RECORDING#36: Babau [LIVE] @Psycho River Fest Preview | Magazzino Sul Po, Turin, 27/04/17


Technical File

Date / Venue

27/04/2017, Psycho River Fest preview #3 feat. Holy Palms & Babau @Magazzino Sul Po, Turin

Info / Links / Recommended Discography

BabauFB page / Bandcamp / Soundcloud / Discogs

ArteTetra: Website / Bandcamp / FB page

ArteTetra is a tape label founded by Babau and based between Bologna and Potenza Picena. The releases mostly concern exotic/fourth world sounds that range from acousmatic [Kink Gong, Moon Ra] to psych-rock [Lay Llamas, Tetuan].

Babau – aka the boogeyman or “black man” in Italian folklore – is the duo project of Luigi Monteanni and Matteo Pennesi which started as an ambient/post-rock project and, captivated by the post-War American exotica among many other sounds found on the internet, became more and more focused on Indonesian music, neo-psychedelia, afro rhythms, and dub vibes. After the release of the latest work Papalagi, the duo (that sometimes becomes a trio with the introduction of Edoardo Grisogani at the percussions) started playing all around the stivale opening to acts like Sun Araw, Arrington de Dionyso’s Malaikat dan Singa, Baba Commandant & the Mandingo band, Uzeda and many others. They recently appeared on two compilation released on vinyl [Interdimensional Folklore vol.1] and cassette [Exotic ésotérique vol.2].

“Papalagi is the title of the new EP by Babau. With this work, the duo tries to summon exotic sounds from purely invented places and sacred rites to which they would be afraid to participate. Deconstructing the exotic sonorities and languages through imagination and recoding them in a very strained and bizarre way, Papalagi arrives to put together the smoking Rano Kau during equatorial storms, the molam orchestras from Laos and two young boys from the marchigian hills experimenting with a shortwave radio. What comes out is a promiscuous potpourri of themes, rhythms, and harmonies borrowed from different ethnicities to which the duo doesn’t belong to. The research of a different familiarity to the one inherited by the white man becomes a synthesis through which the duo moves, seizing everything and belonging to nothing.” [via] The tapes are also quite a sight: transparent purple cassette with a classic ivory case, some of them including ghost tracks. Go buy one before they get sold out!

 

 

Equipment

Luigi: Guitar • Voice • Saxophone • Cheap Thai flute given as a present by his flatmate who went to Thailand last summer
Matteo: Keyboard • Tapestry • iPad • Doepfer Dark Energy only used for the pew pew sounds that they like

Extra

  • Babau were followed on the Magazzino sul Po stage by Holypalms, the solo project of Pavel Eremeev [uSSSy, I Am Above On The Left] from Moscow; after some travels around Asia, armed with his quarter-toned baritone guitar and a laptop, he quickly developed his unique sound that he calls “electro-noise-raga”: a crunchy and noisy approach to classical ragas compositions with a high gain on electronic beats. His last tape was released on Artetetra and it’s called Jungle Judge [listen here], an album that combines elements of ethnic music like gnawa or raga and traditional Nepali or Romal melodies, combining them with synthetic electronic (almost grimey) rhythms and acid dub samples. No emotional kalimbas, neither soulful reeds, if there’ll ever be a jungle version of Mad Max this would be the right soundtrack! If you’d like to see a couple of snippets of his live show just click here and here.
  • The next stop of the Psycho River Fest will be on June 15th at Magazzino sul Po in Turin. The lineup features FÖLLAKZOID, TAU, Foxhound, ọRIọNE. Support!

Videos

BABAU [Live] @Psycho River Fest Preview, Magazzino sul Po, Tur…

BABAU [ArteTetra's Luigi and Matteo] live show at Psycho River Fest preview #3 feat. Holy Palms & Babau, Magazzino sul Po, Turin was CRAZY. Enjoy this little excerpt and wait for more BABAU and Holy palms clips online soon at https://www.youtube.com/c/PaynomindtousLIVE. Support the guys over at Psycho River Fest!

Pubblicato da Paynomindtous su Venerdì 28 aprile 2017


 


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PAYNOMINDTOUS is a non-profit organization registered in December 2018, operating since late 2015 as a webzine and media website. In early 2017, we started our own event series in Turin, IT focused on arts, experimental, and dancefloor-oriented music. We reject every clumsy invocation to “the Future” meant as the signifier for capitalistic “progress” and “innovation”, fully embracing the Present instead; we renounce any reckless and ultimately arbitrary division between “high” and “low”, respectable and not respectable, “mind” and “body”; we support and invite musicians, artists, and performers having diverse backgrounds and expressing themselves via variegated artistic practices.