self-titled - no. 1 - (Page 45)

“MY FRIEND BEN TOOK A MICROPHONE BLOW TO THE CHEST, WHICH LEFT A HORRIBLE PURPLE WELT FOR DAYS.” Such nihilistic art noise was obliterated two days later by the events of September . Both world events and that art-world experience shifted Black Dice’s outlook.“At that performance, we definitely tried to create something that would not be taken in very easily,” Bharoocha says, noting that sheer volume, much like attacking the audience, had reached a creative cul-de-sac.“It became more about creating music instead of just a brutal sonic experience.”The band members poured all of their money into recording Beaches & Canyons, their epic five-song full-length debut, and brought the tapes to the attention of Jonathan Galkin, who had recently set up DFA Records with Mo’ Wax co-founder Tim Goldsworthy and DJ/drummer James Murphy. DFA had already signed the Rapture, which at the time was another New York punk band that Black Dice had gigged with at ABC No Rio.“James told me about this terrifying band that hot girls go to see,” Galkin says.“He was baffled by this combination.” Galkin’s first brush with Black Dice live was resolutely transformative.“It immediately reminded me of seeing My Bloody Valentine at the Ritz in ,” he says.“I had never heard volume used like that to literally change the shape of a room, that suffocated you, that made you twice as stoned as you already were.” DFA signed the band and, in 00, released Beaches &Canyons. Be they at rock clubs, festivals or art galleries, fans packed in to be subjected to Black Dice’s piercing high frequencies and boweljostling drones, the rhythm tics and gradated pulses that slowly emerged from the nauseating din of feedback. Bjorn admired the band’s new setting.“You paint the right picture for it, where you put the frame,” he says.“You trick them, if you have to.”The group made a dance single,“Cone Toaster,” that not only topped New York Times pop critic Jon Pareles’s year-end singles list in 00 but also caught the ear of Timbaland at Miami’s Winter Music Conference. The hip-hop producer, according to Galkin, deemed it “some seriously fucked-up shit.” But as the band members set about recording a follow-up, they ecountered difficulties. First, Jim O’Rourke, the one-time Sonic Youth member and renown producer for the likes of Wilco and Stereolab, backed out of recording the album. Holed up at DFA’s Plantain Studio in the West Village with Murphy and Goldsworthy, the band was ushered out so that Britney Spears could lay down a demo. “We did stop the recording to make that track,” Galkin verifies, though he admits that the match wasn’t an ideal fit. Black Dice returned to the Rare Book Room in Greenpoint to work with Nicholas Vernes. But communication was at a low within the band. Bharoocha wanted to become even more melodic and songstructured. The rest of the group wanted something “more fucked up,” finding that the drums were unable to bend and fluctuate, thus grounding everything.“It was less about playing physical music,” Bharoocha realizes in hindsight.“I definitely started to feel I wasn’t fitting in.”

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of self-titled - no. 1

self-titled - no. 1 Contents Spiritualized No Age Les Savy Fav The Teenagers Booka Shade Michael Gira Ellen Allien Magik Markers Jens Lekman Yeasayer Daptone Records Tipping Point Boris Fiery Furnaces Black Dice Black Mountain The Black Lips

self-titled - no. 1

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