Pigeon Breeders

15) Pigeon Breeders – Luminous Debris

Its the beginning of the list and things are already getting weird. Toward the beginning of the year Pigeon Breeders captured my attention when they released their debut album ‘Nocturnal Reveries’ which featured an impressive series of improvised drone sessions. Where ‘Nocturnal Reveries’ was good in what it was it still came off like a series of jams rather than a proper full length recording which is where ‘Luminous Debris’ comes in. On the band’s second full length release the trio builds from where they left off with their debut and creates an aura of encapsulating psychedelia, juxtaposing noise and drone for something that favors a meditative sort of psychedelic music rather than what the term would initially entail musically. - inb4track

15) Pigeon Breeders – Luminous Debris

Its the beginning of the list and things are already getting weird. Toward the beginning of the year Pigeon Breeders captured my attention when they released their debut album ‘Nocturnal Reveries’ which featured an impressive series of improvised drone sessions. Where ‘Nocturnal Reveries’ was good in what it was it still came off like a series of jams rather than a proper full length recording which is where ‘Luminous Debris’ comes in. On the band’s second full length release the trio builds from where they left off with their debut and creates an aura of encapsulating psychedelia, juxtaposing noise and drone for something that favors a meditative sort of psychedelic music rather than what the term would initially entail musically. - inb4track

From the deaf ears of David Ferris:

In Edmonton — a city where the fringes often seem unusually frayed — there is a Galapagos-style splitting off from the rest of reality. This has clearly manifested itself in the sheer strangeness of its experimental/noise scene, which exists without any scene-politics, division or egos: just a bunch of genuinely weird people getting together once or twice a month to make some really “out-there” shit under the guise of the Ramshackle Day Parade shows. The 2012 Ramshackle compilation pulls a raw core-sample out of this underbelly of outsiders-among-outsiders.

Listen carefully and the following will eventually become quite audible, coming into focus like a Magic Eye: dads loading their massive home-made analog synthesizer rigs into the backdoor of Bohemia; stoned overtone singing in sewer pipes (perhaps the work of some C.H.U.D.-like entities); every fourth performer burning incense and every fifth performer requiring decoder rings and/or 3D glasses; classical composers trying to make your fucking ears bleed; people listening without earplugs, risking tinnitus but savouring it like sex without a condom; a strict 5:1 contact mike to saxophone ratio; dozens of people collaboratively blasting noise generated by custom software on their smartphones, which have been networked together by a performer; Fluxus gags; shows with loyal turnouts of 5-60; revisionist Noir and cosmic keys; sometimes a drunk random in the back, yelling “play some songs”; Potier piling layers of brutal scrapings onto further layers of brutal scrapings; performers with crippling stage-fright playing underneath blankets like trembling ghosts; a bizarro world where extended technique is the norm and normal musicianship has become alienating; the homeless and marginalized constantly pounding at the venue’s glass window, peering in, drawn to something that sounds universally unfamiliar, then coming into the front door and trying to barge in for free. Check it out.

Meat Force – Drifting Towards Darkness At Noon
Pigeon Breeders – Veil
Potier – Untitled
Zebra Pulse – Wild Bros Party - Weird Canada

From the deaf ears of David Ferris:

In Edmonton — a city where the fringes often seem unusually frayed — there is a Galapagos-style splitting off from the rest of reality. This has clearly manifested itself in the sheer strangeness of its experimental/noise scene, which exists without any scene-politics, division or egos: just a bunch of genuinely weird people getting together once or twice a month to make some really “out-there” shit under the guise of the Ramshackle Day Parade shows. The 2012 Ramshackle compilation pulls a raw core-sample out of this underbelly of outsiders-among-outsiders.

