Music Features

Bubble and scrape

Chocolate Monk at P.A.’s, Preliminary Saturation at the Piano Factory

By SUSANNA BOLLE | October 9, 2008

Usurper

If the macho machinations of the noise scene leave you cold (or shaking in your well-heeled shoes) but you still crave a little aural abrasion now and again, Sunday night’s CHOCOLATE MONK showcase at P.A.’s Lounge might do the trick. Chocolate Monk is a UK label whose æsthetic tends toward the bubblier, gurglier — and resolutely sillier — side of noise.

“They’re pretty much ground zero for a plethora of weird bands, weird shows, little avant art skitterings, etc.,” says show organizer and Weirdo Records impresario Angela Sawyer. “A lot of college-age kids would be snapping their tiddlies to Bruce Springsteen cassettes comin’ off a boombox in some awful pub with inedible fish and chips if it wasn’t for Chocolate Monk.” The main bands/duos on the bill are Scotland’s USURPER and Minnesota’s MATHS BALANCE VOLUMES.

For a more artful and restrained (or at least less gargly and goopy) take on noise, try the Dutch duo PRELIMINARY SATURATION, who bring their mysteriously self-described “Belle Époque style” and spectral electro-acoustic drones to the Piano Factory on Wednesday. There’ll also be a rare solo set by the enigmatic STEVE PYNE of local powerhouse RED HORSE. Pyne seems to bring an extraordinary new home-built instrument to every show he does. Spies tell me this time he’s concocted an elaborate conglomeration of rotating speakers that looks like some kind of bizarre explosive device of the mad-scientist type. Should be a treat.