cinchel

[cinchel]

Cinchel + Akosuen by Cinchel + Akosuen

as with the previous post there is a story with this collaborative release. i wrote about that here. i never posted about the actual release which happened this summer on the wonderful local label called Scripts.

out of everything i releases this year these 2 are the most special to me because of the people that agreed to or invited me to collaborate with them. all of them musicians i highly respected for a long time and all of them people that i never thought i was worthy enough to work with.

#ambient #Experimental #drone

[cinchel]

Mirror of Nature

What the Photograph Reproduces to Infinity Has Only Occured Once by Mirror of Nature

allow me to get sappy/sentimental for a moment. apologies if i've told parts of this story before..

we moved to chicago in june of 2001 i am not sure how but one of the first bands i remember seeing after moving here was Zelienople and i was hooked. bought all the releases i could. i discovered Under The Spire Recordings because they had a release on it, which lead me further down the rabbit hole of weird ambient music that has really stuck with me. around the same time i started to use the internet to get my music out there. it was myspace days and i would browse around looking for other people making weird music, especially in chicago. which is where i found music by Neil Jendon. i bought some mini-cdr from him and saw him perform a really cool drone/guitar peice at hyde park art center. for most of the early 2000's i would just try and see their shows, or buy their music but never broke my shyness to reach out. i even played a show opening for Mike Weis and Matt Christensen and the most i could do after the set was quickly walk up to matt and say how much i liked the set and then run away.

somehow in like 2012 neil and i started playing some duets together. which was awesome and is still awesome. we just did a guitar duet a few months ago and i hope we do more soon.

in 2016 neil asked if i would join him and mike in a new group because Kwaidan was not going to be playing anymore but they still wanted to explore a 3-piece guitar/synth/percussion group.

i was fucking honored. to be able to play with musicians that you've been following for about 10 years is crazy.

so that became The Mirror of Nature and we've been playing slow ambient/jazz around chicago for 2 years now. frequently having various guests join us, all excellent and people i never thought i would share a stage with

this past January we spent a few days in Neil's basement and recorded about 3 hrs of music as our base trio. we carved it down to the 6 peices that are on this tape. thank you Muzan Editions for releasing it.

we hope to have a release show somewhere in the new year. and i hope we have more shows and recordings and collaborations forever.

thanks

#ambient #Experimental #tape #cassette #improvisation

[cinchel]

some favorites of 2017

forest management - the elevated quiet

The Elevated Quiet by Forest Management

mazes - the violent tapes

Mazes - The Violent Tapes by Mazes

c reider - listening after the end

Listening After the End by C. Reider

scot tuma - no greener grass

No Greener Grass by Scott Tuma

taylor deupree - somi

Somi by TAYLOR DEUPREE

kyle landstra - vestige i

Vestige I by Kyle Landstra

patrick cosmos - tonal rotors

Tonal Rotors by Patrick Cosmos

uncouth - tree of woe

Tree of Woe by Uncouth

tharsis tholus - soft and vague

Soft + Vague by Tharsis Tholus

boliden - backyard

Backyard by Boliden

peter j woods & andrew weathers - a whole new alphabet

A Whole New Alphabet by Peter J. Woods & Andrew Weathers

jon porras - tokonoma

Tokonoma by Jon Porras

le berger - to twist (one's) knob(s)

to twist (one's) knob(s) by Le Berger

The Devil Speaks To Ivan by German Explaining Station

The Devil Speaks To Ivan by German Explaining Station

[cinchel]

i was a guest on the music manumit a few weeks ago. i talked about pinball and making music and stuff. enjoy 

[cinchel]

video documentation of my set this weekend at the Jefferson Park Chicago Public Library. 

[cinchel]

wonderful short video documenting "Walking into an Unfamiliar Place You Already Know" at High Concept Labs last month. This is what I worked on over the 4 months as a sponsored artist. 

#hcl sponsored artist #high concept labs #drone #ambient #installation #live performance #audience participation #bells #guitar

[cinchel]

yesterday

that was 2015. the first time i played a live set in duet with someone besides Neil Jendon. Neil had originally initiated our collaborative sets starting in 2012 so this would also mark the first time i asked someone to perform with me. before Billie would start to more formally use @akosuen for her experimental musical output. 

that show went really well. better than either of us expected i think. we didnt practice before hand but i was confident that we were on the same page musically. it was suggested to us by her boyfriend (now husband) that if we worked out the ideas more we could really have something great. 

so it planted the bug in me. we would practice! that first practice wouldn’t happen until Jan 17th 2016. it went well. i decided this would be a project that i wanted to capture properly and as such i wanted to go to an actual studio. i focused on ESS both because i thought they would understand the project and because they are an active member in the weirder music community in chicago. i feel if you want to see that flourish you support it anyway you can. we decided that we should at least have 2 practices in before going to record.

we practiced a 2nd time on Aug 21st 2016. then HCL Fall season started. i was pretty much 100% focused on that for the next 4 months... 

so at the end of december i get some dates from Billie and reach out to ESS. March 18th 2018 is set sometime in early jan.

this past thurs (2 days before the session) we played another show together. it basically counted as our third practice. we did both pieces, the 2nd of which we hadn’t performed for an audience yet. 