Listen carefully and the following will eventually become quite audible, coming into focus like a Magic Eye: dads loading their massive home-made analog synthesizer rigs into the backdoor of Bohemia; stoned overtone singing in sewer pipes (perhaps the work of some C.H.U.D.-like entities); every fourth performer burning incense and every fifth performer requiring decoder rings and/or 3D glasses; classical composers trying to make your fucking ears bleed; people listening without earplugs, risking tinnitus but savouring it like sex without a condom; a strict 5:1 contact mike to saxophone ratio; dozens of people collaboratively blasting noise generated by custom software on their smartphones, which have been networked together by a performer; Fluxus gags; shows with loyal turnouts of 5-60; revisionist Noir and cosmic keys; sometimes a drunk random in the back, yelling “play some songs”; Potier piling layers of brutal scrapings onto further layers of brutal scrapings; performers with crippling stage-fright playing underneath blankets like trembling ghosts; a bizarro world where extended technique is the norm and normal musicianship has become alienating; the homeless and marginalized constantly pounding at the venue’s glass window, peering in, drawn to something that sounds universally unfamiliar, then coming into the front door and trying to barge in for free. Check it out.

Meat Force – Drifting Towards Darkness At Noon
Pigeon Breeders – Veil
Potier – Untitled
Zebra Pulse – Wild Bros Party - Weird Canada

Pigeon Breeders say they ‘specialise in improvised music’, but they don’t say what the parameters of their improvisations are, whether they agree on anything in advance, or whether they simply find their way interactively each time they start playing. Frankly, I like not knowing, and I would tend to argue that, when the result of the improvisation is this sort of music, the degree of agency, preparation or intentionality is largely irrelevant, although clearly the creative fluidity of improvisation is important. So what is ‘this sort of music’? Well, I try to avoid reducing peoples’ specific, lovingly crafted artistic utterances to a generic typology, but what I meant there was music that doesn’t appeal to the conventional ideology of art and craft to fix and locate its meanings. The music on Nocturnal Reveries is essentially ambient, in that its pulse is indeterminate, and that it evokes an atmosphere or implies a space, rather than articulating a (melodic, lyrical or any other kind of) narrative arc. The sounds in which it trades are recognisably the product of musical instruments, but Pigeon Breeders largely eschew the traditional signifiers of musicality, preferring instead to explore the sonic landscape of mechanical repetition, material stresses, and other processes in which sound creation is an incidental by-product. Only in ‘Melatonin’ and ‘Cold Sweat’, the final two tracks, do they allow overtly melodic materials to creep in, and then only as grist to the same repetitious mill that has ground out the rest of the album. These improvisations, while demonstrating an impressive degree of instrumental control, more importantly (and interestingly) proceed from a creative discipline and focus that is as unusual as it is single-minded. To resist the urge to vent your inner state runs counter to many people’s conception of improvisation, but Pigeon Breeders keep their collective eye on the ball, and Nocturnal Reverie successfully navigates the gap between impersonal automatism and subjective expression. - Oliver Arditi

Pigeon Breeders say they ‘specialise in improvised music’, but they don’t say what the parameters of their improvisations are, whether they agree on anything in advance, or whether they simply find their way interactively each time they start playing. Frankly, I like not knowing, and I would tend to argue that, when the result of the improvisation is this sort of music, the degree of agency, preparation or intentionality is largely irrelevant, although clearly the creative fluidity of improvisation is important. So what is ‘this sort of music’? Well, I try to avoid reducing peoples’ specific, lovingly crafted artistic utterances to a generic typology, but what I meant there was music that doesn’t appeal to the conventional ideology of art and craft to fix and locate its meanings. The music on Nocturnal Reveries is essentially ambient, in that its pulse is indeterminate, and that it evokes an atmosphere or implies a space, rather than articulating a (melodic, lyrical or any other kind of) narrative arc. The sounds in which it trades are recognisably the product of musical instruments, but Pigeon Breeders largely eschew the traditional signifiers of musicality, preferring instead to explore the sonic landscape of mechanical repetition, material stresses, and other processes in which sound creation is an incidental by-product. Only in ‘Melatonin’ and ‘Cold Sweat’, the final two tracks, do they allow overtly melodic materials to creep in, and then only as grist to the same repetitious mill that has ground out the rest of the album. These improvisations, while demonstrating an impressive degree of instrumental control, more importantly (and interestingly) proceed from a creative discipline and focus that is as unusual as it is single-minded. To resist the urge to vent your inner state runs counter to many people’s conception of improvisation, but Pigeon Breeders keep their collective eye on the ball, and Nocturnal Reverie successfully navigates the gap between impersonal automatism and subjective expression. - Oliver Arditi

