THIS LITTLE UNDERGROUND
Anna Mikhailova, Rat Bastard, SSLOTS, The Gallery at Avalon Island, May 15
Anna Mikhailova at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
Noise was the spotlight of the latest edition of the vanguard In-Between Series featuring two notable out-of-town artists: Rat Bastard and Anna Mikhailova. There are multimedia artists and there is Anna Mikhailova. She’s an experimentalist who expresses in practically every medium imaginable. Some of these include music, voice, performance art and stage design – all of it fiercely modern. And Rat Bastard is, of course, the infamous noise music icon from Miami and the father of the International Noise Conference.
Anna Mikhailova at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
Despite her sprawling artistic repertoire, Mikhailova is no tourist when it comes to noise. Her means and method are advanced and deeper in craft than most. Beyond just basic digital impressionism, her performance employs lots of singular handmade instruments that involve odd non-musical objects arranged and bent in electronically mystical ways, works of art themselves. And she blends the babel with spoken word, adding drama and humanity.
Anna Mikhailova at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
Anna Mikhailova at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
Anna Mikhailova at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
Befitting his legend, Rat Bastard’s rig was also incredibly original, involving a series of motion sensors in front to trigger sound and light. And particularly apropos to the occasion, his set sounded like the in-between static of lost radio transmissions, only cranked up, made primary and wielded into a vortex with its own will.
Rat Bastard at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
Rat Bastard at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
Rat Bastard at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
Rat Bastard at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
But, really, goddamned LMFAO could’ve been the headliner and I still would’ve turned out just to see berserk Orlando percussion hive SSLOTS, a drum corps more indebted to noise than any conventional rhythm theory.
SSLOTS at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
SSLOTS at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
SSLOTS at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
SSLOTS at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
As an almost entirely improvisational group, truly no two shows of theirs are alike. Consistency and predictability are in neither their modus operandi nor their mission. I’ve seen them perform in all manner of arrangement and the result is always savage art.
SSLOTS at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
This time, they spread out with a fully armed drummer occupying each of the four corners of the room. The effect was live quadraphonic sound without any speakers. At least that’s how they started out.
SSLOTS at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
SSLOTS at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
As their sonic convergence grew, the players gradually migrated toward a physical nucleus at the gallery’s storefront, piece by drum piece, all without a pause. What began as wild individual voices communicating got exponentially wild, became cumulative, and ended up a collective beast.
SSLOTS at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
SSLOTS at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
SSLOTS at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
SSLOTS at the In-Between Series Credit: Liv Jonse
These guys are more animal than Animal.
Together, the SSLOTS experience is a rhythm voyage that turns ensemble extempore performance into an organism and is pure, unchained dynamism in motion. Don’t fucking dare call them a drum circle.
