WEIRDSTOCK 2009

We love music and the arts and support DIY initiatives so it should come as no surprise that we are plugging the 40th Anniversary of the Woodstock Music, Arts and Culture weekend. Here in Boston, things are just a little different... Weirdstock is a three-day long exploration of the arts in Cambridge. Weirdstock will feature 50 experimental acts from different parts of New England and beyond!

The whole thing is being brought to you by Whitehaus Family Record, a very cool do-it-yourself arts collective/record label/venue based out of Boston's Jamaica Plain neighborhoods.

FRIDAY AUGUST 14 - Boston's Jacob Mashak is the most far-out composer you don’t know yet. This Avant-Guardian is a master of toying with the toy piano. Past performances have included hair-cutting, disassembled recorders, as well as an eleven hour Beatles inspired composition for two pianos. Forbes Graham is also from Boston. He's a master of trumpet technique extension extreme. Forbes is a blessed solo instrumenterpretator and lucky r those who bear witness. Northampton, MA's George Myers (of Breaking World Records/Greyskull) will give up some slow heavy beats mangled and untangled in a mush of electronics! Friday night will see Boston's own Skeletons Out, a drone duo (featuring Howard Stelzer and Jay Sullivan) take the stage. Expect sSparse, aural landscapes awash in tape fuzz. Truman Peyote (Boston) will offer up samplerdelica and swirling synth explorations. Their new material is on "Light Lightning" available on Whitehaus Family Record. From Brooklyn, we expect some heady jams from Behavior - a fresh psych outfit. White Limousine and Impatient Truck want to keep everybody on the dancefloor. During their set expect techno beats set to keep people dancing. Harry Merry (from the Netherlands) will entertain with his fully-actualized brand of bizarro-pop. From Ridgewood, NJ, Julian Lynch plays warm lo-fi dreamcore music . Get peaced out to his stuff! Providence's Mudboy will host a dub set with fog machines, home built keyboards, circuits brain mush. Closing out Friday night are Keith Fullerton Whitman (Boston) and Geoff Mullen (Providence) - both are analog architects of the highest order.

SATURDAY AUG 15 - Grass Tower from Vermont present a most strange blend of described "diabolic motorcycle engine riffs reverberating through a dank, musty haze." Dick Heaven (from NY) will give us bizarropop karaoke, drippy saxophone solos. The Psych Fam (Boston) are a newly arrived psychedelic-improv super group from Newton w/ members of Truman Peyote, Dropa and others. Boston's Casey Rocheteau is a poet/sound artist specializing in "Schpokin’ Werd." The Great Valley are Peter Pan’s favorite late night alarm clock radio band. The Invisible Circle (Brooklyn) present oboe and casiotone drone, deeply blown out balkan snake charmer jams. The Hard Nips from Brooklyn are an all-girl japanese garage rock freak-out fun-fest! Burlington, VT's Tooth Ache hooks the crowd up with ill beats and synthy layers back beautiful/spooky vox. Vermont's Son of Salami/Psychic Vagina is Burlington’s legendary weird dude around town. Joey Pizza is king of damaged cassette pop karaoke. (ex Nose Bleed Island.) Post-New Age act Many Mansions setup a vibe-filled wonderland - expect spaced out revelations, sonic mediation and dance. Providence's Eat Cloud (former Boston) are a modern electronic ambient act complete with lap steel solos and lots of sonic meanderings! Guatemala City (Boston) present spastic hip-hop drums over glitchy sample beats. A serious party jammer! Northampton's Lord Jeff are "garagey-psychfolk-weirdobeardos" whose music that is so easy to get lost in. Newly born Quilt from Boston are students of reverb and are expect to churn out some gnarly grooves. Tempera from Portland, ME, will present improvised sonic excursions, swirling mantras, celestial vibrations. From the Portland label "L’animaux Tryst." Also from Maine, White Light are a "drifting cloud of pychedelic friendliness." (Honestly, that's what they told us.) Sore Eors from CT will demo bedroom-crafted Dreamtime pop songs for those busy being born. (Their "Second Chants” LP available on SHDWPLY records.) Kurt Weisman (Vermont) makes fanciful, minstrel music from another dimension. (Check out his album “Spiritual Sci-fi” on Important Records.) Burlington, VT's Harmonizer are a creative duo featuring drone wizards Greg Davis and Tobey Aronson. Boston's own Dreamhouse are set to devastate the audience on the dancefloor.

SUNDAY AUG 16 - Boston Concord Ballet are a kraut-rock inspired local supergroup that is complete like salty honey. Ppallmm present are electronic and repetition oriented. Fractillian (Boston, MA) present shamanic chanting, deep droning, spell-casting, vision questing, third-eye exploding music. Ming Ming Dance Company (Boston) beat up drum machines and thrashed synths. Richmond, VA's Sacred Harp show off inspired folk jams and sitar excursions. Boston's Metal and Glass are a drone sound initiative with bowed symbols and deep sea microtone exploration w/ Jaques Cousteau’s underwater glass-sound archive. Land and sky will also be represented. Providence's Omnivore give up five-layer loop tracks sung through old telephones providing eerie goosebump harmonies. Duck That (Boston) present jazz broken up into bits - like "poultry processing". Robert Stillman from Portland, ME, provides performances that range from one-man-band, tape-based sound collage, live accompaniment of silent archive footage, to full ensemble events. Boston's Goat of Arms are a girl/girl accordion/drum duo. (They play wonderfully charming minimal, slightly foreign sounding tunes.” –Anti-Gravity Bunny.) Portland's Cursillistas are an enchanting weird Americana act from Portland’s L’animaux Tryst label. The Human Hairs are a free jazz duo with vocals only! Ricardo Donoso (Boston, MA) is a composer, percussionist and electronic musician from Brazil, but currently residing in Boston. (Ricardo is also sole proprietor of the Semata Productions imprint and event organizing collective which he curates and oversees.) Cave Bears (Turners Falls, MA) are an ambient music adventure waiting to happen. Here it is! Peace, Loving are a whitehaus supergroup based around what is now. Expect a reinterpreted Woodstock VHS experience as a follow up to their Remixed Star Trek Stimulation. Boston's Brian Ellis is one of the city’s hardest working poets, and an entertainer down to the bone. (Check out his book published by Write Bloody Publishing and his upcoming fall tour.) QFWFQ of Portland is the work of composer and sound artist Andrea Pensado teamed up with digital artist Greg Kowalski in Krakow, Poland. Their work often involves the use of sensors and/or motion tracking devices. They moved to the US after having lived 5 years in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Boston's Animal Hospital is really just Kevin Micah (local master of the loop pedal.) Songs start with a simple looping beat and blossom into dense layers of tasteful riffage, all of which he executes with immaculate precision. Devil Music (Boston) is the work of Weirdstock composer Brendan Woo.

WEIRDSTOCK August 14-16
Cambridge's YMCA Theater

Ticketing / Times / More Info
Whitehaus Family Record