Nocturnal Reveries is a 7 track album by experimental ambient / noise trio Pigeon Breeders based in Edmonton, AB which was released on the Ramshackle Day Parade label. On Nocturnal Reveries the band focuses on creating lush bodies of noise that see Pigeon Breeders working with a more organized arrangement of songs as oppose to the freeform chaos that has become ubiquitous to this style of music.

On Nocturnal Reveries the band exploits and manipulates their instruments into forming layers of texture in order to create an encapsulating amount of depth. What sounds like bottles or pieces of metal clank together in the foreground of ‘Urban Decay’ while orchestral bodies of sound rise and fall in the background. The track does meander for a little bit but further in it becomes more dense and intense as a variety of strange and otherworldly noises are introduced into the mix. Modulated pitches emit swirls and screams and rebounding bleeps and bloops that appear as though they are interacting with each other. As I listen I imagine the sound coming from a large mothership hovering above a city. As I described, there are a ton of sound to hear in the second track alone but throughout the span of the album Pigeon Breeders continually introduces something different, even if you are unsure of what the origin of the sound is. I think what is even more impressive is that Pigeon Breeders doesn’t simply stick to a certain set of sounds, they maintain their own identity through their playing style and consistency alone.

One of my favorite things about Pigeon Breeders is each members ability to play like a normal band, to turn these otherwise directionless, formless ambient / noise epics into more structural compositions by introducing instruments not normally prevalent in noise and ambient, specifically the drumming on ‘Garlands’ and ‘Light Clutter’ in which the band implements into their songs surprisingly well. The drums aren’t just thrown in either, Pigeon Breeders instead builds the other components of their music around them adding an additional level of familiarity to an otherwise alien mixture of sounds. Instead of playing like a normal band, with guitars that sound like guitars, synths that sound like synths, bass that sounds like bass, etc. they use their instruments to create sounds that the instrument wasn’t initially designed to create; in a way the band transcends the identity of a band in relation to their instruments and instead, like many ambient / noise musicians they ditch the whole idea of the musician behind the music by introducing familiar sounds that are unfamiliar within a specific genre.

There were moments on this album were I was feeling bored. I was impressed and constantly intrigued by the first half of the album, it all felt so dense and at the same time airy and expansive but after ‘Light Clutter’ a lot of what I heard didn’t really do much for me, the rest of the album felt static, it lacked the energy that I craved from earlier in the album which is unfortunate considering how strong the album was up until that point. This is a good release from a young group that simply lacks a little polish. The trio creates organized movements of sound that remain complex and spontaneous in nature, it is as though they are not being composed by a group of musicians but by a body of advanced machinery or a piece of futuristic technology; that of which is the raw collective sounds of metal rubbing against metal, hissing and screeching, and low hums juxtaposed by high orbital sirens that surround the listener making it apparent that this release is just as much a visual experience as it is an audible one.

Overall rating: 7.4

Favorite Track: ‘Urban Decay’, ‘Garlands’

Recommended: The sounds of an alien space craft flying overhead.

Released: 17 March 2012 - inb4track

Nocturnal Reveries is a 7 track album by experimental ambient / noise trio Pigeon Breeders based in Edmonton, AB which was released on the Ramshackle Day Parade label. On Nocturnal Reveries the band focuses on creating lush bodies of noise that see Pigeon Breeders working with a more organized arrangement of songs as oppose to the freeform chaos that has become ubiquitous to this style of music.

