COCK E.S.P. • AMERICAN NOISE ROCKS!
DVD-R, 35MIN, NTSC, $6 USA / $8 INTERNATIONAL

The first new video release by Cock E.S.P. since 2004, "American Noise Rocks" uses a fast-paced New Wave Cinema style to document the on and off-stage highlights from three short tours and two major festival appearances.

In this film, Cock E.S.P. bring their unique and absurdist take on experimental music and performance art to numerous venues including the 2006 "Brainwaves" experimental music festival in Boston. There they performed alongside such artists as the Dresden Dolls, Thighpaulsandra, members of Nurse With Wound and the Legendary Pink Dots, as well as other noted international acts. A subsequent "warm-up" tour before the festival included additional shows in New England and New Jersey.

The video also follows the group joining infamous French performance artist Jean-Louis Costes for the Midwestern leg of his 2007 US Tour. Their first dates with Costes occurred a mere two days after his performance was raided by the Rapid City, South Dakota police department responding to obscenity complaints - an event which resulted in coverage from several newspapers and FoxNews.com, as well as generated some death threats - all of which created paranoid tension among those on the tour which often found it's way to the stage performances.

"American Noise Rocks" opens with Cock E.S.P. traveling to Oslo, Norway to perform twice at the "Oya" international rock music festival, with an announced attendance of nearly 60,000. There they were billed alongside such artists as Tool, Nine Inch Nails, the Melvins, Lily Allen, Roky Erickson, Primal Scream and the Jesus & Mary Chain. Following this event, Cock E.S.P. went on to play several smaller shows in Denmark and Germany, which are also documented on the video.

The live footage itself is only part of the story told by this film, with many behind-the-scenes moments demonstrating how each member's personality feeds into the group's overall theme. Far from both the numbing narcotic-fueled haze of many underground rock bands on tour, and from the overly serious and elitist nature of many experimental musicians, these unscripted moments give insight into how the group's humanity shapes their art in both subtle and obvious ways.

It is worth noting that two headlining acts due to perform with Cock E.S.P. at the aforementioned festivals canceled their shows at the last minute, apparently en route to the airport in both cases. Boyd Rice - the infamous industrial music pioneer with a reputation for dabbling in fascist and satanic imagery - was scheduled to play Brainwaves, while the troubled headline-making pop singer Amy Winehouse was scheduled to play Oya. It is not known whether Cock E.S.P.'s presence at either fest played a part in these two artists respective decisions to cancel; however Cock E.S.P.'s reputation for challenging and provoking the status quo is well documented and some of their artistic peers have felt threatened enough by this to avoid any association with the ensemble.

HAGONY• IMPERSONAL LUBRICANT
CDR, 23MIN, $4 USA / $5 INTERNATIONAL

HAGONY is a new collaborative project between two of the most unique personalities in the Minneapolis underground music scene: JASON WADE and EMIL HAGSTROM.
HAGONY approaches experimental noise music in an intensely textured manner, tightly layering different sounds on top and around others, mixing electronic noise with amplified and acoustic sound. Starkly contrasting this aural complexity, the duo employs crass and often confrontational themes and performance techniques, drawing comparisons with such visual artists as Jeff Koons and the Fluxus Movement.

JASON WADE is an experimental filmmaker and punk rock musician originally from Rapid City, South Dakota and currently based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He primarily works with 8mm, Super 8 and 16mm film; utilizing both narrative and abstract styles, merging underground film and music in original and dynamic ways. He often presents his work with a live musical accompaniment – including his own bands FAGGOT, RESIN and KILLMOSHFUCKDESTROY -- and is known for his expanded cinema presentations featuring up to 13 simultaneous projections. He was awarded the 2005 MMAC grant in the amount of $10,000 from the Jerome Foundation in order to produce his next film “Stabber”.

EMIL HAGSTROM is an experimental musician and performance artist based in Minneapolis, active in both local and international arts scenes since 1991. Through projects such as COCK E.S.P., WRONG and ORIGAMI GENITALIA he has been noted for applying elements of absurdity, humor and contradiction into his work; specific examples include: approaching canonized avant-garde music with a do-it-yourself punk-rock attitude, “Emperor has no clothes” type satires on underground musician peers, as well as composing and arranging music developed solely from the mistakes and unintended sounds generated early in the creative process. Through such methods, he provides measures of accessibility and universality to even the most abrasive and extreme underground music, while at the same time presenting the opportunity for other experimental musicians to question their own ethos.

COWARD ELECTRONICS • SIMPLEMINDED
CDR, 14MIN, $3 USA / $4 INTERNATIONAL

Featuring members of Cock E.S.P. and Rotten Piece, as well as guest appearances by members of Concrete Violin and Faggot, the first Coward Electronics release in four years is a tribute honoring two exceptional musical groups.

Bloodyminded is the godfather of comedic/absrudist noise who have, since the early 1990's, neatly and brilliantly trimmed the irony and extremism of power-electronics pioneers such as Whitehouse and Consumer Electronics, leaving only a deliciously overblown minimalist parody, impossible to take seriously.

Simple Minds has cleverly sent up a series of rock genres over their 30 year history, from three-chord punk rock to mildly off-center new wave to 80's pop stardom to, finally, christian contemporary music - each time providing a brave and precise mockery of their peers and themselves.

As a study in both the similarities and differences between these two approaches to parody, "Simpleminded" achieves it's goal by presenting Simple Minds-inspired lyrics in a Bloodyminded musical style. Such an approach truly realizes it's premise as these two artistic groups share so much more in common than the usual mix of genres - ragtime mash-ups of Eminem and black metal versions of Britney Spears songs being two examples. A wonderful achievement by Coward Electronics, an ensemble which releases albums far too infrequently.

COCK E.S.P. / SOLYPSIS [SPLIT]
C14 CASSETTE, $3 USA / $4 INTERNATIONAL

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