Wednesday, October 22, 2008

WEEKEND INSANITY IN THE CITY!!!

Ok folks , the is kinda of a pre-mature pre- tour. We'll play with PRE and hopefully pre-vent any fun from going down. Cause if there's one thing AIDS Wolf HATES , it's fun.


Come check out KZZZZZ aka "The New Guy" , maybe grab our "New Record" or "New Shirts" , we'll play a "New Song". All in "New York".




Panache CMJ SHOWCASE!

FRI OCT 24, 2008 @ THE KNITTING FACTORY- ALL 3 FLOORS !




MAIN STAGE




Monotonix 1:00 AM

The Mae Shi 12:00 AM


An Albatross 11:00PM

Akimbo 10:00PM


Best Fwends 9:00PM





TAP ROOM


The Homosexuals 12:45 AM

AIDS Wolf 11:45PM


DMBQ 10:45PM

Shellshag 9:45PM

Catcall 8:45PM





OLD OFFICE

Aa 12:30 AM

Sole and the Skyrider Band 11:30 PM


Yip Yip 10:30 PM

FIASCO 9:30 PM

SCREENS 8:30 PM





Doors at 8pm. ALL AGES


Tickets available here in advance for $14
:


Buy tix

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Saturday, October 25th @ SCHMARKET SCHMOTEL

:: PANACHE / TODD P NOT-CMJ PARTY

12:40am :
The Mae Shi
12:10am :: secret guests we can't list here
11:40pm ::: PRE
11:10pm :::: Psychic Ills
10:40pm ::::: DMBQ
10:10pm :::::: Akimbo
-9:40pm ::::::: AIDS Wolf
-9:10pm :::::::: An Albatross
-8:40pm ::::::::: Sole and the Skyrider Band
-8:20pm :::::::::: Yip Yip
-8:00pm ::::::::::: Cloaks

[ SCHMARKET SCHMOTEL ]
1142 Myrtle Ave @ Bdwy | Bushwick, Brooklyn
JMZ-Mrytle, L-Jefferson, G-Myrtle/Willoughby | 8pm | all ages | no phone

[ curated by Michelle Cable ]
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Tuesday, October 21, 2008

They're Sayin'

Because I seem to have some type of OCD , I've made a list of some reviews the new album's been getting.



Now Magazine on Cities Of Glass


Hour on Cities Of Glass


We Heart Music on Cities Of Glass

Tiny Mix Tapes on Cities Of Glass




Aversion on on Cities Of Glass


New Noise on Cities Of Glass


Megzeazez on Cities Of Glass


EVP on Cities Of Glass

Other Music on Cities Of Glass



The Montreal Gazette on Cities Of Glass




XLR8R on Cities Of Glass


Vue Weekly on Cities Of Glass

Eye Weekly on Cities Of Glass


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And because everyone loves Neue Deutsche Welle , here's some footage of Palais Schaumburg in 81.

Friday, October 17, 2008

The Best Part Of Being In A Band

Is all the inspiring and creative people you meet via playing shows.

Still , having people to care about your tastes in music is kinda neat too. It's nice to know that we can spread a bit of love back to those who inspire us and hopefully introduce a few people to their new favorites . Since our band has more than one record nerd , we relish talking about the records that are getting us excited.

I only wish we could have each had our own list!

AIDS Wolf , Listed :




AIDS Wolf

AIDS Wolf formed during the great Wolf wave of 2003. Satirical and baiting, the Montreal foursome took immense joy in poking fun at the suddenly ubiquitous band nameand pissing off self-righteous folks everywhere. Funny thing happened, though: tasteless as they were, AIDS Wolf made pretty decent music, too. Their brand of danceable noise-rock incorporated the sounds of Captain Beefheart, Voivod and Throbbing Gristle well enough to catch the ear of Montreal’s best radio station CKUT 90.3 FM, which has been a champion of their music ever since. And as you might gather from this week’s Listed, Yannick, Myles, Chloe and Alex are each rabid record collectors. The band’s latest LP, Cities of Glass is out now on Skin Graft Records, and you can catch their debauchery live on the following dates:

Oct. 30 – Danbury, Conn. (Heirloom Arts Theatre)
Oct. 31 – Brooklyn, N.Y. (Danbro Studio Warehouse in Goldenrod Brewery w/ DMBQ, Ponytail, Homosexuals and more)
Nov. 1 – Philadelphia, Penn. (WPW w/DMBQ)
Nov. 2 – Washington D.C. (Velvet Lounge)
Nov. 3 – Baltimore, Md. (Otto Bar w/Deerhunter)
Nov. 4 – Richmond, Va. (The Triple)
Nov. 5 – Greensboro, N.C. (Square One)
Nov. 6 – Atlanta, Ga. (The Earl)
Nov. 7 – Chattanooga, Tenn. (JJ’s Bohemia)
Nov. 8 – Birmginham, Ala. (The Bottletree)
Nov. 9 – Hot Springs, Ark. (The Exchange)
Nov. 10 – St. Louis, Mo. (Bluebird)
Nov. 11 – Kansas City, Mo. (Record Bar)
Nov. 12 – Oklahoma City, Okla. (Conservatory)
Nov. 13 – Dallas, Texas (Club Dada)
Nov. 14 – Austin, Texas (Emo’s)
Nov. 15 – Lubbock, Texas (The Foundation)
Nov. 16 – Albuquerque, N.M. (Launchpad)
Nov. 17 – Phoenix, Ariz. (Modified Arts / Trunk Space)
Nov. 18 – San Diego, Calif. (The Casbah)
Nov. 19 – Los Angeles (The Smell)
Nov. 20 – Sacramento, Calif. (UC-Davis Firehouse w/ AH Kraken, the Mayyors)
Nov. 21 – Oakland, Calif. (21 Grand)
Nov. 22 – San Francisco, Calif. (Hemlock Tavern)
Nov. 23 – Portland, Ore. (East End)
Nov. 24 – Vancouver, B.C. (Biltmore)
Nov. 25 – Seattle, Wash. (Vera Project)
Nov. 26 – Missoula, Mon. (Badlander)
Nov. 28 – Minneapolis, Minn.
Nov. 29 – Chicago, Il.
Nov. 30 – Detroit, Mich.

1. The University of Minnesota Marching Band - 14th Annual Indoor Concert 1975 (Mark Records)
Picked that up in a Minneapolis used shop. Contains probably the most staccato and jerky pieces of pink noise ever. Completely recorded in some incredibly reverby arena, where the crowd screams mix with the drum lines to increase the confusion even more. The songs are complete bullshit arrangements from traditional and other SousaSousa-like favorites, but the fun of it rests mostly in the crazy-assed blend of the percussion that ends up sounding like a hurricane of treble without any tone. The army-like feel and whistle shots increase the uncomfortable feeling of the whole recording (Yannick)

2. The Karate Party “1, 2, 3, 4,” (from Black Helicopter on S-S Records)
The bass goes on a descending scale in 8, while the drums go in 4 – following an extremely basic repetitive pattern, and the guitar is in 2, strumming two huge super atonal chords back and fourth, the guitar meets up with the bass in the chorus, while the drums goes in 2 – the whole thing sounds super alienated but keeps it catchy – a garage unit that is not afraid of churning out completely atonal pieces without sounding like goth-drenched no wave. Like a better, weirder Crime. (Yannick)

3. Moussa Doumbi - “Yeye Mousso” (from Lipa Kodi Ya City Council on Mississippi Records

This tune is amazing because it makes an extremely atonal vocal line very very catchy. 1960s distorted psych from Mali. Its inspiring because its heavy and driving and simultaneously very joyful. The bassline is undeniably North American sounding but the vocal tone and melody is very otherworldly. That particular bassline turns up in a modified form somewhere on Cities of Glass. The rest of the record is beautiful as well, the gospel song at the end of the first side is particularly gorgeous. (Myles)

4. Donna Summer - “I Feel Love” (from Live and More on Casablanca Records)
This one might seem out of left field but the slightly distorted vocals and bizarre harmonies from the back up singers take this version to another level. She introduces her sisters and orchestra during the synth breakdown, which is charming. The energy of the performance and the audience make this one great. And the synth tone of course. (Myles)

5. Alban Berg - Wozzeck: Performed by the New York Philharmonic, Dimitri Mitropoulos, Conductor (Sony Classical Heritage Masterworks Series)
Opera is so abstract. When you get into the 20th century stuff and the music becomes less tonal and you have ladies really getting into the upper registers it becomes bonkers dissonant. This one tells the story of a soldier who is brutalized by the system, experimented on by a crazed doctor, constantly belittled and berated by his military superiors and ends up murdering his mistress...all the while failing his wife and child in untold psychological ways. Harsher than any current p.e. noise. Herzog made a film version of this story. Berg’s opera is better...if you can sift through the German libretto. (Alex)

6. The Scenics - Play the Velvet Underground - How Does it Feel To be Loved (Dream Tower Records)
Recently released, unearthed tapes of some scrappy Ontario boys belting out VU covers in various Toronto clubs circa ‘79-80. No frills, no skills versions of all your faves by some no-name jammers from hogtown. Lovely. (Alex)

7. Felix Morel - Journey Through Quebec’s Weirdo Underground (Live CKUT 90.3 Montreal Broadcast)
Felix is an amazing poster artist in Montreal who does collage better than anyone in the current crop. He’s also in a great Montreal band called Panopticon Eyelids, who have stuff out on Our Mouth and Abandon Ship records. Here he plays two straight hours of absolutely bent Quebec underground music from the mid ‘60s to present. From psychedelic jigs to gutter punk songs in French about mescaline. So amazing. Grip mp3 here. (Alex)

8. Albert Marcoeur - Albert Marcoeur (Atlantic)
A few years back, when we were on tour, we played a show in Munich that was a bit of a disaster. Our set was capped with a huge fight with our then guitarist, Christopher, who stormed out into the fog with the keys to the van leaving us stuck at the venue. On top of that we’d spent the day at Dachau, so were all feeling pretty fucked up and moody.