On Nocturnal Reveries the band exploits and manipulates their instruments into forming layers of texture in order to create an encapsulating amount of depth. What sounds like bottles or pieces of metal clank together in the foreground of ‘Urban Decay’ while orchestral bodies of sound rise and fall in the background. The track does meander for a little bit but further in it becomes more dense and intense as a variety of strange and otherworldly noises are introduced into the mix. Modulated pitches emit swirls and screams and rebounding bleeps and bloops that appear as though they are interacting with each other. As I listen I imagine the sound coming from a large mothership hovering above a city. As I described, there are a ton of sound to hear in the second track alone but throughout the span of the album Pigeon Breeders continually introduces something different, even if you are unsure of what the origin of the sound is. I think what is even more impressive is that Pigeon Breeders doesn’t simply stick to a certain set of sounds, they maintain their own identity through their playing style and consistency alone.

One of my favorite things about Pigeon Breeders is each members ability to play like a normal band, to turn these otherwise directionless, formless ambient / noise epics into more structural compositions by introducing instruments not normally prevalent in noise and ambient, specifically the drumming on ‘Garlands’ and ‘Light Clutter’ in which the band implements into their songs surprisingly well. The drums aren’t just thrown in either, Pigeon Breeders instead builds the other components of their music around them adding an additional level of familiarity to an otherwise alien mixture of sounds. Instead of playing like a normal band, with guitars that sound like guitars, synths that sound like synths, bass that sounds like bass, etc. they use their instruments to create sounds that the instrument wasn’t initially designed to create; in a way the band transcends the identity of a band in relation to their instruments and instead, like many ambient / noise musicians they ditch the whole idea of the musician behind the music by introducing familiar sounds that are unfamiliar within a specific genre.

There were moments on this album were I was feeling bored. I was impressed and constantly intrigued by the first half of the album, it all felt so dense and at the same time airy and expansive but after ‘Light Clutter’ a lot of what I heard didn’t really do much for me, the rest of the album felt static, it lacked the energy that I craved from earlier in the album which is unfortunate considering how strong the album was up until that point. This is a good release from a young group that simply lacks a little polish. The trio creates organized movements of sound that remain complex and spontaneous in nature, it is as though they are not being composed by a group of musicians but by a body of advanced machinery or a piece of futuristic technology; that of which is the raw collective sounds of metal rubbing against metal, hissing and screeching, and low hums juxtaposed by high orbital sirens that surround the listener making it apparent that this release is just as much a visual experience as it is an audible one.

Overall rating: 7.4

Favorite Track: ‘Urban Decay’, ‘Garlands’

Recommended: The sounds of an alien space craft flying overhead.

Released: 17 March 2012 - inb4track

Ambient music, even that which uses slightly more challenging textures than the ubiquitous new age pads, is usually a matter of synthesis and processing. For Pigeon Breeders it’s a matter of instrumental improvisation. As on Nocturnal Reveries, which I reviewed in June, they show themselves to be focussed and disciplined performers, achieving coherent and expansive atmospheres through a combination of long tones, simple motifs, and timbral manipulation. It’s impossible to guess how their working dynamic feels from the inside, but from the outside they sound like a very unified and co-operative group; they plainly listen very closely to one another, and demonstrate a pronounced clarity of artistic vision without recourse to the usual creative hierarchy of composition-arrangement-performance. This is music of great subtlety, in both sonic and affective terms: the smallest intervention is given space, and made to signify as clearly as the loudest, longest sounds, while the emotional content of the work is never obvious, never clearly affirmative, or melancholy, or disturbing, or contemplative. Instead, it weaves a complex skein of meanings and intimations around these and other poles, permitting the listener no easy summation or conventional symbolism, but demanding the same continued attention as that which went into its making. To my mind, for all that it refuses the conventional tropes of instrumental achievement, this is some of the most accomplished playing I’ve heard recently: to improvise with this degree of purpose and erudition is among the greatest challenges in music, and the resulting sound is deeply involving on many levels. - Oliver Arditi

