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viernes, 28 de octubre de 2016

HAIL TO ENGLAND - 4 day micro tour in London and Gateshead - Skull Mask, Neck Vs. Throat, Culver/La Mancha del Pecado, Oppenheimer.....



First got to say that it was such a BLAST to be there, meeting all these new friends...finally catching up with long time pen pals and internet friends....finally playing live in front of people that REALLY appreciate what I do and to be around Culver, Xazzaz, Midwich, Yol, Charles Dexter Ward, Jazzfinger, Los Siquicos Litoraleños, Rubber O Cement, Guttersnipe, Ashtray Navigations, Senyawa, Wrest, Church Burner, Mudguts, Posset, Eddy Detroit, Usurper, Rachel Lancaster
and MANY more in the heart of it all was such a THRILL...not mentioning finally collaborating live with Neck Vs.Throat, Culver with La Mancha del Pecado as a one time member of the amazing Oppenheimer .... no words to describe so many great moments. But will try to give you a few insights on what happened....my mind is a big fucking blur but will try to make as much justice as I can.....

DAY 1 - October 13th plane arrives @ London Heathrow. I am having a great deal of sleepless rush since I did not have ANY sleep the day before and during the flight. Anyways....the RUSH was so intense that I managed to make my way thru the customs. It was a bit of nervous breakdown there since the custom required more info and detained me for like 20 mins. No problem. Always the truth and nothing can go wrong, gave all the info necessary, my VISA and the she comes back, few more questions and I am welcomed into the UK...that was a moment I still don't realize that I am finally in UK ground!!! ... walk ahead to a tunnel and go for what seemed like MILES to the Undergound Tube ticket booth. Ok.... cool... people here and there and few questions are asked and suddenly I am in the tube riding my way to Leicester Square in West End of London...
.....the same Piccadilly line from the Airport so there is no way to get lost.....when I am there looking at the panorama and the people I feel NOW in ENGLAND!!!! it is AMAZING!!!! how much beauty can be crammed in one tiny Island!!!
Leicester Square

First person I met as soon as I arrive in Leceister Square....LEE STOKOE!!!!! Head master of Matching Head Tapes, Culver (and honorary member of Witchblood, Female Borstal, Oppenheimer, Skullflower, Pact Of Ash, and MANY more....like Marzuraan ). We head to sign up to the hostel in King's Cross, leave the stuff there, looked for something to eat and grab a beer myself ...then headed to the British Museum.....

After that going back to the room, grab my stuff and head to Cafe OTO for Soundcheck...there I met Rubber O Cement, Los Siquicos Litoraleños with whom I enjoyed a great time speaking in Spanish. Did some soundcheck and got ready for the night. Rubber O Cement come first and it was SURREAL....these guys making a full scenario off cardboards and lots of things I still don't manage to make my mind how they fly all over the world carrying all those props without a bunch of slaves, but well...it was what you would expect from these Americans....blasting noise, distorted and heavy as fuck and confrontational. It was a very good PHYSICAL show....performance + noise? Maybe, but not maybe even that was the intention. The guys are crazy and don't care what you think or give a fuck. They seem to have a good time doing it and it is confusing, odd, menacing and INTENSE...a really GREAT live experience I had..... there will be videos and everything about this performance, I assure you!
My turn....just got to say that I got to sit down.... issues with the treble of the Fender amp I chose...managed to get thru with the Wah pedal and the looper....all in all I felt weird, great, amazed and taken by all the insanity of realizing I am doing this in the other side of the world basically. 20-22 mins of set, said my thanks and grab another beer (just got the recordings, not bad after all, I am going to arrange a physical release of them as soon as I can). The rest was the show from Los Siquicos Litoraleños that play this sort of improvised folk polka that would make a lot of Mexicans HAPPY.....lots of energy and the dudes seemed unstoppable....they are such a hit and while I write, they are still touring out there in Europe... they sold LOT of merch got to say.....Lee and me managed to sold three tapes only...no problem...at least some people seemed to enjoy what I did and came to let me know in a very emotive / verbal manner...took the bus and back to the hostel (by the way, oddly next to the hostel there was a burritos & quesadillas restaurant. We had dinner there! ) . Got a shower and sleep...my first time sleeping HUNDRED OF THOUSANDS of Kilometers away from home, one thing is to go to Mexico City 2000 Kms down South...this was VERY different......but well, this is an adventure, so let's get over it!.... GREAT trip to follow....over to Gateshead in the morning by train.
Show @ Cafe OTO 

 Lee Stokoe (Culver) sporting a GREAT Skull Mask T-shirt

 Los Siquicos Litoraleños doing Soundcheck @ Café OTO

Pedals and beer @ Café OTO 


Merch @ Cafe OTO

Cafe OTO punters that never ceased to speak....









