Diffused Dead Icon Inspires Hobbyist To Exceed Entry Level Building Skills is the first track from a new project called "Then She Reaches For The Gun". Its inspiration is two fold: Firstly its a homage to some of the stuff i grew up listening to like Mr. Bungle and other noisy bastards where anything goes, and often in quick fire succession and secondly its a chance to work with an never ending stream of talented musicians that i have known for years either in real life Australia or via the Internet. Each track will no doubt change depending on who has sent me what. On this particular little thing we have the following personal
Dane Renshaw ( Australia/Japan)   - Drums
Primaloops (Australia)                      - Drums/Percussion
Frank Wilke (Germany)                     - Trumpet
Paul Miller(U.S.A)                              - Keyboards
Dani Kirby (Australia)                       - Piano
Juan A Miñana (Canary Islands)      - Electronics
Phil Bywater                                         - Tenor Sax
Carolyn Wigston                                  - Voice
Glenn Ward                                          - Guitar
Neska Wigston                                     - Barking/Growling
Me                                                         - Bass Guitar/Noise/arrangement

The process is simple, I collect a bunch of random recordings from people and then see what i can arrange from it. Nothing subtle here, just huge noisy fun : ) I am open to anyone that thinks they might like to be part of this mess. Drop me a message and i will send you my email. The only criteria is that i wont be using samples from TV/film/other music etc, so just original stuff played on instruments, field recordings, stupid drunk conversations etc. Thanks to everyone involved, i am having a ball

Diffused Dead Icon Inspires Hobbyist To Exceed Entry Level Building Skills

Hi and welcome to the 2nd track from my new project "Then She Reaches For The Gun". Firstly I wanna say BIG BIG thanks to all the people around the world that have sent me files to be part of this ongoing fun… I am currently working on track 3 and all the recent recruits will feature in that.

 “All Roads Lead To the Carpark” was finished before the callout so it’s line up is the same bunch of crazy talent as track One except for Carolyn Wigston stepping down from vocals and the formidable Paolo D’Emilio taking her place with a little rant in Italian and English about speaking in Italian and English : ) Neska Wigston is also having a rest from barking duties : )

The project’s inspiration is two fold: Firstly its a homage to some of the stuff i grew up listening to like Mr. Bungle and other noisy bastards where anything goes, and often in quick fire succession and secondly it” a chance to work with an never ending stream of talented musicians that i have known for years either in real life Australia or via the Internet. Each track will no doubt change depending on who has sent me what. 

All Roads Lead To the Carpark features 

Paolo D’Emilio (Italy) - Vocals
Dane Renshaw ( Australia/Japan) - Drums
Primaloops (Australia) - Drums/Percussion
Frank Wilke (Germany) - Trumpet
Paul Miller(U.S.A) - Keyboards
Dani Kirby (Australia) - Piano
Juan A Miñana (Canary Islands) - Electronics
Phil Bywater - Tenor Sax
Glenn Ward - Guitar
Me - Bass Guitar/Noise/arrangement

If you would like to be part of this…….

The process is simple, I collect a bunch of random recordings from people and then see what i can arrange from it. Nothing subtle here, just huge noisy fun : ) I am open to anyone that thinks they might like to be part of this mess. Drop me a message and i will send you my email. The only criteria is that i wont be using samples from TV/film/other music etc, so just original stuff played on instruments, field recordings, stupid drunk conversations etc. Cheers!

All Roads Lead To The Carpark

30/04/21 marked 136 years since Luigi Russolo was born in Portogruaro, Italy. As part of world wide celebrations my Intonarumori played a 90 minute improvised set for 3 Intonarumori and Voice. This is a small excerpt. Always found it notoriously hard to capture this band on tape live ( thats a project for next year with a really good engineer)the frequencies go right through yr blood and weird harmony appears as if by magic... on tape its a bit more of a mooshy blah!  anyeays hope u find some fun in this sonic soupy seance stuff : )

LIVE Intonarumori Trio -Ritual for Russolo's Birthday

Hi and welcome to the 3rd track from my new project "Then She Reaches For The Gun". Huge thanks to all the artists involved. This track features quite a few new people! Its humbling that so many people want to be part of this madness : ) 

The project’s inspiration is two fold: Firstly its a homage to some of the stuff i grew up listening to like Mr. Bungle and other noisy bastards where anything goes, and often in quick fire succession and secondly it is a chance to work with an never ending stream of talented musicians that i have known for years either in real life or via the Internet. Each track will no doubt change depending on who has sent me what. 