Trying to lighten the mood one of our hosts , Herman, poked his bearded face into the room saying “I hear you guys like prog?” and waved a giant slab of records at us. So, we all stayed up all night taking notes. This was the best record he played us, and lucky for me I found a copy at a record convention in Belgium about a month later.

Albert Marcoeur is a french avant-prog multi-instrumentalist who writes some of the most off kilter tunes this side of Captain Beefheart. On this record he sings, plays drums, clarinet, piano, wood pipes and a bizarre homemade percussive horn made from PVC tubing.

On songs like “C’est Raté, C’est Raté" and "Tu Tapes Trop Fort" he gurgles, barks, screams, slows and speeds his vocal lines and uses heavy breathing as percussion. These are the songs I studied while coming up with my vocals for Cities of Glass. This album is so disjointed and discordant, yet manages to be downright celebratory. It’s avant gardism that is FUN. (Chloe)

9. U.S Girls - Bit + Pieces CD-R (no label)
U.S. Girls is one girl – one girl who tours by herself on a Greyhound bus, sings over backing tapes played on a tube-powered reel-to-reel and makes some of the most hauntingly original music I’ve heard in a long time. It’s a one-woman goth-noise-girl group that’s amazingly catchy, using weird percussive elements in both vocal delivery and in the backing music.

The call and response vocals of the title track (a Dave Clark 5 cover, FYI) is especially interesting, it’s auditory schizophrenia! A demented one-person conversation that playfully and scarily subverts the original context of the song, the way few covers can. My fingers are crossed that these tracks will find a proper (meaning vinyl) home in the near future. (Chloe)

10. Country Teasers – The Empire Strikes Back (In The Red)
“All human life must be destroyed!!” Yes, Ben , I agree. The world’s greatest living lyricist doesn’t pull any punches here. His satirical lines might cause some of your friends some discomfort, so ditch ‘em – they aren’t too bright anyway. You deserve much better, smarter and funnier friends.

Being less abrasive than much of the Country Teasers output, I was initially surprised at myself for liking this so much more than everything else they’ve done. And that’s saying a lot cause I’ve been obsessed with this band for 10 years. It works in an “avant” context because of the epic nature of the album. Song to song there are subtle shifts in tone, and thematically, there is more cohesion than found on previous albums. What we have here is a concept album on race relations and misanthropy. This thing is a fucking opera and B.R Wallers is the smartest person I’ve ever met. (Chloe)

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Because I'm a space cadet I forgot to post this . Here yous go! AW live in Milan last May

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Thursday, October 16, 2008

2 Sonic Youth Bios , One Month to Read 'Em!

The Good :

Goodbye 20th Century: A Biography of Sonic Youth by David Browne


Playing the game of “follow the namedrop in the Sonic Youth interview” was what got teenaged me into acts like Jesus Lizard , Boredoms , Pussy Galore and Dead C (putting the missing links together was my own suburban Canadian Noise-Rock n' Roll Highschool.) so I’ll always owe them a major debt. This book is the 3rd major biography I’ve read on them and is , in my opinion , the best. It avoids the drama of many rock bios and gives us the SY brass tacks with tons of talk on process and sound , as well as the band’s ambivilance with fame and success. I'm especially into all the gear talk, in depth discussion of the recording experiences and in hearing about the early days and the influence of the No-Wave scene.


The Bad:

Psychic Confusion : The Sonic Youth Story by Steve Chick

This book is annoying and fawning. It's basically the author having a jerk off fest over how great SY are. Buddy , you don't need to sell 'em to me , I'm already reading the book! Too much fan boy drool , next to no substance.



_______________________________________________________________________________

Since Our record came out a month ago , and tour get closer , we've been getting a a few people writing about us too.

This one is from the
Platine Blog . Platine is a record store in Quebec City.



Les loups sida sont de retour avec une sanglante nouvelle galette. Enregistré en plein milieu de leur dernière tournée étasunienne, voilà un album auquel il faudra porter attention. Notons d'emblée qu'il fut produit par nul-autre que Weasel Walter, l'être le plus actif de la nouvelle scène no-wave, et que non seulement il y appose son sceau, mais il y fait aussi une réalisation remarquable. Puisque sur ce disque, AIDS Wolf y va fort dans leur destruction du rock, d'une façon si intense qu'on y perd parfois la notion même de chanson. Plus dur d'écoute que leurs précédents enregistrements, c'est toutefois avec une heureuse patience qu'on le ré-écoute encore et encore pour comprendre ce qui leur passe par la tête. Cities of Glass marque un retour très lourd mais aussi très efficace, d'une vivacité qui rappelle beaucoup leur énergie en spectacle. (Marc-Antoine Dion, Platine)





________________________________________
And here's an interview I did with Pulp Mag a few weeks ago (I REALLY need to mind the freaking typos , eep!) :



Aidswolf
Interview by Foxxy



A great band from Montreal Canada. A four piece band thats beyond" Very Artsy" that demands people to reconnect, react and recover from the tears of millions.

Love it and demand it......
My interview with Aidswolf!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Q & A'sssssssss

What does AIDS WOLF mean 2 you?

Dada in 2 words.or the world’s shortest sound poem

How did you 4 meet?

Doing our time in the montreal music ghetto , and travellin’ the inter galatic prog-waves.

Do you think that Montreal is the mecca of GREAT MENACING MUSIC from Canada? and why?

I’m not sure , I think vancouver might be leading the pack right now with the whole scene around the emergency room. I’ve been listening the mutators/shearing pinx split lp all week and it’s getting me pumped up on life! vancouver’s probably great for it cause it’s pretty depressing there.

Your track " We are all animals" how did this attack track occur?

We were recording at the hotel 2 tango after a few whirlwind days touring with cpc gangbangs and the brutal knights. On no sleep , raging headaches and covered in bruises from a rowdy weekend , we showed up at the hotel at 8 am Sunday morning. We laid down a few of our songs and then just started jamming with the tape rolling.
we are all animals was one of those jams.

the lyrics are basically about how being on tour reduces you to animal instinct and urges. They were made up on the spot.
it’s on our new split 12” with night wounds on nail in the coffin.

I hear that some of your band members are cutters?

We are armed with exacto knives , that’s the danger of have 2 graphic designers in the band.

Who are some of the bands musical influences?

Captain beefheart , yes , us maple , voivod , emerson lake and palmer , albert marceour , pussy galore , black flag , saccarine trust , sightings , trobbing gristle , royal trux , lake of dracula.

What does Mark Mclean mean to you?

the best friend we could ever have and a non stop source of inspiration and support. He’s the reason this band exists. His new band thrashed jeans is about to be the best thing in toronto.

How is touring in the states compared to Canada?

Less driving ,more vegan treats , rowdier crowds , whole foods , generally more of a scene and support network for noise rock.

Any crazy stories, of fun-unrest and despair on the road?

We all kinda broke down at our show in france because the 2 support bands were sooooo shitty and both played over an hour. It was TORTURE – I actually cried.. French mr bunglesque-emo-prog should be against the geneva convention.

Are there any bands from Toronto that you are listening 2 right now?

BRUTAL KNIGHTS!!! , career suicide , rozasia(rip) , disguises, and the creeping nobodies have all been on the turntable over the past few week.there’s lots to love in toronto .

Where do you think this band will be in 5 years?

Celebrating our 10th aniversary and coaxing john french to join as our second drummer.
hopefully there will be affordable hybrid vans by then.

The Cities of Glass event is coming up in Toronto, What are you hoping for?

To see all our friends in the audience , smilling, looking awesome and dancing up a storm! if we could get a nice brunch with mclean + team burnout on Sunday , all the better.

I really love your track" put yr head on a plate"- How did this song come together?

I don’t remember! it was too long ago!

What does "indie" music mean 2 you?

A band , a van , a plan .

Any last words to the public??

Love yourself!

Thanks

Tuesday, October 7, 2008

Getting Laid(s) Wolf

WOW! Pop Montreal is over and I'm covered with bruises , have a split lip and a giant dazed smile on my face. The "Weird Punk" series was a success despite a few hiccups and I saw several bands who until recently , I knew only from their recordings.

After our show in Quebec city , Yannick and I were stuck in a very bright , very loud room and only slept an hour. That brought in a delirium that lasted the entire weekend and gave me hallucinations while I danced the nights (and mornings) away.Totally incoherent , any conversations I had on the weekend were nonsense babbling.

Thus , our set. Saturday Myles came down with a NASTY case of food poisoning and spent all afternoon and evening puking his guts out.By showtime , he was still vomiting so , being the "get-in-the-van) types we are , the show went on. We invited Erin (Ward , from Shearing Pinx) and Steve (Mattos aka Chrome Jackson , 1/2 of Athletic Automaton , ex-Arab On Radar , our very good pal) to join us from a 3 guitar psychedelic (the lack of sleep helped get those brainwave paterns running overtime , drugfree motherfuckers!) post-neo-wave freakout. We called it getting Laids(s) Wolf and played for about half an hour , part of that time I was hallucinating so hard the only way I could sing was to lie on the floor with my eyes closed.

It was probably one of the more satisfying sets I've ever played. Was it good? I was too tranced out to tell but my friend Jeff (aka Captain No-Pants) was having a blast watching the crowd's reactions and said we split their affections fairly evenly . I guess we'll know the results once Justin sends us the recording .

HOWEVER I offered guest list spots for our Sunday afternoon show to anyone who thought the jamz sucked and only 2 people asked.

Sunday , Myles was in better but not perfect shape and we managed to pull off a "normal " AIDS Wolf Set at the Cove . Afterwards I blushed and felt shy cause dudes from bands I really like lots told me we were good.

Having someone from a band you are a fan of , no matter what , is always akin to your secret crush asking you on a date.It's awesome and exciting and wonderful but deep down , your insecurities are making you paranoid it's some prank out of Carrie.


Or was I just an unpopular kid?

Either way , I hope the fine folks at the Cove start hosting more afternoon BBQ shows , this was seriously FUN , totally different vibe from nighttime shows. It felt so real and friendly , like we were all on the same team.


