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All that DUFF in Retrospect: The Druid Underground Film Festival 2014

by Dane Benko

Poster for May 28th DUFF show at Spectacle Theatre

Last week the Druid Underground Film Festival played at Anthology Film Archives for a two night engagement. Created by Billy Burgess in a punk venue in Los Angeles back in 2006, The Druid Underground Film Festival provides “a traveling powerhouse of the most bizarre and provocative films on earth!”

 

Poster for May 28th DUFF show at Spectacle Theatre
Not featured: testicles, wallet, and watch. Well actually, probably testicles.

But what does ‘underground film’ mean? ‘Underground’ is the type of word that provokes strong expectations, but those expectations will vary person to person. Underground implies both independence and some significant degree of obscurity; it’s rarely used as a pejorative but the implication is that it should be. With increased accessibility of the Internet, is anything truly ‘underground’ anymore?

 

In 2011 I attended the Alternative Film and Video Festival in Belgrade, a festival for ex-Yugoslavian and international experimental film. Each year during the festival the festival hosts hold a panel discussion where they discuss the semantics behind their choice of the term ‘alternative’ to describe the particular type of movies they show.

 

The problem is, many forms of experimental filmmaking are no longer really ‘experimental’ in the sense that the filmmakers making them are drawing from a rich tradition of specific cinematic techniques. Or to call it ‘amateur cinema’ implies that it’s unprofessional even though the original term ‘amateur’ meant ‘lover-of’ or lover practitioner instead of trade practitioner. ‘Independent’ cinema has not only been taken by more or less American groups of non-studio feature length filmmakers, but the dimunization ‘Indie’ refers to a genre of youth stories featuring specific tropes.

 

Sometimes it’s called ‘non-narrative’ or ‘anti-narrative’ cinema even though some of it has a narrative. Sometimes it’s ‘subversive’ cinema even if it doesn’t particularly subvert any real or theoretical authority. Bryan Konefsky of Basement Films in Albuquerque calls it ‘undependent cinema,’ as in cinema released from the dependence of market, genre, or other established forms.

 

So anyway, what the hell does ‘underground’ even mean? It turns out that this two day event was bookended by two found footage films (actual found footage, not the horror movie subgenre popularized by cheap disposable income teen money seeking substudios), the first by Billy Burgess himself and the second from a Massachusetts VHS mixup collective called The Whore Church. These presentations could be considered the thesis statement and conclusion of Burgess’ programming tastes respectively.

 

Still from Rich Polysorbate's "Smerdly's Seahorse"
Form follows function. You think this guy’s face is weird but if you had a mirror you’d see your reaction to this movie looks identical. (Still from Rich Polysorbate’s “Smerdly’s Seahorse”

Burgess’ Self Defense and the Occult for Teens and Law Enforcement is a mashup of Christian, instructional, law enforcement, cult movies, and related content featuring witches, troubled teens, and a fairly linear progression from outright existential anxiety to mystic world destruction. The story itself is fun, but Burgess’ selection of content (self-professed to be administered by a mixture of drunkenness and instinct) is pretty much like his curating of the festival as a whole: a sort of glorifying abject attraction to sensationalistic sub- or countercultural communities.

 

The Whore Church Mixtape Vol 1 is very similar, except that Night II turned out to be more explicit (perhaps even pornographic) than Night I, and so was this found footage film to Burgess’ own.

 

What do Christian hymn singers with baby voices for self-accompaniment, witch-hunting police officers, suicidely depressed teens, prurient pornography, movie monsters made of slime and torn skin, rednecks destroying cars and furniture, and television advertisements for clairvoyant ambulence chaser lawyers have in common? A hugely orgiastic celebration of pure excess.

 

Which would all be silly and even merely overstimulating if it weren’t for the fact that occasionally you can tell that the subjects featured in the films represent what some people actually feel, believe, or even do in real life. ‘Real life’ being somewhat of a misplaced term here, being that each of these people and communities represented all seem to live in their own warped geography of reality, whether they consider themselves to be the authority or anti-authority. Fear of witches isn’t significantly different than fear of communism or fear of youth, hence ‘witchhunt.’