Ambient music, even that which uses slightly more challenging textures than the ubiquitous new age pads, is usually a matter of synthesis and processing. For Pigeon Breeders it’s a matter of instrumental improvisation. As on Nocturnal Reveries, which I reviewed in June, they show themselves to be focussed and disciplined performers, achieving coherent and expansive atmospheres through a combination of long tones, simple motifs, and timbral manipulation. It’s impossible to guess how their working dynamic feels from the inside, but from the outside they sound like a very unified and co-operative group; they plainly listen very closely to one another, and demonstrate a pronounced clarity of artistic vision without recourse to the usual creative hierarchy of composition-arrangement-performance. This is music of great subtlety, in both sonic and affective terms: the smallest intervention is given space, and made to signify as clearly as the loudest, longest sounds, while the emotional content of the work is never obvious, never clearly affirmative, or melancholy, or disturbing, or contemplative. Instead, it weaves a complex skein of meanings and intimations around these and other poles, permitting the listener no easy summation or conventional symbolism, but demanding the same continued attention as that which went into its making. To my mind, for all that it refuses the conventional tropes of instrumental achievement, this is some of the most accomplished playing I’ve heard recently: to improvise with this degree of purpose and erudition is among the greatest challenges in music, and the resulting sound is deeply involving on many levels. - Oliver Arditi

Pigeon Breeders are a three-piece band from Edmonton, Alberta who you may remember from a review I did of their first release, Nocturnal Reveries, an album that brought together minimalist electroacoustic noise and thick walls of psychedelic drone. The latest release entitled ‘Luminous Debris’, a two part epic that continues to see the band move along familiar territory while progressing and pushing the boundaries of their sound.

Noise and experimental music in general have always been about improvising, at least in some aspects and Pigeon Breeders style of noise embodies the spirit of improvised sound. The group’s style of noise is psychedelic, trance inducing even but do take note, this isn’t psychedelic in the traditional sense so put away your shitty weed, your fractal youtube videos, and forget about The Flaming Lips. Pigeon Breeders brand of psychedelic is more meditative and a lot more noisy than what the word psychedelic entails.

Pigeon Breeders approach to drone and noise is more of an organic effort than most favoring the use of the electroacoustic noise of non-instruments and the exploitation of common instruments such as the reappropriation of the guitar, turning it into something more or less a device of noise making as oppose to a tool used to create music . If you are into drone and noise and this just sounds too out there for your tastes dont worry the band still implements some musicality into their performance which I would be so bold as to say the trio possesses traits similar to that of post-rock music, not so much the sound that is but the structure. The band’s post-rock tendencies aren’t so upfront, they never have been but still, their sound is created on behalf of each members contribution even if slight, they feed off of each other in this push pull kind of relationship where many of their tracks begin as these free-form jam session-like compositions in which each member of the band tends to bring a piece to the table and slowly build up into a crescendo or some sort of community of sound. At this point it isn’t about the technical prowess of an individual musician, I was never picking out passages from any one specific instrument that I enjoyed while listening to this. It is about the indication of something much larger that each musician’s sole contribution helps to create.

If you heard and enjoyed what ‘Nocturnal Reveries’ had to offer then Luminous Debris is sure to please. Each member’s offering, even if it is a minimal contribution serves as a crucial piece in creating these noisy soundscapes and proves that the musicians that make up Pigeon Breeders are surely masters of the improvised craft.

Overall Rating: 7.8

Favorite Tracks: –

Recommended: Emeralds and Yellow Swans

Released: 22 August 2012 - inb4track

Pigeon Breeders are a three-piece band from Edmonton, Alberta who you may remember from a review I did of their first release, Nocturnal Reveries, an album that brought together minimalist electroacoustic noise and thick walls of psychedelic drone. The latest release entitled ‘Luminous Debris’, a two part epic that continues to see the band move along familiar territory while progressing and pushing the boundaries of their sound.

