10. THE PATH ILLUMINATED This year marks the tenth edition of Le Guess Who? - in festival years, a coming of age of sorts. We stand for a moment on both sides of the mirror, reaching even further into what’s ahead while bringing the entire family along to celebrate. We began only with the determination to share the music which touched us the most, and the conviction that surely in the wider world there must be much, much more. Every new year, this path is further lit by the procession of incredible talent that graces this city, until now more than ever our purpose is revealed. In this circle is cast a spectrum of sound in which all manners of interpretation are possible. And obsessively we seek to go deeper. Include more. Widen the circle. Four guest curators push this year’s program to our most diverse ever. Wilco, an inspiration to us since the ‘95 release of AM, usher in a line-up culled of 30 years of loving and making music of all types. Bookends, Savages and Suuns map the outer reaches of all things urgent in synth-based electronic and avant rock; and Julia Holter surfs time and space to assay the most intimate sides of minimalism.
A testament to collaboration, Junun, (with Shye Ben Tzur, Jonny Greenwood and the Rajasthan Express), as well as Ethiopia’s Fendika plus Dutch punk band The Ex, combine cross-cultural styles for pervasive and truly original sounds, not to be missed. Visionary vocal greats of free jazz and Brazilian samba, respectively, Patty Waters and Elza Soares literally hold court with a mile of recordings between them. And our ultimate retro short-list: a blessed reprise of Digable Planets plus Dinosaur-freaking-Jr! Ten years worth of thanks is impossible to print. But at least a few cannot go without saying. To the countless artists and musicians we’ve had the pleasure of hosting these ten years; to our featured artist Joseph Yarmush for capturing the image that so perfectly conveys the conduit of color and sound that has become our manifesto. And finally to the growing and dedicated audience that truly make this circuit complete. This one is for you! Here’s to ten more! - Le Guess Who? Team
PREPARE TO BE ENCHANTED The historical inner city of Utrecht is generally known for its beauty - it’s a real architectonic treasure chest. Every year, by midNovember, a musical counterpart is added. A treasure-chest filled with surprising, sometimes even shocking music. Music with, as the insiders say, ‘the focus firmly on the more experimental, avantgarde end of the spectrum’. Not a daily listening for even the most discriminating of music lovers. But, for just this reason, even more loved by them. There can be no doubt that during Le Guess Who? 2016, in TivoliVredenburg and surroundings, new and distant musical boundaries will be explored - and crossed.
Neither can there be any doubt that thousands of congenial music lovers from all over the world will be enchanted. Big chance that you are one of them. Welcome to Utrecht and... for the treasure chest’s contents, just see this programme guide, which makes you even better prepared to be enchanted. Jan van Zanen Mayor of Utrecht
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INDEX 05: 06: 08: 10: 83: 84: 86: 87: 90: 91:
TICKETS & INFO FESTIVAL MAP VENUES ARTIST BIOGRAPHIES PHOTO EXHIBITION BY JURI HIENSCH 5 YEARS OF LE MINI WHO? LE BAZARRE LE GIG POSTER? + LE FEAST PARTNERS BEHIND THE SCENES AT LGW
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TICKETS & INFO TICKETS & INFO + WRISTBAND PICKUP
TIMETABLES AND PROGRAM GUIDE
Our Ticket & Info Area is located in TivoliVredenburg, right next to Utrecht central station. To ensure entrance to the festival venues, you need to exchange your ticket for a wristband here. Please note: you can not pick up your wristband at other festival venues.
Printed timetables and our Utrecht Treasure Guide are available at the Ticket & Info Area. Although we try to offer you the best up-to-date information, info on all printed matter is subject to change. For the latest updates, please visit leguesswho.com, or keep an eye on our Twitter: @LEGUESSWHO Hashtag: #LGW16 Opening hours Ticket & Info Area at TivoliVredenburg: THURSDAY: 17:00 - 00:00 FRIDAY: 17:00 - 00:00 SATURDAY: 17:00 - 00:00 SUNDAY: 12:00 - 21:00
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Lucasb rug
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VENUES 1. TivoliVredenburg 2. EKKO 3. Moira 4. ACU 5. RASA 6. Janskerk 7. Stadsschouwburg 8. Theater Kikker 9. Leeuwenbergh 10. Louis Hartlooper Complex 11. De Helling 12. LE:EN 13. dB’s
TICKETS & INFO AREA TivoliVredenburg Vredenburgkade 11 Please keep in mind that all venues have limited capacity. Make sure to be on time if you want to get in. Some performances may be very loud. Please provide your own earplugs or get them at venues like TivoliVredenburg, De Helling or EKKO.
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Vredenburgkade 11 Bemuurde Weerd Westzijde 3 Wolvenstraat 10 Voorstraat 71 Pauwstraat 13A Janskerkhof 26 Lucasbolwerk 24 Ganzenmarkt 14 Servaasbolwerk 1A Tolsteegbrug 1 Helling 7 Heuveloord 140 Cab-Rondom 100
Mega Record & CD Fair November 12 & 13 Jaarbeurs, Utrecht
- 500 Dealers from all over the World - Special Guest Clinton Heylin - Dutch Punk Reunion - Live Omega Auction - Prince Exhibit
pre sale | dealers list | plan of the fair etc.
WWW.RECORDPLANET.NL
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75 DOLLAR BILL Curated by Wilco Utilizing makeshift instrumentation and unorthodox setups, experimental duo 75 Dollar Bill translate Moorish motifs into chaotic noise workouts, unleashing an aural art-punk, space-jazz & Arabic blues riptide that defies explanation. Percussionist Rick Brown and guitarist Che Chen have a penchant for busking on streets and in DIY-spaces, allowing their surroundings to infuse recordings and performances with special characteristics.
A DEAD FOREST INDEX Curated by Savages Formed by Kiwi brothers Adam and Sam Sherry, A Dead Forest Index writes lush, delicate avant-pop dirges that tenuously drift between bloom and decay. Debut LP All That Drifts From Summit Down persistently holds the listener hostage on the brim of the moment, whether it’s by means of minimalistic restraint or simmering guitar riptides. A Dead Forest Index warrants an arresting and haunting listening experience, operating on a wavelength akin to PJ Harvey, Scott Walker and Low.
ADRIAN YOUNGE Musician and philanthropist Adrian Younge passionately embraces time-honored ideals in the fields of recording and producing. Best known for scoring Blaxploitation-spoof Black Dynamite, Younge revitalizes the erstwhile sounds that made the golden age of hip hop essentially a towering beacon for rediscovering lost music. You’ll be hard-pressed to find an artist or producer who matches Younge’s singular skillset and zealous work ethic.
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ÁINE O’DWYER Curated by Julia Holter Áine O’Dwyer is a vocalist, musician, improviser, composer, performer and visual artist. In recent years, the pipe organ has become an integral site for her experimentation. The forthcoming album Gallarais experiments with acoustic decay, and was developed during her self-made residency at the Brunel tunnel shaft, London. All three releases celebrate her interests in found spaces, acoustic phenomena, listening and the search for alternative scores through a combined use of instruments, drawings, space, time, memory and the body.
ALESSANDRO CORTINI Curated by Suuns When an icon like Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor gives you carte blanche within his own artistic vision, you know said person is cut from a special type of cloth. Indeed, Alessandro Cortini is a compelling case study in the interaction between vintage electronic hardware and human beings. Like some wide-eyed archeologist, Cortini’s wafted compositions demonstrate the full emotive breadth of modular synths, monophonic analogue synths and, of course, the extremely rare Buchla Music Easel.
Alessandro Cortini
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AMBER ARCADES Le Guess Who? marks a triumphant homecoming gig for Amber Arcades, the dream pop outfit led by Utrecht-based musician Annelotte de Graaf. Debut LP Fading Lines has ten swooping, incandescent tunes recorded with Ben Greenberg (The Men) and members of Quilt and Real Estate. De Graaf’s lilting vocals put a mirage-like spell on the listener, as her band propels her personal ruminations on an uplifting sun-drenched treadmill.
ANNA VON HAUSSWOLFF Singer/composer Anna Von Hausswolff’s arcane and moonstricken avant-pop is so consistently gripping and dramatic, the heart regularly skips a beat in anticipation of the next note. Her monumental masterpiece The Miraculous puts its grandiose title to shame with its immense sonic scope. Here’s the kicker: the album was recorded on The Acusticum, one of the largest, most comprehensive pipe organs on the planet.
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ARISTOPHANES The baffling ways Taiwanese MC Aristophanes intersects hip hop, glitchtronica and footwork could perhaps be the least baffling aspect of her overall artistry. If a renowned producer and musician like Grimes gravitates towards you to collaborate on a hit song (SCREAM), there must be a whole lot more going on. Pin it on her incredibly fluent, helter-skelter Mandarin flow, bookish qualities, fierce politically-charged narratives and unique worldview, but the answer remains the same: Aristophanes is the only one of her kind.
ARNOLD DREYBLATT Curated by Wilco
rightful spot in the pantheon of New York composers. Like his peers, the Berlin-based Dreyblatt reimagines the interactions between the aural and physical world with new and modified instruments, sound installations and workshops.
BAMBARA If you’re big fan of the corrosive flail of The Jesus Lizard, the vitriolic sneer of The Birthday Party and the blighted ambience of early Swans, get a load of Brooklyn’s Bambara. This takeno-prisoners trio hauls the listener through all kinds of discomfiting places, ranging from eerie disembodied calms, skulking post-punk malaises and bloodshot noise-exertions.
Arnold Dreyblatt, who studied with the likes of Pauline Oliveros, La Monte Young and Alvin Lucier, is often considered the most ‘rock-oriented’ of the American minimalists. Dreyblatt’s cerebral approach to performance, technique and sonority earned him his LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE 13
BARST Consouling Sounds Bart Desmet has been called a “one man transcendental atmospheric black shoegaze math noise drone orchestra”. Since that’s quite the mouthful, his more succinct moniker BARST will suffice. A BARST performance does encompass many things however: a ceaseless metamorphosis of experimental and sonorous juxtapositions that plug into the imagination. Desmet loves to juggle with different line-ups and set-ups, keeping things fresh and unpredictable for both audience and performers alike.
