All posts by Fest23

Knifeworld

Knifeworld is Eight of Dense. Her psychedelic ray gun spray silver matter into their captive thirdeye.

Formed in 2009, the brainchild of the stupendously prolific Kavus Torabi (Cardiacs, Gong, Guapo, Mediaeval Babes, Monsoon Bassoon), and featuring members of Chromehoof, Sidi Bou Said and North Sea Radio Orchestra, Knifeworld will be bringing their blistering live show to Festival 23 to headline our main stage on Friday night. Knifeworld straddle genres, bringing intricate time changes, soaring vocal harmonies and spiralling metal riffs to bear on rock solid melodic and hook filled songwriting.

Born of neglect, rocket fuelled by Dionysian arkana then atomsmashed onto the shores of Lysergia. Cursed into documenting God and the Devil shaking hands forever. Sexy transgression, carnal mandala, a sacrament of truth ablaze in the shit-tunnel of existence. Knifeworld are the last, only and everything you truly dig.

New album Bottled Out of Eden released on 22 April, watch their new video ‘High / Aflame’

www.knifeworld.co.uk
www.facebook.com/knifeworld

Knifeworld-2016

John Higgs: Ziggy Blackstar and the Art of Becoming

No Discordian event could possibly be complete without the presence of the wonderful John Higgs, author of The KLF: Chaos, Magic and the Band who Burned A Million Pounds, the best introduction to Discordianism for the uninitiated out there, in our opinion, and a prolific speaker, talker and thinker. John will be bringing his Ziggy Blackstar and the Art of Becoming talk, his unique perspective on David Bowie’s death and why it affected people as deeply as it did.

John is a writer who specialises in finding previously unsuspected narratives, hidden in obscure corners of our history and culture, which can change the way we see the world. The KLF: Chaos, Magic and the Band who Burned a Million Pounds, was described as “Adam Curtis brainstorming with Thomas Pynchon” by The Guardian. Ben Goldacre (Bad Science, Bad Pharma) called it “By far the best book this year, brilliant, discursive and wise.” The leading music website The Quietus said it “Might well be the best music book of the 2010s” and it was named as one of the top ten music books of 2013 by The Guardian, The Independent and Mojo.

Alan Moore describes his most recent book Stranger Than We Can Imagine: Making Sense of the Twentieth Century as “A breathtakingly lucid and coherent map of the tectonic shifts which drastically reshaped the human psyche, and the human world, within a hundred thrilling, terrifying years [and which] leaves us asking ourselves how we could have missed so much about the wider implications of a time we lived through. An illuminating work of massive insight, I cannot recommend this magnificent work too highly.” Together with his first book I Have America Surrounded: The Life of Timothy Leary, which features a foreword by Winona Ryder, his work is currently being translated into seven different languages.

A prolific public speaker, Higgs has spoken at events and festivals including Wilderness, The Secret Garden Party, the Brighton Festival, the Port Eliot Literary Festival and LonCon3 (the World Science Fiction Convention). He has written for publications including The Guardian, The Independent and Mojo, and his fiction appears under the name JMR Higgs.

Before turning to full-time writing he directed over 100 episodes of animated pre-school television, created the long-running BBC Radio 4 quiz series X Marks the Spot, and worked as producer on a number of videogames for the Xbox, PlayStation2 and Nintendo Gamecube. He lives in Brighton, England, with his partner and their two children.

www.johnhiggs.com
www.twitter.com/johnhiggs
www.facebook.com/johnhiggsauthor

Map 71

Brighton’s Map 71 combine the words of artist Lisa Jayne with the productions of Andy Pyne, bringing together sinister ritual percussion and sparse electro textures with a voice racing between surreal demons and earthy anxiety.

Lisa Jayne is a regular performer on the Brighton poetry scene and the originator of chaos improv unit Ringlock. Andy Pyne records as Ugly Animal and has played drums with Medicine & Duty, West Hill Blast Quartet, Kellar, Shrag, Black Neck Band and many others, as well as performing live with Kid Millions’ Man Forever project.

“Apocalyptic proclamations from some piss-stained midnight car park of the mind” (The Wire)

“Jayne rants like Lydia Lunch run through a vocoder” (Byron Coley)

“Map 71 trudge a hollowed shadow lined path where lurk the ghosts and remnant sonic skins of PIL, Cabaret Voltaire and This Heat” (The Sunday Experience)

Check out the preview for their forthcoming album Sado-Technical-Exercise at www.map71.bandcamp.com

New live performance video from March 2016.