This track is titled Fuck Them, They Can Find Their Own Fucking Roadkill To Fuck 

 (This is a quote from Dani Kirby at rehearsal one evening last year when discussing the complex relationship between performing musicians and the general public.)

It features 

Dane Renshaw - Drums
Primaloop        - Drums/Percussion
Gonzalo Serrano - Electronic Drums
Frank Wilke - Trombone
Electro Trek - Voice
Dani Kirby - Voice
Timothy Korstad - Voice
Paul Miller - keyboards/Voice
Fake Stereo Machine - Field Recordings
Axel Weis - Guitar
TexMex Shaman - Guitar
Brendan Corey Benson - Guitar
Chicago Word Brigade - Electronica/Keyboards
Martin Pozdrowicz - Organ
Raul Mainer - Field Recordings 
Wüst - Electronica/Keyboards
Me - Bass Guitar/Noise/arrangement

If you would like to be part of this ongoing project

The process is simple, I collect a bunch of random recordings from people and then see what i can arrange from it. Nothing subtle here, just huge noisy fun : ) I am open to anyone that thinks they might like to be part of this mess. Drop me a message and i will send you my email. The only criteria is that i wont be using samples from TV/film/other music etc, so just original stuff played on instruments, field recordings, stupid drunk conversations etc. Cheers!

Fuck Them, They Can Find Their Own Fucking Roadkill To Fuck

Hi and welcome to the 4th track by "Then She Reaches For The Gun". Huge thanks to all the artists involved. Once again its great to have new artists involved ! Its humbling that so many people want to be part of this madness : ) 

The project’s inspiration is two fold: Firstly its a homage to some of the stuff i grew up listening to like Mr. Bungle and other noisy bastards where anything goes, and often in quick fire succession and secondly it” a chance to work with an never ending stream of talented musicians that i have known for years either in real life Australia or via the Internet. Each track will no doubt change depending on who has sent me what. 

This track is titled This Misunderstanding Suggest Tenderness
 Its a phrase i saw in the comment section on one of Ilaria Boffa’s wonderful Sonopoetry, and from that Ilaria expanded and wrote the poem that opens and closes this work.

This Misunderstanding Suggest Tenderness features 

Ilaria Boffa - Poetry
Primaloop  - Drums/Percussion
Dani Kirby - Piano
Vartch - Voice
Holy ShitShow - Midi Strings
Axel Weiss - Guitar
TexMex Shaman - Talkbox
Chicago Word Brigade - Electronica/Keyboards
Martin Pozdrowicz - Sample Pad
Wüst - Electronica/Keyboards
Me -Midi Woodwinds/Noise/arrangement

If you would like to be part of this ongoing project

The process is simple, I collect a bunch of random recordings from people and then see what i can arrange from it. Nothing subtle here, just huge noisy fun : ) I am open to anyone that thinks they might like to be part of this mess. Drop me a message and i will send you my email. The only criteria is that i wont be using samples from TV/film/other music etc, so just original stuff played on instruments, field recordings, stupid drunk conversations etc. Cheers!

This Misunderstanding Suggests Tenderness

A small sample of an Expanded Cinema Event performed as part of the Clarenece City Council's Winter Series 26/08/21. Was a top night. Official press blurb below and link lo live video footage and original film after that. : )

Discontinued Space: The Cinema of Maya Deren 
An Expanded Cinema Event 

Live at The Rosny Barn 26/08/21

Dani Kirby      Piano/Voice
Mat Ward       Bass/Intonarumori/Percussion     
Dylan Banks   Intonarumori

Maya Deren (1917 - 1961) is considered one of true pioneers of experimental film yet unlike many of the film makers she influenced ( Jean-Luc Godard, Stanley Kubrick, David Lynch) her work is rarely experienced outside of academic and film school environments. As part of Kirby and Ward’s continuing investigation into the important (and often overlooked) role of women in the history of Contemporary Art  Discontinued Space: The Cinema of Maya Deren will present several of Deren’s short movies with original live scores written by Kirby, Ward and Banks.