DAY 2 -  Grab some bread, fruit and coffee and head to the train station on King's Cross ( a block away basically) where for the first time I took a train in a foreign country. Oh well was great.... seeing from farms, nuclear plants, villages (I passed by York for fucks sake!! wish I had more time!) , castles and people while chatting with Lee about life and whatnot was such a thrill. 3 hours went like minutes. 




 St. Pancras on King Cross, the London train station I met...










Breakfast

Nuclear plant


Saw Durham and a big castle, few kms the big ANGEL OF THE NORTH and then I am here...NEWCASTLE!...



Headed to the house of the MAN itself...the house of the dark, like going to the Cathedral of the biggest DRONE worship on planet earth....and was AMAZED by piles and piles and piles of movies, lps, tapes and all related parafernalia and got to know where the magic is made from one of my fave labels in the whole world. We chatted got ready for the merch table, and the door knocked and it was the amazing Mike Simpson from Molotov and the almighty Xazzaz.... I was very into chatting with him about history, traditions, the real deal with being English, exchanging points of view from our continents that I still from time to time see / read things that I want to talk about with him! ..a BIG man with a BIG brain...a great individual that for a moment I forgot he was this MONSTER behind Xazzaz, another project I fucking come to really admire / enjoy every time I put his tapes or CDs on my house......Lee grated us not only with Slayer's Show No Mercy, Venom's Official Bootleg and some album from Dark Fury, but with a delicious meal that was something like pasta, vegetables and chicken if I am not mistaken.....more black metal in the background and something like an apple cider ferment that Mike brought and it was delicious but eventually cleaned all my digestive system in a way that....better leave it like that. Mike drived and was insane for me to be in a car were people drive in the other side!! damn!!! first time lot of things there......
We went there to Sage, walked around, they got me to a pub for little beer and walked back to the venue and managed to encounter Rob Hayler before me going back to Sage for soundcheck and after discovering the horrible thing that FOR SOME WEIRD REASON my pedals did not worked in Sage....it was weird since they worked perfectly the day before and the day after....fucking hell...my fingers will be the effects and decided for a fucking CLEAN sound with only the natural reverb of the amp. So Skull Mask for everyone was just that.... a direct attack, no effects...it was very personal, very natural...I felt great there. In fact Lee told me that surpassed last night's performance, so that's a great sign!!!  Finally met Yol!!! that was a blast! I've been collaborating with this man for some years now, and to be able to see ourselves in person. A great salute to this man always...More about it HERE thanks to Rob Hayler on his Radio Free Midwich blog...after a GREAT kick ass set by Guttersnipe, meeting this couple was amazing, great people, great high times! Back to the merch table, getting to know more and more amazing people, Jamie, Craig and MANY more, Joe Murray, Lee Etherington, Jen, Dan Thomas, Rob's wife, Has, Ben and Sarah from Jazzfinger (many thanks for the records I received from their hands)...the discounts on the record shopping stand, the dudes on the merch table taking care of Matching Head stuff...so  many to mention...as my memory floats...then I met many into drone and noise, people I knew from Facebook, etc etc.....walked back to the hotel with Yol and felt not tired, so went to the hotel bar for a pint. There was this couple of police cops in one table and a lady that seemed like she was hot a couple of decades ago...pretty but in a very kind of wasted and slutty way. She called me...there I go all curious and she told me that she can offer me the "hottest thing in Glasgow and the hardest drugs too" that she wanted to fuck and drug me all night...then there comes this hideous / blasted as fuck chubby dude telling me that is true, that back on their room they got the greatest drugs and sex I can imagine...all this...next to two cops....DAMN!!! I said thanks but no thanks, then my friend from Rubber O Cement came along and I said, come on bro, I invite you a beer!!! and here I am chatting with him a good time, then the guys from Guttersnipe arrived and I talked a bit with them before going to sleep....I still think what kind of drugs or what was below that lady dress to be called the HOTTEST THING IN GLASGOW!????


