Supersonic Festival, the world renowned event for adventurous music, art film and beyond is celebrating its 10th birthday.. We love a party so are expanding our celebrations by hosting two very special taster shows in London and Birmingham in August.

On 4 August at Eastside Projects, Capsule present King Midas Sound System and JK Flesh, joined by Iron Fist Of The Sun, Laurence Hunt and Sarah M Farmer to bring cacophonous, abstract, abrasive and titanic sounds into the walls of this converted art gallery/warehouse space.

King Midas Sound System drops DJ exclusive dubs/versions and remixes as well as bleeding other artists’ music into the astounding sound design, Featuring live vocals by Kiki Hitomi and Roger Robinson with Kevin Martin at the controls, be prepared for sonic adventures into the deep. Bass, drones, tones and infinite reverb mark the spot where immersion is the key.  http://www.kingmidassoundmusic.com

Godflesh, Head of David, Napalm Death, Techno Animal, Jesu, Greymachine, Palesketcher – just some of the projects from the insanely prolific Justin Broadrick who this year raised his Techno Animal moniker JK Flesh from the dead to promote his recent album Posthuman. Once again proving his mastery of all things brutal. This material will be showcased for the first time in the UK all thanks for Supersonic. Expect soul-crushingly dark beats and bass, layered with Broadrick’s inimitable guitar and vocal fuzz, that will resonate with fans of Godflesh and the post-dubstep landscape alike. http://justinkbroadrick.blogspot.co.uk/

Iron Fist of the Sun. Bitter cold contemporary power electronics. Synth heavy and tonal, Lee Howard draws inspiration from electro-acoustic academia as much as underground black metal.http://www.myspace.com/ironfistofthesun

Sarah M Farmer. As Plato rightly said, ‘Necessity is the mother of invention’. An Array of Events mixes traditional methods of sound production with DIY instruments and experimental techniques in a bid to overcome the problem of being a lone performer with only the usual number of hands and limited instrumental skill.  Whilst programs such as Logic and Ableton offer their own solutions to these problems, they come with the difficulty of seemingly infinite choice and lack the tactility of real instruments and the analogue sounds and happy accidents that come along with playing them.  In the realm of live performance, if something can be played live rather than sampled, why not at least give it a go?  Sounds and instruments have been created from every day items and cheap technology, generally things found around the studio/bedroom which are triggered by MIDI files and accompanied by live performance. www.sarahmfarmer.co.uk

Laurence Hunt more typically performs as a member of experimental groups Modified Toy Orchestra and Pram. A recent collaboration with sound artists Dreams of Tall Buildings and featuring Arve Henricksen, has triggered an interest in exploring textural soundscapes that he pursues here in his first solo venture on drums/percussion with live electronics.

Joining Khyam Allami are two of the most inventive and talented Arabic musicians; Palestinian composer and vocalist Tamer Abu Ghazaleh and Egyptian electronica musician Maurice Louca, alongside a band of musicians from both traditional and contemporary Arabic music disciplines, including Ayman Mabrouk (Egypt) on Percussion, Khaled Yassine (Lebanon) on Percussion, Khaled Omran (Syria) on Bass and Yarob Smarait (Jordan) on Violin.

“[Khyam Allami] epitomises the best of the new generation of oud players whose roots lie in the Eastern tradition but who also judiciously draw on a wider range of contemporary influences… his compositions are utterly bewitching.”
5/5 – Songlines – Top of the World

http://www.alifensemble.com/

Simon Fox is an acoustic meddler, with work ranging from traditional folk songs to more challenging sonic experiments. his songs, performed under various fox monikers, show a more personal, reflective side, with deceptively rich arrangements, a disarming wit and a flair for creating intimate moods. recordings feature simon playing a wide variety of instruments, including guitars, banjo, percussion, keyboards, theremin, mandolin, even occasional brass and woodwind.

http://www.worldoffox.com/

UNSANE

New York City’s Unsane assisted in pioneering a more aggressive, less studied version of noise rock, one that blended the scum/art industrial sturm und drang of Foetus, the Swans, Einsturzende Neubauten, and Sonic Youth with the decidedly more straightforward hardcore idiom favored by acts like Sick of It All. As a power trio, Unsane relied upon a hammering, power-press rhythm section, a searing Telecaster howl, and distorted vocals that resembled nothing if not the sound of a man trapped in the New York Subway system .

March 20th 2012 sees the band’s 7th full length ‘Wreck’ out on Alternative Tentacles Records. For over two decades they have represented a harsh, aggressive, honest, and intelligent voice of New York’s Lower East Side.

http://unsanenyc.com/

BIG BUSINESS

Big Business started as a two piece band composed of Jared Warren of Karp and The Tight Bros From Way Back When, and Coady Willis of Murder City Devils. Their sound has been characterized as a bombastic and frantic low end attack, marked by Warren’s signature vocal delivery. The band released its first album, “Head for the Shallow”, on January 25, 2005.

In late 2006, after relocating to Los Angeles, Jared and Coady both became members of The Melvins, first appearing on “(A) Senile Animal”.

http://bigbigbusiness.com/

STINKY WIZZLETEAT

Formed some time in 2008, Stinky Wizzleteat have garnered some sort of a reputation, leaving a trail of blood, sweat and broken amplifiers behind them.  United by a mutual love of the Bad Brains, Wizzleteat carve out a sound informed by groove from across the musical spectrum, whilst staying fully committed to heaviness, good times and volume.

http://myspace.com/stinkywizzleteat

Poster designed by Tom J Hughes

Capsule coaxed Harvey Milk to make their first UK appearance at Supersonic Festival in 2008. We’re thrilled to have them back.

