AAYL Whitehouse.

2004. Whitehouse + Merzbow came to town and played a show at the Hellenic club. Toby and Daniel and myself decided to go. Whitehouse was in heavy rotation in the playlist and there was no way we were going to miss 'em. Toby turned up late to Masami Akita! We couldn't believe it, he was his biggest fan. Toby even owned the Merzbox. Dan disappeared for a while. We didn't know where he'd went. Turns out he was begging for a proper Greek coffee. They finally relented in serving him, under the provision that he sat on the other side of the bar with the Greek men. I guess they didn't want every goth and hipster and spare heavy-metal dude in Khanate shirt asking for a cup of joe. Daniel was also olive skinned with full-length beard and sort of full-length hair, replete with male pattern, so it wasn't much of a stretch that he was: one of them. The doors opened too early and everyone was asked to stand behind a barrier whilst Whitehouse did their 'soundcheck.' They basically played an abridged set. During the set proper their microphones were too low in the mix, so instead of screaming into one mic, they had to scream into two. Near the end one of the audience members tried to unzip Billy Bennett's fly. He bashfully swatted the probing hands away.  

I had to edit this piece. Back then, when I wrote about anything I liked, I would get too excited and resort to platitudes. I don't know why I bother saying. 

I was also scathing of Cat Hope. A shame, as she's done some great work for the local scene. Possibly I got the impression from this night's set that it was too much of a 'noize for noise's sake' vibe. I was a demanding cynical prick back then. 

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Wednesday 11th of February

So I've been told all I do is talk about music. What can I say, everyone needs a hobby. Considering that I'll never be proficient at an instrument, or make any artistic contribution to the wide world of music whatsoever, then the very least I can do for this medium is write about it in homage to the sounds which move me. Tonight I saw Merzbow and Whitehouse at the Hellenic Centre. This was a very satisfying night of noise manipulation. Cat Hope, a local artist, started off the proceedings with a brief ten-minute set. She played a bass solo, with aid of a cello bow and jockey's whip, and contorted the sounds produced via the positioning and repositioning of the instrument over the feedback monitor in tandem with relaxing and tightening the tension of the strings. Her set doesn't really do much for me, it trivializes the very possibilities that I believe noise can achieve. Merzbow performs next. Merzbow sits at a desk, in front of two laptops, plays music for around an hour and blinks a total of three times. I guess this music is meant to be heard loud, otherwise why else am I here to watch Merzbow stare at a computer screen if it weren't for the pro-quality speakers surrounding him. His set is soon finished and there's a short break. Why didn't Merzbow headline this performance? Whitehouse hit the stage wearing matching black pants, tight fitting European shirts (one white, one red) and dark sunglasses that mask the top half of their faces and contort their cheeks to impossible points. They scream obscenities and rhetorical, surreal cutups of monologues at the audience. Regardless of the resulting retort they don't stop. Whitehouse's faces alternate between grimaces and wide smiles displaying their pearly whites. The music kicks in as a low undulating throb. Over the course of the forty minute performance the only noticeable change to the music will be the intermittent playing of a sampled bass drum hit and, near the climax, a skittering break beat. When not sharing the microphone both members hunch over their consoles, twiddling knobs and descending or ascending the pulsing throb a pitch either way. As they sound manipulate Whitehouse open their mouths and flick out their tongues, as they shake their heads to the different sounds they're producing (or should it be, what they're hearing in their minds?). The Whitehouse member in white wraps a microphone cord around his neck and pirouettes across the stage in glee. The Whitehouse member in red lights a cigarette and sneers in disgust. Once in a while the noise stops and Whitehouse stand there, staring down the audience with absolute revulsion. And finally they drop the microphones. The music throbs from two giant-sized PA systems on either side of Whitehouse and the band take off their shirts. They stand in the middle of stage with arms outstretched, like some leader of a political party who has just given a successful speech to the faithful and is basking in the resultant applause. There's something going on here with this band, a hidden motif that would coalesce all the pieces of the performance into a complete jigsaw. Why else would they begin the performance by baiting the audience with pre-prepared rants on humanity and end it like false gods?