Sage Gateshead
Tyne River from Gateshead
Walking in Newcastle
A traditional English Pub
My stuff when I was about to go after Bad@Maths
People at Sage Hall 2

Jen's installation about Matching Head Tapes
My fave stash backstage....
Joe Murray, Rob Hayler, Yol
Me and Rob Hayler
Guttersnipe (Gretchen and Rob)
Jamie Stuart (Wrest) and Craig (Invisible City Records)


DAY 3 - Woke up extremely late (11:20am) and we had to see each other at Sasge by noon....quick shower and hit the street on a hurry. Fortunately there was Toby Lloyd out of the hotel waiting for people to take them to the venue....it was sheer luck and got to see bits of Wolfgang Voigt ... a bit too polished drone for my taste, but good nevertheless. I was more in awe with Rachel Lancaster's visuals and with the hangover I was having I felt a bit trippy. Then we headed to the thing I was made for...the Dark Tusk at the Soundroom.
First...it felt like family. Everyone there was a regular to this type of gigs. Second....it was super professional in terms of equipment, sound, organization and timing. This was not going to be a fucking amateur affair. Everyone was very organized and it was something I am not accostumized in such small settings (I come from the Mexican metal world that most of the time is TOTAL chaos even if they are big bands playing).
Word is that Mike and Lee had everything under control and well in place. To watch the set up Mike was about to use...damn!... I remember like three guitars, using more than two amps, a bouncer in a drum, lots of pedals.... not even that prepared me to what I was about to witness.
Yol organized his stuff, myself put the mic in place to a harsh 12 string guitar that Joe Murray lent me....waited a bit, gave my salutes to a lot of people there, the great Pete from Half An Abortion, there was Scott McKeating, many of the girls and guys from Tusk...some very nice girls that were in all the shows I played. People that was dead serious into drone from the English North.
Instead of going on how fucking great it was to play along with Yol as Neck Vs. Throat after years collaborating via email. It was very raw, direct and short as it had been our recordings...but this was the BEST since it was the two of us there (Rob Hayler already wrote about it on RFM and you can check a video of the show here) I want to reflect on something. This specific type of drone you can enjoy over there in England (in fact I wrote about this in the past here scroll a bit down the ladies pics and you'll read my piece) is something that is only to be experienced there. Sergio of Ruido Horrible recently told me, that since he toured Europe, he felt the English scene to be very auto sufficient. This type of thing exists and ends there. People go to the shows, people consume the tapes, cdrs, lp's released there. They have this very unique position where they basically do shows and go to them in a very natural weekend to weekend basis. I almost dare to say that this is somehow a folk music for them. Something to be perceived and really experienced at it most real by being there. In Gateshead, in Newcastle...these artists are very particular. Is a sound that you can only get from there.... they almost not receive outside influence and (most of them) they do not use facebook, or are in youtube, is simple as THEY DON'T NEED THIS, since they really never tour abroad and the moment, the sounds, the releases are very physical and real. They exist there and only there. Coming from a culture here in America where EVERYTHING needs to be posted, everything needs to be recorded for posterity, anything you record / play has to be released...this was a big life lesson to me....I realized the importance of experience things as they are, in the MOMENT they happen, like in the old days. Of course there are people using social media like everywhere and I am MORE than grateful that Pete Kann has his cell phone at hand to record the Neck Vs. Throat once in a lifetime show... but at the same time I understood why there is so little online presence, so little bootlegs or bandcamps of it...people there live in the PHYSICAL world,,not in the ONLINE world...like many of us in our BIG crammed cities that make us even more isolated and insecure...they are from small places, full of culture and life....... So to be part of it, at least during this early show...was... very VERY, special.....I felt like if I was a teenager again and had the opportunity to play grindcore at the Mermaid in Birmingham back in 87.... that special it was to me to be there....and then again and MORE at the Old Police House...but more of that later.
Then comes Xazzaz.....so I already described all the equipment I saw there....the way it all turned into BLACK was menacing. Mike's stage presence is like witnessing an executioner in action, joyful about to kill his victims, this giant manipulating this BIG mass of sound, that throbs and flows in a very malignant way. It was very titanic maybe? Like this big monolith rising and falling in your city....Something very dark but not static or abstract...you could sense the music, not sense, but be blasted by the music...it was almost black metal stripped down to its most essential matter...to the core of it. It ROARED (and not in a Katy Perry kind of roar...if there was Katy Perry it was only to be skinned alive and slaughtered) .....I definitely understood why it was to be witnessed there and only there....never to happen again in this dimension