BASSEKOU KOUYATÉ & NGONI BA Curated by Wilco Uncut Magazine called Grammy-nominated Mali-based musician Bassekou Kouyaté the Jimi Hendrix of the ngoni, an ancient string instrument often described as the West-African equivalent to the banjo. As his prowess of the ngoni remains strongly rooted in regional traditions, Kouyaté and his mighty ensemble Ngoni Ba defiantly apply Pan-African and Western standards as stepping stones on landmark albums like Jama Ko and Ba Power.
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Photo: Jens Schwarz
BEAK> Curated by Savages BEAK> is the all-out sonic sanctuary of Bristollians Geoff Barrow (Portishead, Invada Records), Bill Fuller and Will Young, three astute, welltraveled souls sparked by the venturesome spirit of Can. Like their forebears, BEAK> serve up a smorgasbord of malformed soundscapes and prowling noise workouts, skipping base on their evolved tastes with the abandon of gleeful youngsters raiding their parents’ record collection.
THE BLACK HEART REBELLION Consouling Sounds Belgium’s The Black Heart Rebellion molded their ardent hardcore-ethos into infernal doomsday folk in the spirit of Wovenhand and Angels Of Light. By employing a wide range of instrumentation, TBHR’s songs often have a brooding, almost symphonic quality to them. That being said, the band still embraces its hardcore
roots to the fullest, and the inherently fiery propulsion of that music often rears its head to devastating effect during their suspenseful live shows.
BLACK MOUNTAIN Black Mountain is back with a vengeance. Over the past six years, the Vancouverians sought out new projects, ranging from Stephen McBean’s sister band Pink Mountaintops to Joshua Wells and Amber Webber’s synth-pop outfit Lightning Dust. Turns out all that artistic soulsearching amounted to arguably Black Mountain’s finest effort yet. IV is like that rare reboot that outshines the original: an all-out exercise in quixotic prog transits, cosmic rock ‘n’ roll and turnpike balladry, only just that wee bit more refined.
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BO NINGEN Curated by Savages If you prefer your alternative rock supercharged and mad as a box of cats, look no further than London-based, Japanese-bred bizarro-punks Bo Ningen, who never fail to impress. This enigmatic bunch subjects post-punk, noise rock and heavy metal to the laws of cartoon physics, putting on electrifying performances that shred sanity into tiny smithereens.
BRIAN CASE Curated by Suuns Brian Case’s (Disappears) debut solo album Tense Nature sees him focus his work on space, minimalism and repetition. The songs are all built around the idea of tape loops or lock grooves, working with snippets and phrases of sound. The result of his experiment is twelve primarily electronic, abstract, visceral, ambient tracks, depicting a dark environment, an uncanny landscape with its own contained world.
BRIGID MAE POWER Brigid Mae Power’s majestic drone folk melodies arise so naturally from rigid song structures, it’s like watching tiny strands of weeds peer through the tiles of some abandoned monastery. In producer Peter Broderick’s hands, even her more confessional piano-based ballads dissolve like ambient soundscapes that constantly ebb and flow. The music takes on an upward trajectory out of its own, with Power grounding it with her raw emotion as she chooses.
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19 nov The Heavy 29 nov Theo C r o k er 3 0 n ov Joan As Police Woman & B en ja min Lazar Davis 2 dec Terz ij d e H or d e G G U : L L Kj eld 9 d ec S c H o ol b o y Q 10 d ec Remy van Kesteren 1 1 d e c L u b o m y r M e l n y k 11 dec M b o n g w a n a S ta r 1 5 ja n Avish a i c o h e n (trumpet) & M a r k G u i l i a n a 28 ja n The Flaming Lips 28 jan Vaudou Game 29 jan Con or Ober s t 9 feb Lambchop 19 mrt Ame nra A f te rlife
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Broeder Dieleman
BROEDER DIELEMAN Prolific Dutch musician broeder Dieleman carved out a niche with his own mystic spin on native “polder folk”. Still and all, Dieleman’s musical range and curiosity reach far beyond the whole rustic balladeer-with-a-guitar shtick. Third LP Uut de bron is an intriguing collage of field recordings, fragments of song and visuals informed by secular Zeelandic culture and geography. Dieleman’s drone performance at Le Guess Who? is an ode to the creeks of his native Zeelandic-Flanders. Visuals by Eduard Walhout.
THE CAIRO GANG Curated by Wilco The Cairo Gang’s Emmett Kelly has been a quiet yet vital creative force to a host of records and ensembles, including Will Oldham, Angel Olsen and Ty Segall. He has been so prolific in fact, that his own brilliant vehicle The Cairo Gang feels perennially overlooked. All the more reason to fall head over heels for Kelly’s incisive, Rickenbacker-twanged pop magnetism. Kelly will be playing a solo show at Le Guess Who?.
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CANSHAKER PI Amsterdam-based quartet Canshaker Pi’s inflammable brand of indie rock is a gleeful, albeit high-stakes affair. This mischievous bunch voluntarily allows the anxious friction in their music to boil over, until it irrevocably submits to the kneejerk enthusiasm that makes them tick. Not surprisingly, indie rock’s chief slacker-savant, Pavement’s Stephen Malkmus, took a shine on Canshaker Pi’s noise pop haphazardry, co-helming the group’s debut full-length LP.
CATE LE BON To avoid the oxymoron of comparing outsider artists to the likes of Don Van Vliet and Syd Barrett: Cate Le Bon inhabits her individual sense of weird just as brilliantly as the two aforementioned. The Welsh musician/songwriter makes a living meandering across pop music’s uncharted shores much like the sea creature dubbed on latest LP Crab Day. The album has garnered well-deserved critical
praise with its gobbledygook lyrical whims and erratic postpunk takeoffs.
CHARNIA Consouling Sounds Hailing from the muddy plains of Belgium’s Waasland, Charnia brings forth an ambient post-metal dirge which – at designated moments – sequesters hushed, contemplative beauty as well. Few heavy-melodic peers have such fine-drawn mastery over ambience and atmospherics as Charnia, who are able to soothe and genuinely move with reflective slowcore flourishes, gradually escalating towards allout barrages of massive sound.
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CHVE By the end of 2015, Colin H. Van Eeckhout, aka CHVE, made quite an impression with heady debut LP Rasa. Best known for his work with post-metal dissidents Amenra, Van Eeckhout’s solo offerings take quite a different turn, both musically and stylistically. Instead of the usual brute primal force and walls of sound, CHVE lingers in introspective but foreboding calms, utilizing voice, hurdy gurdy and bodhran. That said, even in his most tranquil state, Van Eeckhout strikes with devastating and brutal honesty.
CIRCUIT DES YEUX Curated by Julia Holter When listening to Circuit Des Yeux’s deeply passionate opus In Plain Speech, it almost feels like you’re having an intimate dialogue with someone. As the smouldering orchestral dramatics and anxious noise fragments transfix the listener into a daze, Haley Fohr’s disarming and yearnful vibrato strikes with crude reassurance, almost like this physical burst of energy.
CLUB GUY & RONI PRESENTS: HAPPINESS Those who’ve seen Todd Solondz’s zany black comedy Happiness would do well to catch dance ensemble Club Guy & Roni’s equally absurd performance by the same name. Together with the musicians of Slagwerk Den Haag – led by Frank Wienk, who debuted his Binkbeats-project at Le Guess Who? in 2014 – this performance explores prurient behavior and acts of voyeurism through the lense of slightly less-than-hunky dory individuals. Club Guy & Roni give the premise of Happiness a 21st century update, exploring the standoff between one’s human and virtual self.
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CONTAINER
THE COMET IS COMING
Curated by Savages
While their ominous band name may fool you, The Comet Is Coming truly is an all-out joyous exposition. The mighty trinity of King Shabaka, Danalogue The Conquerer and Betamax Killer conjure a futuristic neonglitzed space funk extravaganza. If the band’s associations with likewise genre-bending projects, specifically Sons Of Kemet, Melt Yourself Down, Sun Ra Arkestra and Mulatu Astatke, indicates something, this show’s sure to make a wholesomely awesome impact.
In breakneck fashion, Container’s goopy noise torrents and corrosive inflections pack a punch not many peers can muster. Providence-native Rob Schofield, the mastermind behind this convulsing and discombobulating techno-noise dynamo, doesn’t exactly employ kid gloves with his dilettantish take on electronic dance music. Indeed, Container sounds like some vicious monstrosity trapped inside the genre’s geometric features, frantically pounding dents in the walls.
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Deerhoof
Photo: Joe Singh
DEERHOOF Curated by Wilco San Fran’s resident Deerhoof remains one of the most bamboozling, intense and highly original bands around. Led by Japanese-born singer/bass player Satomi Matsuzaki and giddy skinsman Greg Saunier, Deerhoof’s iconoclastic, fragmented take on alternative pop knows no peers. The band’s reciprocal surges go at blistering rinseand-repeat pace, often so incredibly elusive to the ears, in fact, that it’s probably for the best to consider everything ‘part of the plan’.
DELPHINE DORA Curated by Julia Holter French artist Delphine Dora commands the familiar combination of voice and piano as if she’s resurrecting some dead language. After spending her salad says studying piano and harpsichord, Dora reawakened in her twenties as a constantly shapeshifting maverick of sound and composition. Running her own label Wild Silence, this ever-curious soul drifts through a wilderness where classical, minimalist, ambient and folk music are part of the same fabric. 22 LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE
24.11
LAS KELLIES
27.11
ROBERT ELLIS + BEN WEAVER
02.12
MARISSA NADLER
10.12
WOODIE SMALLS
11.12
FLAMINGODS
18.12
DANS DANS
23.12
CANSHAKER PI
12.02
MAGNAPOP
02.03
MITSKI
AT ACU
AT ACU
FOOD DURING LE GUESS WHO? WE SERVE THREE SEASONAL DISHES (FISH/VEGGIE/MEAT) DURING LE GUESS WHO? AND THE ONLY THING YOU HAVE TO DO IS CHOOSE, PAY €10 AND WE’LL DO THE REST. SOUNDS GOOD, RIGHT? THURSDAY TILL SUNDAY, 17H - 21H.
