Pink Violence + Silver Apples, Live at the Hare and Hounds, 27/11/14

Pink Violence

Untill 10:00 in the morning yesterday I had never heard of Silver Apples, I just knew that Pink Violence was playing and that it was a chance to catch up with a good friend of mine. This was also the first time I'd ever been to the Hare and Hounds, which is kind of amazing actually. Pink Violence was on first, I've been mates with Jason ' Pink violence' Tyler for a while, and had forgot how much I like his music. This set was very different from the last time I'd seen him play a set on a wobbly bar table at the actress and bishop. His music has changed to being more melodic,  rather than the futuristic collage of sounds I had previously heard from him. This time he sampled songs from Crystal Castles to create his own live remixes, mixing fat hip hop bass with ethereal witch house. Although his own songs such as 'Everywhere Nowhere' made for highlights.

Incase you don't already know, Silver Apples were one of the very first electronic music groups, contemporaries of White Noise (AKA, The BBC Radiophonic Workshop), their music can be traced back to the late 1960's, while apparently electronic music itself can be traced as far as the 1920's. So you may understand why people bleating on about electronic music being a new thing, or worse not music at all, really bugs me. Despite one half of the duo passed away Silver Apples are still touring and have released a hand full of albums since their 1960's inception.

Not knowing anything about the band apart from the background information above before the show made it an interesting experience. Little more than 25 fans had shown up to this rather small room and none  of them were exactly party animals. Silver apples music confused and bewildered me right from the start. Like all electronic music that dates back to before the mid 70's (and the likes of Jean Michelle Jarre and Kraftwerk's classic albums) It makes for challenging listening. Of course I can't say whether the music was made up of more recent material or 60's originals, but a lot of it seemed to be a mix of both. The old geezer in a black cowboy hat was perched behind a small series of boxes, using about 3 guitar pedals and something that sounded like a theremin to make this bizarre noise. The beats were reminiscent of modern dance music yet everything else had a an adventurous yet dark psychedelic feel to it. While he sung over the tracks in a deep echo laden voice as if he was addressing someone over an airport PR. I'm very much on the fence with this show. But it was endearing seeing how after all these years Silver Apples still tours to a small but dedicated following.

 http://www.soundcloud.com/pinkviolence