 

Basically, the Druid Underground Film Festival makes the argument that boiling under the surface of culture are subcultures, one and all ready to pop… or preferably explode. And yes, most of the films are fictional, but those that are fictional often function in and of themselves as attacks on the overhead pressure of non-underground society. When not fictional, such as the Jan Soldat film ‘Law and Order’ featuring an aged S&M couple who’ve been together in East Berlin since before the wall fell, it just punctuates the fact that much of the content shown is not as much wish-fulfillment fantasy as perhaps some people would want it to be.

 

Most of the footage was lo-fi, either being shot that way or an accident of the copying and compression for presentation. There were a couple stand out technical films that only serve to make the whole presentation feel weirder. One was Clown Town, an Expressionist film either shot at a very low frame rate or possibly even stop-motion animated (of live actors) that leads an uncanny motion quality that will fuck your dreams. Another was the viral video “Danielle”, the compositing production where a woman ages from infant to elderly in five minutes (featured at the end of Night II after a series of videos that seemed to be about creeping fatality, more or less).

 

Thus as proclaimed by the mixtapes, the films Billy Burgess likes to select exist at the intersection of commingling spheres of alternative realities, whether those realities stem from histories pagan, punk, cult cinema, horror, or even anti-communist.

 

Fortunately, it’s not quite over yet. The Druid Underground Film Festival will be continuing at Spectacle Theatre in Brooklyn May 28th for the long form shorts program. You still have a chance to watch Satanists and sex fiends release some of that workaday pent up frustration you’ve been emotionally snowballing.

 

Oh, and Billy Burgess gives away prizes. Though it’s unclear whether these would be the sorts of prizes you really want to win.

Filed Under: MOVIES Tagged With: alternative film, anticommunism, b movie, Billy Burgess, counterculture, druid, east berlin, experimental film, film festival, horror, law enforcement, mixtapes, occult, punk, sadomasochism, satanism, subculture, undependent film, underground, witch, witchcraft

Album Review: Perfect Pussy – Say Yes To Love

by Peter Foy

CT192 PerfectPussy Cover

Perfect Pussy: Say Yes to Love

Similar Artists: No Age, Screaming Females, Bikini Kill

Genre: punk, noise rock, lo-fi

Label: Captured Tracks

Alright, let’s get this out of the way before anything else: Perfect Pussy isn’t trying to shock anybody with their name. Any band to name their self as such knows that they’ve solidified themselves as a non-commercial act (just ask Fucked Up), so trying to incite uproar by including a potentially vulgar slang word in their name wouldn’t seem to be part of their agenda either. What’s more, there’s so much more degrading reference that particular female body part in so many media-accepted pop songs in this day and age, that it’s actually more of a relief to find an female-fronted indie act would adopt such a name. It’s far more likely that the band intends for their risqué title to be funny, ironic and cute, and if you’re offended by it, then what the fuck are you doing listening to this shit in the first place?

That said, the band in question, a five-piece from the upstate-New York town of Syracuse, might still shock people in that it only took them one LP to make even the most casual music listener prospect that they might very well be the new face of arty punk! An ironic fact in itself, as the band was formed sort of accidentally. Back in 2012, film maker Scott Coffey asked Merdith Graves (former lead singer of a Syracuse-noise-rock band called Shoppers) to appear in his movie  Adult World, and assemble a new band for the film. Enlisting the talents of drummer Garrett Kololski and bass guitarist Greg Ambler, Graves seemingly realized that she was onto something big. After completing their work on the film, they added guitarist Ray McAndrew and Shaun Sutkus to their line-up, and they released a very well-received 4-song demo tape in 2013. Now a year later, refining their sound even more so for the proper debut, Say Yes to Love, the band might very home take home the honor of releasing the most simultaneously pretty and brash album of 2014.

