Noise Fest
Encyclopedia
Noise Fest was an influential festival of no wave
noise music
performances curated by Thurston Moore
of Sonic Youth
at the New York City
art space White Columns
in June 1981. Sonic Youth
made their first live appearances at this show.
In mid 1981 Kim Gordon
and Josh Baer convinced Thurston Moore to organize this nine day noise festival to accommodate underemployed experimental performers in the downtown scene. The festival was held in the White Columns
gallery, which had a capacity of 60 people. Each night three to five acts performed, including Glenn Branca
, Rhys Chatham
, Jeffrey Lohn,Built on Guilt, Rudolph Grey
, the Avant Squares, Off Beach, Mofungo, Red Decade, Robin Crutchfield
's Dark Day, Ad Hoc Rock, Smoking Section, Chinese Puzzle, Avoidance Behaviour, and Sonic Youth
.
influenced loud noise music
mixed with performance art
was held at New York’s Artists’ Space that led to the Brian Eno
-produced recording No New York
. This recording was seen by many as the first attempt to define the no wave
sound, as it documented The Contortions
, Teenage Jesus and the Jerks, Mars
and DNA
.
Music from the Noise Festival was first released as a cassette titled "Noise Fest" on ZG Music, the music label of the legendary ZG magazine organized by Rosetta Brookes. In 1982 the "Noise Festival Tape" was released by White Columns
.
series organized by Live Skull
members in May 1983 at White Columns
. Among an art installation created by David Wojnarowicz
and Joseph Nechvatal
, various performance art
ists such as Ilona Granet and Emily XYZ did their acts intermixing with the music of The Fall, Beastie Boys
, Live Skull
, Sonic Youth
, Lydia Lunch
, Elliott Sharp
, Swans
and Arto Lindsay
.
"Speed Trials" was eventually released as a live album recorded by Mark Roule and became one of the best-selling independent records of its time.
No Wave
No Wave was a short-lived but influential underground music, film, performance art, video, and contemporary art scene that had its beginnings during the mid-1970s in New York City. The term No Wave is in part satirical word play rejecting the commercial elements of the then-popular New Wave genre...
noise music
Noise music
Noise music is a term used to describe varieties of avant-garde music and sound art that may use elements such as cacophony, dissonance, atonality, noise, indeterminacy, and repetition in their realization. Noise music can feature distortion, various types of acoustically or electronically...
performances curated by Thurston Moore
Thurston Moore
Thurston Joseph Moore is an American musician best known as a singer, songwriter and guitarist of Sonic Youth. He has also participated in many solo and group collaborations outside of Sonic Youth, as well as running the Ecstatic Peace! record label...
of Sonic Youth
Sonic Youth
Sonic Youth is an American alternative rock band from New York City, formed in 1981. The current lineup consists of Thurston Moore , Kim Gordon , Lee Ranaldo , Steve Shelley , and Mark Ibold .In their early career, Sonic Youth was associated with the No Wave art and music scene in New York City...
at the New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
art space White Columns
White Columns
White Columns is New York City’s oldest alternative non-profit space and one of its most prestigious. White Columns is known as a show case for up and coming artists....
in June 1981. Sonic Youth
Sonic Youth
Sonic Youth is an American alternative rock band from New York City, formed in 1981. The current lineup consists of Thurston Moore , Kim Gordon , Lee Ranaldo , Steve Shelley , and Mark Ibold .In their early career, Sonic Youth was associated with the No Wave art and music scene in New York City...
made their first live appearances at this show.
In mid 1981 Kim Gordon
Kim Gordon
Kim Althea Gordon is an American musician, vocalist, artist, record producer, video director and actress. She has sung and played bass and guitar in the alternative rock band Sonic Youth, and in Free Kitten with Julia Cafritz...
and Josh Baer convinced Thurston Moore to organize this nine day noise festival to accommodate underemployed experimental performers in the downtown scene. The festival was held in the White Columns
White Columns
White Columns is New York City’s oldest alternative non-profit space and one of its most prestigious. White Columns is known as a show case for up and coming artists....
gallery, which had a capacity of 60 people. Each night three to five acts performed, including Glenn Branca
Glenn Branca
Glenn Branca is an American avant-garde composer and guitarist known for his use of volume, alternative guitar tunings, repetition, droning, and the harmonic series. In 2008 he was awarded an unrestricted grant from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts.-Beginnings: 1960s and early 1970s:Branca...