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CHECK EKKO.NL FOR THE ENTIRE PROGRAMME
DIE NERVEN Tumultuous German noise rock trio Die Nerven looks to unnerve, agitate and confuse till everyone is completely engulfed in the band’s indwelling madness. Consider Die Nerven Germany’s answer to fellow feral racket makers The Jesus Lizard, Big Ups and Brainiac, a band similarly owning up to its own demented quirks.
Digable Planets
DIGABLE PLANETS In the 90s, Digable Planets sampled past visionaries like Art Blakey and Curtis Mayfield to create this futuristic hybrid of jazz and hip hop. They unshackled hip hop from its repetition-based framework on debut Reachin’ (A New Refutation of Time And Space). Then on followup Blowout Comb, they employed jazz instrumentation to hip hop’s modernistic inner-city vigor. Fast-forward twenty years, and nobody came remotely close to sounding like Digable Planets, barring founder Ishmael Butler’s equally brilliant Shabazz Palaces. Guess that makes Digable Planets’ latest ‘rebirth of slick’ all the more imperative.
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DINOSAUR JR. Dinosaur Jr. is one of the first bands to successfully harmonize heavy melodic riptides with vulnerable lyricism. By doing so, they caused a shockwave in contemporary rock that’s still felt today. If surviving three decades atop the indie rock foodchain amounted to one thing, it’s the increasingly tight-knit bond between J. Mascis’s Pavlovian guitar wizardry, Lou Barlow’s steamrollin’ bass slabs and Murph’s buzzsaw-like inflections. LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE 25
DJ NIGGA FOX Curated by Suuns DJ Nigga Fox’s dizzying patchwork of tarraxinha and kizomba grooves rampantly clashes with fluorescent techno and pop productions. And frankly, the results are as joyous as they are perplexing. You know that Japanese game Katamari that makes you roll all these random objects into this giant ball of wax? DJ Nigga Fox is pretty much the musical equivalent of that: an audacious dumpster dive that leads to a gloppy candyland of booming bass inflections, warped shards of melody and knee-jerk noise-breakouts.
DON TEEL CURTIS Curated by Savages There’s next to nothing to be found on the internet about the mysterious Don Teel Curtis. You’d assume this is an extremely shy artist who simply doesn’t want to be found. The only remotely famous Don Teel Curtis is the doctor who attempted to save JFK’s life in 1963. And the 26 LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE
only snippet available is a seemingly crackpot tale of a man who wrote songs for his two mothers (on mother’s day no less). If spawning confusion is the goal, he sure as heck succeeded. But regardless, it looks like we’ll get to meet Mr. Curtis after all…
DOODCAST LIVE SPECIAL Blasting out of East London since 2009, DOODcast’s radio show spews a heavy brew of unearthed, rarely heard psychedelic gems, beautiful ditties and downright serious jams. DOODcast’s iconoclastic music tastes cover all the greats, from mod Dutch Freakbeat to the heavy fuzz-drenched sounds of Zamrock, from Turkish melancholic Psych to the erotic sounds of Indian Disco, Persian Funk, Jamaican Roots, and deep Tropical Treasures. Now the DOODcast crew leave the safety of East London and make a very rare outing to bring the ultimate weird dance party to Le Guess Who?
Drinks
Photo: Cara Robbins
DRINKS Curated by Wilco Drinks is what happens when two creative minds are struck with boredom and decide to make a break for it together. Untethered by their past sounds or internal logic, Tim Presley (White Fence) and Cate Le Bon indulge in deliciously inane avant-rock vignettes. In this galvanizing musical tête-à-tête, no stone is left unturned: peripheral post-punk, Faust’s rampant experimentalism, Syd Barrett’s cryptic absurdity, Nico’s Teutonic charm… you name it. LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE 27
DUKE GARWOOD Curated by Savages The brooding guitar licks and downcast vocal drawl of blues deconstructionist Duke Garwood emit a quiet, soul-piercing intensity. Garwood’s career arc seesawed in similarly clandestine fashion, releasing four fantastic albums in-between reputed collaborations with heavy hitters like Mark Lanegan, Savages and Archie Bronson Outfit. Latest effort Heavy Love puts the limelight squarely on Garwood’s heartfelt songwriting acumen and immense musical range, earning heaps of praise from peers and critics alike.
THE DWARFS OF EAST AGOUZA On debut LP Bes, Cairo-based trio The Dwarfs of East Agouza reimagines both Western and Eastern traditions in baffling fashion. Multi-instrumentalists Sam Shalabi, Maurice Louca and Alan Bishop conjure feverish psych-folk/space jazz mantras that sound as if they derive from some alternate timeline, one where Can formed in the Middle East to record Monster Movie on benzodiazepines.
The Dwarfs of East Agouza
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Photo: Maged Nader
ECTOPIA Curated by Savages Ectopia is an ongoing live project founded by musician Vicky Steiri (cello, vocals), performance artist Adam Christensen (vocals, accordion) and Jack Brennan (electronics). This trio’s absorbing improvisational performances seem to either augment, react to or complement outside sources. In the past, Ectopia’s music has served as a backdrop for revisionist artist Jack Smith’s color film Normal Love and as a riposte to director Carl Theodor Dreyer’s 1928 silent film The Passion of Joan of Arc.
ELYSIA CRAMPTON In cooperation with Gaudeamus Elysia Crampton is a BolivianAmerican producer, sound artist and conceptual collagist. Crampton’s work is an ambitious confluence of ideas, synthesizing multiple underrepresented histories, geographies, musical genres and cultural signifiers into addictively colorful sonic material that emanates a modern dancefloor feel. At Le Guess Who?, Crampton will present Dissolution of The Sovereign: A Time Slide Into The Future, an audio-visual play that unfolds as both DJ production and live performance. In cooperation with Gaudeamus Muziekweek. LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE 29
ELZA SOARES After eight decades of triumph and tragedy, Brazilian protest singer Elza Soares is lauded as grande dame of samba and a powerful voice against repression and injustice relating to gender, race, sexual orientation and class. For her arresting 34th album The Woman at the end of the world, Soares left her hometown of Rio de Janeiro to collaborate with key players from São Paulo’s samba sujo (‘dirty samba’) scene. Together, they made a masterpiece of 21st century Brazilian music that draws as much from avant-garde, rock, noise, jazz, soul, dub, funk as samba’s oral history. Soares’ savvy artistry has only become clearer and more innovative with age, as she pushes samba – the music that flows through her veins – in directions never imagined.
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ENTRANCE Within his signature polychromatic blues blueprint, indie shaman Guy Blakeslee courts fatalistic fever dreams, wistful emotional exorcisms and New Age gravitas. After a slew of releases under his own name helped alleviate personal demons and struggles with substance abuse, the Baltimore singer and guitarist returns under the Entrance-moniker with renewed purpose and clarity of vision.
THE EX More than three decades after their zealous plunge into the late seventies punk explosion, The Ex stand tall as one of the most forward-thinking and tireless bands on the planet. By means of fruitful collaboration and their own headstrong curiosity, The Ex embraces virtually every musical movement into their ethos: jazz, improvisation, dance music, African music, folk and orchestral sounds, and that’s just scratching the surface. At this year’s Le Guess Who? they’ll be joined on stage by Fendika.
The Ex & Fendika
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THE EX FESTIVAL
FEDERICO ALBANESE
The Ex Presents
All of us are at least somewhat familiar with the fleeting majesty of magic hour. For those lucky enough to capture the gradual transition between day and night, it always instills this sense of bewilderment. For Milan-born, Berlin-based composer Federico Albanese’s second album The Blue Hour, twilight is the visual catalyst for his tender piano-based pieces, which he adorns with benign electronic textures and icy atmospherics.
Accompanied by an eclectic cast of perennial collaborators and performers from the magnificent Circus Debre Berhan, The Ex embarks on an aural odyssey to be remembered. This three and a half hours long improv-session finds the Dutch punk savants and their friends reinvent themselves for all of us to witness. With so many different individuals sharing a single stage, one notion remains imperative: the music is always one step ahead. The Ex Festival will feature Han Bennink, Terrie Hessels, John Butcher (GB), Andy Moor, George Hadow (GB), Ken Vandermark (US), Katherina Bornefeld, Endris Hassen (ETH), Misale Legesse (ETH), Nardos Tesfaw (ETH), Melaku Belay (ETH), Zenash Tsegaye (ETH), Paal Nilssen-Love (N), Zea, Lena Hessels, Api Uiz (F), Zerfu Demissie (ETH) and Circus Debre Berhan (ETH).
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FENDIKA The Ex Presents The Ex will play at Le Guess Who? with recurrent co-performers Fendika, an exuberant dance and music ensemble that embraces both Ethiopian roots and radical punk spirit. Fendika combines traditional dance with voice, Kobera percussion and the masenko one-stringed violin with wholesome abandon, creating a joyous bonanza.
FENNESZ Curated by Wilco Noise and melody are generally considered opposites from one another. Luckily, nobody told highly influential Austrian guitarist and composer Christian Fennesz this. Instead of having distortion, static electronics and field recordings become trespassers to his phantom-like guitar progressions, astonishingly, Fennesz synthesizes and shapes them into this oddly beautiful symbiosis.