I feel that the best punk albums are those that are as concerned with personal issues as they are with societal ones, and Say Yes to Love is that in every regard. Front-women Meredith Graves’ lyrics tend to bring up romance and self-admonishment (“and I want to fuck myself, and I want to eat myself”), and it’s clear that life hasn’t always been kind to her. Still, her songs are also life-affirming, and her presentation is often prophet like. While she does often scream her vocals (frequently in an manner that’s hard to hear out, but more on that later!), often we get the sense that we are hearing monologues, not unlike the style that was popularized for American indie rock by Slint’s Brian McMahan. Ms. Graves is so singular a performer, that she practically screams alt-rock icon, not unlike Liz Phair or Kathleen Hannah did in their earliest releases

As powerful and abrasive a front woman Graves is, the band really earns it’s keep through the dichotomy of all five of the performers. Choosing to use lo-fi production, the band’s affinity for noise rock really comes out in how chaotic their songs can suddenly become, albeit in a controlled sense. While Graves has said that she and keyboardist Shaun Sutkus are the really reason for the band’s heavy degree of noise, it’s hard to imagine it being quite as loud without the other three members, particularly with the occasionally dronish six-strings from Ray McAndrew. It can be hard to make out what Meredith is saying much of the time, and more for her accompanying music than for her lyrics crypticism, and it’s a band that encourages their listeners to paddle harder. It’s a most challenging listen, and for that reason we can be grateful that the album only comes to about 22 minutes, as it invites it’s audience to come back and re-listen again and again, enticing up to really feel victorious whenever we succeed in making out another line from Meredith, or discovering another cool new musical backdrop.

Only time will tell whether Say Yes to Love makes it as influential as I hope it does, but I feel it’s obligatory that this record will find a rather large niche audience throughout the year. Whether you’re an art-school student, a pro-feminism type, or just an appreciator of great music, Perfect Pussy will not only speak to you, but also encourage you to go to the next level in every regard. Perhaps this lyric best sums it up: Because I’m an advance upon the real/ Not a step up from the others, but a step away. 

Track Listing

1). Driver

2). Bells

3). Big Stars

4). Work

5). Interference Fits

6). Dig

7). Advance Upon The Real

8). VII

Filed Under: ENTERTAINMENT, MUSIC Tagged With: Noise Rock, Perfect Pussy, punk, Say Yes to Love, Syracuse

Album Review: No Age – An Object

by Rio Toro

 

No-Age-An-Object

No Age: An Object

Similar Artists: Deerhunter, Times New Viking, Wavves

Genre: Lo-Fi Rock, Punk, Noise Pop

Label: Sub Pop

 

Despite being a No Age fan ever since their ’07 to ’08 heyday, after listening to An Object on and off for about a day and a half, I really had no intention of formulating my thoughts into a review. Overall, I felt my opinion correlated with quite a few other reviews I had read, and besides restating those same facts and points, I didn’t think I had anything worthwhile to contribute to it. It’s an album that’s hard to love — with its shoddy production, murky atmosphere and absence of the hard boiled drumming the band is known for — but the more I thought of it, No Object was just as hard to hate, and despite Dean Spunt and Randy Randall’s attempts to “destroy” the record’s appeal with a whacked out presentation, it manages to survive as an enjoyable and catchy punk record all the same.

First, I’ll go over the not-so-great aspects of the record. “Muddy” is the first adjective that comes to mind when listening; both in terms of the quality of the instrumentation and Dean’s achingly sour vocals. Sure, lo-fi music is nothing new — and the limits of Dean’s voice were always apparent — but their last album Everything In Between saw the duo experimenting with a broader sound palette; in comparison, this has much more in common with their Weirdo Rippers compilation. It’s not just the edges that are rough though, as the whole of the compositions seems to have been built from roughness. By these regards, one would assume No Age are going back to their roots and perhaps following their friends Deerhunter down a path in which they aim to revitalize underground rock from the late 70’s to early 80’s. However, the production is a bit too curious for its own good, and doesn’t make a whole lot of sense in terms of a big picture. There are parts to these songs that just aren’t there, and there are other parts that will cause you to scratch your head as to why they are there at all (are those birds chirping on Defector Ed?).