Shearing Pinx , Tyvek ,U.S. Girls & TV Ghost = Fellow Spaceways Travelers , possible new friends for lyfe. (It's true we played with Shearing Pinx a while ago so TECHNICALLY they aren't NEW friends but this Pop was our first serious bro-down with them.)

An Albatross = Old School crew , back in my arms at last! Can't WAIT till CMJ to spend more time with these truly wonderful men.


Black Feelings = one of the best bands in Montreal and total troopers for playing on the roof IN THE FUCKING RAIN!.

Some pics by Pierre:


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MORE!


Only bummers were that both Neptune and Made In Mexico had to cancel , it just wasn't the same without them.


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ATTEN: ONTARIO/QUEBEC! We might do a few smallish shows inside you at the end of the month (between Oct 26-29) , anyone interested in booking us holla : andre (at) blueskiesturnblack (dot) com.

Anything fun will be considered.

xo.

Saturday, October 4, 2008

We're Playing 2 shows

weird punk

October 4th Le Divan Orange (4234 St Laurent):::

02:00 AM --- AIDS Wolf
01:00 AM --- Neptune
12:00 AM --- Death Set
11:00 PM --- Shearing Pinx
10:00 PM --- CHROME JACKSON (feat. Steve Mattos of Arab on Radar/ Athletic Automaton)
08:30 PM --- screening of the new ARAB ON RADAR DVD "Sunshine for Shady People"

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Sunday, October 4th :::

@ Friendship Cove (215a Murray St - Bonaventure Metro station).

doors open @ NOON! ALL AGES!!!!!

05:00 PM --- Tyvek
04:00 PM --- AIDS Wolf
03:00 PM --- Double Dagger
02:00 PM --- Black Feelings
01:15 PM --- The Pink Noise
12:30 PM --- Many Mental Mistakes

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Last night was our second time playing Quebec city and , as last time everyone sat down while watching us. What's up QC? Do you guys hate us? Or just fun in general.
Cause shows are way more fun for both the band AND the crowd when you stand near the front and perhaps bang your head or shake your ass.
We're confused.

Wednesday, October 1, 2008

Shoot Me , NOW

So yesterdayI got a lovely message praising our new record a part of it was a congratulation for how we made our cover of another band's song "our own".
Except it's not a cover . We have not recorded a cover to this date. If we did we would not change the title of the song and we WOULD credit the band.
I'm baffled.
UGHHHHJHHHHHHHHHHJ.


______________________
Speaking of covers , my on-and-off Black Flag cover band , The Sandwiches, played a few shows the other week. One of them being an after party for the
Mudhoney show across the street. As soon as I stepped of the stage , Mark Arm asked me if we could do it again.

As fun as it is to make fools out of ourselves playing all of "Damaged" , I think The Sandwiches , or at least this version of them are laid to rest for good.




________________________

In totally ancient news (aka I suck) we did the record launches aka 2 last ever shows with Andre and they were happy sad. As I've mentioned on this blog more than once , playing local shows always gives me crazy amounts of stress because I'm simply too aware of who's there , who's not and all the promotion details . Also as we generally bring outta town bands to join in the fun , I worry about them having a good time , being satisfied with the show AND getting a good impression of Montreal.
This time was no different. Yannick and I were up printing till 5 am the night before and the day of , I couldn't nap cause it seemed everyone I know was calling. Dancing around the kitchen and listening to The Intelligence while drinking homemade kombucha and taking every vitamin known to man only goes so far to replace lost hours of sleep.
So tired and wonky I got to the venue and as usual started panicking. Panopticon Eyelids were great , Indian Jewlery were great and we played to a very rowdy crowd (maybe 2 rowdy with one dude BLOWING in my face--wtf? multiple times , Tobias lifting me over his head and Eben grabbing my face and pulling it.) . In the rowdiness I realized that outta the 250 people there , I only knew about 20 and a wave of calm washed over me. In the 5 and a half years since our first sow at the defunct Pasalymany's , our local crowd has turned from mostly being people we know to being , what? Fans? Kids? I have no idea who these people are but I love that they move and I love that I no longer feel nervous.

Walking around outside with my friend Lisa after the set was kinda weird cause kids were all"oh is that the singer ?" , It seems strange to be anything other than just Chloe , especially on home turf.

The Toronto show was more "fun" and yet yet more drama at the same time. Since we hadn't been there in a year (!!!!!!!) pretty much ALLLLLL the Toronto crews came out (yes even TEAM BURNOUT) so just catching up with everyone all night was LOVELY! The poster art on the walls only made the night better as did the mock duck from Buddah's.
Mclean's new band thrashed jeans brought the flipper meets meets throbbing gristle jams (although I could only hear one of the guitars, not to guitarists 15 watt amps are for the bedroom , not the stage. ) and I really really impressed with Romo Roto

I had a few talks with a few intense fans (thanks Toronto , we love you tooooo) including Tavis who flew in From Winnipeg (your dedication is awesome and it reminds me of myself when i was your age) and one girl who started crying on meeting me. Awkward yet AWESOME. THIS is the reason to be in a band. If only a fraction of these people end up pursuing art or music making , it'll have been worthwhile.

Of course ,being an AIDS Wolf show there needed to be a bummer and our bummer starts and ends with a violent sack of hippy shit.First he climbed on stage ,stomping on a buncha gear , THEN he threw a bottle at Andre , hitting him in the face THEN he was onstage again , punching Myles in the back.I was in the crowd and had no idea anything was amiss until my bandmates walked off the stage 2 songs before the end of our planned set.

Afterwards we saw some REAL violence on the street while loading our van .


Some photos Pierre took


Photobucket

toronto

More.
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Ends and starts , our first show with KZZZ is tomorrow night in Quebec City

Jeudi le 2 Octobre
L'Agitée
251, rue Dorchester:
Quebec, QC

Festival Antenne-A


LA soirée si vous aimez les sensations fortes et les performances qui résonnent pour les semaines à venir.
22h - 8$

An Albatross
An Albatross est un orgasme sonique, une bourrasque mécanique, saccadés des signatures des temps éclipsées par des pseudo-mélodies d'orgue Farfisa. Vous connaissez un groupe qui fait quatre prestations en une journée, qui offre un spectacle qui fait l'équilibre entre une attaque explosive de disco, une cérémonie Appalaches manipulateur-de-serpent et James Brown? An Albatross de Philadelphie est reconnu pour sa performance légendaire et sa musique est incontestablement parfaite pour la génération d'aujourd'hui : courte, complexe et remplis d'éclats viscéraux. An Albatross souligne la sortie The Family Album en tournant au travers l’Amérique et en nous rendant une première visite à Québec. Visite qu’il ne faut pas manquer!
An Albatross

Aids Wolf
AIDS Wolf est un groupe de noise rock canadien originaire de Montréal. Ils ont débuté chez Pasalymany tapes mais sont actuellement signés chez Skin Graft Records et Lovepump United. Citant Captain Beefheart, ils comparent leur son à quelque chose comme "une pieuvre mangeant de la bouillie dans un sac de polyéthylène" (a squid eating dough in a polyethylene bag).
AIDS Wolf

Billets en feu chez Platine le disquaire et à L'Agitée.

AIDS Wolf , aids wolf, AIDS WOLF , AIDSWOLF
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Here are some olddddd and short videos of us in Orlando!




Friday, September 19, 2008

Mirror , Mirror On The Wall, Who's The Weirdest of Them All?

If I had to say who the biggest weirdo in underground music , I'd vote for my buddy Jeff Schneider , formerly of Arab On Radar , currently of the excellent Made In Mexico .
Brilliant guitarist , hilarious guy and total superfreak.
He's pretty quiet in real life bro-downs but online , he's got alot to say. I love this dude.



On Reggeaton:


On Bands:


Making Money/ That D. Boon shit:


Influences part 1:


Influences 2:


Made In Mexico @ The Knitting Factory


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If you wanna see ME dork the fuck out , my Black Flag cover band, The Sandwiches , are playing tonight at Katacombs , tomorrow at Casa. We play all of Damaged. I "sing".
Please don't throw shit ,I'm not tough like Hank.


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Friday, September 12, 2008

Bursted

Playing the whole album tonight and tomorrow , and then some.

Goal: trying to take the perimeters of "rock" or "punk" and push the to the breaking point. ????


Tour dates are up , line-ups coming together .

Goal : to get to see all the exciting bands that will never make it to Montreal by playing with them. (and buy their tshirts and 7"s) !!!!!!


Saturday September 13 08
AIDS Wolf
Indian Jewelery
Romo Roto
Thrashed Jeans (Mclean's new band)
@ Whippersnapper gallery , Toronto.
All Ages - 10$

ALL there will be a poster art show featuring:
Seripop (me an' Yannick)
Autodestruck
Merchguy
Deadweight
Micheal Majewski
Jeremy Wilson
Gavin Dee
Michael Deforge
Doublenaut
Aaron Ber
John Kurmis
Haggard Beast
Adam Swinbourne
Steph Davidson
Tad Michalak
Leslie Predy
Tomas Del Baso/Alex Mckenzie
Mat King

Art Show starts at 6pm , bands around 8:30.

I feel weird about playing. Andre's last shows and the last time we played together was in Tel Aviv , a billion years ago. Montreal is pissing rain and the day is generally non-beachy. Listened to Panopticon jam last night and they have tapped into this heavy psych that goes perfectly with the clicks and drones of our printing press. SO GLAD they are FINALLY putting out an LP. Brace yourselves , Montreal has a few secret weapons.

8888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888

Thursday, September 11, 2008

This Is Spinal Tap

We have a new guitarist. His name is Alex Moskos and if you've been following the Montreal avant scene over the past few years you might have seen him performing as part of the Unireverse , Et Sans , Goa , Thames or solo as
Drainolith. Or perhaps djing as Khozzy Mozzborne at Casa or Blackjack.





Myles and I have both know him since the old days , back in Ottawa and he's a chiller dude.