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GGU:LL Over the course of seven years, Ggu:ll (pronounced as “ghoul”) gradually evolved from noise duo to the four-piece doom metal abomination it is today. Ggu:ll’s smoldering cinderblocks of guitars, drums and growls spawn from a brisk sense of desperation. Their live shows have a physicality to them, as if you’re overwhelmed by an immense force of nature. No words or philosophies are required when a band can evoke such a potent cathartic release through sheer sonic force.
GIRL BAND Sure, there are plenty of bands who make a good racket, but Dublin’s erratic Girl Band truly are rare birds among their peers. With propulsive, jagged industrial inflections, masterful suspense-building and frontman Dara Kiely’s unhinged howl, Girl Band’s madness swings from the disturbing to the downright absurd. The group’s breakthrough LP Holding Hands 34 LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE
With Jamie permeates a sinister aura through and through, to a point where things can go haywire at the slightest prick.
GOAT Ever wondered if there’s an organic live band out there that can pull off the kind of complex, slithering sonic hijinks you’d normally hear on some Aphex Twin or Autechre record? Enter the nonconformist Japanese maestro’s of Goat, each of them exploiting the sonic properties of their respective instruments to the fullest, circumventing familiar orthodoxy into atonal throbs and stabs of abstraction.
Group A
GOOD SAD HAPPY BAD Curated by Savages It appears Good Sad Happy Bad like to keep things as mysterious as possible, offering no info other than playing “friendly heavy rock music – trippy and slow, but positive”, in what’s assumed to be a wide spectrum of sonic shapes, moods and textures. Moreover, if you happen to have a faint clue of who the genius behind this band is, you know Good Sad Happy Bad will hatch an immersive experience that’s best left untainted by preconceived notions.
GROUP A Japanese duo group A’s industrial noise/no wave cabaret is often times described as quizzical, intrusive, if not outright demonic. On stage, Sayaka Botanic (violin, tape machines) and Tommi Tokyo (vocals, synths, percussion) let their imagination run rampant with a nexus of eye-catching visuals, dadaïst poetry and strange costumes, leaving behind a startling imprint that would make even Throbbing Gristle swoon in awe.
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GUY ONE & THE POLYVERSAL SOULS Renowned Berlin-based druma-holic Max Weissenfeldt channels his awesome ability with a scholarly vigor. When he isn’t Dan Auerbach’s go-to guy behind the skins for his pop productions, Weissenfeldt avidly mingles his chops with fellow travelers from Ghana as The Polyversal Souls. At Le Guess Who? 2016, The Polyversal Souls will perform alongside Kologo-wielding Frafra-bred soul-raconteur Guy One: a joyful exercise in psychedelic jazz, homegrown reggae and afrofunk.
and fuses analogue synth-based works with a 33-piece brass orchestra as alter ego Mary Casio. Her new solo album Awake But Always Dreaming is a powerful and touching meditation on the human memory.
HANNAH PEEL Curated by Savages Whether it results in freeform or song-based material, vocalist, musician and composer Hannah Peel’s inventive talents always serve her keen creative spirit. Peel is a key member of renowned experimental indie rock outfit The Magnetic North, makes her own music boxes 36 LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE
Hannah Peel
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HEATHER LEIGH A cathartic musical release of traumatic experiences can be a beautiful, albeit soul-fracturing thing. Heather Leigh’s haunting vocals and deeply interpretive pedal steel-playing treads the wire between both of those states. Her 2015 release I Abused Animal is one of the most confronting listening experiences in years, obscuring the pedal steel’s sonic essence to abrasive, brooding and anxious states.
HEATHER WOODS BRODERICK For the past seven years, multi-instrumentalist and vocalist Heather Woods Broderick has lent her immense talents to the likes of Sharon Van Etten, Efterklang and Laura Gibson. While it’s easy to lose track of life whilst incessantly touring, the accumulated songs on Broderick’s powerful LP Glider highlight the essential landmarks of her journey. Within the album’s fleeting sonic textures and foggy, reverb-drenched reverie is a voice of compassion, yearning and warmth.
HORSE LORDS If Steve Reich had opted to become a bona fide punk rocker, he may very well sound similar to Baltimore freaksters Horse Lords. Saxophonist/percussionist Andrew Bernstein, bassist/synthesist Max Eilbacher, guitarist Owen Gardner and drummer Sam Haberman execute gripping instrumental tracks that teeter between stark minimalism and abrasive polyrhythmic noise like a predator on the cusp of attack.
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Curated by Savages
I SPEAK MACHINE
IDRIS ACKAMOOR & THE PYRAMIDS
Noisenik-outfit I Speak Machine is comprised of singer/ synth pundit Tara Busch and filmmaker Maf Lewis. Together they produce sinister soundtracks for brooding horror and sci-fi movies, paying equal mind to aural and sonic elements. The band’s MO is very much inspired by legendary spaghetti-western tandem Sergio Leone and Ennio Morricone, the shining example of how music and visuals can potentially take shape and interact in synchronicity.
In the early 70s, spiritual freejazz pilgrims Idris Ackamoor & The Pyramids sprung from the tutelage of the great Cecil Taylor. Drawing from the vast musical riches of Fela Kuti and Sun Ra, the Pyramids spearhead their futuristic jazz music with a powerful mission statement: celebrating our equality from a Pan-African center of gravity. In 2007, three decades after disbanding the Pyramids, Ackamoor and his brethren picked up right where they left off without missing a single beat.
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JACKIE LYNN Curated by Julia Holter By going incognito as Jackie Lynn, Circuit Des Yeux’s Haley Fohr pulls off the bold artistic transition from ardently passionate In Plain Speech to a seedy Bonnie & Clyde tale. And that’s not even the most surprising part. Instead of adhering to Jackie Lynn’s rather sinister guise with dark themes, Fohr shrewdly scores Jackie’s vindictive outlaw life with nimble electronic beats and warm synths.
JAMESZOO QUARTET Dutch maverick Jameszoo has that special knack for elevating stubborn experimentalism to ear-pleasing pop sensibilities. His impressive Brainfeeder debut Fool unleashes a bag of tricks that leaves the listener in a suspended state of disbelief, boldly splurging the canvas with permeating colors and textures that range from modern jazz to hip hop, R&B and heck, even classical music. Jameszoo will perform at Le Guess Who? with Frans Petter Eldh (bass), Richard Spaven (drums) and Niels Broos (synths/electronics).
JERUSALEM IN MY HEART Curated by Suuns Under the moniker of Jerusalem In My Heart, Radwan Ghazi Moumneh is a savvy employer of traditional and modern crafts alike. Lamenting buzuq mantras and pulsating electronic drones are part of the same distinctive lingo, resulting in captivating sound collages that haphazardly bleed into ambient or rhythmic surges. Exploratory music that reflects on Moumneh’s cultural heritage and place in the world.
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Jessy Lanza
Photo: Hollie Pocsai
JESSICA MOSS
JESSY LANZA
Curated by Julia Holter
Curated by Savages
Best known as a permanent creative force in Silver Mt. Zion, Jessica Moss is also a founding member of Black Ox Orkestar and a featured collaborator with some of Montreal’s best known bands and performers. As a solo artist, she harnesses both her extensive knowledge and versatile skill set in the most adventurous ways. Utilizing violins, prepared instruments and a myriad of effect pedals, she creates hypnotic, soothing and frantic sound dynamics within the framework of topical narratives.
Without question, Jessy Lanza’s Oh No is one of the finest records of the year, thriving in its offbeat lyrical charms, wobbly pinball aesthetic and nimble pop minimalism. Between the album’s lucid, simplistic miscellany of synth pop, R&B, footwork and 80s balladry, Lanza maneuvers into the voids with winsome sincerity and emotional depth. If there’s one burgeoning artist exemplar to the rapidly fading line between fringe music and pop, it’s Jessy Lanza.
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JHEREK BISCHOFF To have Jherek Bischoff’s majestic Cistern-video projected onto hundreds of LED screens on Times Square makes you stop and wonder: how does music that stems from such profound, slow-paced solitude end up being exhibited in the fastest, busiest place on earth? The renowned composer – who collaborated with the likes of David Byrne, Kronos Quartet, Evangelista and Neil Gaiman – was inspired by the natural reverb-y acoustics of this large hollow cistern, prompting him to forge exhilarating compositions that coax both performer and listener to fully immerse themselves in sound and texture.
Photo: Alex Stoddard
JLIN Curated by Suuns Suddenly out of the blue came Jlin, an Indiana-based bedroom producer who steers the overwrought sonic anatomy of footwork into an entirely different direction. While there’s still plenty of gleeful fiddling about with vocal cut-ups, samples, keyed up electronic beats and such, Jlin isn’t so much concerned with devising a propellant dance floor aesthetic. Her acclaimed LP Dark Energy thrives more on its taut narrative-based execution and darker moods to balance out footwork’s exuberant restlessness. 42 LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE
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Julia Holter
Photo: Tonje Thilesen
JOSEPHINE FOSTER Curated by Julia Holter No doubt, Josephine Foster’s music has that tasteful archaic flair. The Colorado-based songwriter utilizes folk songs, visual art and poetry as entry points to shape her own musical lingo. Over the years, Foster reimagined classical compositions and brought poems under the spell of her fluttering voice and delicate guitar strums. Latest LP No More Lamps In The Morning is a reinvigorating document of personal discovery that revisits Foster’s past recordings.
JULIA HOLTER The gifted and elusive Julia Holter drifts between intimate storytelling and impressionism like some divine astral being. Between the fluorescent avant-pop of Ekstasis, the urbane theatrics of Loud City Song and the deft, Arcadian balladry of Have You In My Wilderness, Holter’s creative outpour ceaselessly shapeshifts into something inexplicably beautiful. It’s a tremendous privilege that Holter agreed to curate a special Le Guess Who?-bill this year, featuring a cast of likewise remarkable performers. 44 LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE
JUNUN feat. SHYE BEN TZUR, JONNY GREENWOOD & THE RAJASTHAN EXPRESS Gathered inside a 15th century Mehrangarh fort, Radioheadguitarist Jonny Greenwood and Israeli composer/project overseer Shye Ben Tzur collaborated with the Rajasthan Express, musicians comprised of various factions representing North-Indian folklore: the sermonizing qawwali singers, the exuberant Manganiyar-performers and a free-form brass section. Junun is a compelling snapshot of the unprecedented musical and lingual inquiries between these vastly different lineages. Each person involved became both student and interpreter, producing an album as satisfying and inventive as you’d expect. Meditative spirit singing, upbeat raga grooves and newfangled fanfare jazz are all part of the same oral wavelength. Indeed, Junun epitomizes the eclectic sound of India in the most forward-thinking and exotic way imaginable.
