Synthesiser ↘↖
Here is a video for our collaborative single with DJ Format, ‘Battle of the Planets’. You can get the single on the new DJ Format LP, ‘Statement of Intent’.
We’ve added quite a few new shows to our current tour so hope to see you there. This weekend we are in Wrexham, Cardiff and Southampton.
May 4th - Le Zoo, Geneva
May 5th - Le Romandie - Lausanne
May 18th - Band on the Wall - Manchester
May 19th - The Yellow Rooms - Newton Abbot
May 24th - The Cluny - Newcastle
May 25th - The Shipping Forecast - Liverpool
May 26th - The Faversham - Leeds
June 15th - WTF @ Le Nouveau Casino - Paris
August 16th - The Tunnels - Aberdeen
August 17th - The Annexe Liquid Rooms - Edinburgh
August 18th - Koko - London
Tomorrow (March 8th) is International Women’s day so I thought it worth reminding you of the Tone Generation episode dedicated to celebrating the lesser known female electronic composer’s working in the ’50s and ’60s.
The Tone Generation, originally made as a 10 part series for London`s Resonance FM, has expanded beyond its initial coverage of early electronic music around the world, and continues with a new topic in each subsequent program. Still using his record and cd collection as source material, Ian Helliwell has explored electronics in jazz and dance, and looked in detail at Expo 58, the RCA Synthesizer and electronic music authors. Women in Electronics, is the 19th show and the electronic music tracks all come from a selection of female composers who worked with tape or analogue synthesizers. Featuring Else Marie Pade, Jean Ichelberger-Ivey, Pril Smiley, Daria Semegen, Ludmilla Frajt, Laurie Spiegel and Lily Greenham. To listen to the podcast series go here.
The latest episode of The Tone Generation, is now available here. Focusing on music composed on the legendary Buchla range of electronic music boxes, Ian Helliwell plays and discusses tracks by Morton Subotnick, Ernst Krenek, Michael Czajkowski, Warner Jepson, Bulent Arel and Arthur Krieger.
![[image]](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lgvj942eo31qzxt50o1_400.jpg)
The latest episode of the ongoing electronic music history series The Tone Generation, is now available here. Focusing on music composed on the legendary Buchla range of electronic music boxes, Ian Helliwell plays and discusses tracks by Morton Subotnick, Ernst Krenek, Michael Czajkowski, Warner Jepson, Bulent Arel and Arthur Krieger.
For those that delight in the old fashioned wireless transmissions, London’s Resonance FM will be broadcasting programme’s 19, 20 and 21 starting on February 23rd at 5pm then the next 2 Wednesday’s following that.
Laura J Martin performing Spy with The Simonsound at From Inner Space to Outer Space at the Duke of York’s in Brighton.
From Inner Space to Outer Space was fantastic - a successful mission at every stage. The Duke of York’s was full to capacity with humans keen to explore inner space and outer space.
Thankyou to everyone who came along for the ride and to all who made it happen.
Thanks to all involved in putting on the excellent Wah Wah live party at The Scala this past weekend. It was only the second outing for our new live show but the response was very satisfying. Special thanks go to Dom Servini and Adam Scrimshaw for inviting us to play and extra special thanks to Laura and Debbie for adding their special magic to the performance. Mustn’t forget to mention Martin who created some suitably vintage Dr Who set design using bubble wrap, wood and lamps - Thankyou!
The next show should be a special one - The science fiction sound and vision extravaganza, ‘From Inner Space to Outer Space‘ at the Duke of York’s in Brighton. 60’s TV series screenings, 16mm projections, multi projector lightshow, Laura J Martin, The Simonsound (with Debbie Clare and Laura J Martin), DJ Format psych and obscurities set!!!!
Images taken by Curtis James at Not The Kinda Cool You’re Looking For
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The Simonsound newsletter – Nov 2010-10-22
GRAB YOUR 3D GLASSES AND LOOK INTO THE FUTURE - then read our newsletter!
Hello Earthlings! We have lots of exciting Simonsound news to tell you about but first of all we’d like to say thank you to everyone that has supported The Simonsound by buying the album, writing about it and spreading the word. We really appreciate it.
News
Apart from a successful first live show at the legendary Pizza Express Jazz Club in Soho, things have been a little quiet of late, but behind the scenes there has been much fevered activity. We’ve been busy preparing our new live show (see below) working on a Simonsound track for the new DJ Format album, remixing a track for Laura J Martin as well as writing new material.
Tee Shirts
We have now got high quality hand screen printed Simonsound tee shirts in stock, featuring the album artwork by Emily Macaulay. Printed on high quality Fruit of the Loom tee-shirts, these are much more than your average band tee! Go to our website to order or pick one up at one of our shows (see below).
It’s 1984 on Mars – Free download
Fans of classic electro prepare for a treat.
At the start of the year we created a medley of It’s Just Begun and Tour de Mars, travelling in the time machine from the late 60’s Switched On sound to the 80’s drum machine era and mixing a selection of our favourite electro beats. The medley was originally created for our appearance on Gilles Petersons BBC Radio 1 show earlier this year and we are now making it available as a free download, with super futuristic 3D artwork by Mr. Krum at Cold Rock Stuff. Get it here.
See a video of DJ Food playing ‘It’s 1984 on Mars’ at the Do-Over in LA.
Call it an early Christmas present and a way of celebrating our new live show! Which brings us nicely on to…..
Shows
We’ve got a few live shows planned over the next month and more to come next year. Featuring the super cosmic mix of synthesiser, space echo, tape loops, Debbie Clare on vocals and Laura J Martin on vocals, Flute and Mandolin; the addition of spaced out visual projections will be enough to blow the mind of even the most cosmic of space cadets anywhere in this Galaxy.
27th November – Wah Wah Live with The Unabombers, Quantic, Florian Keller, The Simonsound, The Hackney Colliery Band and Stac. The Scala, London
10th December – From Inner Space to Outer Space with Laura J Martin, DJ Format (pysch and obscurities DJ set), screenings of trippy 60’s TV series UFO, 60’s space exploration films and live multi projector light show. The Duke of York’s Cinema, Brighton. Tickets.
18th December – Brownswood Records Christmas Party. Gilles Peterson, Mosca, The Simonsound, The 2 Bears and Ghost Poet. XOYO, London. Tickets.
For more up to date listings and details -
‘The New Sound of Music’ is a 1979 BBC TV programme that looks at the history of recorded music from Barrel Organs right up to computer controlled synthesisers courtesy of EMS. There is lots of amazing material here, most of which is filmed at the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, including demonstrations of music concrete using tape editing techniques, Malcom Clarke demonstrating the EMS Synthi 100, Dick Mills creating Dr Who sound fx using the EMS VCS3, and David Vorhaus demonstrating his MANIAC and Kaleidophon inventions.
There are 4 parts so make sure you check them all out.
Its a great time to stock up on electronic music inspired tee-shirts. Our hand screen printed ‘Reverse Engineering’ tee’s produced by Dan at Another Fine Mesh are now available to order from our website, and Chalk Brighton have fantastic Moog Tee-shirts designed by DJ Food/Strictly Kev for sale. The tee features the classic Moog/Dick Hyman/futuristic typeface made up of 100’s of artists that have used the iconic Moog synthesiser (including us!). Go and order one now!
Photo’s from the Pizza Express Jazz Club, Soho. New Generation Music hosted by Nick Luscombe. It was the first outing for the new Simonsound live show with Debbie Clare and Laura J Martin. More gigs coming soon. Nov 21st - Orange Rooms, Southampton. Nov 27th - Scala, London. Dec 10th - Duke of York’s, Brighton.
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