Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Shogun Kunitoki in Helsinki



3/4/09: After the Chip Tune workshop, I headed back to the centre of Helsinki to meet some friends, to go to the Get Busy club event that spanned the Tavastia and Semifinal venues. We saw a great set by Vuk, who had the coolest stoner-metal dude drummer any of us had ever seen. Caught a few other bands too, before Ed Banger's Busy P played a theatrical, crowd-pleasing DJ set, and the weaker few amongst us fled into the night to catch the 03:00 bus back to Lahti (the dozing Irish next to me sleep-cursing the whole way). But earlier in the evening, I slipped away to the Pixelache clubnight at nearby Dubrovnik, to catch an amazing set by Fonal Record's Shogun Kunitoki. They play determinedly analogue music, hypnotic, propulsive, dreamy psych-kraut. And I may not have seen the aurora borealis whilst in Finland, but I'm pretty sure I heard some slow-falling whistlers during their set. The percussionist was also responsible for a Super-8 projector, which created a small intense square of scratchy, blurry focus on the rear wall, the projector's beam carving an elegant arc through the darkness. It was actually incredible just to watch the looped film spinning on the projector, apparently hovering, only just held there by its speed and buffeted by the hot air from the machine. As the music reached its climax, the loop was jammed, causing a brilliant burn-hole to bubble and grow from the centre of the image, a beautiful end to an unforgettable set.


                     

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