For the most part, the up front vocals on songs like “Running From A Go-Go” and “Defector Ed” don’t work to the group’s advantage, and although Dean’s lyricism is basically unchanged in terms of subject matter and execution, the lack of a proper foundation on many of these songs cause it to stick out like a sore thumb; unfortunately not in the quasi-political way the duo had probably hoped for. This is especially the case when played on quality sound systems and headphones. The same can be said of the flat textures and detuned guitars that act as the foundations of these songs. I probably enjoyed listening to An Object the most when I played it on my ancient computer speakers, as they complemented the hissing static and drawn out fuzz.

While Randy Randall’s guitar patterns can still be interesting, due to the decayed production it’s harder to tell this than ever before. Even on more straightforward punk jams like “Lock Box”, everything seems weirdly distanced, like the music is being barricaded behind a wall. While I have immensely enjoyed this group’s ambient excursions in the past — such as the lovely  “Keechie” from Nouns — here, instead of enticing us with melodic guitars they prefer to disorient us with a thick hazy wash that absorbs any kind of discernible pattern. It’s tempting to say that No Age have gone in a direction that embraces No Wave acts like Teenage Jesus & The Jerks and early Sonic Youth, but from a songwriting perspective these tracks are rather straightforward and traditional; creating an experience that is more confusing than abstract.

Still, An Object is never boring, and even though it’s the first No Age release in three years (at a mere 30 minutes no less), it’s nothing to get disappointed about. Even when I came upon a section that I felt didn’t come together all that well, It’s hard to say they did something wrong. The band are expressing themselves in creative and emotionally honest ways, and that is essentially what punk music is all about. It’s not a punk album that’s going to rock your socks off though, and besides the blazing opener “No Ground” there’s nothing close to a sing-along anthem. However, it does happen to be catchy more often than not (I can appropriately nod my head back and forth for 3/4 of the running time), and the best songs — “I Won’t Be Your Generator” and “C’mon Stimmung” — are among the most memorable No Age have churned out.

As I’ve said before, it’s not what one would call colorful, but the duo manage to change sounds just enough from track to track to keep us interested. For instance, “Running From A Go-Go” is a somewhat dreary ballad with weird electronic squiggling that ends with meshing keyboards and a warm, uplifting baseline. It’s perhaps the one moment on the album where the band’s true ambitions of creating music that is as off-kilter as it is beautiful rings true. More surprises come with “A Ceiling Dreams Of A Floor”, which is lead by a comparatively clean acoustic guitar strum, and “An Impression” which somehow manages to incorporate a string section without sounding kitschy.

If you don’t care for stylized production and have a penchant for music that sounds damaged, then maybe, just maybe, you can see past this album’s shortcomings and appreciate it as the artistic statement it is. Maybe it’s just because I’ve been so fully engaged with ultra-polished electronic releases through this year, but to me, An Object sounds uniquely refreshing. But whether you like how it sounds or not, this is some kind of a leap forward for the band, and it should be taken seriously. Whether they choose to return to this style on previous releases or abandon it in favor of something more holistic, An Object can rightfully stand on its own.

 

Track Listing:

1.) No Ground

2.) I Won’t Be Your Generator*

3.) C’mon Stimmung*

4.) Defector Ed

5.) An Impression

6.) Lock Box

7.) Running from a Go-Go*

8.) My Hands, Birch, And Steel

9.) Circling With Dizzy

10.) A Ceiling Dreams Of A Floor

11.) Commerce, Comment, Commence*

 

Album Highlight – *

Filed Under: ENTERTAINMENT, MUSIC, OPINION, REVIEWS Tagged With: Album Review, an object, Dean Spunt, music, no age, punk, Randy Randall, rock, sub pop

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