Then comes Midwich... Rob Hayler and I also have a long history exchanging and being pen-pals (or how you name that in this century) and even collaborators in a couple of releases (that I urge you to check out) . Words aside as a big supporter of my projects and along Lee Stoke and Joe Murray,  the main reason I walked on English ground finally. His enthusiasm over my music and The Skull Mask is amazing...so much that he dedicated his set to me and named the first part as how my daughter describes what I listen (Papá, esto suena a nada, como si estubiera roto! - Dad, this sounds like nothing, like if it was broken!.).. so NADA / ROTO is how she describes it...and Rob made it the first part of his set. He has this little piece of equipment that is mostly used by electronic music makers. But instead, he manages to create one of the most dense throbbing drones in England....is minimalistic, very deep, and there it has a sense of rhythm beneath it all. Is very hypnotizing, very mesmerizing....is a sound to wander around the city and get lost in the lights and the cars and the people and feel like floating above it all...very intense and beautiful (second track was a loop transformation of his son snorting..)... after this I put his music on my phone for the morning commute to work. Is like that...very vivid, perfect for the morning... if Xazzaz was the black and pitch DARK, Midwich was the flashing LIGHT.

Then here I go again....this time....with CULVER.....something I can only say...a dream come true....I used this bass amp that did not emitted but this BASS sounding buzz...it was a monster....I candidly asked Lee if he tought it was ok...as I was just minutes away to blast along HIM! you know LEE @#$% STOKOE in the stage with me!!!!! The main master of all what drone, static drone and therefore all the static works I have made until now... he is arranging his table with keyboards, tapes, pedals and a tiny mixer....here I am with this BASS beast, my guitar (the one I used for the Skull Mask shows) and my two pedals only. No needed more...not really sure what I was going to do I decideed to let myself go.... and that was a great decision to make....Lee turns his candles..everyone quiet and for a nick of a second I forgot I was about to play too as Lee let his drones invade the whole room like a gas in a gas chamber...I was so close, damn, I am ONSTAGE....so I woke up and did what I felt this sound made me do, started to emit transmitions from this amp as the guitar strings catched the frequencies..there was NO use to have the guitar with me, as the vibrations did they part on the strings and I started to manipulate the amp and control the flow with the pedals...was intense, was pure magic....the power that came from Lee's set up was brutal, was what I always took from his tapes and more.. no way to describe the flow of the pure, faceless, devastating, magnificient sound that comes out of the amps....I felt like a vehicle of all that since the vibrations were so thick that the strings and pick up of the guitar absorbed it all....I am drowning in the middle of it all manipulating my pedals and sounded like a chain or whip beneath it all... and sorry....you'll never hear it if you wasn't there as this thing exist there and only there. Lee's ethics of no live recordings I did not understood when we mailed each other...but now...I understood why...there will be no way to replicate this in a recording..the way it was to be there. So the people that was with us in the Soundroom totally understands this. Lee started to low volumes until the tapes are by their own, I did the same and just strung the unamplified guitar till the end of our set.... just perfect...in my terms....and as a witness of Lee's grandeur ...