Andre is now the Chuck Dukowski of AIDS wolf and if you don't know what that means then you haven't done your homework and and
Get In The Van.


Andre's gonna be doing the Montreal and Toronto record launches with us this weekend as his last shows , Alex takes over in time for Pop Montreal and CMj.


Photobucket








16" x 22" 6 color screenprint .


Friday, September 12th in Montreal :::

AIDS Wolf

Indian Jewlery

Panopticon Eyelids

20h30
$8 / $10
@ La Sala Rossa (4848 St Laurent)

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

SOON!

( the orange is dayglow in real life)
cities of glass

Front Cover.

cities out
Outside Foldout.

cities inside
Inside Foldout. (photo by Yannick Grandmont)

cities cd face
CD Face.


traycard front
And Under.


tray card back
Backcover.



cog promo

Close up of the photo (merci Yannick!) , masks by Morag Kydd .


Preview track for the curious , or morbid :Tied-Up In Paper

Track listing :
1. M.T.I.
2. Tied-Up In Paper
3. Cities of Glass
4. Ch-ch-ch-chatter
5. Down, Holy Ground
6. Gnarly Tooth
7. General _ _
8. A Sacrificial Drone
9. Relevant Issues
10. So Many Plastic Pearls

Out September 9th , CD on Skingraft , gatefold LP on Lovepump United
.

Vinyl Pre-order here , tour dates on our myspace .



Please note , 300 of the LPs are mint and orange splatter vinyl. First 200 copies copies mailordered will be splatter.

xo
chloe

Friday, August 15, 2008

Impossible You Say?

I must have fallen into BIZARRO WORLD 'cause actually got a good review from our Columbus show at the end of last March. It was a pretty fun night despite the kid who was stressing me out 'cause he was on so much drugs he kept hurtin' himself and freaking everyone out.

Hugs not drugs duder.


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Image and video hosting by TinyPic

Image and video hosting by TinyPic

Image and video hosting by TinyPic
Our split with Night Wounds is finally out on Nail In The Coffin Skin Graft bought up a bunch of copies so if you're already ordering stuff from them you can grab one. This record was a loooooong time coming and we're pretty excited to finally have 'em in hand. Night Wounds are one of my personal faves with their weird disoriented no-goth. I know I've said it a million times but for me the best part if being in a band is getting to play and do splits with the bands I'm excited about. If i were cuter I would have become a groupie . I'm such a nerdy fan-girl I foam at the mouth thinking about all the bands I love.

Now the stats . There are 500 of these babies floating around , an undisclosed amount are red / yellow splatter but most are black.

xo,
scum

Monday, July 21, 2008

Nearly Forgotten....

Momus wrote about us in his Live Journal. He has some interesting things to say about making culture outside of commercial ambitions .
_____________________________________________________________________________________

AIDS Wolf in Lyon , FR.
You probably can't tell in the video but I had a nervous breakdown (THE nervous breakdown?) right before we went on. It seems my mental faculties always fall apart in France.

It's weird though , so many people were filming and taking photos , this is the only evidence.
If you saw us on this tour and have photos/audio/pics/reviews (even bad ones!) ect please send us the link!

aidswolf .at. aidswolf .dot. net

merci!


_____________________________________________________________________________________

In other news , Montrealers into avant rock , cranky garage and weird punk could do worse than to show up at Time's Up on Thursday nights . It goes down at Blackjack , St. Henri's best neighborhood dive. This week I'll be be djing alongside some of the best in town.
My playlist will potentially include : The Rebel , Courge , Crack Und Ultra Eczema , Abe Vigoda , Yikes , The Dippers , Costes , Double Dagger , Clockcleaner , Love Tan , Singer , Harry Pussy and Deep Jew.

Save a dance for me ok?
xo,
c.scum

Thursday, June 19, 2008

London!


oh my gawd i loved this show. the rebel rule my ass . bromancer ruled my ass. dancing with keex and sophie ruled my ass.





from a show at death by audio last october. it's on the fingered dvd zine , montreal edition.

random and dull AIDS wolf newz:

-yannick and i get home next week and we'll be in the studio shortly to record a few new split 7"s. one of them involves us doing our first ever cover.

-for everyone who keeps asking about shirts , we're setting up an online distro and will have exclusive shirts for sale in the next month. these will be designs you can only get from us by mail order.we'll even have a few one of a kind shirts , made by me and yannick, aka seripop , obviously.

-our friends gay beast are on tour in the us/canada. go see them, they are the greatest thing to come out of the midwest since lake of dracula.


-i might have mentioned it before but we aren't playing any shows till september 12th. we have big stuff planned that we're working on this summer.



thanks so much to everyone who helped us out , played with us and came to see us in europe and israel. especially if you danced. even more so if you danced with me.

we love you tons.

Thursday, June 5, 2008

tour is over , the sky is grey

My tour diaries are random scraps that may take awhile to edit into something semi coherent , if ever.

Myles took some pics though and we'll get those up soon enough. I don't really have much to say other than I'm tired , happy and sunburned. Our week in Israel was bizarre and scary and fun . Playing a kibbutz in the woods outside of Jerusalem is one for the memory box , probably the weirdest show any of us will ever play. Fun too , if we forget the hostile jocko-punks and concentrate on the legions of sexxy.



Look , I did an interview!





AIDS Wolf live , at Hebrew University in Jerusalem . Another WIERD show. We are playing in the noonday sun and it's about 40 celsius. The "crowd" is 10 meteres away , in the shade. It felt surprisingly good but combined with being a tourist in the old city , made me sleep at the venue all night during our "real" show. Sleeping before our set makes me feel out of it and dreamy but doesn't make me too many palz.




Performing "We Multiply" in Tel Aviv @ Levontin7. (we both lie and we multiply our fears)

We'll be taking a bit of a break from performing now , with no shows planned until the fall. Our Montreal show in July is OFF as Mutators and Night Wounds have canceled their tours and we were only playing to bro down with them. We'll be hitting the road again in October for a full US tour . Send inquiries to Michelle at Panache Booking.

NEW WYNIL ON IT'S WAY!

xocdlux

Friday, May 23, 2008


AIDS Wolf in Milan.

Tour has been pretty wonky lately. We're playing London tonite (with The Rebel = love love love love love. GREAT FUCKING BAND) but are not expecting much considering how the UK has been going. The only thing we're looking forward too is getting to play with The Intelligence in Brussels and Amsterdam on Saturday and Sunday. At least if those shows blow we'll get to see a band we like and have been wanting to see live forever.

Israel is a total mystery . The homous will be plentiful and tasty if nothing else.

xo,
chloe

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

So Austere


AIDS Wolf in Graz, Austria. Playing to a very calm crowd.

AIDS Wolf

Saturday, May 3, 2008

SMASHISM

Some recent live videos.....



In Providence....




In NY..........






Right now we're in Bratislava , Slovakia. Tour is having as many brodowns as throwdowns. A few minor altercations and many major lovefests.

We love HEALTH forever. And ever.

Thursday, April 24, 2008

Hello , we're on tour

I guess the dates would be useful.
We're in Cologne now , at Nikita's (our bookinng agent) place.
Hi!

24 Apr 2008 20:00
@ Kulturbunker Cologne, DE
25 Apr 2008 20:00
@ Molodoi Strasbourg, FR
26 Apr 2008 20:00
w/ OLD TIME RELIJUN + TV BUDDHAS @ Friese Bremen, DE
27 Apr 2008 20:00
@ Lades Kaelder Copenhagen, DK
28 Apr 2008 20:00
@ Hafenklang Hamburg, DE
29 Apr 2008 20:00
@ West Germany Berlin, DE
30 Apr 2008 20:00
@ Zoro Leipzig, DE
1 May 2008 20:00
@ Under13 Munich, DE
2 May 2008 20:00
w/ HEALTH @ DonauFestival Krems, AT
3 May 2008 20:00
@ A4 Bratislava, SK
4 May 2008 20:00
@ Forum Keller Graz, AT
5 May 2008 20:00
w/ OLD TIME RELIJUN @ Student Center Zagreb Teatar Zagreb, HR
6 May 2008 20:00
@ Mensa Pri Koritu Ljubliana, SL
7 May 2008 20:00
w/ OLD TIME RELIJUN + HIROSHIMA ROCKS AROUND @ Init Roma, IT
8 May 2008 20:00
w/ OLD TIME RELIJUN @ Circolo Magnolia Milan, IT
9 May 2008 20:00
@ Velvet Torino, IT
10 May 2008 20:00
@ L’Embobineuse Marseille, FR
11 May 2008 20:00
@ L’Ecurie Geneva, SUI
12 May 2008 20:00
@ Grnnnd Zero Lyon, FR
13 May 2008 20:00
@ Le Ferrailleur Nantes, FR
14 May 2008 20:00
@ Instants Chavirés Paris, FR
16 May 2008 20:00
@ Revenge (Great Escape Festival) Brighton, UK
17 May 2008 20:00
@ TBD (help!!) TBD ????, UK
18 May 2008 20:00
@ Captain’s Rest Glasgow, UK
19 May 2008 20:00
@ Edinburgh College of Art Edinburgh, UK
20 May 2008 20:00
@ The Star & Garter Manchester, UK
21 May 2008 20:00
@ Rainbow Birmingham, UK
22 May 2008 20:00
@ Clwb Ifor Bach Cardiff, UK
23 May 2008 20:00
w/ THE REBEL + BROMANCER @ Catch 22 London, UK
24 May 2008 20:00
w/ INTELLIGENCE @ Recyclart Bruxelles, BE
25 May 2008 20:00
w/ INTELLIGENCE + EATS TAPES @ OCCII Amsterdam, NL
28 May 2008 20:00
@ City Hall Haifa, Israel
29 May 2008 20:00
@ Uganda Jerusalem, Israel
31 May 2008 20:00
@ Levontin7 Tel-Aviv, Israel

Friday, April 18, 2008

OMG!!!

We just *may* end up touring with my favorite new band (that features members of my all time favorite band)!!!
I hope this is real and not a hallucination or a false alarm!!!!!!!!!!!