Deren employed a vast array of cinematic devices (looping, reversing, overlaying and time manipulation) to create vignettes that focused on graphic and kinetic form rather than straightforward narrative. Conceptually the work examines rhythm, isolation, social constructs, movement and ritual, all of which is underpinned by the notion of the inner world and its disconnection from the space of everyday life. 

It is the conceptual framework of Deren’s cinema that informs the scores produced for this project. Rather than compositions that ‘soundtrack’ the  action and the visual imagery the music reflects and explores Deren’s philosophical beliefs and her desire to immerse her audience in a world that is barely hinted at in everyday life yet sits just under the skin of reality. 

The performance by Kirby, Ward and Banks showcases the 7 major short films Deren produced from 1943 to 1958.

https://vimeo.com/595121466
https://vimeo.com/595129696

A Witch's Cradle (1943 Maya Deren) LIVE - Kirby/Ward/Banks

Hi and welcome to the 5th track by "Then She Reaches For The Gun". Huge thanks to all the artists involved…. so much variety, craziness, originality and musicianship.

The project’s inspiration is two fold: Firstly its a homage to some of the stuff i grew up listening to like Mr. Bungle and other noisy bastards where anything goes, and often in quick fire succession and secondly it’s a chance to work with an never ending stream of talented musicians that i have known for years either in real life Australia or via the Internet. Each track has changed of course, depending of who has sent me what.

This piece is titled “When all this is over I am off To Madrid to seek mentorship In the traditional art of Pet Flamenco"


Its starting point was a wonderful field recording sent to me by Raöulfr Maganhar of him teaching Flamenco singing to his cat Yoda and his dog  Hacho, its gorgeous and hilarious as both respond vocally. The madness organically expanded either side of the file from there. 

"When all this is over I am off To Madrid to seek mentorship In the 
 traditional art of Pet Flamenco" features the following artists

Dane Renshaw - Drums
ElectroTrek - Vibey Synth
Timothy Korstad - Electronica
TexMex Shaman - Talk Box
holy shitshow - Piano
Chicago Word Brigade - Electronica/Keyboards
Raöulfr Maganhar - Field Recordings/ Flamenco Instruction 
muterial -Electronica
Dough Factory - Electronica
W:I:L-o’ the-wisp - Double Bass
Ariad Music- Clarinet/Percussion
The Windscale Blues Experiment - Saxophones
Thomas Bergheim - Bass/Guitar/Electric Guitar
Hverheij - Electronica
Agnostura Elwar - B-ARP2600, B-Crave, Roland D70, Roland Gaia.
Bellai Pelegrim - Electronica
Hacho - Barking/Growling/Whining
Yoda - Meowing/Purring

me - Noise/Rhythms/Arrangement


If you would like to be part of this ongoing project….(and you know I want you to)

The process is simple, I collect a bunch of random recordings from people and then see what i can arrange from it. Nothing subtle here, just huge noisy fun : ) I am open to anyone that thinks they might like to be part of this mess. Drop me a message and i will send you my email. The only criteria is that i wont be using samples from TV/film/other music etc, so just original stuff played on instruments, field recordings, stupid drunk conversations etc.

 Cheers,
 Mat

When All This Is Over I Am Off To Madrid To Seek Mentorship In The Traditional Art Of Pet Flamenco

I was a bit late to this wonderful party but thankfully the wonderful Hell Feeder team let me in the door. Please check out all the great re-mixes by artists via the Hell Feeder page.

hellfeeder.com/mabon

Heres the background......
The celebration of the Autumnal Equinox, Harvest Home, Mabon, the Feast of the Ingathering, is a modern Pagan ritual of thanksgiving for the fruits of the earth and a recognition of the need to share them to secure the blessings of the Goddess and the God during the coming winter months. The name Mabon was coined by Aidan Kelly around 1970 as a reference to Mabon ap Modron, a character from Welsh mythology. Among the Sabbats, it is the second of the three Pagan harvest festivals, preceded by Lammas / Lughnasadh and followed by Samhain. (Source Wikipedia)

Hell Feeder shared our track Mabon to remix with a number of invited artists from Soundcloud.
These artists were handpicked simply because we were big fans of their creative output.

