Iron Giant Percussion, Valerie Kuehne & the Wasps Nests, & Holland Hopson

NYC-based punk-classical cabaret trio Valerie Kuehne and the Wasps Nests play in Birmingham at Syndicate Lounge on February 7 as part of their album release tour of the South

On February 7, Valerie Kuehne and the Wasps Nests will perform a new set of songs about cults, porn, food and transcendence at Syndicate Lounge in Birmingham as part of their month-long album release tour of the American South, celebrating the November 2015 release of their album The Apocalypse as Witnessed by a Slice of American Cheese on the Gold Bolus Recordings label. The New York-based trio plays a loving mix of grindcore, cabaret, performance art, punk, and neo-classical art song, with a dash of free improvisation for good measure. Valerie Kuehne is “part punk classical cellist, part performance artist, but her performance art isn’t the foofy, mannered kind – it’s oldschool 80s style and it has fangs. And it’s hilarious” (Lucid Culture). The Wasps Nests are Jeffrey Young on violin (thingNY, The World/Inferno Friendship Society) and Alex Cohen on drums (Malignancy, Pyrrhon, Pak). The trio’s new album is available online to purchase and can be streamed in full at https://dreamzoo.bandcamp.com/album/the-apocalypse-as-witnessed-by-a-slice-of-american-cheese. The show will also feature experimental singer/songwriter Holland Hopson from Tuscaloosa playing songs for banjo and electronics and Birmingham’s own Iron Giant Percussion.

Sunday, February 7, 2016
Syndicate Lounge
433 20th St S
Birmingham, AL 35233
https://www.facebook.com/TheSyndicateLoungeBham/

Iron Giant Percussion, or abbreviated in the most confusing manner possible, FeGP, is an emergent contemporary ensemble based in Birmingham, consisting of Sam Herman, Brett Huffman, Seth Noble, and Justin Wallace. Established in 2011 to perform a collaborative piece with Sanspointe Dance Company, they subsequently presented three ambitious concerts in Alys Stephens Center’s Sirote Theater – each featuring some of the most influential and challenging percussion music from the 20th and 21st centuries. The group won the 2013 Clefworks Festival competition in Montgomery, where they performed with internationally acclaimed So Percussion group for the premiere of Jason Treuting and Josh Quillen’s Montgomery Double Music. FeGP’s recent concert for the Birmingham Art Music Alliance’s 2012-2013 season featured an evening of world-premiere works by local and international composers. In addition to formal concerts, Iron Giant Percussion regularly participate in community and outreach programs through organizations such as BAMA, Children’s Dance Foundation and Metropolitan Youth Orchestra’s Scrollworks. With each performance, Iron Giant aims to bring an answer to the most common question regarding percussion music: “Is that actually a thing?” That answer is a resounding, unequivocal “Yes it is!”

Holland Hopson

Holland Hopson grafts traditional Appalachian banjo with live electronics to grow roots music for the 21st century. Since the early 2000s, Holland has injected his experimental and electronic leanings into the traditional song forms of Appalachian folk music. 

After opening for legendary krautrock band Faust, Mike Hotter of Albany NY’s Metroland wrote, “…amazing outré music… Hopson, in particular, is a must-see performer, a musical treasure hiding right under our noses.”

Holland has performed in Australia, Europe and North America along with notable experimental and outsider musicians such Macarthur Genius Award winners Anthony Braxton and George Lewis, live electronics pioneer David Behrman, sonic meditator Pauline Oliveros, mutant-trumpeter Ben Neill, free-improv innovators LaDonna Williams and Davey Smith, ECM recording artists Dans les arbres, noise-monger John Wiese, and the robotic instruments of LEMURplex. 

Holland’s latest CD of music for banjo and electronics, Post & Beam, was called “…a haunting, often mesmerizing album of old songs and new sounds” by Michael Eck of the Albany Times Union and “…beautifully performed original and traditional folk songs set against an electronic dreamworld.” — David Zicarelli, Cycling ’74.

http://hollandhopson.com/reviews/

http://fieldguide.hollandhopson.com/
http://www.hollandhopson.com/
http://hollandhopson.bandcamp.com/

$5 at the door