Cross yr fingers for me?
xo
chloeeee

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

How'd ya get built like that? You ain't been here that long.

"So do you wanna fuck?"

***********************************************************************************

Thursday :

When we were in Pittsburgh last week , one of the more hilarious things (((microwaves))) drummer , host with the most and general bon vivant , John Roman , said was (more or less) "sooner or latter every weird n' heavy band gets compared to Dillinger Escape Plan " . Thanks to local blog , Midnight Poutine , we too join the ranks of bands that sound nothing like D.E.P being compared to them. M.P. DID play us in their podcast so the youth can decide , Dillinger or not.

The show at Sala was fun , but like all local shows nerve wracking as all fuck. Personally , I find when we play Montreal , I'm just WAYYY too aware of what's going on. Thus , it's harder to get into "the zone". Things got off the a late start because of the hockey game and it was 1:15 by the time we played (and almost 4 when we got home!). Despite the lateness , things were more or less perfect. I was well chuffed at the line-up we chose and none of the bands disapointed. I thought that each brought a different take on what could loosely be described as "noise rock" , while still leaving a large margin of variety.

As usual , it was a joy to see Japanther and Sightings + Black Feelings are on the list of Montreal bands worth keeping an eye on. It was my first time seeing them but Andre's praise was right on.

I noticed tons of fresh faces , which is nice. As much as I love my friends coming to our shows , it's nice to know they aren't the only ones. One thing that was especially heart warming , was to read so much praise about our set on the local scene msg board. As a band , we've always felt a lil' outta place here , it feels good to see we aren't as alone as we thought.

a review , en francais + pics


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Image and video hosting by TinyPic
Pics above and in link are by Sandra Lynn Belanger

Notable event: several couples making out HARDCORE during Sightings set , a couple fucking in the downstairs men's washroom (thanks for the tip Kyle) . I guess other people think the slow grooves are sexy too.

Friday :
Woke up at 8 to grab the guys and DRIVE, after packing it made for exactly 3 hours of sleep. RAD. Our van started dying once we got into the city and it took us a million years to arrive at the Knit so we missed soundcheck.

We ran out grab some food and were spotted by a few young fans who seemed really excited about the show , screams and all , giving us a nice boost of energy. On returning the same kids were crying , telling us their dreams were shattered (no , I'm not making this up. We s attract some pretty intense folks and we love 'em to death). Turns out a guy they were chilling with was getting drunk on the sidewalk and the bouncers weren't gonna let any of them in. Jake said he'd put in the word and we went inside to watch 2up.

And had our brains blown. 2UP , for those not in the know are a Japanese noise rock duo featuring our good buddy Tetsunori , also of Dmonstrations.


Got changed , played . The super fans were in the house (managed to talk their way in it seems) and by our 5th song the girl who was bawling just 45 mins earlier had her shirt off and was licking my boots! I got rowdy with several kids in the crowd and felt a surge of great vibes the entire show. Faces were grabbed , legs were bit.

Watched Pissed Jeans (great!) , banged my head HARD , chatted with a few friends and we were OUTTA there. Early shows and late arrivals don't leave much time for bro-downs , sadly. I only met 2 of the dudes from Pissed jeans and BRIEFLY. They both seemed sympathetic to my begging that they play Montreal , if for no other reason than to please Blam Blamerson , their super fan.

the word "Pissed" is a no-no?
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Image and video hosting by TinyPic

Image and video hosting by TinyPic

Image and video hosting by TinyPic

Image and video hosting by TinyPic


Image and video hosting by TinyPic

Image and video hosting by TinyPic

All posted pics of AIDS Wolf at the Knitting Factory by Todd Fisher.

**
CMJ review + pics + DRAMA.

**
More photo documentation.

Notable : No , I will NOT sit on your face. (Do today's kids have no shame?)



Still Friday (show no.2) :

Arrived at the Market Hotel for the not-so-secret-secret Todd P party , our ex-bandmate , Christopher was already waiting for us at the back door to help load in.
By this point fatigue was setting in BIGTIME and I'm surprised I actually made it through our set. Most of the night I just got caught up with Christopher and my buds Josh and Harrison. Unfortunately , I was too tired and the venue was too smokey ( I've got wicked bad asthma ) to really watch the other bands. And I'm bummed 'cause I had zero clue Knyfe Hyts were most of Ex-Models , who I LOVE. My bandmates taunted me for missing the good stuff but I've only got so much juice in me. Instead I stood around with my eyes half closed (looking like a junkie on the nod) and got hit on by really hot , really young guys.

I met Josh from Deerhunter (and the lamented SIDS) and we had a nice chat about neo-no wave + Mark Mclean.

Zack from Knyfe Hyts seemed in worse shape than me as he slept under the merch table most of the night. Wish I had a photo!
Got Back at 5 am , crashed hard!

2 things about the Market Hotel: -AMAZING PA. Like holy crap , I can't believe a loft venue has such a great sounding LOUD system.
-Great ambiance , friendly and unpretentious folks running the place.

Clashing reviews (with pics) here and
and here .

Pitchfork hearts Deerhunter.


Saturday:

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Woke up at 9 to bring the van in for repairs ( 3 hours of sleep is starting to feel like a theme here) , went broke. Had brunch with Jake and Michelle and Carlos and Chris , and then got locked out of their (j+m's) place for a few hours while they were looking at offices . Met their cute and friendly neighbor and talked about jam bands. Finally got in , put on our shoes and left for Providence. Our van filling with exhaust the entire drive .

Loaded in , ate burritos , hung with buds . Japanther had to bail due to injury (get better Ian!) so the bill was down to just us , Sightings and Trouble vs Glue , our buddy Toni's band all the way from Roma. T vs G is 2/3 of Dada Swing and they played angular , stripped down & noisy weird pop. Toni is also known for being the drummer in Hiroshima Rocks Around and for being an amazing host and wicked cook.


During Sightings set some really drunk , really messed up kid jumped on stage and grabbed the mic. Mark gave him a HARD shove offstage and the fucked landed on me. Ouch! Shaken , I went out side for the next song. When I came back in the same dude insisted on grabbing me in inappropriate places several times over . Harsh words were said and he left.


I got asked to fuck several times by a very good looking young guy (another theme? Am I the punchline to some joke I don't know?) and we played to a smallish but rowdy crowd. Several rows of positive vibes and spastic dancing momentarily cured any fatigue related blues.
After the show , we all went to this bar where Rebecca works and hung out with the crew (minus a few ). I think it's the first time our band has been to a bar after playing. We certainly don't do the party thing.
Crashed a Vik's with the meowers , ate salad and regained a sense of humanity. Some douches tagged out van with inanities while we slept , awesome.

Notable : I can carry Jeff Schneider with relative ease. Deadlifting , try it.

Sunday:
Met up with Dare and Rebecca for brunch at Jillian's (fellow vegans take heed : you MUST try the Saint Jamez Benedict while in Providence , it's heaven in your mouth) did the thing , saw peeps. Had a nice hangout with Quigley that I wish lasted a year. Drove to Boston and caught up with Neptune , ate pizza sat around and talked to dudes.

I had brought a Jean Louis Costes book to read on this micro-tour , in the spirit of offensiveness , but at this show had to put it away. Not because I was OFFENDED but because I couldn't surpress my gag reflex any longer.

White Mice are now a 4 piece and have a new oscillator guy + a guitarist . They sound better than ever (industrial jams are back in a big way) and played a short set. They had a bunch of new gear (helped the sound a bunch) and in general the material they played was "groovier" that the previous times I'd seen them.
Our set was totally frustrating as there was ZERO vocals in the monitors and our stage sound was mud - none of us could hear each other. I ended up staining my vocal chords pretty bad by over compensating - I still can't talk. AT ALL. Meh. . The same thing happened last time we played Milky Way. The PA there just isn't powerful enough for a loud band.

More memorable than PLAYING was grabbing this kid and carrying him around after our set.

Neptune had a few gear issues but played a great set of all new (well new since I last saw them) songs. Kickass , as usual . I got their new record , Gong Lake ( Table of The Elements )and have been jamming it all freaking day.
More bro downs and attempts to get caught up with various friends but the time at a show is never enough and such meetings are often less than satisfying . At 1: 30 we were in the van and drove to our motel in Vermont , to the consternation of our would-be hosts. We needed a head start home so Myles could spend time with his fam before Europe.



Notable : Dan with the mic duct tapped to his face! + Eating raw spinach , straight from the bag + Homemade tats.



Got home saw the doctor , got steroids and horse pills . Was told to stay away from second hand smoke (I wish!) and get plenty of bed rest (YEAH RIGHT) . My lungs are pretty seriously infected and we're leaving for tour in less than a week.








AIDSWOLF aids wolf AIDS WOLF aidswolf.





I'm not quite sure what these are for but we have one anyhow.


I'm making a move to formally start boxing training on returning from tour. I think it would be much more fun , productive and cathartic to fight those who have a problem with our band than engage in circular arguments. Besides , everyone's bored of music. Let's have a good ol' fashioned cage match or 2 , in good fun and good faith , to resolve issues and get our hearts racing and cheeks flushed.
HEALTHY, 'cause health = wealth .

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Upcoming tour posters

Okayyyy this is what we did for the upcoming European tour, there will be an edition of 200 screenprinted for sale at the merch booth by yours truly. I know there has been a whole bunch printed offset tabloid size, and put up here and there in venues etc already:

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and here's a poster designed by our buddy Elzo from Brussels, created especially for our leg of shows in Israel:

Image and video hosting by TinyPic


AIDS Wolf , aids wolf, AIDS WOLF , AIDSWOLF

Thursday, April 10, 2008

Art , Class , Accessibility

My personal misgivings about "conceptual art" have always been about class and accessibility . Art that requires an artist's statement or manifesto to understand means it can only be understood by those educated in conceptual art. Art that requires the white walls of a gallery to contextualize it , fails to be accessible to to the majority of people who for reasons of class , will not step foot inside a gallery.