Ashtray Navigations

The Old Police House is at it sounds a HOUSE..this time thanks to Mariam a very GREAT lady that was always supportive and showing a great sincere grin and offered me a Modelo beer (and that was awesome)... sat down and have a smoke and talk with Jerome and his girlfriend and some dudes that were with us at the Soundroom... Lee and Mike taking care of it all again (thank you guys!), Jamie offered me a bite of Pizza, Jerome putting his keyboard ready...the bass and the amp ready...turned it up and again a BASS beast, no treble, no clarity...just BIG FAT BASS...just what I needed in this situation. Oppenheimer was resurrected just for the occasion...so I was ready to blast along them.... catched some Rachel Lancaster in another room doing her guitar drone very great, got to have another smoke outside and ready to go here we are....lots of people packing this tiny space, felt very VERY old school... since my  shows in Juarez back in 1991 - 1993 with the bands I was in I just realized I haven't played a house show again ever since...after those years it was venues and bars around Juarez and every now and then Mexico City or Chihuahua City...but to be in a house gig, with all these people around...damn!!!! Jamie Stuart (Wrest) on drums, Jerome Smith (Charles Dexter Ward) on analog keyboard and amp, Mike Simpson (Xazzaz) and Lee Stokoe (Culver) on guitars and myself on bass.... it was our turn...the room was PACKED, you could feel the oppressiveness... even one dude was sitting literally beneath my rear (and then Lee told me it was the former Marzuraan singer...damn!!! ) so we just BLASTED...Jerome manipulating subsonic frequencies, Lee and Mike in full on black metal blast and Jamie and me locked in this primal kind of Black Flag / Big Black groove...so there you go...a big magma of primal metal / punk and people FEELING it, because it was literally that...a PHYSICAL sound coming out from the amps (All Men Play on 10)
It was for what I was made for...I lived to be there...both shows, the Tusk fringe, the Dark Tusk, the true Gateshead underground...I was there, I felt it, lived it, died in it....was crucial in all senses.
After the show (that was brutally ended by a punter that was literally hitting on Mike's back and Mike was ready to punch him....not going for more details...this life makes you pay sooner or later)

Walked into the night, chilling, looking everything around me....couldn't believe...really expecting a ghost to haunt me on my way back...but no, I was just a bit annoyed by a bunch of happy girls walking after a party, but, hey...I am walking in this ancient bridge all by myself...damn!!! got safe to the hotel and had a beer, could not help not to....what a triumph !!!!










DAY 4: My last day....and I just woke up early (slept like 3 hours) and go out and take a walk...I would not have forgive me if I don't at least see around a bit....was a thrill..this place is beautiful. I am in Newcastle, walking in the morning...no traces of hangover this time (even If I drank like nuts in Saturday) so all fresh and happy went out at 9 AM to look for something to eat.... then a familiar voices screams at me... it was Chris Spencer (Depletion, Church Burner) with his son!... so he saluted me and invited me breakfast! this was another once in a lifetime thing!!! ... then went back to the hotel and catch up with the Senyawa dudes, talked a bit about their life in Java and my life in Mexico, recommended a couple of things for their show in Cafe Oto next day and again Toby took us to the venue. This time rain was heavy and that was beautiful. Now in the venue just in time to witness YOL solo live....no enough praises...was so radical, hardcore, blasting....this man has no way of faking it...he is the REAL DEAL....the words, funny at time and another times alien as fuck...the way he transforms himself and the feel that he is about to explode...the smashing of stuff also is so natural....in this lifetime there will not be another one like him... no pedals, no fancy electronics, just this man and this junk objects...but he managed to become this POWER machine (power acoustics?) ... simply as that...no posses, no snobbism, just real power, real junk bashing with no pretentiouness...really, one of the BEST shows I witnessed in Tusk...and great they gave him that space instead of the stage..it was more natural to what he does.... Had a BLAST
The gang took me out there , went to have a great Korean meal, was in front of the now defunct but legenday Morden Tower, say my goodbye to Mike and carried on with Jamie to do some souvenir shopping...went back to the venue and ended my trip meeting Eddy Detroit...a man full of histories and anecdotes...he was very kind and charming...his show was very simple folk but with very dark lyrics...even made me feel nostalgic since most of his songs about Phoenix, AZ are VERY like my life in Juarez, MX...so I felt for the first time a bit homesick with him singing (South USA and North Mexico are very similar in culture and territory) then at the end of 
the night with the Senyawa show...very mad, couldn't believe I could see a sort of Zeni Geva like blast but with a traditional instruments. After that....said MANY goodbyes, hughs and it was a bit hard since everyone treated me and made me feel like home....special thanks to Lee Stokoe that was with me since the beginning of this trip, Jamie to take to where I could get the stuff for my ladies, Chris and that amazing breakfast we had and Mike and his talks and wisdom.....what to say about the music, ALL the music I grab, was given to me and bought, the festival, the venues and the people at shows........something...that is just now part of what I am and that I still don't know if it will be the last forever or if I happen to go again...is going to be different experience....we had that moment together and that forever will remain.


HAIL TO ENGLAND!!!!































And dude...the ladies...BEAUTIFUL ladies everywhere!!!! EVERYWHERE!!!!!




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