Culture Club

toytronica, a form of electronica made with toys and toy instruments (the band uses toy guitars, flutes, and a chicken they named Brunhilda).

Muslimgauze was a music project of Bryn Jones (17 June 1961 – 14 January 1999), a prolific British ethnic electronica and experimental musician who was influenced by conflicts in the Muslim world, with an emphasis on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. With dozens of albums released under the Muslimgauze name, Jones was remarkably prolific, but his mainstream success was limited due in part to his work being issued mostly in limited editions on small record labels. Nonetheless, as critic John Bush[1] wrote, "Jones' blend of found-sound Middle Eastern atmospheres with heavily phased drones and colliding rhythm programs were among the most startling and unique in the noise underground."

Muslimgauze music is often difficult to describe as sheer volume, content diversity and often singular stylings make for a confounding task. Nor did Jones produce any hit albums or songs, rather he made music both as audio aesthetic exploration and to express outrage over perceived injustices in and against predominantly Muslim countries. Muslimgauze did incorporate elements from a variety of genres including ambient, techno, house, traditional-ethnic-percussion, experimental-electro-acoustic and Jamaican dub, among a myriad of other styles that he fashioned into his own. Commonalties are often samples and loops of ethnic music from the places such as the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia; field recordings of said regions; and as the recurrent use of percussion. Another defining trait was the mongrelisation of disparate ethnic and urban music stylings. On occasion, Jones eschewed stylings he was known for—namely ethno-percussion, to create beatless pure electronic textures or 4/4 dance-oriented material. Muslimgauze music also features more abstract content such as noise and drone on selections from No Human Rights for Arabs in Israel (1995) as well as The Remix (2005), Izlamaphobia (1995), and pure electro-acoustic on Azzazin (1996). Add to that, collaborative efforts with projects such as Apollon, the Rootsman, Bass Communion, Systemwide, and Suns of Arqa—artists who influenced Muslimgauze directly or indirectly and added further breadth to the oeuvre.

Jones produced music with the use of synthesis; drum machines (sometimes used as a sample trigger); sound modules; tape, Digital Audio Tape (DAT) and CD samples and loops; and a wide array of percussion and chimes. Many Muslimgauze albums were recorded in professional studios with the aid of sound engineers to add depth and further audio singularities. Computers were sometimes used in the editing process. In his last few years, Jones had personal access to increasingly sophisticated synthesis and recording equipment but never owned a personal computer.

Jones claimed Muslimgauze was formed in response to Operation Peace of the Galilee, Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon[5][6] to stem attacks from Palestinian Liberation Organization guerrillas stationed in South Lebanon. This event inspired Jones to research the conflict's origins, which grew into a lifelong artistic focal point, and he became a staunch supporter of the Palestinian cause,[7] and often dedicated recordings to the Palestinian Liberation Organization or a free Palestine.[8] Jones's research further grew to encompass other conflict-ridden, predominantly Muslim countries including Afghanistan, Pakistan, Chechnya, Iran, and Iraq. He concluded that Western interests for natural resources and strategic-political gain were root causes for many of these conflicts and should Western meddling halt, said regions would stabilise.[5]

Jones frequently netted criticism for never having visited the Middle East. He explained in a 1994 interview, "I don't think you can visit an occupied land. It's the principle. Not until it's free again."[9]

A short introduction to Butoh

Butoh originated in Japan with a performance called Kinjiki by Tatsumi Hijikata in 1959. It was originally named 'ankoku butoh' or 'dance of utter darkness', as Hijikata tried to distinguish his new dance. It was later shortened to Butoh and drew in the work of a number of other artists. Butoh was throwing off the constraints of Western dance and the rigidity of the highly codified Japanese traditions such as the ancient Noh drama and Nihon Buyo (Japanese classical dance). While butoh was born out of a rejection of western dance, there are pedagogical links between butoh's founders and German Expressionist dance. Hijikata also drew on the writings of Jean Genet and Antonin Artaud, among others. The contradictions within butoh are part of what make it fascinating.

Founders, Tatsumi Hijikata and Kazuo Ohno, were both trained dancers, and butoh certainly grew from a dance context, but like so much other work celebrated at Sadler's Wells, hybrid fusions with theatre or with visual art have enriched and broadened the scope of the artform. Sankai Juku's work is as famous for the sublime design as it is for the incredible training and expertise in their bodies and the choreography. Butoh has had a number of very distinctive periods throughout its history, which makes a brief history very difficult. The wild rebellion and improvisation of the sixties gave way to a focus on transformational forms in the '70s, and by the '80s, a number of very distinctive artists and approaches were established. Some were highly theatrical, others were pure dance and more abstract, while still others were site-specific improvisations.

Butoh has now been transported all around the world, finding fertile soil in which to thrive and evolve in Europe as well as the USA and most other continents of the world. Ariodone (Ko Murobushi, Carlotta Ikeda and Yumiko Yoshioka) were first to perform in Paris in the late '70s. Sankai Juku were invited to France in 1980 and found a warm reception for their beautiful, sculptural and metaphysical works. Their international touring would soon help butoh to reach ever wider and larger audiences.

So what traits might we consider to be 'butoh'? A definitive description would never satisfy the breadth of artists involved in it, but a few recurrent themes are useful by way of introduction. Butoh is an attempt to uncover the dance that already exists, it must emerge from within, and not be imposed from without. Butoh uses 'reduction' to great effect, for example, stillness and slow motion are well known to audiences of Butoh. Done well, highly charged stillness and very embodied slow motion can heighten the awareness of the dancer and their audience to the detail of movement, and it can explore timeframes beyond the everyday. Reduction or distillation heightens presence, though stillness and slow motion themselves do not account for the absolute presence associated with butoh. Often observed as a kind of 'trance', it is more accurate to say the butoh dancer is in a state of 'hyper-presence', aware of everything going on around them and within their own body. The fact that butoh dancers often seem 'other' than themselves is the result of their skills in transformation.

The two original founders of butoh, Kazuo Ohno and Tatsumi Hijikata offer seemingly contradictory advice on the process of transformation. Ohno might say, 'find the spirit, and form will take care of itself'. Hijikata might say, 'find the architecture of the cat, and the spirit will enter'. They approach the same point from different perspectives. Another distinctive aspect of transformation in butoh is that performers don't necessarily use only human characters as a source. Equally ready to explore transforming into a stone or a wet rug the butoh dancer draws on the full range of textures available in the natural world and attempt to manifest those physical and psychic materials in their bodies. Yoko Ashikawa, one of the earliest female exponents of butoh, danced a tree enduring the changing seasons. For the audience though, her body can become an old woman or their grandmother reliving all of life's experiences. To think of an old woman is not necessarily the best way to transform into old woman.

Cultivating a highly receptive or responsive body, open to both external and internal stimulus is the crucial basis for transformation. A wave passing through the spine and limbs will reveal physical resistances, and in repetition can develop greater receptivity to being moved by that wave. In butoh is often said, 'the dancer should not dance, but be danced'.

Ultimately the test of a great butoh dancer is their ability to transform not only their body but also the space, as their 'spirit' can only be accessed by the audience when manifested in the space. The butoh dancer carves an incredibly potent space between them and their audience. Drawing on the worlds of the unconscious, dreams and the irrational, butoh leaves space for the audience to bring their own thoughts and dreams to the work, offering a rich, metaphorical world to taste and to enter.

http://www.sadlerswells.com/dance-genres/butoh/