Because of this , the world conceptual art becomes a gated community where the entry key is connections , money , education and ample free time. Only the social elite need apply .

Brendan Fowler aka BARR , despite his "cred" in the D.I.Y scene doesn't seek to prove otherwise with the piece he made about our band and Jay Reatard. The piece in question (titled 11/16/07, 11/18/07) costs $3000, the most expensive piece in the show.

The price of the speaks loud and clear on WHO Mr.Fowler seeks as an audience. And it ain't "the kids" .

(In stark contrast , the most expensive anything by my and AIDS Wolf drummer Yannick's art factory , Seripop , was 150$ for a 16 color one-of-a-kind silkscreen monoprint.)


You better have a good job or large trust fund if you wanna buy some of this brand of empowerment.


************************************************************************************
Our buddy Jake overheard this BRILLIANT tidbit : "Why isn't Child Abuse ( Our LPU labelmates , FYI) in it?" and his friend said "Well, I
guess he knows those guys and knows they're good dudes".


No news on if he will be doing more of this deep , hard hitting work about the bands Child Pornography , Anal Cunt , Fag Cop , Two Dead Sluts , One Good Fuck or canuk punk legends , The Dayglo Abortions.






Read a review of the show here.

Unfortunately , Brendan declined an invitation to our Knitting Factory show this Friday. A shame because I have tons of questions to ask him about art , class and the controversial works of some of the artists featured in his magazine. Because if Raymond Pettibone's (bless his soul , I love him to death!) drawings aren't "socially questionable" , I don't know WHAT is. That's exactly why his work is so relevant.

Tuesday, April 8, 2008

Socially Questionable Is The New Pink?

I don't even know WHAT the fuck to say about this....

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"Fowler’s most recent performance project/band, Disaster, began as a direct address to what he sees as the growing roster of bands with socially questionable names (Aids Wolf, Jay Reatard etc.). In doing so, Fowler created a project he himself would find morally negligent in hopes of understanding their motives."

2 Watchdogs Watching Cable.........

Never before Sightings have I ever met a band that is so cheerful and matter of fact about bumming out audiences . And when you are as far on the weird dial as these guys are , a bit of joy goes a long way to keep morale up. They are 3 regular , down to earth dudes who are making some of the most original and spellbinding music I've ever heard. A band that manages to be both fast and slow at the same time , where the grooves reside in the empty spaces between notes & beats .

Their latest record , Through The Panama ( Load / Ecstatic Peace!) is produced by Andrew W.K and manages to be both more clean and austere than their earlier work. Some noise fans might sniff at the queasy melodies but fans of Sightings' cathartic performances will dig the accurate representation of the live sound on record.

Personally , I find that shaving a layer of fuzz from their records does A LOT to expose the songs' scaffolding and shows off some next level playing and composition. In FACT , I personally challenge any jaded fuck insistent that music just ain't as good as it was "back in the day" to listen to 'This Most Real of Hells', the 5th track , a few times and then try to say with a straight face that there's nothing new under the sun.

It's danceble , hypnotic , paranoid and HOT.

Oh and very weird. It's become a bit of a single-player game for me to listen to this at the gym and mentally deconstruct the songs to see how they are put together but no matter how many times I listen , I can't get any insight on their compositional process.


Scarier and sexier (seriously , it's avant-rock that you FUCK to. When did that last happen? Not since Royal Trux and U.S Maple called it quits that's for sure!) than any other band around , last time we played with them I gave myself a concussion from banging my head too hard and hitting in on the monitor. And it was well worth it , even if I lost a few IQ points.

While the sound on this live clip doesn't do the band justice , it gives you an IDEA of what's in store.


10 Apr 2008 Sala Rossa Montreal, Quebec
Sightings w/ AIDS Wolf , Japanther , Black Feelings
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
11 Apr 2008 Oxfam Cafe Medford, Massachusetts
Sightings w/ Baixa, Bezoar , Life Partners

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

12 Apr 2008 AS220 Providence, Rhode Island
Sightings w/ AIDS Wolf ,Japanther , Trouble vs Glue

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Going Back In Time

I never posted this before 'cause the bio is so lame it makes me cringe (Seriously , who come up with this shit? It makes me wanna eviscerate myself.) but in spirit of our Friday night show at the Knitting Factory I figured these vids of our CMJ show there made sense.

They actually sound/look pretty good so here ya go:

AIDS Wolf @ The Knitting Factory part 1

AIDS Wolf @ The Knitting Factory part 2
AIDS Wolf @ The Knitting Factory part 3

love love love
chloeeee

Monday, April 7, 2008

MORE BAD THOUGHTS

One thing that's funny is that we ( being AIDS Wolf ) get put down for supposedly not having "songs". This confuses me greatly because to me , our songs are really obvious and pretty catchy. Often too much so. I find myself frustrated that while many of the bands I admire most form structure out of abstraction , AW is still highly rooted in "rock". My dream would be to escape any rock trappings , 100%.


))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))----(((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((

Anyway , we're playing a few shows this week for all to experience our non-songs in the flesh . And flesh is nice isn't? Bring your body to:



Montreal, Quebec APRIL 10 8:30 @ Sala Rossa
AIDS Wolf + Japanther + Sightings + Black Feelings

BUY TIX here
Image and video hosting by TinyPic
Screenprinted poster by Seripop aka me an' Yannick.


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NY , NY APRIL 11 7:00 (SHARP!)@ Knitting Factory (Main Stage)
Pissed Jeans + AIDS WOLF + UP UP aka 2UP


BUY TIX HERE


Image and video hosting by TinyPic

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Providence, RI APRIL 12 8:00 @ As220
AIDS Wolf + Japanther + Sightings + Trouble vs Glue

**********************************************************************************

Boston, MA APRIL 13 9:00 @ The Milky Way
Neptune + AIDS Wolf + White Mice


**********************************************************************************

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Myles took a photo of the crowd in Chicago , look how cute everyone is.

!
Old newzzz




AIDSWOLF aids wolf AIDS WOLF aidswolf.

Friday, April 4, 2008

Kombucha > Cocaine

" So you guys all play in a rock band and not ONE of you smokes???"

That's what the border guard said to us as we crossed back into Canada Monday evening. He wasn't the only one who was incredulous over our healthy lifestyles and low party threshold.

Easy going , not too exciting. Wholefoods and hot showers and laundrettes are where WE hang. Soccer fields and beaches when it's warm out.

The shows were all fun , except for Detroit which was a BUST. We were SUPPOSED to play with our palz ,Monotonix at this D.I.Y space called Scrummage University (totally sketchy!) and got press and everything . At the last minute they canceled our show (plus most of the other shows they had booked) without so much as an explination and held a DANCE PARTY instead. A dance party with a 5$ cover. Just another reason why "the kids" suck ass.

So we got added onto the BIG SHOW at the BIG VENUE and it was kinda weird. We played at 8:30 to an empty room and then drove an hour and a half to a motel cause we didn't have a place to crash. As the random guy smoking weed backstage said " AT LEAST YOU GOT PIZZA!"


The rest was a blur of rowdy times with dudes with beards and fros , drinking kombucha and eating salad and tofu. Chicago (with Monotonix) was especially fun and Pittsburgh , despite the small crowd was especially rowdy. And bearded.

Still , it was kinda chilly so there was no soccer to be had.

GOOD THINGS: new drummer in Monotonix is the HILARIOUS , Todd R. came to our show ,
John Roman , chillin' with Zack , Unholy 2 ,Italian Ice , weird kids in Ohio who get ROWDY , BEARDS , MIKE BUDAI + his awesome posters , very good looking dude in Pittsburgh who bit my hand , vitamins + supplements , the staff at The Empty Bottle , GT's Kombucha.

BAD THINGS: all having colds ,Scrummage University, coming home, smoke.



Here's a video of the Pittsburgh show , it's dark and you can't hear me-- just like being there!


This is the AWESOME band we played with , Italian Ice.



**********************************************************************************



Hot off the presses : AIDS Wolf NEWS!


- The tracks for our upcoming album all all mixed . Now they just need to put in order and sent to the pressing plant for a fall release.

- We'll be doing a split 7" with Santanized on Badmaster Records. We played with Satanized last fall in Philly and kinda fell in lust. They are one of my favorite bands we played with (they also have the best looking front man) and I'm really happy they asked us to do this 7" with them. Now we just need to record something! We love evil and we love goodlooking friends . Meow!

-We're playing a few shows next week. Yep.

-Our Nov.08 US tour is being booked now ,interested folks should contact Michelle Cable about setting up a show in YOUR city.

Wednesday, April 2, 2008

Secret Secretions

Some of you keep asking for AIDS Wolf lyrics. While I'm flattered you are interested in what I'm yelling/mumbling I'd have to say , please hold off on the cover bands. At least until we break up .


The lyrics are mixed low , I slur and garble and spit and sometimes choke on the words.

It's all secret secretions , subliminal messages.
Not unlike speaking in tongues .

Like Beefheart said , "You got ears , you gotta listen".

It's all there and is an integrated part of the whole. Inseparable. My tongue stays in my mouth for now.

xo

Tuesday, March 25, 2008

SO SAD WE NEVER GOT A FUCKING PHOTO

Columbus Ohio, we love you. You are the city they gave us our name and for that we give thanks and praise.
Columbus Ohio, we are not worthy to receive you but only say a word and we shall be healed.
Columbus , the most high , except our humble prayers and forgive us our trespasses.

Holy Columbus , we have prepared 5 long years for this pilgrimage .


THANK YE!!!!

We are ready to meet our maker and come face to face with the truest AIDS WOLF.

AIDS WOLF HATE YOU

So dear readers(all 2 of you),

This is the AIDS Wolf band blog , there is no excitement. That's because lately we've just been holed up making things. Now like ugly butterflies we'll emerge from our shabby cocoons and play a few shows.
yes?
yes.


