UK underground dream big band/supergroup centered around the Singing Knives/Chironex labels and featuring the combined sonic forces of Part Wild Horses Mane on Both Sides, Chora and The Hunter Gracchus. Night will kick off with a set from London's Liberez.

LE DRAPEAU NOIR

Le Drapeau Noir is dream collaboration project comprised from members of The Hunter Gracchus, Chora and Part Wild Horses Mane On Both Sides. Seemingly inspired by 'the sound of a displaced Europe fighting to escape the banality of recycled postmodernism’ they issued a fantastic LP on Chironex, the French label ‘carrying the European improvisation-on-wax torch high and filling a gaping chasm left by the departure of Italy’s Qbico Records' and responsible for individual sides from Hunter Gracchus, Part Wild Horses Mane On Both Sides and Chora.

The Hunter Gracchus, a Sheffield trio playing what has been described as 'fourth world trance music using percussion, strings, small instruments and crude folk melodies with the kind of abstruse post-punk strategies of ensembles like The No-Neck Blues Band.’



Chora began their career as freeform, instrument-swapping sound hunters in Sheffield since when they have expanded with amongst others the addition of Ben Nash and developed the kind of nerve and telepathic interplay of true non-academic improvisers.



Part Wild Horses Mane On Both Sides of Lyon and Manchester, a flute and drums duo that is 'jazz in terms of the organisational hierarchy that it’s filtered through, psychedelic in that it’s keyed to an unusual feel for time and space, and punk in that it refuses any previous mode of getting there.'



"Collaboration LP that builds a virtual free-playing orchestra from the combined line-ups of three excellent UK underground groups, Part Wild Horses Mane On Both Sides, The Hunter Gracchus and Chora. Far from a dopey free-for-all, the recording has an elegance and a sense of restraint that's often missing from your average low-rent polyphonic jam, with each group preserving their own unique identities while unequivocally contributing to the overall heft of the sonics. The dosed flute and drum style of Part Wild Horses provide some of the record's highlights, with their dark, mutant Cherry/Blackwell-isms propelled even higher by waves of clean, modal guitar straight out of the Mick Flower/Richard Bishop school of elevating electricity. And while there are certainly 'moments' where the specter of Vibracathedral Orchestra and NNCK is unmistakable, Le Drapeau Noir's music is something else entirely, drawing on UK free music modes, Eurasian ritual music, folk and psych forms in order to articulate precisely where English underground music is at circa now. A great record from one of the most consistently interesting UK 'scenes'." - David Keenan



LIBEREZ

Formed in 2003, Liberez is the latest incarnation of a long running musical collaboration between John Hannon and Pete Wilkins. The Letter, their latest release on Alter Records (autumn 2010) is the first LP where they are joined by multi instrumentalist Tom James Scott and vocalist Nina Bosnic.

Live, liberez attempt to engage audiences using simple techniques such as light rhythms, abstracting the audiences view, deliberate mistakes, ritual, repetition etc.