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the Electricka Zoo album
We’re happy to announce the release of the Electricka Zoo‘s first (self-titled) album.
The duo of Dave Black & the Digitator, The Electricka Zoo combine influences from EDM and post-punk avant-garde rock to jazz, reggae, Balkan and Portuguese music. Their self-titled debut album features 8 original tunes by the bass/guitar and electronica duo wrapped in colourful mandala artwork by Lucie Hannon.
Thanks everyone who came to the launch gig at the Pyramid Club !
22nd July – Tapioca Dragon, the Electricka Zoo, 1/3 Octave Band @ Pyramid Club
A night of improv, otherworld musics, and ethereal sonic crunch at Wellington’s Pyramid Club, plus an album release for The Electricka Zoo.
Saturday 22nd July 2017, 8pm
@ the Pyramid Club
272 Taranaki Street, Wellington NZ – $10 door sales
The Electricka Zoo
The duo of Dave Black & the Digitator, The Electricka Zoo combine influences from EDM and post-punk avant-garde rock to jazz, reggae, Balkan and Portuguese music. Their self-titled debut album will be released at this gig, and features 8 original tunes by the bass/guitar and electronica duo wrapped in colourful mandala artwork by Lucie Hannon.
1/3 Octave Band
Also in the line up; the 1/3 Octave Band, aka Bill Wood. A master of tones and drones, Bill an his collaborators in the group have released many CD,s LP’s over the past decade, and recently been championed by no less than former Black Flag frontman Henry Rollins in his column for LA Weekly. Don’t miss this once a year appearance from Mr Wood.
Tapioca Dragon
And let’s not forget and that merry duo of free thinkers, Tapioca Dragon, feat. Andy Wright (ex-Orchestra of Spheres) and Mark Williams (MarineVille / Cookie Brooklyn and the Crumbs). Tapioca Dragon released their debut album last year, a collection of 5 improvisations building from sparse, loops and jabs into a psychedelic spin cycle.
New releases coming in 2017
Coming soon in 2017… new projects on the go, available to pre-order.
The Electricka Zoo
The debut album from the Hutt Valley guitar/bass and live electronica duo – full of eclectic electric sonic surprises.
and
Other Islands: 2012-2017
Our third overview compilation* of album tracks and previously unreleased recordings – made in Okinawa, Indonesia, Western Australia, Fiji, and New Zealand.
*see also Gleefully Unknown: 1997-2005 and Fame & Oblivion: 2005-2013
Pre-order now and you’ll be automatically sent the download link to the full albums once these are released, along with bonus material not available for streaming.
Also coming in the near future, two new field-recording based albums made of sounds from Western Australia and Indonesia. We didn’t release an album in 2016, but that wasn’t for lack of ideas!
the Electricka Zoo on Access Radio this Saturday
Electricka Zoo played live in the studio
on Terry’s Songwriters Show.
It was broadcast on Saturday 15th of April – hear the podcast online.
Terry’s Songwriters Show is a weekly programme hosted by Terry Shore – who is a singer/song-writer himself.
Nat da Hatt – Harpsychord
The latest offering from Nat da Hatt, recorded in 2015-2016 in Kawaguchi City, Japan using an array of instruments, devices and machines including: a Zoom digital eight track recorder, A Gretsch Electromatic guitar and a Korg vocoder.
Harpsychord follows hot on the heels of 2015’s Volume V and Kleptomania
and his previous 2012 solo masterpiece, Twango
Nat da Hatt is a political refugee from New Zealand who has settled in Japan where he spends his days in a cave creating tone paintings on an array of devices and instruments including: guitar, thumb piano and a Korg vocoder.
He’s also collaborated with fiffdimension’s Dave Black on the 2014 explicitly Japanese psychedelic album
ネオン列車の風景 Neon Train Landscapes
and guested on Ngumbang
as well as with American jaw-harp maestro Richard Morrison as Mezcla de Refresco
Ascension Band 2004
The post-punk big band Ascension Band convened in 2003-2005… here’s the 2004 lineup performing at the Meatwaters Festival at Happy in Wellington.
Nigel Patterson – hammond organ & conductor
Dave Edwards – guitar & electronics
Mike Kingston – guitar
Jesse Toews – bass
Warwick Donald – bass
Antony Milton – violin & electronics
Damian Stewart – laptop
Jason Secto – cornet
Simon O’Rorke – percussion
Myles Climo – drums
The following year we won best music award in the 2005 Wellington Fringe Festival
Ascension Band 2005
“With elements of punk, post-punk, jazz, classical, straight rock, opera and music hall, the Ascension Band are that rare thing: Something Wholly Other. They retain avant garde cred and still manage to rock harder than AC/DC.” – www.varsity.co.nz
This riff
by organist/conductor/arranger Nigel Patterson (The Black Seeds, The Manta Rays, Fly My Pretties), guitarist & organiser Dave Edwards (fiffdimension, The Winter), and over a dozen musicians on guitars, basses, drums, electronics, keyboards, trumpets and vocals, was the seed that grew into a full scale electric symphony: Evolution.
“The 50-minute piece of music, broken down into six movements, was performed live over a few nights for the Fringe Festival in 2005; the group taking out the Best Music Award.
“It was stunning. Discordant guitars were choked, drums clattered and crashed, voices mingled with percussion and keyboards – but this form of free-improvisation had a structure to it. It had movement, it had a plan. It was a great beast of a song that writhed and wriggled and often managed to run downhill, away from the players – in the best possible way.
“Here, the show has been recorded onto a CD for posterity – and it begs discovery. It’s an intense listen – but that’s to be expected from a group of players who took their name from one of John Coltrane’s toughest listening albums.” – Simon Sweetman
Nigel Patterson – hammond organ & conductor
Will Rattray – electric guitar
Bell Murphy – bass
Warwick Donald – bass
Murray Stewart – keyboards
Damian ‘Frey’ Stewart – laptop
Ryan Prebble – tone generator
Felicity Perry – vocal
Atushi Iseki – vocal
Matt Baxter – drums
Greta Welson – drums
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