26 Mar 2008 21:00
SCIENCE VS WITCHCRAFT , CAGES
@ Soundlab Buffalo, NY

27 Mar 2008 20:00
w/ THE UNHOLY TWO and MUSCLE PUZZLE @ Bourbon St Columbus, Ohio


28 Mar 2008 20:00
w/ MONOTONIX , Bottomless Pit@ Empty Bottle Chicago, IL

29 Mar 2008 20:00
w/ MONOTONIX @ Scrummage University Detroit, MI


30 Mar 2008 20:00
w/ITALIAN ICE + ICE CAPADES @ Gooski’s Pittsburgh, PA



+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

There might have been some small rumblings about our next record , CITIES OF GLASS. We had initially hoped for a late spring release but it looks like it's gonna be postponed a few months , probably until the fall as we are STILL in the mixing process with WW. It's been drawn out but all parties agree that the record will be better for it.

In the meantime we have a few 7"s , eps and splits planned. I'll post more about that shit latter.



Here's the layout for our newest 7" . It's called CHIPPED TEETH and is on the German label Slowboy . The sleeves will be screenprinted.


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Front cover .

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Back cover .

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Insides

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More insides...


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And more...

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Center Labels .

More to come....

Wednesday, January 9, 2008

My View of Your Naked Chest Dulls the Pain

In not so breaking news , we posted a new track on our myspace like 2 weeks ago. It's called We Are All Animals and it's from our forthcoming split with Portland , Oregon's Night Wounds. The split will be vinyl only and will be on Nail In The Coffin .

And here's a lil' back and forth I had recently with John Webb from PRE. A band we've had the joy to tour and do 2 split 7"s with. Their debut record is one of my favorites of this year and I feel so amazingly lucky to have met them , both on a personal and musical basis.They are a big favorite here in camp AW so anyone with an interest in our music will be most likely pretty charged up by PRE. We did this talk a few weeks ago , but i **just** got around to editing it and posting now. that's why there's the references to NYE.
cheers,
Chloe



Chloe Lum / AIDS wolf :In many ways , since we first met you guys and got that PRE demo , I felt you were our twin band . Similar sounds , similar approach + attitude. I’m guessing others feel that way too as our bands not only done 2 splits , toured together but we are also label mates 3 times over (Skingraft , Lovepump United , Blood of the Drash) , something that I’d guess doesn’t happen often.

What do you figure the chances are that 2 bands , living so far from each other would end up so intertwined?

John Webb / PRE: That whole thing is so weird! I remember the first time I heard you guys. PRE had only been around for about 4 months and were thinking of recording a 'demo'. I remember ordering yr album from the Lovepump site and was so stoked when it arrived with a 3inch badge as well!!! I remember sitting in my room playing it to Kevin. We were both totally blown away. Artwork, songs, recording. Amazing. Then, by the time you guys came to London we had recorded 'the demo'. We came to your London show and I made Kevin give you a copy. That was a hard 20 minutes or so. We were both too shy to give it to do it.

Anyway... You liked it, we were really happy - we all had sex, you pointed us in the right direction - we sent out 2 demos, one to Lovepump and one to Skingraft, we all snogged and the rest is current history etc etc.

Hooking up again with you guys in New York in October really brought up that whole ' 2 bands intertwined' thing for us. It's like family meeting up after a years break, only better.

I know I'm sounding really emo here, but that's what is sooooooo amazing about music and the position PRE is in. We have only really hung out a handful of times, but along with Jake and Mookie (Lovepump United) and Mark (Skingraft) it all just makes me want to take my top off and carve FAMILY into my chest with a bicycle pump or something....

SO - HOW EASY IS IT DOING WHAT YOU DO FROM A DAY TO DAY BASIS. MAKING ENDS MEET, FINDING TIME TO JAM "FREEBIRD' ETC? WHATS THE FIRST THING YOU DO WHEN YOU WAKE UP?

CL/AW :
Yeah , you guys saved our asses that first time in London , what with Kevin putting us up. The fact that your band ruled was just icing on the cake 'cause we were pretty fast friends.
I gotta say I REALLY love the family vibe of working with Skingraft , Love Pump United , Panache (our US booking agent)- it’s great to be working with friends who really care about the music they’re putting out or booking. I’ve always said that for me , the camraderie was one of my favorite parts of being in a band. I love being excited by music and meeting people just as curious/passionate is always great. Even better when they have right-on projects of their own.
I also find it interesting that both in music and in visual art when I really enjoy someone’s work and they feel the same about mine we usually end up getting along really well and being fast friends.
I’d say many of my closest friends are people I met via mutual admiration- it’s funny how our other interests and personalities would mesh up so much.

I’m not really sure what Andre and Myles do in the morning but for Yannick and myself the basic routine is get up , check emails , eat , go to the gym , eat again. then we start working on Seripop stuff , often dealing with clients and getting sketches done and sent off. For Seripop we ideally do more of the client relation stuff early in the day and the creative work latter in the afternoon or even at night.

We’re in an interesting situation because we live off of Seripop YET so much of what Seripop does is for the band , or for our friend’s bands.

3 nights a week we jam with AIDS wolf , usually for 2-3 hours a shot. Yannick will often spend a fair bit of time at home going through our practice tapes and dumping them on the computer to make CDs for the guys. Otherwise nobody would remember the parts for the new songs. While he does that I usually work on lyrics for new songs or do band correspondence or draw.

If we’re not practicing and don’t have a huge work rush for Seripop stuff we’ll often spend our evenings drawing more casually. Sketching ideas or doing more “fun” stuff like posters or just drawing for the sake of it.

While we’re at home drawing we just listen to a steady steam of records all day. So the only times we’ll stand is is to flip the record or get another tea/coffee.

Every week or 2 we’ll have a day where ALL we do is pack and mail tubes of posters off. That’s probably the most mind numbing boring thing we do and we both hate it . Mailorder is a good income source for us and we’re glad folks like our print but fuck filling out customs forms SUCKS! And we are LAZY!


Sometimes managing time is tricky because we mostly make our money doing illustration jobs or record covers and we never know in advance how busy we’re gonna be in a given week.

Ideally , as we get more stable financially from our illustrations , we spend more and more time making music. And the easier it is for us to go on tour and the more money we can spend on amassing crappy gear.

Yannick and I have been slowly putting money on some basic recording gear and have both been reading up a fair bit on home recording , in a few months we’ll have a pretty decent set up for AIDS wolf (and our various side projects)to do demos in our practice space. Mostly we’re just buying lots of mics so that we can keep stuff more or less separated. We do our song writing from jamming so the better we can hear what each of us did on tape , the easier everything is.


Having our own company certainly gives us flexibility to tour , all we have to do is give a heads up to the folks who regularly hire us that we’ll be gone and that’s that. I mean there ALWAYS is tons of last minutes rushing to get everything we started done before we go but , ultimately since we don’t have bosses we can leave for as long as we want, as often as we want.

We’re pretty much busy all the time but will TRY to fit time for going to shows , going to the DJ night I do with some friends , attempting to see art , hosting bands at our house. There always time for Freebird. I guess the main thing that suffers are our social lives.

What about you? Do you have difficulties balancing life with being in a band? Your recent us tour was a month long , were lots of headaches and heartaches involved? Do you get homesick ?


JW/P : Yeah, balancing things can be really difficult and frustrating. Living in London is hard purely because it's so expensive. Apart from Keex, who works freelance, the rest of us have FULLLLLL time jobs. Making music is essentially a way to make the day-to-day stuff a little more bearable. We will rehearse once a week usually, but for whatever reasons it's kinda rare that all 5 of us make it. Me, Rick and Kevin are always there. Like Yannick, I always record our rehearsals, and burn cd's or send mp3's to pass around to everyone. that way, even if someone isn't around, they can still get up to speed, plus we always forget stuff.



Outside of PRE, me, Keex and Kevin do other music related stuff. For example, this week I'll be practicing with mine and Kevin's new band, Male Bonding - plus we are duping tapes for Paradise Vendors Inc (our tape label) first release. Talbot Tagora / Hand Jobs split . There is always time to go to shows, art or music. We are totally spoilt for that living in London.



The U.S. tour meant we all had to negotiate taking a whole years worth of holiday in one block, which was hard. There was no point in us going all that way just to do 2 weeks. I don't think anyone got homesick on tour. It was hard to really. We were out on our own (with constant help from the life saving Michelle at Panache), so there was always driving, navigation, rolling tees, counting out dimes, repairing broken windows, repairing broken teeth, trying to find fruit, trying to find floors to sleep on etc to figure out. We are all pretty big drinkers, so there were a few headaches along the way, but nothing that Fleetwood Mac couldn't smooth out. Remember Keex at CMJ???

It's hard being apart from girlfriends. You end up spending the equivalent of the airfare on calling cards. Plus when you get back it takes a while to switch your head back to London mode. It's easy to get selfish and self absorbed. I fucked up big time regarding this and hate myself for it. Matt's girlfriend wrote him a dated letter for every single day that we were away, which was super sweet. He opened the last one during the taxi trip back to JFK and shared it with us and the fruit consuming taxi driver - it made Keex cry.



The tour was amazing though, and it went by so quick. We are all such good friends that we felt invincible.



WHAT’S YR WORSE TOUR MOMENT (BROKEN FOOT?) AND WHAT"S THE WOLFS PLANS FOR 2008 - PLUS TELL ME WHAT YOU WILL DO ON NEW YEARS EVE PLEASE?

CL/AW: My worse moment on tour was smashing a guy in the face with a mic. It was in Baton Rouge and things SUCKED . It was a huge “hangout” type bar with pool tables . The staff and the other bands were very nice to us but from the beginning , when the first band started playing jangly garage rock I knew we were in for it.

During the 1st band there were about 80 people , by the time we started 15 or so were left. Half of whom split as soon as we started playing. The few people who stayed watching us seemed bored as shit and all I could think of was trying to get the set done as fast a possible so we could get the hell outta there.

