Supersonic
The Village Underground in Shoreditch is a cavernous, dark and atmospheric space and tonight plays host to Norwegian experimentalists Supersilent featuring former Led Zeppelin lynchpin John Paul Jones with support from Japanese electronic artist Aki Onda. Somehow, I can't imagine Jimmy Page limbering for such a gig on the eve of the release of Zeppelin's O2 show but this is the kind of challenge the unpretentious Jones revels in - kind of like a Brian Eno that reads music.
The gig begins with a young Japanese making his way through the crowd spewing out tape hiss from a handheld device taking crowd members by surprise before the centre of the floor is illuminated by light and brooding violins are cued by Aki Onda from his circular set-up; as unconventional as you would expect. Scattered field recordings and sound effects punctuate the booming chamber music as Onda's head bobs to and fro through the sea of heads all as deep in concentration as the artist. A disembodied voice joins the churn like some ghost in the shell of Onda's electronics while his shadows dance against the back wall.
When tonight's main event take to the stage there's more of a gasp than a roar. A blast of brass beckons the start of a ninety minute performance and rather than give you, dear reader, a blow-by-blow account of those minutes I will simply say this: the music ranges from demented ice cream van tune meets haywire casio keyboard demo to a sort of sci-fi Muslim call to prayer. No wonder Helge Sten blew his cheeks out when I asked him earlier in the week what to expect from the gig. Eventually he said "supersonic music", I see what he means.
The four musicians are laid out across the stage with Jones in the centre with his million string bass and laptop, Sten is sat to his right at a keyboard, guitar by his side opposite him is Stale Storlokken behind a bank of keys with percussionist, trumpet player and sometime vocalist Arve Henrikson at the back of the stage. Grimaces, nods and smiles are exchanged and after an hour the band are introduced by Henrikson and thanks proffered to the audience. In between it's been a case of overloaded Radiophonic Workshop meets free jazz interjections: bip, tiddle, honk, rumble, skronk, parp that occur between yawning atmospheric spaces. It's strangely captivating, there's a quickening and slowing of the pulse and a desire to hear what's coming next. It's a full hour before I investigate the time - a rare occurrence these days.
It's not all great, like watching an author grapple with the drafts of a novel there are missteps and dead-ends, but when it's bad or simply 'meh' the next exciting moment is rarely far away such as the slide into woozy spaghetti western twang just after the introductions. Goodness knows what it'll sound like tomorrow or the day after.