Our lovely volunteer film crew work hard at Supersonic each year to document the performances so you can relive your favourites or check out the people you missed. In advance of our show with Bardo Pond on Wednesday 1st August at Hare & Hounds, they’ve released some beautiful footage of the American space rockers in full flow at the festival last year.
Tickets for the show are available via https://www.theticketsellers.co.uk/
We’ve just announced a gig with the inimitable Om. Starting off from the ashes of Sleep, they have moved on to explore psychedelic and world music whilst maintaining groove ridden doom riffs. They will perform at The Rainbow Warehouse on Tuesday 25th September.
Tickets are available via https://www.theticketsellers.co.uk/
Capsule invited Om to embark on their first UK tour in 2007 – here they are performing at Supersonic Festival that year
And here they are at Roadburn 2012
You cab read an interview with Khyam Allami in advance of his show with the Alif Ensemble in Birmingham on Thursday 19th July about his first experiences of Arabic music and a little of what you can expect from this exciting show.
Despite his cultural background, Khyam Allami wasn’t expecting to fall in love with Middle Eastern music.
Having moved with his family from Damascus at the age of nine, and quick to embrace his new home, it was the electric guitar wizardry and thumping drum solos of rock music that got his heart beating quickly.
Then in 2003, a US-led coalition invaded Iraq and Allami found his world view shifting.
“It wasn’t so much that I wanted to play Middle Eastern music per se, it was more that I wanted to immerse myself in music full stop,” he explains.
The debut performance by this new Arabic music collective took place in Liverpool at the weekend as part of the Arabic Arts Festival. We’re delighted that the Alif Ensemble will be performing in Birmingham this Thursday 19th July at Ikon Gallery. Tickets are still available via https://www.theticketsellers.co.uk/
Here’s a review of the show from the Liverpool Echo –
The ‘sound’ is led by ensemble founder Kyam Allami, playing the oud, the traditional fretless string instrument which is the basis of middle eastern music.
Add to that the buzuk, mastered by vocalist Tamer Abu Ghazaleh, the the rest integrates the already widely familiar – bass guitar (Khaled Omran), two percussion players (Ayman Mabrouk and Kaled Yassine) with Yaroub Smarait on violin and Maurice Louca on keyboards.
Indeed, when also operating the mixing desk, Louca’s bodily animation communicated enthusiasm for a sound world which, frquently, could easily have crossed over into the realms of mid-period Pink Floyd.
In case you missed the news yesterday, we’ve just announced a very exciting show with Norwegian avant jazz group Supersilent, who will be joined by the legendary John Paul Jones – multi-instrumentalist and Led Zeppelin bassist. This heavyweight collaboration will enter uncharted sonic zones.
We are producing this event in conjunction with Town Hall Birmingham, and Jazzlines. Support comes from cassette manipulator Aki Onda.
This very special event will take place Wednesday 14th November at Town Hall Birmingham, tickets are available via http://www.thsh.co.uk/
The Alif Ensemble have posted up this teaser in advance of their UK tour dates. One of the most exciting new projects to come from the Arab world, bringing together musicians from Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine, Egypt and Iraq for a beguiling blend of acoustic and contemporary electronic sounds. The ensemble will feature Capsule favourite Khyam Allami, who has blown Supersonic audiences away both solo and in collaboration with Master Musicians of Bukkake.
The Alif Ensemble will perform at Ikon Gallery, Birmingham on Thursday 19th July. Support comes from Simon Fox whose work ranges from traditional folk songs to more challenging sonic experiments.
Tickets are available via https://www.theticketsellers.co.uk/
Watch a full Unsane live set from May, 1997. Pretty exciting stuff.
You can see them play in Birmingham on Wed 4th July at Rainbow Warehouse with the mighty Big Business (members of Melvins) and Stinky Wizzleteat. Tickets are available via https://www.theticketsellers.co.uk
Cast your mind back a few weeks, when Capsule and Fierce Festival were asking you to entrust us with one night of your life. We co-commissioned a mysterious and memorable experience where an undisclosed artist performed in an undisclosed venue. Thanks to all who came to the sell out show.
So, what actually did happen at the Secret Show? According to the Wire magazine…
“A kind hand leads me to the car transporting me to who knows where. It comes to a halt after ten minutes. We might not have
phone.
gone far, but, disorientated, I lose balance and start feeling deeply scared. Other hands lead me in complete silence to the designated space. The surface beneath my feet feels like grass or fur. Remembering I’m wearing an S&M like mask, I wonder if this is a porn movie set…
…Finally, a long synth sound emanates from the abyss: as if from a forest, sounds emerge one by one. They’re probably generated by a computer, but in my mind I see green trolls belching fire. The wisps of sound thicken into a fog; clicks and drones tremble over basses; guitars squeal, making me think of Norwegian Black Metallers in leather and painted faces. I lose hope and take refuge in childhood memories. Then a voice enters, an animalistic, asthmatic, death rattle. It’s like someone was being killed right in front of me. Unable to do anything, I slump in my seat, helpless. But having got this far, I must survive…
…I preferred not to know who had done this to me. Hearing an unknown performer in an unseen space had altered the way I experienced sound…But for the purposes of this review I must reveal the perpetrator was Francsico Lopez.