Below are artist links to those who contributed towards what has proved to be an exciting and eclectic aural project. Thanks to everyone that got involved.

Order Of Thee Octopi @jameshootman
Drown / Backstab @drown-dub @backstabmusic
Blink Twice @blink-twice-archivale
Tuonela @tuonela-1
Negative Headphone @negative-headphone
Grim Heka @grimheka
Insatiable Void @insatiable-void
Lady Of Fire Poetry @ladyofire
Boson Spin @boson_spin
Wayfarer DG @user-996383829
taRka @myrhyum
Enigma Curry @enigmacurry

Hell Feeder - Mabon (No Mates Ensemble Remix)

Hi and welcome to the 6th track by "Then She Reaches For The Gun". Huge thanks everyone involved! people come, people go and new stuff happens : ) 

The project’s inspiration is two fold: Firstly its a homage to some of the stuff i grew up listening to like Mr. Bungle and other noisy bastards where anything goes, and often in quick fire succession and secondly it” a chance to work with an never ending stream of talented musicians that i have known for years either in real life Australia or via the Internet. Each track will no doubt change depending on who has sent me what. 

Post-Woke Cunt features the following artists

Vartch - Voice
Nosensend - Keyboards
Dane Renshaw - Drums
Muterial -Electronica
W:I:L-o’ the-wisp - Keyboards
Ariad Music- Clarinet/Percussion
The Windscale Blues Experiment - Saxophones
Thomas Bergheim - Bass
Hverheij - PIano
Bellai Pelegrim - Electronica
Glenn Ward - Cunt
Dylan Banks - Voice
Adam Meredith - Voice 
PuppetXeno- Synths
Axel Weis - Guitar
Widar’s Spiritual Front - Electronica
Primaloop -Drums

Me - Bass/Noise

If you would like to be part of this ongoing project

The process is simple, I collect a bunch of random recordings from people and then see what i can arrange from it. Nothing subtle here, just huge noisy fun : ) I am open to anyone that thinks they might like to be part of this mess. Drop me a message and i will send you my email. The only criteria is that i wont be using samples from TV/film/other music etc, so just original stuff played on instruments, field recordings, stupid drunk conversations etc. Cheers!

Post-Woke Cunt

A New Year - a new project : ) 
Grundomma is myself and my brother Glenn Ward. Its been a few years since we actively made music together...but now seems like a good a time as any. We live a few 1000 kms apart across Australia so this a file swapping exercise. The first track "Flying" features Glenn on rhythm programming, synths and sampling and yours truly on Basses and glitchy noise stuff.. this will no doubt change with each future track. Thanks as always for stopping by. Grundomma salutes you : )

Flying

Hi and welcome to the 7th track by "Then She Reaches For The Gun". The ever changing line up has some new members this time around as we tackle Lewis Carroll’s famous nonsense poem The Jabberwocky. I haven’t read Carroll since I was a teenager so it was a cool trip down memory lane doing a bit of background research for this piece. Big Thanks to Gary Rees who first sent me an English reading to the work a few months ago. It sat on my desktop for a while as I wondered how tackle the work. After a while it seemed obvious the best (and most fun) approach might be to get some translations recording in other languages… so thats what we did, hope u enjoy 

The Jabberwocky features the following artists


Tuonela - Electronica
Yui Nikaido - Voice (Japanese)
Gary Rees - Voice ( English)
Raul Mainer - Voice (Spanish)
Antonella Eye Porcelluzzi - Voice (French)
Paolo D’Emilio - Voice (Italian)
Frank Wilke - Voice (German)
Hverheij - Guitar
MatVee - Electronica
Widar’s Spiritual Front - Electronica

Me - noise, digital orchestra/piano

More about Then She Reaches For The Gun

The project’s inspiration is two fold: Firstly its a homage to some of the stuff i grew up listening to like Mr. Bungle and other noisy bastards where anything goes, and often in quick fire succession and secondly it” a chance to work with an never ending stream of talented musicians that i have known for years either in real life Australia or via the Internet. Each track will no doubt change depending on who has sent me what. 

If you would like to be part of this ongoing project….

