese noise-rock duo blasting through 8 songs in the space of 3 minutes!
Supporting Melt Banana are these local noisemakers:
Glatze – Glatze is all about attention grabbing, energetic live performances so draws influences from the likes of Henry Rollins, Afrirampo, rave DJs such as Sy and Slipmatt, and of course Melt Banana!
Thrilling Headgear – Thrilling Headgear is all about libidinous acts of creation, getting hyped off of hype stoked off of stoke.