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KAROLUS MAGNUS Curated by Julia Holter The Schola Cantorum Karolus Magnus from Nijmegen preserves and propagates the authentic Gregorian chant as a valuable, cultural and liturgical heritage. It draws from the achievements of the studies of early-medieval manuscripts, which were unearthed by the monks of Solesmes (France) in the 19th century. The Schola’s starting point is the semiology behind the Gregorian chant, which studies the explanation of signs (neumes) as mentioned in the manuscripts at the top of the texts. These provide little accurate information about the melodies themselves, but all the more about the rhythmics that must be practised in the singing.
Karolus Magnus
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At Le Guess Who? The Schola Cantorum Karolus Magnus will sing two pieces: The Martyred Virgins (a Gregorian memorial to female victims of violence) & Matins of Saint Lebuin (which is recorded on their new album, to be issued during Le Guess Who?).
KING CHAMPION SOUNDS King Champion Sounds is an all-out, dynamic manifestation of Ajay Saggar’s spirit of inquiry and cultured musical background. The third KCS chapter To Awake In That Heaven Of Freedom serves up a rollicking assembly of dub, post-punk, free jazz, kraut rock and spoken word vignettes. As always, is propelled by the sharp-witted snide of GW Sok. KCS host their very own night at Moira, and invited Mrs. Pilgrimm, Ab Baars and Seamus Carter for this special occasion.
KING CREOSOTE On his latest LP Astronaut Meets Appleman, King Creosote contemplates whether he decides to daze in anti-gravity or comply with grounded nostalgia. Between Isaac Newton and Neil Armstrong, mankind often moved faster than its own shadow, and likewise, the uberprolific Scotsman himself has probably forgotten more of his songs than he remembers. Which makes Astronaut Meets Appleman all the more moving, with Creosote taking a moment to ponder the gravity of now with his usual earnest delivery and wry reflections.
KLARA LEWIS Curated by Wilco Klara Lewis’ steely atmospherics are proof that abandoning familiar structures and melody can still produce a very accessible listening experience. This young talented Swedish composer is an avid collector and sculptor of sound, as well as someone with a very visual mindset. Her immersive performances merge both those qualities, taking you away from earthly pastures to gripping dreamlike abstractions.
KYOKA Curated by Wilco If Kyoka’s sample-based techno sounds completely alien to your ears, there’s a good reason why. Experimenting with tape machines from an early age has taught the Japanese-born, Berlin-based musician/ composer the intrinsic spatial quality of sound, knowledge she inventively applies to today’s state-of-the-art tech. Her gripping debut Is (Is Superpowered) shrinks the physical self into vast and immersive ambience instead of the other way around.
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LARAAJI Curated by Julia Holter A master of the zither, a laughter therapist, an actor and a new age pioneer: indeed, Edward Larry Gordon, aka Laraaji, is many, many things. By augmenting his instrument of choice with guitar effects, electronics and synthesizers, Laraaji creates lucid dreamscapes that sweep the imagination to cosmic proportions. Even Brian Eno was instantly smitten in 1979 when he caught Laraaji busking in Washington Square Park, a fortuitous encounter that led to Laraaji’s global reach.
LAUREL HALO Curated by Julia Holter While technology has always been Laurel Halo’s musical backbone, immersing in her work invites both physical and emotive impulses. Ever since releasing more her more vocalbased LP Quarantine, Halo vaulted far beyond techno music’s orthodoxies with Chances Of Rain and In Situ, creating a brilliant artifice of complex, propellant and riveting specimens of sound.
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LAU NAU Curated by Julia Holter You can’t help but be charmed by the whimsicality and picturesque beauty of Lau Nau’s work. The Finnish composer toys with melody and sound with uninhibited joy and exuberance, creating music that acts like its own ecosystem. Scurrying strings, sketchy guitar strumming and ghostly vocal loops follow their own stubborn trajectory, yet somehow manage to stay in perfect harmony.
LEE RANALDO & EL RAYO Curated by Wilco The name Lee Ranaldo is most famous for being a pivotal creative force of noise pioneers Sonic Youth. With a tireless work ethos as a soloperformer, visual artist, producer and composer, Ranaldo still likens himself as a dumbstruck, credulous student of the craft that made him a true icon of alternative rock. Latest album Electric Trim finds Ranaldo working with Spanish multi-instrumentalists Raul ‘Refree’ Fernandez and Cayo Machancoses, otherwise known as El Rayo.
LERA AUERBACH & NETHERLANDS CHAMBER CHOIR Some artists are so ridiculously gifted, they seemingly grab magic out of thin air wherever they set foot. Lera Auerbach is one of those. At Le Guess Who? 2016, the prolific Russian-born, New York-based composer will perform her majestic work 72 Angels with both the renowned Raschèr Saxophone Quartet and the Netherlands Chamber Choir. This formidable musical affair is heavily informed by the Kabbalah, a mystical Judaist school of thought that practices the connection between the physical and spiritual world.
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LES FILLES DE ILLIGHADAD Fatou Seidi Ghali and Alamnou Akrouni reside in the tiny village of Illighadad, Niger. Fatou plays the tende, and an old blue guitar, slightly bent because of the extreme weather. She is one of only two Tuareg female guitarists. Together with her cousin, vocalist Alamnou Akrouni, they strip Tuareg music from all progressive leanings, right back to its bare essence. Various Western African artists have expanded the Tuareg-blues movement on a global scale, but rarely have these soul-purging sounds resonated so candidly and emotively. This is communal music poured straight from the heart, performed to comfort the sick, to entertain the people and to blend in with the radiant ambience of the environment. Les Filles de Illighadad will play a total of three times at Le Guess Who?, marking the first time Fatou and Alamnou tour outside of their homeland.
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BELEEF
LE GUESS WHO? MET
volkskrant.nl/leguesswho
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Lonnie Holley
Photo: Tim Duffy
LJERKE
LONNIE HOLLEY
LJERKE is the Artist-inResidence of Klanklânskippen, a multidisciplinary breeding ground for experimentation. Each project features musicians from abroad to bring fresh new perspectives on Frisian geography and anthropology. LJERKE finds Frisian and Norwegian musicians and visual artists improvising various disciplines together, devising an immersive overall experience that reflects on the demise of the rural landscape, the decline of biodiversity and the homogenization of culture, the latter being an intrinsic motivation behind LJERKE.
To put it in the man’s own words: “Art is in the eye of the beholder.” For Lonnie Holley’s singular and visionary genius, this most definitely holds true. You could consider it an analogy of his own stormy lifetime, the way Holley harvests deepsixed materials and objects to create something beautiful, silly or profound. Holley’s improvisational performances and cosmic poetry are likewise once-in-a-lifetime occasions never to be repeated twice. That at the very least, deserves a thumbs-up from Mother Universe.
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LUCRECIA DALT Curated by Julia Holter Lucrecia Dalt’s recent work revolves around the ideas of repositioning fiction, time perception, scale, physics, repetition, vocoding and sound dynamics. She employs external wellsprings like German cinema and science as a prism to illuminate a variety of emotional states. Dalt explores the full sonic scope of her main instrument, the bass guitar, to generate abstract tones that prowl and contort like silhouettes of the night.
MAARJA NUUT & HENDRIK KALJUJÄRV Maarja Nuut’s work may be minimalist in nature, the Estonian composer inexplicably rises far beyond umbrella folk tropes. Nuut takes the familiar sonic palette of voice, fiddle, loops and physical sounds into an entirely new stratosphere. Her spellbinding album Une Melees (Estonian for “in the hold of the dream”) projects her compassionate and impulsive spirit onto spellbinding, tactile melody patterns. A special collaboration with Estonian electronic music composer Hendrik Kaljujärv will see Maarja’s hypnotic acoustic loops met with more edgy electronic sounds.
Maarja Nuut
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The Mandolin Sisters
THE MANDOLIN SISTERS Throughout the years, the infamous Mandolin sisters have given over two thousand concerts across India and abroad. Siblings Sreeusha and Sireesha honed a captivating, unprecedented take on classical southern Indian movements, generally referred to as Carnatic music. While the mandolin has been part of folk traditions for many, many generations, fusing its intrinsic sonics with the Carnatic doctrine happened – relatively late – in the 1980s. In other words, the Mandolin Sisters’ prodigious playing treads new ground that’s been dormant for longer than we can comprehend.
MARCHING CHURCH Curated by Suuns As Marching Church, Elias Bender Rønnenfelt appears in the guise of a self-indulgent charlatan skulking the back rooms. Full-length debut This World Is Not Enough is filled to brim with erotic tension and feral violence. Moreover, Marching Church is the rousing Iceage frontman’s love letter to soul and jazz. He accumulated a full-fledged band that elusively channels the tender grace of Percy Sledge and Duke Ellington within the music’s tortured, squalid exterior. 54 LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE
MARIE DAVIDSON Curated by Suuns Montreal-based composer, vocalist and poet Marie Davidson instills a perpetual claustrophobic unease, as if you’re floating adrift in an infinite emptiness. Her album Perte D’Identité is an intrusive cinematic journey that gravitates between these placid womb-like ambiences and frantic, earth-shattering natural disasters. Davidson’s monotonous diction acts as a faint but ethereal light source peering between the music’s murky depths.