The process is simple, I collect a bunch of random recordings from people and then see what i can arrange from it. Nothing subtle here, just huge noisy fun : ) I am open to anyone that thinks they might like to be part of this mess. Drop me a message and i will send you my email. The only criteria is that i wont be using samples from TV/film/other music etc, so just original stuff played on instruments, field recordings, stupid drunk conversations etc. Cheers!

The Jabberwocky

a few out takes from Dani Kirby and Mat Ward's weekly rehearsals at the legendary Rat Palace as we plot and stumble our way to a new full length album. We seem to have more riffs this year, less texture, more fuzz, less space. Fuck knows where these things come from, a couple we have stopped and thought about, others we just let flow. Hopefully towards the end of the year we will have decided whats what and have a new shiny thing out in the universe. Thanks as always for all the support : )

Dani and Mat Riffing @ The Rat Palace

Hiya! welcome to  track 8 by "Then She Reaches For The Gun”. Big big thanks to all the amazing artists on this little track and in particular to Chicago Word Brigade whose wicked spoken word was the starting point and focus of this little tune. 

The project’s inspiration is two fold: Firstly its a homage to some of the stuff i grew up listening to like Mr. Bungle and other noisy bastards where anything goes, and often in quick fire succession and secondly it” a chance to work with an never ending stream of talented musicians that i have known for years either in real life Australia or via the Internet. Each track will no doubt change depending on who has sent me what. 

Breakfast with Charlie Contained No Fucks Whatsoever features the following artists

Chicago Word Brigade - Poetry/Voice
Dane Renshaw - Drums
Primaloop -Drums
Dani Kirby - Voice
Garbage Truck Disco - Pixies Tribute
The Windscale Blues Experiment - Saxophones
Thomas Bergheim - Bass
Hverheij - Nursery Rhyme Glockenspiel 
Life in The Movies - Electronic Percussion and Synths 
PuppetXeno- Guitar
Primaloop -Drums
Paul Miller - Keyboards
My Nocturnal Twin - Guitar

Me - Sensible Bass/Noise

If you would like to be part of this ongoing project

The process is simple, I collect a bunch of random recordings from people and then see what i can arrange from it. Nothing subtle here, just huge noisy fun : ) I am open to anyone that thinks they might like to be part of this mess. Drop me a message and i will send you my email. The only criteria is that i wont be using samples from TV/film/other music etc, so just original stuff played on instruments, field recordings, stupid drunk conversations etc. Cheers!

Breakfast At Charlies Contained No Fucks Whatsoever

2nd track from Grundomma 
Grundomma is myself and my brother Glenn Ward. It's been a few years since we actively made music together...but now seems like a good a time as any. We live a few 1000 kms apart across Australia so this a file swapping exercise. Bongo features Glenn on rhythm programming, synths and sampling, bass and yours truly on Piano/keys. The track features samples from the 1970s/80s cult Australian Tv show Prisoner  (released in the UK and USA as Prisoner: Cell Block H)  that ended up playing in repeat on late night Tv for decades afterwards. My brother even owns the DVD box set Thanks as always for stopping by. Grundomma salutes you : )

Bongo!

Hi and welcome to the 9th track by "Then She Reaches For The Gun". Its Titled Portogruaro (12,000 B.C Blues). Its a tribute (as a lot of my work is) to Luigi Russolo and features extended Intonarumori playing. For change there are only 5 artists on this track, compared to the normal 15 or so! 

The next piece will be the final track before releasing an album and putting the project on hold for a little while. This may take a little while as I would like to try and write something that features every single contributor to this project somehow. That’s around 60 people (and several dogs and cats) ! Thanks to each and every person who has sent me files for this, its been such a creative endeavour full of chance and surprise. So many talented people have been involved!

Background 
The project’s inspiration is two fold: Firstly its a homage to some of the stuff i grew up listening to like Mr. Bungle and other noisy bastards where anything goes, and often in quick fire succession and secondly it” a chance to work with an never ending stream of talented musicians that i have known for years either in real life Australia or via the Internet. Each track will no doubt change depending on who has sent me what. 

Portogruaro (12, 000B.C Blues)  features the following artists

Phil Bywater - Tenor Saxophone
W:I:L-o’ the-wisp - Guitar
Carolyn Wigston - Voice
Life At The Movies - Synths/Drums

Me - Intonarumori/Noise/Piano

Portogruaro (12,000 B.C Blues)

Been listening to A lot of John Zorn over the last couple of months so this is very much inspired by his work. Woodwind and Brass Quintet with Piano and too much Drumming.