DADA 101: An introduction to Defence Against the Dark Arts

Not everything in the Cosmic Trigger blast radius is necessarily good or helpful.

It gets Weird out in the Wyrd: sometimes it can seem as though you are not just wandering in Chapel Perilous, but being pursued. At times like that, it’s helpful to know the basics of how to protect yourself.

This is not about turning you into an occult badass: it’s more like a anti-mugging course for those who want to be safer in their travels.

DADA 101: An introduction to Defence Against the Dark Arts.

In this introductory workshop Cat Vincent, a long-time expert on magical protection and curse-breaking, will take you through some useful underlying concepts, such as grounding, shielding and counter-spelling. Providing an underlying model for combat magic, Cat will demonstrate how to use these principles to protect yourself and even to disperse unwanted forces.

All you need is to be comfortable and ready for some mild stretching (in all senses of the word).

About Cat Vincent…

Ian ‘Cat’ Vincent is a lifelong student of the occult, and a former paranormal protection consultant.

In recent years he has turned his attention to Fortean journalism, with a focus on examining the rise of ‘hyper-real’ (fiction-inspired) belief systems and other pop-culture manifestations of the occult. He was one of the earliest journalists to write in depth on the Slenderman phenomenon. His writing has appeared in Fortean Times, the American college text Apocalyptic Imaginary, a monthly column at Spiral Nature and the Darklore anthologies, and he is a a contributing editor at The Daily Grail.

He has lectured on subjects including Slenderman, the life and works of Robert Anton Wilson, the fictional roots of modern paganism and the Westernisation of Eastern beliefs at a range of venues including the Senate House Library, the University of Leicester and the Royal College of Art.

http://www.catvincent.com

Bloom

Bloom make alternative, life affirming music using experiments with natural and augmented vocal harmonies, syncopation and synthesisers. The music is about nature, magic and being in awe of life whilst also surviving it.

As Bloom and under their previous name The Beautiful Word the band were played by pioneers of alternative pop Tom Robinson (BBC) Ruth Barnes (Resonance FM) Kairen Kemp (BBC Introducing) Co founder of label Bella Union Simon Raymond (Amazing Radio) and James Fox (Juice FM). They have performed at events including Secret Garden Party, The Great Escape Festival, Brighton Dome (SPECTRUM) and T in the Park. The band have been supported with words by Source Magazine, Q Magazine, Brighton Dome and Brighton Noise.

Bloom are Megan Clifton (vocals, synth) Emily Cluley (vocals, guitar, Casio) Thomas Newman (electric guitar, vocals, Casio) Scotty Jones (bass) and Gruff Keogh (drums). Bloom are based in Brighton, UK.

www.facebook.com/wecanbloom
www.twitter.com/wecanbloom
www.wecanbloom.com
www.soundcloud.com/wecanbloom

Super Weird Substance

Super Weird Substance is the multi-media label founded by legendary DJ Greg Wilson, releasing a swathe of balearicpsychedelicdubdisco recordings in 2015 whilst hosting live sixties styled ‘Happenings’ that include talks, art, bands and DJs.

Informed by the past but by no means trapped there, the idea behind Super Weird Substance is to help reclaim the culture and reintroduce some forgotten ideas back into public consciousness with uplifting and accessible music, with a depth seldom seen in the charts today.

The label’s eight singles were all released within a four month span from June to November 2015, Super Weird Substance setting out its stall ahead of album projects in 2016 with Blind Arcade and The Reynolds, as well as a series of Super Weird Happenings, building on the success of a memorable Festival No.6 showcase in Portmeirion last year.

The Super Weird Substance crew will be headlining our Saturday night, having amassed a posse of crack musicians and singers fronted by the manic magic of Kermit Leveridge (Black Grape) and including such luminaries as The Reverend Cleve Freckleton. All of this topped off with a Super Weird DJ set from Greg. And don’t expect the magick to stop there, keep your third eye peeled for campfire cleve-rness into the early hours…

www.superweirdsubstance.com
https://www.mixcloud.com/gregwilson/

Greg Wilson presents Super Weird Substance

Twitchey Spleen

Twitchey Spleen was born in the late 1970’s. Bad dreams necessitated he begin on the path of lucid dreaming around the age of seven years.

