JAN 12 2013_Dublin (IE) Mika Vainio aka Ø & Whirling Hall of Knives @ The Twisted Pepper

Facebook event page/  The Twisted Pepper/  Tickets.ie

Mika Vainio, currently based in Berlin, was one half of the minimal electronic duo Pan Sonic from Finland, (the other half was Ilpo Väisänen). Before starting Pan Sonic in the beginning of the 90’s, Mika Vainio has played electronics and drums as part of the early Finnish industrial and noise scene.

His solo works, under his own name and under aliases like Ø, are known for their

analogue warmth and electronic harshness. Be it abstract drone works or minimal avant techno, Vainio is always creating unique, physical sounds.

He has released on labels like editions Mego, Touch, Wavetrap and Sähkö and he has been producing among others with Alan Vega of Suicide, Keiji Haino, Chicks on Speed, John Duncan and Bruce Gilbert.

Joining Mika at this concert will be Whirling Hall of Knives, a collaboration between Magnetize and The Last Sound named after a Butthole Surfers song. Sounding something like “A deep, foreboding pulse mongs periodically away in the background like a metronomic warning to the nation as this windy vortex of caustic despair builds slowly in urgency. Then take (what I approximate to be) the sound of elephants from an escaping zoo & frantic air-horns and hear them mingle worriedly, blended effortlessly into a steadily escalating, increasingly static-doused cyber-shitstorm.”

Whirling Hall Of Knives’ harsh smouldering circuits and eruptions of panicky white noise have a profoundly unsettling quality, a sense of gnawing paranoia but interspersed with moments of almost euphoric epiphany, as if in the grip of an unshakeable 4am psychosis a growing sense that the door will be kicked in at any second and the world outside will come pouring in. Psyche electronics of a particularly greasy and grime-flecked hue.

They have multiple releases across Nute, Reverb Worship, Munitions Family and several on Magnetize’s acclaimed vinyl 7″ imprint, Trensmat. You should really hear them live.