1 year, 7 months, 22 days after that first show. from an idea to a poorly notated in my alternative notation on small sheets, 

(that was another level of self consciousness. i wrote out the pieces for our first practice because i thought it would help Billie. but i also worried that she would laugh “what the hell is this” or something. she didn't. ever.  that was nice )  

to a thing i had to explain to a third person who i was paying and using their time/talents. While talking with Alex i had to constantly fight an inner monologue saying to me how this was a dumb idea.  i had to fight an inner monologue that wanted to remind me i was not a good musician. because if i let that voice out in the room then that would shift the mood in the room away from the 2 pieces which were the most important thing. which means i have to admit that this is worth doing because if i dont then i am wasting the time of everyone in that room. and that would make me feel shitty too. 

when i arrived with my 2 amps (w/ inner monologue saying “do you really need to bring both of these!?!) i let it slip saying to alex “hi, here i am with these 2 huge silly things.” and he just smiled and responded “oh this will be fun” 

that put me at ease. 

Billie arrived. we setup. sound checked and on schedule started recording. I liked the intense listening and reacting. its great mental exercise. its a different feeling than a show usually is. 

but intense listening. for 3 hours. either listening to each other play or listening back to recordings and deciding “yeah thats good”. gets very exhausting.

we were both more critical of our own performances than of each other, or the whole recording. which i think means we did well.   

also i drank too much coffee. i should have drank more water. 

anyway, 1 year, 7 months, 22 days ago i didnt think i would have reason to record at ESS. (and to some maybe you still dont think i do.) but those little encouragements: Jesse suggesting we practice more, Billie agreeing to take time out of her very busy schedule and finding the time to practice, my wife for being understanding about some sunday afternoons spent in a practice space. all these little things adding up to this. an idea that is now real. and hopefully this year those of you that want to will hear these pieces in a form that i didnt think would ever be. 

this is also to say that maybe this year you’ll see less solo work from me. i think the encouragement from working with Billie helped me be more confident. it may have allowed me to seriously consider and accept the offer to play in a band with Mike Weis and Neil (The Mirror of Nature). both of these projects are challenging me in new ways that is very exciting. also spending 4 months working on a solo piece may have burned me out. 

time is an abstract concept that will slowly devour us. lets try and make things while that happens. 

[cinchel]

mini walks in slightly familiar places

This past weeks I've had 2 chances to perform/install/what-have-you the piece i've been working on at High Concept Labs during this fall season. On December 1st there was a critique session with Vesna Jovanovic and some of the other sponsored artists. Outside of the actual time in the studio that the SAP at HCL gave me, this was the thing I was most excited about. As solo artist I dont often get any feedback on what works and what doesnt. At one point this season i pretty much convinced myself that my idea was terrible and i shouldn't have tried. the feedback I got at this critique was exciting and encouraging. There were suggestions on staging which i hadnt thought about and dynamics/movement (that has encouraged me to get a 2nd set of 3 bells for the piece). Overall, it seemed that the ideas/feelings I wanted to convey came through. that was exciting. here is a mix down from that presentation of the piece. There were about 5 ppl in attendance. 20161201 then on this past satuday (10th of december) HCL had their fall send off party. 7 different sponsored artists got 10-15min to present their work. I got to try out a bit of the suggestions from the critique on a larger audience (about 20 ppl in attendance). It went pretty well and the audience again enjoyed the ability to interact and contribute. (slight down side was that ppl thought some of the other artists instruments were meant for this piece. oops :) it still worked out though). 20161210 and video that Kirstie (@kirstiecat) took is up here:

cinchel - HCL 20161210 from cinchel on Vimeo.

and some photos that Billie (@akosuen) took

#drone #ambient #Experimental #live performance #high concept labs #sap #fall send off #2016

[cinchel]

week 5

20161013 20161016 interesting getting back into the routine this past week. i was even more exausted then usual. i noticed i didnt really record much on thurs, spent more time listening. i'm practicing patience i geuss, which i think is really what this peice needs. even more space on sunday. honing in on a set of ways that i think processing the bells sounds good. might start practicing the set with all 4 speakers this week.