Spider Race (for John Zorn)

Canals and Crows

Meet Me at Midnight By The Highway and We Can Dance With The Cars ( For Carolyn)

On a Train To Meet My Lover (NoMates/Caveman420)

A quick 1 minutes worth of chicken dancing featuring Drums, Harp, Cornet, Guitar, Soprano Recorder and Baritone Horn

Half a Chicken

a bit moody this one..with some bright bits as well!

Hands In The Mud

a snippet from the first gig of a new project that explores the more esoteric parts Of Luigi Russolo's fascination with Noise. 3 Intonarumori and Vocals ( with occasional bass guitar and percussion ) used to create a hypnotic, ritualistic noisescape as a platform to connect beyond the physical realm to who knows where. Dylan Banks - Intonarumori, Dani Kirby - Voice, me - Intonarumori/bass/percussion. has a blast playing in the Nolan gallery getting the whole building to rumble : )

LIVE Enharmonic Improvisation for Voice and Intonarumori

My little bundle of joy Ms Neska was very keen on disrupting my studio time the other day. It was very important to her to continually bring me a rubber chicken and demand we fight over it. So I gave in and that's the way the rest of the day went... All sounds from a zoom recording of the wrestling match : ) https://www.instagram.com/neskagram/

I Spent The Entire Day Fighting Over A Rubber Chicken

Snippet of a set we did at The Moonah Arts Centre as part of their winter "Friday Nights Live" concert series

LIve at Moonah Arts Centre 16/08/19 Dani Kirby and Mat Ward

Re-worked Soundpiece from recordings taken in Florence that became part of La morte mi troverà vivo which investigates how noise can be a catalyst for communicating with the supernatural.
https://nomatesensemble.bandcamp.com/album/la-morte-mi-trover-vivo

Florence Nightscape

The wonderful Frank Wilke has recently sent me a bunch of files for a new big project involving a heap of great musicians. As a warm up to this new project, and for a bit of fun I put together this little thing. Always a great pleasure to work with Frank : ) check out his stuff @brass-lines

Another Round Of Happiness - with Frank Wilke

A real pleasure to be part of the 2020 Unconformity Festival based in Queenstown Tasmania This year Dani and I, along with 8 artists from around the globe were asked to re-score an old Sci-Fi movie as part of Unconformity's UNTV live night. Naturally enough all activities were via the Internet this year and the show was broadcast on October 17th 2020 There is almost no info about the 1926 film Dani and I were given other than the year it was made. I cant even find any info on the production company etc... If you would like to see the film I have it here on Vimeo. So thrilled to be involved in festivals re-inventing themselves in these strange times  https://vimeo.com/469587954

A Trip To The Moon (1926) Dani Kirby/Mat Ward

Dance of the Deserted Spaces is composed using field recordings taken from four different locations across the globe after the Covid-19 outbreak resulted in mass public lockdowns. The sonic character of these places shifted dramatically once stripped of the dominance of human activity and previously hidden aural worlds built from nature, automated machinery, the reverberation of open space and the earth itself revealed themselves.
The piece takes these ‘background’ sounds and give them a stage of their own to dance, converse, expand and exist independent from their relationship to human presence. These normally unregistered noises evolve rhythmically and harmonically in an autonomous celebration
of sound itself.
The idea developed from my last night on duty at the museum I work for in Tasmania, Australia. With the museum suddenly closed indefinitely to the public I walked from gallery to gallery shutting down all but the most basic power and lighting systems and listened as the empty
building revealed a new sonic atmosphere of gentle creaks, air-conditioning and essential plant mechanics. There was a sense of spirit emitting from the vacant architecture and the ever working
but unchampioned infrastructure the allowed these places to be habitable.
The sounds of the museum were recorded that night and form the raw material for Dance of the Deserted Spaces along with field recordings sent to me from a deserted intersection in Brooklyn, the empty auditorium of an international school in Yokohama and the entrance to the Parc des Buttes-Chaumont in Paris.
Ideas of dystopia, harmony, freedom, tension and evolution are explored as the global sounds come together in defiance of cultural classification, revelling in the peopleless space and time.
Life and energy beyond the reductive parameters of humanity and society are given a platform to create a celebratory noisescape of the omnipresent sounds the secretly surround us.