Noise and experimental music in general have always been about improvising, at least in some aspects and Pigeon Breeders style of noise embodies the spirit of improvised sound. The group’s style of noise is psychedelic, trance inducing even but do take note, this isn’t psychedelic in the traditional sense so put away your shitty weed, your fractal youtube videos, and forget about The Flaming Lips. Pigeon Breeders brand of psychedelic is more meditative and a lot more noisy than what the word psychedelic entails.

Pigeon Breeders approach to drone and noise is more of an organic effort than most favoring the use of the electroacoustic noise of non-instruments and the exploitation of common instruments such as the reappropriation of the guitar, turning it into something more or less a device of noise making as oppose to a tool used to create music . If you are into drone and noise and this just sounds too out there for your tastes dont worry the band still implements some musicality into their performance which I would be so bold as to say the trio possesses traits similar to that of post-rock music, not so much the sound that is but the structure. The band’s post-rock tendencies aren’t so upfront, they never have been but still, their sound is created on behalf of each members contribution even if slight, they feed off of each other in this push pull kind of relationship where many of their tracks begin as these free-form jam session-like compositions in which each member of the band tends to bring a piece to the table and slowly build up into a crescendo or some sort of community of sound. At this point it isn’t about the technical prowess of an individual musician, I was never picking out passages from any one specific instrument that I enjoyed while listening to this. It is about the indication of something much larger that each musician’s sole contribution helps to create.

If you heard and enjoyed what ‘Nocturnal Reveries’ had to offer then Luminous Debris is sure to please. Each member’s offering, even if it is a minimal contribution serves as a crucial piece in creating these noisy soundscapes and proves that the musicians that make up Pigeon Breeders are surely masters of the improvised craft.

Overall Rating: 7.8

Favorite Tracks: –

Recommended: Emeralds and Yellow Swans

Released: 22 August 2012 - inb4track

From the fulgent wreckage of David Ferris:

Pigeon Breeders, one of the more meditative crown-jewels of Edmonton’s experimental/free-improv scene, allow us to overhear their wide-screen conversation: a psychic space where vast celestial strings vibrate slowly, played by solar winds (which are actually disembodied vocals sent by astral projection), and the players float freely through the burnt-out husks of various interminable ruins. Luminous Debris is a truly singular beast: one-part expansive drone via Natural Snow Buildings, one-part empyrean searching via Cluster, and the rest comprised of various kitchen sink tomfuckery. The two pieces are called “Interior” and “Exterior”, but this is a clever ruse. On the Cosmic Scale, one will eventually pan out far enough to notice that both topologically rest on the same side of some vast and ecumenical coin. - Weird Canada

From the fulgent wreckage of David Ferris:

Pigeon Breeders, one of the more meditative crown-jewels of Edmonton’s experimental/free-improv scene, allow us to overhear their wide-screen conversation: a psychic space where vast celestial strings vibrate slowly, played by solar winds (which are actually disembodied vocals sent by astral projection), and the players float freely through the burnt-out husks of various interminable ruins. Luminous Debris is a truly singular beast: one-part expansive drone via Natural Snow Buildings, one-part empyrean searching via Cluster, and the rest comprised of various kitchen sink tomfuckery. The two pieces are called “Interior” and “Exterior”, but this is a clever ruse. On the Cosmic Scale, one will eventually pan out far enough to notice that both topologically rest on the same side of some vast and ecumenical coin. - Weird Canada

PIGEON BREEDERS (Edmonton)
In 2012, the PBs, (what I’m now calling them for the rest of time,) put out “Luminous Debris,” and played a very wide variety of shows, which ranged from dozens of spellbound floor-sitters at Elevation Room/Wunderbar/Bohemia/etc. to about ten disinterested “art lovers” at some bullshit local politicians “art” show. I think they were also asked to “turn it down” there, too. Well guys, may you never turn it down in 2013, as you are one of the best things in Edmonton music.
http://pigeonbreeders.bandcamp.com/ - David Ferris

Seeing is believing when it comes to noise music.

