Our friends at The Quietusare celebrating their 5th year this year and and will embarking on a bunch of new projects to mark this. One of those is a ‘new music digest’ on Tumblr – offering a simple breakdown of some key emerging acts they bill it as an ‘ongoing archive of adventurous and exciting new music’.
There’s already lots to read on there, including info on Supersonic 2012 artist Goat, Birmingham born Lee Gamble, and other great new acts like Ex Easter Island Head and Heatsick.Take a look via quietusnewmusic.tumblr.com
Any krautrock fans out there will be pleased to hear that the Einstellung record ‘Wings of Desire’ is available again on the Capsule shop. The limited edition double vinyl comes with gatefold sleeve designed by Lucy McLauchlan www.lucy.beat13.co.uk
“From the deepest depths of the industrial heartlands of Middle England comes a small ray of light. Since late 2003 a warm glow has steadily grown into what can only be described as a fireball. From this point on let this gentle fireball be known as Einstellung.
Blending glorious monotonous Krautrock with melodic tones and heavy slabs of Sabbath riffage, whilst finding time to declare sonic warfare on those tinnitus victims who have passed the point of no return.
Einstellung feature ex members of Sally, Katastrophy Wife, Cable Regime, Godflesh and Grover” www.myspace.com/einstellung
“If Klaus Dinger and Michael Rother had undergone their musical educations in 1990s Birmingham instead of 1960s Berlin, the music they would have made together under the Neu! banner probably would have sounded a lot like Einstellung’s debut, Wings Of Desire.”
Drum Media, Sydney
At Supersonic Festival 2012 we hosted a Q&A with Savage Pencil aka Edwin Pouncey ahead of the release of his ‘Trip or Squeek’ publication, a collection of comic strips that have featured in the Wire since 2002.
You can see an exhibition of the original Trip or Squeek artwork at London’s Orbital Comics 10th January – 10th February.
One of Savage Pencil’s comic strips was about Home of Metal – quite an honour!
Our friends at Flatpack Festival have set up a Kickstarter campaign, asking people to pledge fund to their festival hub – the Flatpack Palais.
“A lot of what goes on in the Palais is free, and we’d like to keep it that way so that as many people as possible can enjoy a piece of Flatpack. Some of the budget is already in place, but setting up a temporary cinema-cum-music-venue-cum-café-bar isn’t cheap. Your support will help to pay for technical equipment, seating, signage, and most excitingly all the great things that we’re hoping to put on in the building during the festival: from short film programmes to live bands to psychedelic poster shows. In return you’ll have the satisfaction of helping to make a unique cultural event happen.“
One of the most innovative film festivals around, the programme is a treat each year and we can’t wait to see what they’ve got planned for 2013.
Happy new year! Hope you all had an enjoyably gluttonous winter break.
Beard Rock have posted up a review of our show with Boris in December. Nice to see they enjoyed the support slots too, with big compliments going out to Opium Lord and Joe Volk.
“They were dynamic, magnetic, hypnotising, and managed
the difficult twin feats of having a gong and not appearing like dicks, mainly due to the boundless (and shirtless) enthusiasm of Atsuo, miked up seemingly just to shout “WOO” and “YEAH”. Aside from his loud enthusiasms, the rest of the band just went about their business, Wata not even
breaking a sweat when pulling out impressive riff after impressive riff. It was a great show.”
We’ll be announcing news of an exciting event very soon. Meanwhile we’re pulling together an artistic programme for the Library of Birmingham’s opening season. Watch this space for more details.
Another busy and varied year for Capsule, 2012 saw a number of extraordinary events and crucially, saw us celebrate 10 years of Supersonic Festival in October. This year’s edition of the festival was one of the finest of the past 10 years, a truly excellent way to celebrate a decade of experimental music and art. Highlights included the Vinyl Rally installation, Kim Gordon performing as Body/Head as well as bringing her Reverse Karaoke installation. We saw thrilling new acts grace the stage like Richard Dawson, Goat and Clifford Torus as well as firm favourites Chris Corsano, Drunk in Hell and The Bug and new collaborations and special performances from the Oxbow Orchestra, ORE vs KK Nulland Moon0))). We also extended our Kids Gigs programme to include a number of workshops in the lead up to the festival with Juneau Projects and two gigs with Flower/Corsano Duo and Islaja. An enormous thanks goes out to everybody who supported this year’s Supersonic Festival via our We Fund campaign. Your donations truly helped to make the anniversary festival one of the best yet. We are now looking forward to the opportunity to re-imagine the future of Supersonic Festival.
In May we were awarded the role of curators for the Library of Birmingham’s Opening Season. Taking the theme of ‘discovery’, the season of events will celebrate the opening of a dynamic new cultural space in Birmingham with a mix of performances, exhibitions and special commissions. The events will take place in the lead up to, and after the opening on 3rd September 2013. Watch this space for more news.
At the very heart of Capsule, we’re fans, so every show feels like a highlight, but to name a few we’re extremely proud this year of:
– Esmerinewith a beautiful visual show in the stunning setting St Paul’s Church in the Jewellery Quarter with drone guitarist Adam Beckley in May.
– Grouperpresenting new work at Vivid in March as part of Fierce Festival with an excellent set from Diamond Catalog and commissioned performance from SWLLWS.
– Also in collaboration with Fierce, we presented the Secret Showwhere Francisco Lopez sent the audience on a disorientating sound journey.
– Panopticon in March was a wild night of psych rock with White Hills and Pontiak, part of Flatpack Festival
Grouper performing at VIVID in March
It was also great to invite back firm favourites Bardo Pond, Harvey Milk, Unsane, Big Business, Boris, OM, Justin Broadrick and Khyam Allami to Birmingham.
It is with a heavy heart that we say goodbye to co-founder Jenny Mooreat the end of the year – she will always remain a firm member of the Capsule family.
Thank you to all who have supported us this year and come along to our events, watch this space for news of our 2013 programme.
It is with a heavy heart that Capsule say goodbye to co-founder Jenny Moore at the end of the year. Her creative passion and inspiring level of commitment have driven Capsule forward over the years and been central to the organisation’s ethos. All who have worked alongside her will miss her enormously. We wish her the best in her future endeavours, and anyone who has enjoyed a Capsule gig or a Supersonic Festival should raise a glass to her.
Anyone who enjoyed the Moonn0))) performance at Supersonic Festival this year, would be wise to check out the next phase of the artist collective’s project. Now turning to Sun-Ra for inspiration, they will perform in London this Friday.
MOON RA | 21 12 2012
a Session towards Ascension
on 21.12.12.
at the Round Chapel, Powerscroft Road, E5, Clapton, London
8pm – 10pm FREE
with Sanna Charles, Mark Wagner, Jussi Brightmore, ‘Philly’ Kev Morpurgo, Luca ‘Zoo’ Franzoni, Christos Fanaras, Cibelle Bastos, Sal Chyamolonskas, Graham Dunning, Rob Truscott + more
visuals by Conny Prantera
Courtesy of 