, Rhys Chatham
Rhys Chatham
Rhys Chatham is an American composer, guitarist, and trumpet player, primarily active in avant-garde and minimalist music. He is best known for his "guitar orchestra" compositions...
, Jeffrey Lohn,Built on Guilt, Rudolph Grey
Rudolph Grey
Rudolph Grey is a musician and writer.As an electric guitarist, Grey has recorded and performed under his own name, as well as leading various ad hoc ensembles called The Blue Humans. His music draws on no wave and free jazz....
, the Avant Squares, Off Beach, Mofungo, Red Decade, Robin Crutchfield
Robin Crutchfield
Robin Crutchfield is an American artist. He is best known as one of the founding musicians of the former New York No Wave scene. He has performed at such hallowed musical grounds as CBGB's, Max's Kansas City and Artist's Space; as well as had his work on display at prestigious venues like MoMA and...
's Dark Day, Ad Hoc Rock, Smoking Section, Chinese Puzzle, Avoidance Behaviour, and Sonic Youth
Sonic Youth
Sonic Youth is an American alternative rock band from New York City, formed in 1981. The current lineup consists of Thurston Moore , Kim Gordon , Lee Ranaldo , Steve Shelley , and Mark Ibold .In their early career, Sonic Youth was associated with the No Wave art and music scene in New York City...
.
Recording history
In 1978 a similar series of punk rockPunk rock
Punk rock is a rock music genre that developed between 1974 and 1976 in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia. Rooted in garage rock and other forms of what is now known as protopunk music, punk rock bands eschewed perceived excesses of mainstream 1970s rock...
influenced loud noise music
Noise music
Noise music is a term used to describe varieties of avant-garde music and sound art that may use elements such as cacophony, dissonance, atonality, noise, indeterminacy, and repetition in their realization. Noise music can feature distortion, various types of acoustically or electronically...
mixed with performance art
Performance art
In art, performance art is a performance presented to an audience, traditionally interdisciplinary. Performance may be either scripted or unscripted, random or carefully orchestrated; spontaneous or otherwise carefully planned with or without audience participation. The performance can be live or...
was held at New York’s Artists’ Space that led to the Brian Eno
Brian Eno
Brian Peter George St. John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno , commonly known as Brian Eno or simply as Eno , is an English musician, composer, record producer, singer and visual artist, known as one of the principal innovators of ambient music.Eno studied at Colchester Institute art school in Essex,...
-produced recording No New York
No New York
No New York is a compilation album released in 1978 by Antilles Records under the curation of producer Brian Eno. Although it only contained songs by four different artists, it is considered by many to be the definitive single album documenting New York City's late-1970s No Wave...
. This recording was seen by many as the first attempt to define the no wave
No Wave
No Wave was a short-lived but influential underground music, film, performance art, video, and contemporary art scene that had its beginnings during the mid-1970s in New York City. The term No Wave is in part satirical word play rejecting the commercial elements of the then-popular New Wave genre...
sound, as it documented The Contortions
James Chance and the Contortions
James Chance and the Contortions, led by saxophonist and vocalist James Chance, were one of the original punk jazz groups of the New York No Wave music scene. Their first recording, credited solely as Contortions, was on the 1978 compilation, No New York, produced by Brain Eno...
, Teenage Jesus and the Jerks, Mars
Mars (band)
Mars was a New York City No Wave band formed by vocalist Sumner Crane in 1975. He was joined by China Burg , Mark Cunningham , and artist Nancy Arlen , and briefly by guitarist Rudolph Grey. The band played one live gig under the name China before changing it to Mars...
and DNA
DNA (band)
DNA was a No Wave band formed in 1978 by guitarist Arto Lindsay and keyboardist Robin Crutchfield. Rather than playing their instruments in a traditional manner, they instead focused on making unique and unusual sounds...
.
Music from the Noise Festival was first released as a cassette titled "Noise Fest" on ZG Music, the music label of the legendary ZG magazine organized by Rosetta Brookes. In 1982 the "Noise Festival Tape" was released by White Columns
White Columns
White Columns is New York City’s oldest alternative non-profit space and one of its most prestigious. White Columns is known as a show case for up and coming artists....
.