Dance Of The Deserted Spaces

Feeling very lucky to be involved in this recent festival project. Link to website at the bottom of this info. There is a lot to this one! The short version is under the guidance of Composer Madeleine Flynn myself and 6 other musicians performed a beautiful work on two different rivers in my home state of Tasmania during the MONA FOMA 2021 festival. The instrumentation included horns, strings, sirens/fog horns, intonarumori and many other sound and trad instruments as well as a beautiful and moving text from Theresa Saintly. Here is a small summary from the program guide. ...
Relay / Country Remembers Her Names

Madeleine Flynn, Tim Humphrey with Theresa Sainty

A slowly unfolding relay of land and sea signals echoes across our fair island, opening and closing the festival. Foghorns streamed from Low Head, boat horns, sirens, experimental intonarumori instruments, palawa kani (the language of Tasmanian Aboriginal people), bagpipe streamed from Queenstown, and other sound-making apparatus call each other over land and water, and ask us to reflect on where we are. From wukalina / Mount William and pilawaytakinta / Low Head, to Queenstown, Launceston and nipaluna / Hobart.  

You will hear the work projected from a moving vessel meandering close to shore. In Launceston, listen from the banks of kanamaluka / Tamar River around Riverbend Park, Royal Park and Seaport. In Hobart, listen from the banks of the Derwent around the Hobart foreshore, to Long Beach, Sandy Bay, and on the eastern shore between Howrah and Bellerive. 

The full story and list of all involved (there was lots live stuff streamed to the vessel as well as the onboard musos) can be found here
https://www.relaysound.art/

relay//country remembers her names

A small excerpt from a recent Expanded Cinema project by Dani Kirby ( Keyboards/Voice) and Mat ward (Bass), presented Live at MONA FOMA festival 2021 in Hobart, Tasmania. 
Project Synopsis/Media release....

The Smiling Madame Beudet
Germain Dulac, 1923

Kirby/Ward present the the latest chapter in their ongoing investigation both the history of sound in the era of silent cinema and the pioneering role female artists played (most often overlooked) in the avant garde. They have written and will perform a new score for voice, piano and bass to accompany Germain Dulac’s ground breaking 1923 film The Smiling Madame Beudet.
The Smiling Madame Beudet is credited as the first Feminist movie. The protagonist Madame Beudet is trapped in a suffocating marriage with her only escape being music and the fantasy that she lives in a different world. Her husband is domineering, boorish and frequently pretends to shoot himself (sometimes in front of guests) to taunt and belittle her. Far from portraying Madame Beudet as a victim it casts her as a heroine who, rather than submitting to a life of cruelty, seeks to assert her desires and free herself from the bonds of domestic misogyny.
Dulac uses groundbreaking cinematic artistry to embellish and add detail to both the narrative and the investigation of sexism and gendered roles through techniques such as super-imposition, ultra contrasting of focus, slow-motion, repetition of shots, abstraction and extreme camera angles. These techniques powerfully enforce the Dulac’s desire to show both the oppressiveness of the situation and the absolute need for an imagining of a better life.
The compositional approach focuses on highlighting the sub-text and philosophical underpinnings of the film with emphasis on the meta-narrative behind the protoganist’s story - which is a timeless critique of marriage, gender and sexism. Cinematically this is expressed through Dulac’s focus on Madame Beduet’s internal world as she moves between the disparity of escapism and reality. It is her complex voice and thoughts, as a metaphor for the broader issues of the film that Kirby/Ward bring to life through a dynamic score that incorporates multiple genres ranging from ultra minimalist melody all the way to deafening sub-bass drone.

The Smiling Madame Beudet LIVE Dani Kirby/Mat Ward

Music and things that might sound like music by Mat Ward. Band stuff - mainly Piano and Bass Duet at the mo, Intonarumori Stuff - exploring the strange world of Luigi Russolo with homemade machines and vocals, Digital orchestral/ensemble stuff, noise stuff, live stuff, experimental stuff and stuff with other people. So yep lots of stuff : )If you like to collaborate I am always keen to try new things. Cheers Mat

No Mates Ensemble

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