Poster designed by Daniel Margretts

Harvey Milk are an American experimental rock/noise rock band that formed in Athens, Georgia in the early 1990s. While Harvey Milk invariably draws comparisons to the Melvins, due to their penchant for slow, heavy riffs, the band has touched upon such artists as ZZ Top, Led Zeppelin, Leonard Cohen, and Kiss as influences in their music.

http://www.myspace.com/harveymilk

Einstellung are a krautrock/shoegaze band from Birmingham. Einstellung’s work has been likened to My Bloody Valentine Bardo Pond and Neu!. They released a double vinyl names ‘Wings of Desire’ on Capsule’s very own record label.

http://www.myspace.com/einstellung

Grimpen Mire

Effortlessly combining traditional Doom by the likes of Sabbath with the aggressiveness of sludge and hardcore, West Midlands trio Grimpen Mire have continued to lay waste to venues since their inception in late 2007. The blend of textured guitars and unrelenting heaviness has seen them rapidly rising the ranks of the UK doom scene, their debut album is due out in 2011 on At War With False Noise.

http://www.myspace.com/grimpenmire1971

A very special show in a beautiful location – St Paul’s Church in the Jewellery Quarter area of Birmingham.

Esmerine was co-founded ten years ago by percussionist Bruce Cawdron (Godpseed You! Black Emperor) and cellist Rebecca Foon (Thee Silver Mt. Zion) soon after the duo met while recording the first Set Fire To Flames record, Sings Reign Rebuilder (2001) at the old brothel at 10 rue Ontario Est in Montreal. Esmerine has since released two critically-acclaimed albums of modern chamber music, If Only a Sweet Surrender to the Nights to Come Be True (2003) and Aurora (2005) that have one foot in the new music/experimental terrain of contemporaries like Rachel’s or Town And Country and the other in the more visceral and lyrical landscape populated by the likes of Dirty Three (and GY!BE themselves).

Esmerine recorded its third album La Lechuza in 2010.

http://www.esmerine.com/

Hailing from Stourbridge near Birmingham, Adam Beckley uses field recordings and looped samples to create textures of sound, sometimes hypnotic noise, other times dreamy soundscapes.
Adam has released two tapes. The first called ‘Revere’ through the label ‘Carnage Club’. The second and most recent release is a split tape with Los Angeles based musician Beru. This was put out on Adam’s own tape label ‘Armed Within Movement’ and is the first release for the label. You can listen to both these releases on the links below.

adambeckley.bandcamp.com
armedwithinmovement.bandcamp.com

Poster designed by http://iamchair.com/

Can you keep a secret?

Will you give us one night of your life?

Capsule and Fierce Festival have co-commissioned a mysterious and memorable experience that will take place in Birmingham on Thursday 5 April as part of the next Fierce Festival (which runs from 29 March – 8 April 2012). The artists have insisted that their identity is kept strictly anonymous until after the event has taken place.  Capsule and Fierce Festival are combining their expertise in producing cutting edge music, contemporary art and live experiences to create this very unique event.

When you book you will be asked to leave an email address and phone number. We will arrange to meet you at a location near Birmingham City Centre, where your experience will begin.

Please note you will be blindfolded as part of this experience.

www.wearefierce.org

Grouper unveils a haunting new performance entitled ‘Violet Replacement’ comprised of tape loops, field recordings and submerged atmospherics presented in a set of naturally resonant and specially customised locations.
Grouper is a recording and performing project by Liz Harris. She lives and works in Portland, Oregon. Since 2005 she has released a flow of LPs, CDRs and tapes into the world on labels like Type, Room40 and her own Yellow Electric imprint.
Grouper’s live shows are rare occurrences and are always in tune with the architecture and acoustics of a space. For this tour she performs a new collection of tape collages derived from a commission for New York’s Issue Project Room. Field recordings, Wurlitzer loops and vocal tracks from her archives are mixed, spliced and processed live from an array of dictaphones and tape players.

http://sites.google.com/site/yellowelectric/

Diamond Catalog

“NNA is proud to present the debut LP by Diamond Catalog, the new duo of Lala Conchita and “Glamorous” Pat Maherr (Indignant Senility, Expressway Yo-Yo Dieting, and so on). This full-length is the definitive statement of Diamond Catalog’s concoction of cross-bred dance music and mutated, swirling noise bricolage. “Magnified Palette” seems to exist in five dimensions of sound, with factory-booming beats creating a mechanical-yet-organic framework for devious sonic chatter to wind its way through. Imagine the sound of a distant rave in the midst of a disorienting drug spell, wading your way through the infinity of your mind’s own dark matter.”  NNA Tapes

SWLLWS/Sian Macfarlane presents a new work exploring the Victorian séance, and its roots in the pain of the loss of loved ones.

An exploration of the world of the séance, popular in Victorian times, where spiritualism was at its height, this piece will incorporate family snaps, slides, and super 8 footage as well as found sounds.

http://swllws.bandcamp.com/

Tickets to this show includes entrance to after party featuring:

Harry Dawes Trio:
Harry Dawes from Pram
Joe Welden from Juneau Brothers
Stuart Tonge from Papa November

plus BOYD/First Fold DJs playing an eclectic uptempo mix of the familiar and rare:
Pierre and Karlheinz
The Quite Good DJs

www.firstfoldrecords.com

This event is part of Fierce Festival http://www.wearefierce.org/

Poster designed by Bethan McKnight http://b-vo.tumblr.com