[cinchel]

Some words about a trio of releases

I am trying to clear out my "works in progress" folder as a lot of these had been sitting there for almost a year. I had bigger plans for them that didn't pan out and instead of deleting them I give them to you.

first up sometimes never is soon enough is a collection of 3 tracks of guitar and keyboard. Looking back at the recordings it looks like i did these in single long takes. Usually I sample and loop and mix of small bits of guitar/instruments to make a piece. For each of the tracks here I sat down and recorded a line of guitar uninterrupted for the entire piece, and then went back and did it again overtop with either more guitar or keyboard. There is a sense of longing and distance in these pieces and the title was inspired by that. The first track I am very much trying to (poorly) mimic a Glenn Branca orchestra.

recesses of (nature (part II)) is more guitar and keyboards looped/mixed and distorted. it's in the vein of my previous nature release and invokes the spirit of a rainforest, glistening and bright. 

silence of the oncoming train is a story. the train is played by the fender rhodes keyboard and a person on the tracks is the guitar. in the story distance and time are slowed down to infinity as the train approaches and the two characters combine and disappear. it is dark outside. 

thanks for listening. 

#noise #ambient #pr #releases

[cinchel]

week 4

20160929 20161002

this is the first week since i started that i havne't thought to meself "this is a terrible idea. why did they even accept me. this sucks". some ideas are starting to come together. i'm really starting to understand how to maybe make the space sound good and provide an interesting experience for this performance/installation. i think there will need to be more interaction from me (in terms of mixing/looping) during the performance than i thought initially but i think it will still work.

thursday the documentation intern came by and shot some photo/video. looking forward to seeing how bad i look.

#hcl sponsored artist #works in process #ambient #noise #noiselife

[cinchel]

week 3

20160922

20160924

its week 3 and i'm starting to get a pattern. 5-10min spent setting up. 10-12min of playing guitar and getting a long-ish loop going and then i play with mic levels and effects. i tend to start from the same ableton session each day but quickly try changing different things about it. this week i was really getting bored with some of the longer droney effects of the first 2 weeks. this week i tried to focus on sharper cuts. different lenghts of breaks and repetitions. I also started playing with adding an EQ to each output channel that really cuts out a lot of freq below 200hz. maybe that is too much but i did notice that the sound in the room was way less muddy and i could actually get louder and hear more detail. i am sure this is something you probably learn on like day 1 of sound design101 but..

i'm still tyring to find ways to make these bells sound cool and fit with the idea.

on the 24nd (saturday.. due to EXPO stuff i coudn't get my usual sunday spot so i had a very early 9-11am saturday spot..that was rough..sooo early).. I played with panning a lot! that session posted here may be even more unlistenable than most others.

overall feeling better this week than last. even had some moments that i thought were really great. i am sure it will pass.

oh and i think i want to use piano for the performance. and i also jsut want a piano

#hcl sponsored artist #weekly update #sorry not sorry

[cinchel]

Week 2

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This was my first week with my normal schedule of thurs evening and sunday afternoon. thurs evening was a bit rough. i need to think about how to focus and not get frustrated. I kinda new that getting up when i do (4:45am) and working a full day then coming home at 5:30pm eating quickly and then heading down to pilsen for 3hrs of focused listening would be draining. i left thursday night thinking all my ideas were terrible. i spent most of friday thinking about what i didnt like from thurs and what i would focus on for sunday. it helped a bit. sunday was a better session. listening back to what i "caught" each day there is maybe like 3-5min of ideas i really like. baby steps, right.

#hcl sponsored artist #weekly #experiments

[cinchel]

days 1 & 2

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First week of studio time in the can. due to my own schedule overlaps (brothers wedding and tickets for that Nick Cave film that i bought in june!) my time this week was saturday and sunday (i guess technically sunday would be the start of week two if i was counting correctly. but i’m not). so that meant 2 days of 4 hr sessions in a row. by 4pm on sunday i was wiped out. slowly learning what things sound like in that very live space. 

trying to get into a habit of listening back to what i record each day and make a quick mix. here are 2 from yesterday. i hope to upload a daily from saturday by this evening. 

(to quote my friend lindsey #notsorrynotsorry that i will be way over sharing on most social media for the next 4 months. it helps me process all this information and ideas. there is surely a mute button somewhere if you need it.) 

(updated @ 9pm CST with 20160910 tracks. enjoy. ) (anyway. i'm both tyring to remind myself of the specialness of these sessions and also try to organize all the thoughts that are in my head. i'm not a good writer but i have a lot of energy now and i find this helps calm me down.)

#hcl sponsored artist #week1 #works in process #dailys #overhsare

[cinchel]

here is almost 20min of a very borting drone that i'm not sure why you'd want to listen to it.

#drone #boring #noise #ambient #guitar

[cinchel]

live recording from a solo set at the comfort station this past saturday. first solo show (in front of ppl/not in a radio station) of the year. i was a bit rusty. and its a bit longer than i usually play but still a pretty good set. enjoy

#ambient #drone #noise #guitar #solo #chicago #comfort station

[cinchel]

Autumn Plans...

Honored to have been choosen as one of the Sponsored Artists for the Fall season at High Concept Laboratories http://highconceptlaboratories.org/category/sponsored-artists/ . I am going to work on a quad speaker sound performance that will incorporate audience participation. Very excited!