Tomorrow Collective video online

I just made a new promo for the Tomorrow Collective’s Brief Encounters show. Looking at the whole montage together, it’s awesome – so many different art forms, so much bizarre mash-up entertainment!

The show puts pairs of artists together for the first time, with two weeks to create a live performance for a 3-night show at the Anza club. I did one with Take 5 and it was the most challenging creative thing I’ve ever done.

Launched in November
2005, Brief Encounters is
an ongoing performance
series designed to push
boundaries and fuse
artistic practices.

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Digital Shrine at Parade of Lost Souls!

I’m curating a digital shrine at Parade of Lost Souls! Please make a digital shrine and send it in, or text message / twitter during the Parade!

Call for submissions

Digital Shrine at
Parade of the Lost Souls 2008
Oct 25th, 2008,
Grandview Park,
Vancouver, BC
Time: 6.30 PM, procession at 7:00 PM

The Parade of the Lost Souls is a lively commemoration of the cycle of life and death, and of facing fears in order to live life to its fullest. Costumed stilt walkers, jugglers, dancers, skeletal brides, blessed witches, ghastly ghouls, and prancing pixies lead a walking procession through the neighbourhood to honour the dead, wake the living and celebrate.

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BUMBERSHOOT Wreckspedition

I had a fun mission down to Seattle this weekend for Bumbershoot, the giant Seattle music fest, where I saw Wreckless Eric and Amy Rigby, and handed them a prototype of the new DVD of “Wreckless Eric’s Tourette!”

I must say, when you see one of your favourite acts perform with a partner you’ve never heard, there is a deep fear that they will ruin everything you love about them.

But Man Oh Man, that DID NOT happen.

Amy actually blew Eric away into the dust once in a while, from whence he would re-emerge to blow her away in turn. When they did “Raising the Bar,” with Amy singing, I actually started feeling high just off the rock’n-out. The two of them leaning back to back, he grinning like a schoolboy in the girls’ locker room, her eyes closed, head at a bizarre angle – it was fucking cool. It looked, from the expressions on their faces, like this was the music they’d been waiting all their lives to play. New. Favourite. Song.

Album out on Stiff Records (yes, Stiff is back!) any moment now.

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House of Seikilos

Theatre Terrific is a great little company in Vancouver that produces activist shows – both by working with performers and addressing issues that surround disability.

After I made this video for them to promote House of Seikilos, a show that combines the story of Agamemnon with Arthur Miller’s little-known, abandoned, mentally-handicapped son, I was singing the song for weeks. It happens to be the oldest fully-documented piece of music in history.

From the Theatre Terrific site:

The House of Seikilos is a contemporary twisted family voyage that bridges a Greek tragedy with a true modern tale of fateful decision. In Aeschylus’ The Orestaia, Agememnon the king had to choose to sacrifice or save his daughter in order for his army to sail into war. In the modern world, famous playwright Arthur Miller was gaced with a choice ti deny ot accept the disabled son at his birth. Based on these leaders’ dilemmas, The House of Seikilos explores the choice between embracing public honour or choosing the private honour of family.

Here are excerpts of a work-in-progress presentation, May 2, 2008 at the Vancouver Japanese United Church. The House of Seikilos cast are: Nigel Vonas (father), Tallulah Winkelman (mother), Nathan McNamee (child), Marylin Blandford (elder), Greg Labine (son), Cindy Angel (daughter). Auditions will be held in the Fall for the chorus.

The House of Seikilos premieres April 21 – 26 at the Roundhouse Community Arts and Recreation Centre.

Promo video by Flick Harrison

Futuristi remount!


Runs May 31 – Jun 7 2008 at Frederic Wood Theatre.

Check it out at Bella Luna’s website

BELLALUNA’S FUTURISTI :

In the spirit of the turn of the century Italian Futurists, an ensemble of like-minded artists of various mediums with a hunger for excitement and change, Directors Gerald Vanderwoude (UBC) and Susan Bertoia (BellaLuna Productions) have assembled a prodigious ensemble of performers, designers and artists to re-create, pay tribute to and experiment with an art form that had an incredible impact on the shape of art and life as we know it.

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Futuristi!

SHOW POSTERI’ll be making video for the Bella Luna theatre project Futuristi at the Frederick Wood Theatre at UBC, opening Oct 11!

It’s a theatre collage piece based on the writings and manifestos of the Italian futurists.


FUTURISTI!


Canadian Premiere

OCTOBER 11, 12, 13, 2007
BellaLuna with Theatre At UBC present a theatrical celebration of the ITALIAN FUTURIST MOVEMENT of the early 1900’s at UBC’s Frederic Wood Theatre (Vancouver, BC).

BOLD MANIFESTATIONS.
ABSURDIST COMEDY.
AVANT GARDE EXPRESSION.
PROVOCATIVE REALISM.
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Wreckless Eric video posted!

Wreckless Eric reading from his book in Seattle.

I shot this for my upcoming W.E. concert video.

He sez: ‘I didn’t want to write a showbiz biography, the sort that chronicles the early struggle for fame, works through a successful middle period, and chronicles the downfall via a collection of lurid drug-related episodes and boring contractual details, finally fizzling out in a collection of lame anecdotes designed to demonstrate what a great guy I am now that life’s being good to me and I’m on the straight and narrow. WH Smith is already full of crap like that.’

Buy the book online!!

Wreckless Eric video in post-production

Wow!

I’m now editing a video I shot for / with Wreckless Eric in Seattle and Portland. It was an amazing little tourette on the West Coast. I caught the Vancouver show at Kier-La Janisse’s Big Smash music-on-film festival and just decided to boogie on down to two more shows, bringing my camera along.

It’ll be a concert doc with great raw energy. Fuck, it was great watching him pound through the tunes and belt out stories of the good old / bad old Stiff Records days, the trauma of big-money producers and crappy episodes in his life.

More to come.

Axis Theatre promo video for Driftwood

Just finished editing a promo video for Axis Theatre’s Driftwood, a retelling of the story of Pinnochio. They’re the folks behind the insanely successful “Number 14.”

Soon, very soon, the songs will start drifting slowly out of my head.

Honestly, I have been waking up at night singing “Lies, Lies, are quickly recognized, difficult to keep disguised, Lies Lies Lies!” Although it’s a kids’ play, that song would make a great Nick Cave tune.

The vid is for promoting the show for far-flung gigs and tours. Good luck to them!