Mario Batkovic
Photo: Rebecca Cleal
MARIO BATKOVIC Curated by Savages Mario Batkovic is a Bosnia-born, Switzerland-based accordion player and composer whose work instills a sense of unearthly wonder that continuously subverts its sometimes complex, challenging nature. Like Colin Stetson does with the saxophone, Batkovic avidly explores the full sonic scope of his instrument, from its tonal proponents to its inherent structural blemishes. Geoff Barrow (Portishead, BEAK>) became an instant fan of Batkovic’s iconoclastic approach to the accordion, slotting him on his record label Invada Records. LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE 55
MAYA DUNIETZ PLAYS EMAHOY TSEGUÉ-MARYAM GUÈBROU Curated by Julia Holter Pianist Maya Dunietz will perform pieces by Ethiopian composer Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam Guèbrou (1923). After spending three years of political imprisonment in Italy with her family, Tsegué-Maryam began studying violin in Egypt. Sadly, a promising musical career was cut short when emperor Haile Selassie denied her from leaving Ethiopia. She spent the following decades reclusively in a monastery, sporadically recording for her own pleasure: an otherworldly form of improvisation rooted in her love for classical music. After Selassie’s reign, she left Ethiopia for Jerusalem, the city where she was discovered by Dunietz, who became the primary catalyst for TseguéMaryam’s overdue success, writing songbooks, making new recordings and, of course, performing the music herself.
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MONNIK Consouling Sounds Monnik is Charnia-vocalist Thibaud Meiresone’s experimental one-man project. Meiresone creates ominoussounding minimalistic tapestries of drones, soundscapes, fragmented shards of melody and feedback. Monnik’s compelling albums Horizon and Vondeling explore boundaries of spiritual isolation, deftly treading the intermediate between cold desolate landscapes and contorted arcane fever dreams.
NADJA Since forming in 2003, Canadian noisenik-tandem Nadja released a whopping fifty-plus records worth of rampant experimentalism, submerging doom metal, avant-rock, heavy drones, folk, ambient music and classical music into unmitigated sonic abstraction. Toronto-natives Aidan Baker and Leah Buckareff have relished and thrived within
the hyperconnected DIY scenes of their adopted homebase Berlin, which ceaselessly spurs on Nadja’s appetite for artistic reinvention.
NAP EYES In the spirit of The Kinks’ mellower work, the elemental jangle pop jams of Halifax outfit Nap Eyes pleasantly meander between the mundane and profound. Nigel Chapman’s witty, self-awareness train-ofthought narratives illustrate feelings of defeatism and obliviousness without sounding sad in any way. At the center of Nap Eyes’ gauzy stripped-down tunes, Chapman evokes a keen sense of calm reflection with each hushed syllable.
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NEIL HALSTEAD Neil Halstead’s musical journey turned out to be quite the cinderella story. With seminal shoegazers Slowdive he pioneered an influential movement, until Creation Records dropped the band amidst the Britpop-storm. Then Halstead reinvented himself as an astute melodist with Mojave 3. Moreover, he crafted gorgeous introspective solo records like Palindrome Hunches and Sleeping On Roads. With Slowdive reformed again, Halstead’s versatile and headstrong acumen now shines brighter than ever.
NÉVOA Porto-based tandem Névoa’s bombshell concoction of doom metal, ambient soundscapes and neo folk elements is about as forlorn and grim as music can get. The title of their first fulllength, The Absence Of Void, aptly describes the guttural despair that anchors this music. The group’s newest record Re Un is even more monolithic than 58 LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE
its predecessor, expanding its sonic signature with ritualistic tribal inflections, psychedelic influences and traditional folk tenets. Névoa’s Le Guess Who?show will be their first outside of Portugal.
OATHBREAKER Ghent’s Oathbreaker is without question one of the most groundbreaking and fresh sounding heavy bands on the planet. The group’s high-wired fusion of hardcore and black metal defies conventional logic, especially the way they achieve sheer ferocity while still managing to sound so crystal clear and ethereal. Spearheaded by enigmatic vocalist Caro Tanghe, Oathbreaker are at the cusp of releasing their third successive LP on Deathwish Inc., the monumental Rheia.
Oathbreaker
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OLIVER COATES In cooperation with Gaudeamus As a vital cog in the string arrangements for Radiohead’s A Moon Shaped Pool and with his own fragmented masterpiece Upstepping, it’s safe to say Oliver Coates is enjoying a landmark year. Though the London-based cellist’s collaborations with Jonny Greenwood and Micah Levi are well-documented, Upstepping brings Coates’s creative vision to the forefront. Never before has the cello been utilized so astutely within the blueprint of propulsive minimal techno. To find out exactly how Coates plans to realize this live, well… seeing is believing. In cooperation with Gaudeamus Muziekweek.
ORTEGA Consouling Sounds Cavernous Groningen-based sludge metal behemoth Ortega is teemed with all kinds of heavy noise permutations. These guys poke at humankind’s darkest corners with pitch black smoke curtains 60 LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE
of guitar onslaught, the lurching, obtuse cadence of The Melvins’ heaviest work and a demonic growl that gushes from the music’s crusted surface like a smouldering cascade of molten rock.
PATRICK HIGGINS Curated by Suuns Over the years, guitarist/ composer Patrick Higgins has lent his peerless talents to New York experimental rockers Zs, composed scores for television, film and museum exhibitions and led a myriad of orchestra’s. No wonder many anoint Higgins as a vital cog in New York’s contemporary avantgarde scenes. Higgins’s album Bachanalia is arguably the most revitalizing modernistic take on Bach’s discography since Wendy Carlos’s seminal Switched On Bach.
PATTY WATERS A staple artist of radical 60s free jazz label ESP-Disk, Patty Waters’s sheer gravitas and mysticism as a vocalist charmed the likes of Miles Davis, Charles Mingus and Chick Corea. For the past decades, her influence has spread far beyond the realms of avant-garde and jazz: rock icons such as Patti Smith, Diamanda Galás, Thurston Moore and Lydia Lunch are all huge fans. Despite performing few and far between since the 70s, Waters’s tortured 14-minute interpretation of folk classic Black Is The Color Of My True Love’s Hair remains a lifetimepurging testament to the power of human expression. LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE 61
PAULINE OLIVEROS Curated by Suuns In cooperation with Gaudeamus In the comprehensive work of renowned composer and multi-instrumentalist Pauline Oliveros, music and sound aren’t separated entities, but part of the same fundamental vocabulary. From the 50s on out, Oliveros has been a highly influential figure who champions the bare essence of performing and listening. She changed the way we perceive music orally with her Deep Listening – a term she coined –, a principle that embraces all sound in its totality through hyperfocussed listening. Oliveros is also a pioneer in the field of electronic music and the synthesizing of physical music and sounds with tape machines. In cooperation with Gaudeamus Muziekweek.
Photo: Vinciane Verguethen
PETER BRODERICK For a musician as crazy prolific as he is, it never fails to amaze how Peter Broderick manages to find fresh new angles on each record he puts out. On his latest LP Partners, Broderick dissects some of John Cage’s most famous pieces to guide his own spontaneous, heartfelt artistry. Particularly moving is Up Niek Mountain, an ode to Broderick’s deceased Dutch friend Niek van den Broek, whom he met during a residency on a farm in Hilvarenbeek. 62 LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE
PHURPA Phurpa’s mastery over the most primordial of instruments, the voice, quite simply needs to be witnessed to be believed. These Russian savants, led by Alexei Tegin, bring a truly metaphysical listening experience with their dirgeful ritual chants, largely based on the preBuddhist and Bon traditions of Tibet. These vocal mantras are oftentimes referred to as “rgyud-skad” or Tantric voice, which Phurpa embellishes with traditional Tibetan instrumentation.
Phurpa
PITA Curated by Wilco Peter Rehberg is a busy guy. He runs revisionist hotbed Editions Mego (heir to renowned Vienna-label Mego), harvesting music as diverse as Oneohtrix Point Never, Stephen O’Malley and Fennesz. After more than a decade overseeing Edition Mego, Rehberg finally revived his own moniker Pita this year. New album Get In’s fractured soundscapes instill a hypnotic listening experience that examines the dynamic between systemized and improvisational forms. LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE 63
Preoccupations
PREOCCUPATIONS Calgary powerhouse Preoccupations: amorphous post-punk that sounds like either an impending clash between nature’s rampant lawlessness and the civilized world’s stark mechanics...or the festering remnants of that clash. Blistering death jams, electric shocks and harsh Canadian winters notwithstanding, Preoccupations won’t relinquish their place as spearheads of contemporary post-punk anytime soon.
QUILT Quilt’s ethereal new album Plaza bolsters their gift for flourishing psych rock, folk and dream pop with just a casual swing of the wand. Opening track Passersby sets the tone perfectly, a lament on watching strangers walk by 64 LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE
in a public space. That beautiful panoramic imagery happens to correlate nicely with Quilt’s live performances. This is a band who can stealthily soften a grand baroque elegance with a flurry of whispering sweet nothings to the ear.
RAIME When you devolve the mechanics of dub music and ambient electronica back to the stone age, you’ll get the kind of ominous and dark abstraction prevalent on Raime’s debut Quarter Turns Over A Living Line. Crude electronic beats burrow dark caverns whilst ambient sounds restlessly meander about like ectoplasmic entities. Sophomore effort Tooth sounds as if those dark caverns were excavated and exposed to a radiant crystallized landscape.
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LAS KELLIES THE WOODEN SKY DEWOLFF
JOSÉ GONZÁLEZ & THE STRING THEORY
LET’S EAT GRANDMA ROBERT ELLIS THERAPY? CUT_ + LAKSHMI
CANSHAKER PI + PIP BLOM ELEPHANT STONE WEVAL
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REBEL UP! Rebel Up! started early 2007 as a global music DJ & VJ collective, with members from Belgium and Netherlands. Comprised of DJ’s SebCat, LeBlanc & Duckfood, visual artist VJ M and graphic designers Jet & Ness, these guys are true pundits of grassroots sounds from all over the globe, ranging from ethnic or urban music, a fusion of folk, pop and electronics. At Le Guess Who?, Rebel Up cooks up a vibrant selection of unsung dancefloor bangers, incorporating interactive visuals to make the experience that much more immersive.
