February Music Mailout

My monthly email blasts got a little sporadic over the turn of the year, but I did manage to get one going for February. It is pasted below for public posterity.

Hello Friends!

Hope your year is off to a magical start. I haven’t emailed in a while; I have a few things to tell you in the world of Stuff I’m Doing.

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/ Magic City Counterpoint EP/Game/Single
// Mr. Maps show March 9 at Netherworld
/// Nonsemble Push Demonstration
//// Cool happenings about the place

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/ MAGIC CITY COUNTERPOINT DIALOGUE EP/GAME
Magic City Counterpoint is Madeleine Cocolas and I making weird surreal electronic music. We have the most exciting project underway with good friends and super indie game designers Fuzzy Ghost (aka Pete Foley and Scott Ford). Our Debut EP, Dialogue, is going to be released in June, but with a twist - Fuzzy Ghost are collaborating with us to create a strange magical world online where you can explore the music from the inside. It’ll be part music release, part game, and we cannot wait to share it with you!

Keep an eye out in the meantime as we share little bits and pieces of the process along the way. For instance, our single “Dream State” which will be out next month.

The first single “Fern Bells” is already out - you can listen to that here and see the video here.

+++Magic City Counterpoint - Dialogue
+++EP/game out June 2023
+++ Single Dream State out March 2023
+++ Single Fern Bells out now
+++ Join MCCP Discord to stay up to date

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// MR. MAPS SHOW MARCH 9 AT NETHERWORLD
A string of reunion shows last year has been the catalyst for a new lease on life for this ageing-noisily math-rock operation. We are writing some of our best material and I find myself excitedly agreeing with friends/punters who’ve said they reckon the band is sounding tighter than ever.

We’re back to squish ourselves onto the Netherworld stage on Thursday night 9 March, with support from Ruffled Feathers.

+++ Mr. Maps & Ruffled Feathers
+++ Netherworld, 186 Brunswick St Fortitude Valley
+++ 8PM, Free Entry

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/// NONSEMBLE PUSH DEMONSTRATION
Late last year Nonsemble released our new album Archaeopteryx, which has met some pretty lovely responses out in the world, like this one from Higher Plain Music: “Each track is distinctly unique and full of passion. The string arrangements are spellbinding and the way the ensemble leans into electronics and drum machines breathes life into everything they do.”

When we play these pieces live, people sometimes ask how we approach integrating the live electronics. Embedding electronics meaningfully within a live string quartet can be challenging, and there have been years of development behind the way we now do things live. So I thought it might be nice to share a few of the techniques we use onstage.

I’ve made the first of what I hope to be a series of short videos showing how I use Ableton Live and the Push instrument to perform these pieces alongside the strings.

You can watch it here.

If you haven’t yet heard our new album Archaeopteryx, you can find all the links you need to stream or buy right here.

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//// COOL HAPPENINGS AROUND THE PLACE

A true dream team, Shugorei and Shem Allen, created ripples in the spacetime continuum by unleashing this amazing single and video.

Fuzzy Ghost, as well as working with Madeleine and I on Magic City Counterpoint, have a new game in development that looks amazing, called Janet DeMornay is a Slumlord (and a witch), which has such a delicious premise that it's been featured on a News.com.au article and on realestate.com.au!

OHM Festival at Powerhouse is looking pretty monstrous:
- Kae Tempest, Black MIDI, and Nakhane are particularly piquing my interest.
- Dots+Loops’ VESSEL/MATERIAL is looking very intriguing.
- The final concert Traces is free and looks killer.

Ryuichi Sakamoto has released a beautiful new album, which feels even more something to cherish given the difficult news around Sakamoto’s health.

Also if you’re looking for new listening material but don’t have time to trawl through thousands of new releases, there are people out there who do this quite thanklessly so that you don’t have to.

For instance, I heard about the new Sakamoto release via Peter Hollo’s extremely long-running FBi show, Utility Fog - I’m not sure how Peter manages to collate and present the volume of music he does and keep it so consistently good.

There’s also Chris Cobcroft and his team that run the 4ZZZ New Releases Show, which is also a lovingly crafted weekly guide of good bits. Rusted Satellites is another 4ZZZ show, also unearthing great strange stuff every week. 4ZZZ rules in general.

Blogs like CutCommon, acloserlisten.com and stationarytravels.com are also inspiring given the amount of music they feature despite what I assume is very little return.

Even this short list above is more than I can keep up with religiously, but maybe by sharing them with you, we’ll all collectively make their hard work more widely appreciated. Thanks legends!

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As always, hit me up with an “unsubscribe” if you want off the list, and I shall remove you with good cheer and no hard feelings.

'Til next month!

Chris