Influence
Noise Fest inspired the Speed Trials noise rockNoise rock
Noise rock describes a style of post-punk rock music that became prominent in the 1980s. Noise rock makes use of the traditional instrumentation and iconography of rock, but incorporates atonality and especially dissonance, and also frequently discards usual songwriting conventions.-Style:Noise...
series organized by Live Skull
Live Skull
-Overview:Live Skull created abrasive no wave music not unlike their 1980s contemporaries Sonic Youth, Swans, Rat at Rat R, The Chameleons, Mars, Teenage Jesus and the Jerks and Band of Susans. Their music featured angular guitar parts interspersed with bleak, quieter passages, for a haunting...
members in May 1983 at White Columns
White Columns
White Columns is New York City’s oldest alternative non-profit space and one of its most prestigious. White Columns is known as a show case for up and coming artists....
. Among an art installation created by David Wojnarowicz
David Wojnarowicz
David Wojnarowicz was a painter, photographer, writer, filmmaker, performance artist, and activist who was prominent in the New York City art world of the 1980s.-Biography:...
and Joseph Nechvatal
Joseph Nechvatal
Joseph Nechvatal is a post-conceptual art digital artist and art theoretician who creates computer-assisted paintings and computer animations, often using custom-created computer viruses.-Life and work:Joseph Nechvatal was born in Chicago...
, various performance art
Performance art
In art, performance art is a performance presented to an audience, traditionally interdisciplinary. Performance may be either scripted or unscripted, random or carefully orchestrated; spontaneous or otherwise carefully planned with or without audience participation. The performance can be live or...
ists such as Ilona Granet and Emily XYZ did their acts intermixing with the music of The Fall, Beastie Boys
Beastie Boys
Beastie Boys are an American hip hop trio from New York City. The group consists of Mike D who plays the drums, MCA who plays the bass, and Ad-Rock who plays the guitar....
, Live Skull
Live Skull
-Overview:Live Skull created abrasive no wave music not unlike their 1980s contemporaries Sonic Youth, Swans, Rat at Rat R, The Chameleons, Mars, Teenage Jesus and the Jerks and Band of Susans. Their music featured angular guitar parts interspersed with bleak, quieter passages, for a haunting...
, Sonic Youth
Sonic Youth
Sonic Youth is an American alternative rock band from New York City, formed in 1981. The current lineup consists of Thurston Moore , Kim Gordon , Lee Ranaldo , Steve Shelley , and Mark Ibold .In their early career, Sonic Youth was associated with the No Wave art and music scene in New York City...
, Lydia Lunch
Lydia Lunch
Lydia Lunch is an American singer, poet, writer, and actress whose career was spawned by the New York No Wave scene...
, Elliott Sharp
Elliott Sharp
Elliott Sharp is an American multi-instrumentalist, composer, and performer.A central figure in the avant-garde and experimental music scene in New York City since the late 1970s, Sharp has released over eighty-five recordings ranging from blues, jazz, and orchestral music to noise, no wave rock,...
, Swans
Swans (band)
Swans are an influential American post-punk band initially active from 1982 to 1997, led by singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Michael Gira. The band was one of the few groups to emerge from the early 1980s New York No Wave scene and stay intact into the next decade. Formed by Gira in...
and Arto Lindsay
Arto Lindsay
Arthur Morgan Lindsay is an American guitarist, singer, record producer and experimental composer. He is a 1974 graduate of Eckerd College in St. Petersburg, Florida....
.
"Speed Trials" was eventually released as a live album recorded by Mark Roule and became one of the best-selling independent records of its time.
Discography
- Noise Festival Tape (1982) TSoWC White ColumnsWhite ColumnsWhite Columns is New York City’s oldest alternative non-profit space and one of its most prestigious. White Columns is known as a show case for up and coming artists....
- "Noise Fest" (1982) cassette tape, ZG Music
- Speed Trials (1984) Homestead Records HMS-011
See also
- Cassette cultureCassette cultureCassette culture, or the cassette underground , refers to the practices surrounding amateur production and distribution of recorded music that emerged in the late 1970s via home-made audio cassettes...
- List of noise musicians
- Post-punkPost-punkPost-punk is a rock music movement with its roots in the late 1970s, following on the heels of the initial punk rock explosion of the mid-1970s. The genre retains its roots in the punk movement but is more introverted, complex and experimental...
- Noise musicNoise musicNoise music is a term used to describe varieties of avant-garde music and sound art that may use elements such as cacophony, dissonance, atonality, noise, indeterminacy, and repetition in their realization. Noise music can feature distortion, various types of acoustically or electronically...