REPETITOR “They make you fall in love with guitar rock all over again and are arguably the best guitar band on the planet right now”, that’s punk evangelist John Robb (Louder Than War, The Membranes) take on Serbian powerhouse Repetitor. An assessment that might not be so hard to fathom. Repetitor clobbers you with the brunt force of a tank, but maneuvers with the precision and velocity of a jet fighter. New LP Gde ceš ´ sharpens the trio’s heavy-melodic, stupefying sting yet another notch.
RP BOO Curated by Suuns RP Boo jumped out of the woodwork in the mid-eighties as a member of Chicago dance collective House-O-Matic. A decade and a half later, Boo introduced a vibrant and helter-skelter amalgam of Chicago house, Detroit techno and hip hop’s cut-and-paste sampling, otherwise known as footwork. A formula that would inspire followers like DJ Rashad and the Teklife crew. After witnessing footwork’s upsurge from the sidelines, RP Boo is back behind the wheel to push the genre he invented forward once again.
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RYAN SAMBOL Even whilst embodying the headstrong spirit of Bob Dylan and James Dean, Ryan Sambol marches to his own beat with quiet selfpossession. Sambol’s razzle-dazzle songwriting smarts first surfaced with The Strange Boys, a marvelous Austin-based bunch that sounds like some forgotten relic from the American Bandstand-era. After taking a whole year off, Sambol trots along with a variety of offbeat solo endeavors, epitomizing the tumultuous creative spells he’s always been known for.
RYLEY WALKER Much like Tim Buckley’s later work, charismatic Chicago-based songsmith Ryley Walker imbues psychedelic and jazz influences into his elegant brand of folk music. His work encompasses a fascinating contrast between quaint, pastoral ambience and the restless energy of inner city life. That said, Walker’s new LP Golden Sings That Have Been Sung sounds like a definitive departure from the earthbound world towards full-blown cosmic abstraction. LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE 67
SAMUEL KERRIDGE Curated by Suuns With roots planted in the Madchester rave scene, Samuel Kerridge is perfectly content functioning in the outskirts of Berlin’s dynamic techno hub. Kerridge runs independent label/ brand Contort with his wife Hayley and releases his own downbeat brand of techno music on imprints like Downwards and Horizontal Ground. Kerridge’s music is distinguishable by its metallic cadence, feverish throbs and cauterized dark wave electronics.
Words To The Blind with Bo Ningen two years ago, it’s time to turn it up a notch. Savages are given a slice of Le Guess Who?’s ten-year anniversary with their own curated event.
SAVAGES London’s seminal post-punk outfit Savages levelled all biased human notions to their bare essence with austere debut Silence Yourself. On brooding follow-up Adore Life, Jehnny Beth, Ays˛e Hassan, Fay Milton and Gemma Thompson answered them with visceral fortitude, exploring the complexities of love and sex. After the unforgettable joint performance 68 LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE
Savages
Scott Fagan
SCOTT FAGAN
SHOPPING
For every generation-defining icon, there’s an equally impressive talent who fizzled into obscurity. Scott Fagan’s lost 60s classic South Atlantic Blues is a gorgeous synthesis of Donovanish pop, jazz, R&B and Caribbean sounds plus a grandiose vocal delivery that recalls Scott Walker and Bowie. Thanks to a series of reissues, Fagan – the biological father of Magnetic Fields’ Stephin Merritt – finally achieved recognition as a trailblazer after a wild sequence of odd flukes and footnotes. At this year’s Le Guess Who? Fagan will be performing South Atlantic Blues in full.
Curated by Wilco Shopping definitely earned DIYcreds by selling out indie debut Consumer Complaints, warranting a re-issue from FatCat Records. The London punks’ likewise awesome follow-up Why Choose earned rightful praise as well. The album title indeed begs the question why a band should have to choose between sly sloganeering and catchy-as-sin melodies. Shopping solicits the ears with seesawing bass inflections, tricksy call-andresponse chants and derelict disco beats.
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ST. FRANCIS DUO Guitarist Stephen O’Malley and drummer Steve Noble’s joint improv project St. Francis Duo naturally took flight during a soundcheck for their experimental unit Æthenor: two divine musical forces rampantly clashing with swift and hard-cutting sonic aerobatics. O’Malley’s signature heavy droning sound is the backbone of the mighty Sunn O))) and a gazillion other projects. Noble honed his own idiosyncratic skin playing by consorting with the likes of Peter Brötzmann, The Pop Group and Nigerian virtuoso drummer Elkan Ogunde.
STARA RZEKA Kuba Ziolek’s experimental project Stara Rzeka is championed by The Quietus for good reason. Frankly, we’ve never heard such a wondrously unique blend of avant-folk, electronic drones, prog rock and ambient jazz. The broad emotional and sonic scope of Ziolek’s work veers restlessly between soothing and sinister, always keeping the listener on heed. From a staple artist of exciting Polish indie label Instant Classic, home to stellar homegrown acts like Innercity Ensemble and Zlota Jesien, you’d expect nothing less.
STEVE GUNN Curated by Wilco Making a point about the number of influences in music becomes arbitrary once you hear a Steve Gunn record. Gunn’s refined flourishes of folk, jazz and psych rock jams all come as second nature, encompassing the inherent beauty of a landscape rather than its intricate dynamics. His latest gem Eyes On The Lines is the perfect record for the road. A calm, meditative journey towards unknown horizons, driven by the spirit of inquiry.
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31 March — 2 April 2017
Early Birds now on sale: www.rewirefestival.nl
24 NOV
26 NOV
03 DEC 11 DEC 10 FEB 18 MRT
NOISIA - 'OUTER EDGES' DRUM015: SOLARIS + VAULT + ALBERT VAN ABBE MYSTIC BRAVES A GIANT DOG CHATHAM COUNTY LINE AMENRA (AFTERLIFE ACOUSTIC) voor het complete programma en locaties: LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE 71 www.effenaar.nl
SUUNS Whereas many bands chase ambition by tackling a grander scope of things, Montreal-based art rockers Suuns thrive as a more selfcontained unit. Their inverted take on rock is emphasized by restraint and personal progress. Latest LP Hold/Still turns the screws tighter than ever, forging an often unnerving listening experience that explores the most visceral of human impulses. As a staple artist of Le Guess Who?, Suuns’ splendid body of work is finally punctuated with a well-earned stint as festival curator this year. Photo: Nick Helderman 72 LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE
Swans Swans
Photo: Samantha Marble
SWANS Throughout his extraordinary life, Michael Gira managed to maneuver his Swans from the refractory early work towards the transcendent rush of living sound it is now. Gira’s venturesome and incessantly curious spirit prompted a curatorship at Le Guess Who? two years ago. Now, with latest epic The Glowing Man arriving, this awe-inspiring epoch of Gira’s artistic pilgrimage draws to its emphatic close. Finally at peace? Obviously, mistaking “peace” for “quiet” would – in Swans’ case – be considered pure lunacy.
TAU TAU includes numerous additional vocalists and musicians, all of whom put their unique stamp on TAU’s celebratory psychedelic folk. After being lead on a pilgrimage through “Wirikuta”, the sacred desert of the Wixarika native land of north-west Mexico, Berlin-based musician Nunutzi became inspired to form TAU, a constantly shifting and fluid collaborative project with partner-in-sound Gerald Pasqualin. Featuring contributions by Knox Chandler of Siouxsie and the Banshees, Earl Harvin of Tindersticks, Nina Hynes and Miss Kenichi, the album. LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE 73
TIM HECKER Curated by Savages Over the past two decades, few composers have maintained such an inquisitive and nonconformist ethos as Tim Hecker. If one thing remains consistent throughout Hecker’s visionary work, it’s that his comprehensive sound manipulations are inhabited by some kind of tangible, (meta) physical essence. Hecker’s latest LP Love Streams being no exception, mixing processed medieval choirs with present day choral arrangements to haunting effect.
TOM CARTER Curated by Wilco After overcoming a bad case of pneumonia that left him in a forty day coma, former Charalambides-guitarist Tom Carter summons sprawling, feverish soundscapes that test the guitar’s sonic range to its utmost limits. Instead of meandering about with perpetual improvisation, Carter 74 LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE
uses noise as paint with a clear image in mind. Pitchfork named his masterpiece Long Time Underground the best experimental album of 2015 for good reason.
Tortoise
Photo: Andrew Paynter
TORTOISE Curated by Wilco Tortoise is easily one of the most influential, experimental outfits of the past 25 years. The Chicago-based collective is widely regarded as one of the spearheads of the post-rock genre. For all of that, Tortoise have more up their shells, mashing styles such as electronic music, dub, jazz and progressive rock into new territories with rollicking exuberance. Tortoise has an unquenchable thirst to create, attracted as much to succinct popcraft as mindwarping experimentalism.
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UFOMAMMUT Italy’s Ufomammut remains a unique beast by virtue of their searing space doom flare-ups and bona fide prog rock mysticism. The band’s inquisitive nature encompasses the primordial, spiritual and futuristic alike – often times all of them at once. Ufomammut plunge into arcane psychedelica and plodding sludge metal with the humble outset of surprising themselves as much as the listener, an attitude exemplar to their overall appeal as a band.
ULRIKA SPACEK Ulrika Spacek boomed with the spontaneous majesty of a big bang event. Two musicians Rhys Edwards and Rhys Williams had a mutual eureka-moment prowling the streets of Berlin together. The Album Paranoia’s infrared-filtered guitar gleam and harsh vapors of noise pop put Ulrika Spacek in the same conversation as Deerhunter, Television and My Bloody Valentine: a band that carves its own slice of alt rock canon with unmatched creativity.