In the middle of one of our songs , some Joe-college guy started heckling LOUD . I mean you know how fucking loud we play? The guy was projecting over us , basically SCREAMING that we sucked. I walked over to him and asked if he though he could do better several times while pointing the mic at him.
I was so boiling pissed I kept goading him , telling him to get on the stage . Finally when he just stood there muttering insults under his breathe I SMASHED his face and then spat a huge a chunk on him.
THAT was the worst part of our tour.

All I could think after was I was really glad I don’t drink cause if I hadn’t been so nervous about really hurting him I probably would have lost it on his face.



GNARLY.


In 2008 we gonna do few us shows through the winter and spring , hopefully we’ll make it to SXSW. Then we’re spending the end of April and all of May in Europe Plus a few dates in Israel .30 some shows. You guys better play some of them with us!It’s around that time that our new record will be out so hopefully people might care about that.HA!

Then, a full U.S. tour in the fall. Andre’s talking about Japan/Australia in late fall.... I dunno , I guess we’ll see what happens.

On NYE I’ll be helping my crew , The Pirates of the Lachine Canal , with a party. We have Clockcleaner from Philadelphia coming plus great locals the The O-Voids
, Panopticon Eyelids & The American Devices . I’ll be DJing the noise rock , weird punk , avant garage and space jams as long as I can hold up behind the DJ booth on crutches.

My pal Shaun , who’s the one who really put the show together , and I have a friendly competition going on over our record collections. We both DJ this weekly night he set up and I’m looking to show off with all the new records I picked up while on tour. It’s been frustrating being laid up with a broken foot cause I really wanted to DJ as soon as I got home!

Nerdy huh?
Most bands I know get laid or wasted , all we do is buy records and books , check emails and wash our clothes as often as possible ( I think we must be one of the most hygiene conscious bands out there , after the Chinese Stars that is). Oh and go to Whole Foods like every day .

You guys are for sure much more the party animal types than we are. Does this ever cause any drama?I know Keex was falling all over the place at CMJ , any interesting stories there? What will YOU be doing NYE?

JW/P:the 'party animals' side of PRE hasn't caused too much aggro so far. Matt can be rather urmm 'insensitive' at times, but so far this has just caused tons of laughter, rather than insult. in a similar vein to Chris ex-aids (Chris Taylor our former guitarist)! Keex was so wasted at CMJ. Jupiter from HEALTH and her were knocking back a lot of licker - she stole Andre's bottle of whisky and then lost it , I seem to remember! I KNOW that us and ***HEALTH could get into a lot of trouble together - we just haven't had the time yet.

There were some moments on tour that were 'interesting' but nothing too fucked up. Baltimore was BIG, but I opted out of that nights 'entertainment' and slept in the van. When I went into the warehouse where the rest of PRE were partying the next morning to clean my teeth, it was depressing as hell.

NYE is a weird one. I've not committed to anything yet. Might come to Montreal and see Clockcleaner.


So, what do you make of the whole 'sinraft' bootleg live split. Crazy eh? All of us topless in the worst venue in Brighton. Still can't remember how that materialised...

CL/AW:Considering how SHITTY and depressing the Brighton show was and how poorly we were all treated , it only made sense to take off our clothes. I’m waiting to be crucified . People are such fucking puritians!

We get so much flack for our photo in “The Lovvers” , journalists always get pissy thinking we are trying to shock.
I wish they’d just get it through their skulls that we like excuses to take off our clothes! It’s usually my fault! I make out with the audience and wanna get naked all the time.

I’m glad for the boot though , it’s helping me erase the memory of a terrible show and replace it with memories of Freebird singalongs and taking off our clothes in an empty venue while being heckled by the bouncer.

I guess that’s the better part of touring with friends , you can turn a shit show into a fun night just by hanging out and having a laugh.

Are people accepting of naked bands in the UK?
How do you feel your music and noise-rock in general is accepted in the UK vs. North America?

JW/P:
People seem pretty cool about naked girls over here. I work in a record shop (Rough Trade) so I got quite a lot of stick from from people when the 7" came into stock, but just dumb jokes. I don't get it when people think that by doing a record sleeve like that, it's an exercise in 'shock'. Who finds topless people shocking????? Keex gets a lot of questions about why she plays in her bra or pants (English folks call underwear "pants") or whatever. She gets hot really quickly cos she's so active, so she takes her clothes of to kool down. Why is it any different to a guy taking his top off? It isn't unless yr have issues with females - she still has everything covered. In write ups for our shows, people always mention stuff about Keex playing half naked like it's our shtick or something. that pisses me off.

It's hard for me to compare the noise rock scene here with North America, as I don't know what it's like there. It's ok here I guess. I haven't heard too many rad noise bands. Things are getting better though. I think people here are so into the NME scene that people are scared to like bands that they haven't been told to like. - maybe thats not true, but it feels like that sometimes. I like being out on our own though. I would much rather come to America and play show, then play shows in the UK.

A friend of ours lives in a warehouse and has just started putting on shows. That's so fucking kool. It's rare for London. That kinda thing happens all the time in the states (and Canada!). We need more of that kind of action over here, rather then rigid venue gigs.

Whats yr views on the UK / North American scenes? You have played to people both in the UK and North America, so in theory you must have noticed differences.

CL/AW:
Don’t even get me started about the double standard about sweaty , overheated gals shedding some clothes. It’s actually depressing how quick you get to see the real sexism and double standards that are alive and well in the underground music scene to this day.
It’s like as if riot grrl never happened.
Not only is a gal taking off an extra layer a shtick , her very femaleness is also! Especially if she happens to be somewhat cute.
I’m not sure who finds nude people shocking exactly but journalists at least love to state that they AREN’T taking in by our supposed attempts to shock! As if we were up to some serious G.G Allin stuff rather than in a tasteful naked pose in the nature.
As for the bootleg split , I love it cause the photos are soooo unflatering! it looks like an office party gone wrong!

I guess that’s one different we’ve noticed between the UK and the USA . In England people are much more into trend , hypes and fashions BUT it seems like folks over there are more open to being EXCITED about things there.
While in the US or Canada we get dumped on for our name or publicity shots , in England people are just “oh here’s a mad new band”.

It seems that while there are less noisy rock bands , those types of bands are seem as more legitimate than in Canada or the US. (perhaps due to The Wire?)

In the States , we do fine and have lots of like minded bands to play with (soooo many great bands!) but it’s more of a cult thing. People outside of the scene tend to be kinda snarky about noise rock . It’s certainly not seen as “cool” . In Canada , forget it! outside of Montreal , Toronto and Vancouver there is ZERO interest in this kinda music at all.

I mean , sometimes you can luck out on a decent show in some of the mid-sized cities but it’s soooo hit or miss and as far as I know there aren’t any active noise rock/no wave whatever bands in any of the other cities.
Except for Be Bad from Halifax but they just split up!

A few years ago , when we weren’t so world-weary , we went across Canada in some naïve hope of being noise-rock johnny appleseeds and came home wanting to end our lives. Let’s just say the general reception wasn’t very positive!

In the UK you at least get some curiosity ....

We’ll take touring in the UK or the USA over Canada ANYDAY.
What I’ve noticed similar in the UK and the funner cities in the States is that people tend to show they are having fun by getting rowdy, something that’s very inspiring to anyone performing. I just love feeding into the wild energies that crowds can give off. It’s one of the things that makes performing so satisfying.


Noise rock has never been very big here in Canada . I spent years just mailordering records of bands I’ve never get to see ‘cause until recently , most wouldn’t tour here and stores wouldn’t exactly be brimming with it.

It’s funny cause I spent my teenaged years in Ottawa , where there was a very fertile and active all ages scene but I really slowed down going to shows for a few years starting at around 17. In my most formative period I was strictly mailordering records and trading D.I.Y noise tapes with weirdos I’d find on the back pages of zines.

Being obessed with theBoredoms , U.S Maple , Lydia Lunch ,The Flying Luttenbachers,Royal Trux ect I just couldn’t get much satisfaction from the very PC post-hardcore scene in my backyard. I actually found it pretty alienating.


At least I was lucky enough to see U.S Maple early on , who for some bizarre reason came to play the Cave in Ottawa.

And for you guys, what are your main influences , interests and life changing experiences vis-à-vis playing music?

JW/P:
Influences are a tuff one as I can't speak for the rest of the band, but for me, myspace has opened up another world of bands that i/we would never have heard before. Bands like Pretty Thigh (R.I.P), Finally Punk and Hot Girls Cool Guys (R.I.P) Totally blew me away the first time i heard them, and are a huge inspiration. the direct result of that overwhelming feeling of excitement has resulted in the tape label I mentioned. Kevin and I are so jazzed about pairing up bands that we feel so lucky to have heard, like LOOK LOOK DANCING BOYS/PANTZ PARTY/TEMPERATURES/PAPER LEGS/TALBOT TAGORA /HAND JOBS etc.

I'm really interested in the No Wave scene as I know you are. Marc Masters current book "No Wave" is really great. - Mark Fisher (Skingraft CEO) has reviewed it for the current issue of The Wire! That scene and the way it included performance art, lo-fi films as well as bands/ music makes me HUNGRY. From where I'm at it seems like that kind of thing is maybe happening at The Smell in L.A a lot of those bands are an inspiration - Silver Daggers, HEALTH, No Age, Mika Miko etc. Maybe that's romantic of me, as I haven't been to L.A or The Smell, but that's what I like to think.(I've been there and it's pretty much paradise on earth!) I love that pop edge dood. In my world The Screamers have been as big as The Beatles. I'm really into the idea of making exposed, harsh music with a (for the want of a better word) 'POP' element. That's were PRE are heading at the moment.

As for in LONDON - I have an endless amount of respect for Chris Tipton and the Upset The Rhythm crew. I find their activities very inspiring. It's all about sharing the wealth.

Being in a band has changed my life so much. I know that without being involved in making music, I would be desperately unhappy and even more boring. I've met so many amazing and inspirational people through music. I've been stealing a little bit of those people's KOOL for a couple of years now. I plan to piece it all together over Christmas, like the ultimate jigsaw puzzle and relaunch myself in 2008. I am going to be so hot - and I will owe it all to the scene man...