Musicians can argue all night about the validity of a genre that ignores conventional song structures and sometimes eschews melody altogether. But one thing’s for sure: it’s an entirely different beast in a live setting.

Coolfest, happening Saturday at Bohemia (10217 97 St.), will unite some of Alberta’s finest noise, drone and improv acts for a free night of auditory and visual surprises. Zebra Pulse, Matthew A. Wilkinson, Pigeon Breeders and others will unleash the assault on the senses.

“Some of the bands that have similar sounds will be getting them in such a variety of ways,” says show promoter David Ferris, who frequently puts on noise gigs and plays drums in Taiwan and other local acts.

“When you listen to the music, there’s no contextual clue to how they’re making it. You might hear a piano here, you might hear a guitar there, but it’s really tough to identify where it’s actually coming from. Zebra Pulse is like that times a thousand. There’s so much stuff going on it’s insane … it’s disorienting.”

Some performers will loop their own vocals, some will run guitars through a mass of pedals, and some will use found objects to achieve their sound. It’s part concert, part performance art.

“Hearing it is one thing, but … it’s almost watching them create it that’s the interesting aspect,” says Zebra Pulse member Parker Thiessen. “It’s almost like sounds from another planet.”

Thiessen uses records and a jumble of equipment on stage, splicing in samples from classical and opera music and even TV news. The quartet he describes as playing “garbled pop music” also includes Owen Strasky and Dave Schaefer on the electronic end, plus lightning-quick drummer Sean Macintosh.

Zebra Pulse plays entirely improvised sets, so even the band members are sometimes surprised at what comes out.

“It’s almost exciting for us to hear what happens, because we’re not really sure what the other person’s going to play,” says Thiessen, who has helped build the city’s experimental and noise scene by putting on oddball shows under the Ramshackle Day Parade moniker for five years.

Zebra Pulse released its one-of-a-kind album Endings in October, featuring 11 tracks plucked from a free jam. Even the eerie but oddly catchy single Basaraba, which has a cheeky accompanying music video featuring clips from a 1960s bike safety PSA, won’t make the live set. But you can still find a little bit of pop sweetness at Coolfest if you listen for it.

“A lot of noise and drone people do have hooks,” says Ferris. “They’re not consciously made as hooks, but there’s certain elements of it. Pigeon Breeders, for example, they’ll have these big codas that they’ll go into and repeat them over and over again. And I guess that’s the drone equivalent of a pop hook.”

A key factor in the growing popularity of experimental music in Edmonton is the willingness of artists to play with others who sound nothing like them, which allows bands that are way out in left field to actually find substantial audiences. Matthew A. Wilkinson’s ethereal melodies, for example, starkly contrast Zebra Pulse’s abrasive rhythms.

Some of the musicians have extensive backgrounds in classical or jazz, while some have no musical background at all. But while you won’t walk into Coolfest knowing exactly what to expect, you might walk out having discovered something you love.

“I think anybody could find something that they’d appreciate in these bands,” Ferris says.

Segue, Everybody, Yankee Yankee, and Valiska will round out Saturday’s lineup. The show starts at 8 p.m. - Edmonton Sun

Seeing is believing when it comes to noise music.

Musicians can argue all night about the validity of a genre that ignores conventional song structures and sometimes eschews melody altogether. But one thing’s for sure: it’s an entirely different beast in a live setting.

Coolfest, happening Saturday at Bohemia (10217 97 St.), will unite some of Alberta’s finest noise, drone and improv acts for a free night of auditory and visual surprises. Zebra Pulse, Matthew A. Wilkinson, Pigeon Breeders and others will unleash the assault on the senses.

“Some of the bands that have similar sounds will be getting them in such a variety of ways,” says show promoter David Ferris, who frequently puts on noise gigs and plays drums in Taiwan and other local acts.

“When you listen to the music, there’s no contextual clue to how they’re making it. You might hear a piano here, you might hear a guitar there, but it’s really tough to identify where it’s actually coming from. Zebra Pulse is like that times a thousand. There’s so much stuff going on it’s insane … it’s disorienting.”

