On April, the 21st, attendants of the Riga club „Piens” (Astrida Briana Street 9) will become witnesses to a performance by the critically acclaimed experimental electronic band Excepter, which has been dubbed as one of the definitive groups of the so-called „Brooklyn noise” genre. The concert will be opened by the local producer TV Maskava. The event is organized by the Skaņu Mežs association for adventurous music, and supported by the Riga City Council’s Education, Culture and Sports Department. Concert starts at 19:30. Tickets are available at www.bilesuserviss.lv (EUR 7) or at the entrance (EUR 10).
Formed in the summer of 2002 in New York City by ex-No Neck Blues Band member John Fell Ryan, Excepter is described by its members as „A synthetic protest band engineered to erase cultural distinctions through polarized confusion”. The line-up of the band has changed many times, and at the moment Excepter consists of Ryan himself, his wife Lala Harrison Ryan, John Williams and Jon Nicholson who is also known for his solo project SSPS (SS Pyramid Snake).
They have released their work on labels such as Load Records and Animal Collective‘s Paw Tracks, and are known for their improvisational approach to playing both live and in the studio, and therefore they are often referred to as an electronic jam band. The Village Voice alt-weekly has mentioned the subject of the band’s attire, with blogger and (former) Voice writer, Nick Sylvester referring to them as having “ousted Animal Collective as the Village People of Brooklyn Noise”. Their performances are characterized by psychedelic improvisation, theatricality and willfully silly and awkward humor.
As far as recordings go, the band has had a quiet period since 2010, but returned to public attention near the end of 2013. The Christisland EP is their first return; it was recorded in the summer of 2012 during the bands stay in Copenhagen, and is released in collaboration with Cejero. Also, a new LP Familiar will follow in 2014, recorded in Prague the same summer and released by Blast First Petite.
Excepter was featured on the cover of The Wire‘s May 2010 issue; over the years, the adventurous music magazine also included Excepter albums in many of their „best releases of the year/rewind” lists.
Their performance in Riga is organized by the Skaņu Mežs association for adventurous music, which is also responsible for organizing the annual Skaņu Mežs festival, considered to be the largest experimental music festival in the Baltic states. The event will be opened with a concert by TV Maskava – a Latvian electronic music producer, who also has a taste for wild humor and references to various past stages of electronic music and pop culture.
Excepter video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SqBcxi7i9Bw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otu3A1Efd_k