Weyes Blood
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WAND Curated by Wilco With Thee Oh Sees still widely regarded as the apex predator of the West Coast, their more schizo kinsmen Wand are quickly gaining ground. Wand’s widely praised LP’s Golem and 1000 Days expertly channel the eroded spirit of 70’s era Bowie, The Flaming Lips, and Hawkwind, applying LA’s signature acidic fuzz-oomph as the spiffy backbone. Wand has cemented their rep as an electrifying live group, always keen on delivering the goods in the most cutting-edge, remarkable fashion imaginable.
WEYES BLOOD Multi-instrumentalist and singer Natalie Merling, aka Weyes Blood, is a stubborn but sensitive soul. In the hands of an artist equally smitten with Harry Nilsson’s sonorous West Coast pop majesty and Wolf Eyes’ feverish noise incursions, even the most docile elegant folk ditty gets tainted by distant,
sinister chills. That’s a sentiment Weyes Blood’s pagan folk dystopia seems to underscore: glints of flourishing beauty are cherished all the more within a slowly disintegrating reality.
WHITNEY What started as a Smith Westerns and Unknown Mortal Orchestra-offshoot has blossomed into Whitney, a band who uphold the fluent rock classicism of Big Star and George Harrison with a contemporary glistened-up pop mindset. The group’s dream-like debut Light Upon The Lake is brimmed with so many immediately satisfying melodies, just the prospect of pressing the repeat-button makes us all woozy.
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WILCO Last year, alt country icons Wilco celebrated two decades well spent turning the genre completely on its head. This year, Jeff Tweedy and pals are stopping by Utrecht to curate an immersive programme for this year’s Le Guess Who?-festival. The Chicago-based group’s ability to inject cutting-edge sounds into pristine pop splendor is second to none, and remains omnipresent to this day. In the process, Wilco continues to breathe new life into ageless classics like Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and Sky Blue Sky one tremendous performance at a time.
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Photo: Zoran Orlic
EFTERKLANG &
THE HAPPY HOPELESS ORCHESTRA
HAUSCHKA
MY BRIGHTEST DIAMOND D.M. STITH
UNREMEMBERED ORCHESTRA VANDRYVER IN CODE MOLINO JAMES OESI JERBOAH TU:T PERFORATOR THEREARENOMOREFOURSEASONS AND MANY MORE
02.03 03.03 04.03 05.03
EINDHOVEN GRONINGEN ROTTERDAM AMSTERDAM MUZIEKGEBOUW
DE OOSTERPOORT
DE DOELEN
MUZIEKGEBOUW // BIMHUIS
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WWW.CROSS-LINX.NL
WILLIAM TYLER Curated by Wilco Williams Tyler’s vivid and haunting guitar playing goes far beyond the countryside aesthetic that epitomizes American roots music. In Modern Country, Tyler has crafted one of the finest, most life-affirming albums you’ll hear this year. Over the course of seven instrumental tracks, Tyler meditates on both the majesty and fallacy of American life. He pulls it off with a sense of bewilderment and poignancy so succinctly wholesome, any spoken word would feel redundant.
WOODEN SHJIPS The premise of Erik ‘Ripley’ Johnson’s mighty Wooden Shjips was a compelling one: press the reset button on the rock ‘n’ roll playbook and recruit some self-taught musicians. Wooden Shjips successfully planted something fresh out of the seeds that The Velvet Underground and The Stooges buried in the soil decades ago. From here on out, the group honed their signature sound, employing cinder-encrusted guitar swirls that culminate into warped, monochromic fever dreams. 80 LE GUESS WHO? PROGRAM GUIDE
WORMHOLES ELECTRIC Curated by Suuns Wormholes Electric is an audiovisual improvisation project led by guitarist Sharif Sehnaoui and visual artist Mazen Kerbaj. The premise of Wormholes is to alter a specific segment within time and space, hoping to open a corridor between two artistic disciplines. And, by doing so, allowing them to give each other new meaning. Wormholes Electric is the newest evolution of this project thanks to the notable addition of versatile bassist Tony Elieh, who elevates the performance to the fields of psychedelic and noise rock.
WRANGLER Curated by Savages As Wrangler, Cabaret Voltaire-mastermind Stephen “Mal” Mallinder, TUNNG-member Phil Winter and gearhead Benge (John Foxx & The Maths) conspire to steer analogue-electronic music to audacious directions. The trio’s malformed synth squiggles and straddling beats are drenched in 80s goth glory. Instead of submitting to fullblown malaise, however, Wrangler employs a sensual, underpinning tension to their acidic jolts.
WYMOND MILES Between guitar duties for garage pop refuseniks The Fresh & Onlys, Wymond Miles quietly honed his melancholic vaudevillian pop with a trinity of solo-releases. The latest of those, the gospel-tinged Call By Night, is a grand and gorgeous lament on overcoming past traumas from generation to generation. Despite the record’s heartfelt candor, Miles drifts above it all with the same sense of buoyancy you get from visiting that dusty, cobwebbed attic where all your favorite valuables are stored.
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YOSHI WADA AND TASHI WADA Curated by Julia Holter Two generations of visionary composers on a single stage is something to be cherished. Yoshi Wada is an acclaimed minimalist who started out as a jazz saxophonist, built his own instruments and later became one of the first to compose music through computer programming. Likewise, his son Tashi Wada’s body of work is an deep-seated study of sound, acoustics and tuning systems, often undertaken in collaboration with peers.
ZERFU DEMISSIE The Ex Presents Zerfu Demissie is an Ethiopian musician who plays the Begana, a towering and beautifully adorned ten-stringed harp that’s over three millennia old. When wielding this ancient instrument, Zerfu generates these pensive, humming tones that sound strangely futuristic. At present there are only a handful of Begana players left, and Zerfu is the most authentic, outspoken and candid of them all.
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10 YEARS OF LE GUESS WHO? - AN EXHIBITION IN THE CITY OF UTRECHT Photographer Juri Hiensch has been documenting Le Guess Who? for nine years, and has managed to vividly capture many memorable moments throughout the history of the festival. To celebrate his involvement, we have set up an exhibition at prominent locations throughout the city with Juri’s most special shots. Want to know where exactly you can find them? Pick up our Treasure Guide for more info.
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5 YEARS OF LE MINI WHO? Over the past years, Le Mini Who? has grown rapidly, and finally, it is about to face adulthood. Le Mini Who? presents the contemporary Dutch underground, in collaboration with independent local record stores, shops and bars. It transforms Utrecht’s streets into a festival area, with more than sixty bands playing on minuscule improvised stages (it’s like window shopping, but for bands). Le Mini Who? also celebrates their 5th anniversary party at ACU on Saturday, November 12. As always: all is freely accessible.
Saturday, 12 November (Breedstraatbuurt) 2 - 10 PM Sunday, 13 November (Oosterkade & Westerkade) 1 - 4 PM More info: www.leminiwho.nl or grab a copy of our Treasure Guide.
Photo: Juri Hiensch
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BORIS JP CLIPPING. US WIFE IE 10 & 11 DECEMBER / TILBURG WWW.INCUBATE.ORG
BABYFATHER UK GRUMBLING FUR UK WREKMEISTER HARMONIES US FLAMINGODS UK OKKULTOKRATI NO CONDOR GRUPPE PLAYS MOONDOG BE MICHAEL NAU US OATHBREAKER BE YEAR OF NO LIGHT FR CHEENA US BAD BREEDING UK MIA ZABELKA AT COCAINE PISS CURATED PROGRAMME SUM NL OOZING WOUND US INDOLE RECORDS SHOWCASE WITH: OOBE / HENRY CARAVAN / HOLVOR +OTHERS AND MUCH MORE TO DISCOVER
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LE BAZARRE Le Bazarre is a renowned and packed cult market to hunt for the best vintage, vinyl, books, design, and lots more. On Saturday November 12, Le Bazarre sets up camp at the Neude square: wind your way through the stalls, find out what drives our local community and grab some food at one of the mobile kitchens on-site. Entrance is free.
Saturday, 12 November (Neude square) 12 - 6 PM
Photo: Rinke Vreeke
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LE GIG POSTER? AN INTERNATIONAL GIG POSTER EXHIBITION On the first floor of TivoliVredenburg you can find some of the most beautiful silkscreened, custom-made concert posters, designed by 45 national and international gig poster artists from around the world. Le Gig Poster? Is initiated by Joris Diks (Handprinted Stuff) and all exhibited posters are official pieces of artwork, established in cooperation with the depicted artists. Most posters are limited edition silkscreens, and are for sale at the exhibition.
LE FEAST
by Joris Diks
Le Feast invites you into a living room in Utrecht, to enjoy a meal together with people you don’t know (yet). On Saturday November 12, around twenty Utrechtian home-chefs will transform their living room into a cozy restaurant. Guests can make a reservation until the 9th of November: www.leminiwho.nl/ le-feast.
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TIVOLI VREDEN BURG
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BEHIND THE SCENES AT LE GUESS WHO? General & creative managers Johan Gijsen Bob van Heur
Assistant production Noortje Koster Justine Haantjens
Board members Franc Faaij, Thomas Nova, Matthijs Timmer, Marlies Timmermans, Sjoerd Wennekes
Festival copywriting Jasper Willems
Marketing Barry Spooren Jessica Clark Manon Marijs Max van der Riet Artist production & logistics Gijs Cals Nienke Bodewes
Le Mini Who?, Le Bazarre & Le Feast Rinke Vreeke Jacob Hagel Production & decoration Triomf Concept/artwork Joe Yarmush Loudmouth Website Jerry van Heerikhuize
BECOME PART OF THE LGW FAMILY We want to make Le Guess Who? an even more amazing and immersive experience for you. Become part of the LGW Family and support us in making an even bigger impact. For more info, check bit.ly/LGWfamily.
le guess who? 2017 9 - 12 november