Some performers will loop their own vocals, some will run guitars through a mass of pedals, and some will use found objects to achieve their sound. It’s part concert, part performance art.

“Hearing it is one thing, but … it’s almost watching them create it that’s the interesting aspect,” says Zebra Pulse member Parker Thiessen. “It’s almost like sounds from another planet.”

Thiessen uses records and a jumble of equipment on stage, splicing in samples from classical and opera music and even TV news. The quartet he describes as playing “garbled pop music” also includes Owen Strasky and Dave Schaefer on the electronic end, plus lightning-quick drummer Sean Macintosh.

Zebra Pulse plays entirely improvised sets, so even the band members are sometimes surprised at what comes out.

“It’s almost exciting for us to hear what happens, because we’re not really sure what the other person’s going to play,” says Thiessen, who has helped build the city’s experimental and noise scene by putting on oddball shows under the Ramshackle Day Parade moniker for five years.

Zebra Pulse released its one-of-a-kind album Endings in October, featuring 11 tracks plucked from a free jam. Even the eerie but oddly catchy single Basaraba, which has a cheeky accompanying music video featuring clips from a 1960s bike safety PSA, won’t make the live set. But you can still find a little bit of pop sweetness at Coolfest if you listen for it.

“A lot of noise and drone people do have hooks,” says Ferris. “They’re not consciously made as hooks, but there’s certain elements of it. Pigeon Breeders, for example, they’ll have these big codas that they’ll go into and repeat them over and over again. And I guess that’s the drone equivalent of a pop hook.”

A key factor in the growing popularity of experimental music in Edmonton is the willingness of artists to play with others who sound nothing like them, which allows bands that are way out in left field to actually find substantial audiences. Matthew A. Wilkinson’s ethereal melodies, for example, starkly contrast Zebra Pulse’s abrasive rhythms.

Some of the musicians have extensive backgrounds in classical or jazz, while some have no musical background at all. But while you won’t walk into Coolfest knowing exactly what to expect, you might walk out having discovered something you love.

“I think anybody could find something that they’d appreciate in these bands,” Ferris says.

Segue, Everybody, Yankee Yankee, and Valiska will round out Saturday’s lineup. The show starts at 8 p.m. - Edmonton Sun

'Art is our daily lives. It's everywhere: the papers we read, the music we listen to, even the cereal box that we're eating from," states Phil Jagger, curator for Art's Birthday.

The international event has been confirmed in 10 different countries, and the celebrations can be viewed live online in cities such as Prague, Antwerp, Vienna and Stockholm, as well as places a little closer to home like Vancouver and Calgary. Edmonton's chapter is spearheaded by the Boreal Electroacoustic Music Society (BEAMS), and will follow in the now 50-year tradition first conceived in 1963 by French artist Robert Filliou, who dedicated his own birthday—January 17—to commemorate all things art. Filliou suggested at the time that art didn't exist until one million years before the creation of the designated celebration, which makes Art 1 000 050 years young in 2013.

This year's birthday celebrations aim to bring together a group of artists and musicians who push the boundaries, as well as provide a chance for them to be acknowledged for their hard work and dedication. The lineup of outside-the-box thinkers includes SkruntSkrunt, Don Ross, Bill Damur, Serenity Cell, Babysugarbag, Pizzarrhea and Pigeon Breeders.

To add to the celebration, Jagger has dubbed this year's theme the Edmonton Non-Music Awards in response to what he sees as the lack of categorical variety at the annual Edmonton Music Awards, particularly when it comes to electroacoustic music.

"I'm not trying to diss the Edmonton Music Awards, but they didn't have categories for experimental artists and they didn't have categories for jazz artists or world-beat artists," he adds. "I'm just wanting to acknowledge those musicians in our community."

Sat, Jan 19 (8 pm)
Bohemia, $5 (BEAMS members),
$10 (non-members) - VUE Weekly