1986 was a significant year for young Twitchey: he publically performed his first musical ‘composition’*, and almost successfully cheated his way to attaining a ‘3000 Metre’ swimming badge **.

In 1992 Twitchey picked up the habit of playing the electric guitar. His conscious motivation to learn and play was due to an accurate and realistic fear of the torturous challenges he would face in later life. Musical study, and willingness to please, diluted both his personality and punchable smile.

He attempted to attain a low degree of control of the guitar, and in doing so has to date spent several thousands of hours of technical practice.

He has also made some music.

In the interests of avoiding further crimes against music, he has also clocked up several thousands of hours trying to unlearn the aforementioned technical study.

In 2007 his guitar (un) work paid off, when he met his future wife and partner in fun ‘Lexington’. She is the sparky clutch that validates and thickens his fragrant, brothy stew.

In 2014 founded his latest vanity project, a band called GIBLET***.

Twitchey and GIBLET are buoyant and proud contributors for the Festival 23 Project.

Footnotes

*…which had no name, because he had clumsily plagiarised the main theme from the opening refrain of the contemporaneous hit record ‘Every Loser Wins’

**He employed the clever ruse of feigning breaststroke, and bouncing on one leg in the shallow end of the pool

***a band

Lisa Lovebucket

Lisa Lovebucket

Lisa Lovebucket is Chair of the Teesside Literary Society, Gatekeeper of Chapel Perilous, Editor of Teesside University’s Creative Writing Blog and Founder of the Church United in the Name of Thinking.

Her short play ‘Sister of Mercy’ was performed at the Crossing the Tees Literary Festival in June this year, her first dalliance with scripting skills since she adapted part of Philip K Dick’s Divine Invasion for the stage (performed at the Horse Hospital, 2006). She quizmastered her interactive Game of Fnords ‘23’ at Frightened, Glastonbury and Passing Clouds (for the Cosmic Trigger crowdfunding appeal).

She used to suspect you could change the world by surreptitiously beaming KLF videos out from Alexandra Palace; these days she thinks that the Tees Transporter Bridge may be the focal point. She has been writing, designing and producing unnerving, bizarre and confounding publications since she was 23.

She has played a cybernetic alien in a Doctor Who play (with Ken Campbell from beyond the grave); a ‘hippie with nothing to contribute to society’ in MI23; and a born mystic with clairvoyant abilities in The Warp. She co-founded Subliminal Revolutions in London 23 years ago, spending months of her life helping to organise their infamous allnighter ‘All Hail Discordia’ in 1995, before getting too whacked on the night and missing the entire event. (She may still have DJed.)

Anomino

We were looking for an artist to help create the designs for our logos and one night they just appeared from nowhere with a message saying …

“Do with these as you will is the law of the spirit of the logo design void” signed PoPe Anomino the 5th, bringer of chaos to order with a Pencil and Potatoshop

Groot

Groot

Once a Yorkshireman who handed out flyers for events at night and played his guitar by day writing music. In between various chef and cook jobs, Bob was offered the chance to organise a live gig one time and from there, and by the gaul of his cheek, he slowly got more into being a promoter (with no money, but great memories).

Eventually he started to take matters more seriously and year by year worked on bigger and better festivals and shows. Along the way he realised it was better to offer production services to earn his money and to organise crazy parties to feed his soul.

This journey started just over 23 years ago! For the last 6 years he has been running his own events company which now produces festival style weddings for strange folk in forests all over the country and crazy parties for people who want something different out of life

He met and became enchanted with Pope Absinthe Codeina / Anwen Fryer last year and, since then, day by day and week by week, has slowly become aware and enthralled by the world of Disco.

Reading John Higgs‘ KLF book was the glue to join all the odd shaped and sized pieces of the crazy jigsaw world of Discordian madness together in his party battered brain. He is now slowly chewing his way through the Principia Discordia itself, changing his mind on a daily basis as to whether he is a Discordian or not!!

Since spending most of his time in forests on events, he has evolved…….

Bob is now very pleased to state, as part of his Disco trip in life, ………… “I Am Groot!!!!”