Saturday May 11th 2013 @Pyramid Atlantic

Sonic Circuits: Off the Grid seeks to expand the vocabulary of its participants by challenging them to perform only with acoustic and/or battery operated instruments and without the use of microphones or a PA system. In past installments these restrictions have lead to creative performance innovations (e.g., solar powered amplifiers, lap tops running off of car batteries) and powerfully intimate listening environments for the audience.

Public Speaking
Public Speaking is the solo moniker of Brooklyn experimental musician Jason Anthony Harris. Utilizing found objects, radio, tape recorder, synthesizer and effect pedals, he constructs percussive, textural music for his deep, soulful vocals to croon over. Somewhere between Brian Eno and Tune-Yards, or Tortoise and James Blake, Harris explores pop music as organized sound. The Deli Magazine writes: “This is soul music functioning as 21st century meditation… [This] is what happens when an artist personally realizes the sound of his environment, and puts it to use.” His first full-length, "Blanton Ravine" [Fabrica Records] is a lush collection of songs and sounds drawing on avant rock, IDM, ambient, pop, noise, and R&B.;
http://jasonanthonyharris.tumblr.com

Chester Hawkins
Chester Hawkins is best known for his kosmische electronic psych project Blue Sausage Infant. A survivor of the DC cassette culture of the 1980s, Hawkins revisits some of those kitchen-sink techniques of electro-acoustic musique concrète for this unique, unplugged performance. Expect an improvised display of sound-sculpting via percussion, machines, cassettes, shortwave, toys, etc.
http://soundcloud.com/chester-hawkins

Music from the Film
Music from the Film hasn’t scored any movies yet, but their songs sound like drugged-out dream interpretations made by several psychotic synesthetic mental patients. Post-Jungian free association tape loop trances brought to you by a duo of DC weirdoes, they make really creepy haphazard collages using anything from clanging loops of subterranean percussion, warbling spoken word samples played at all sorts of wrong speeds to sound totally alien, adamantly indecisive keyboard wanderings, bizarro theremin, and atonal marimba shredding.
http://musicfromthefilm.net/
http://musicfromthefilm.bandcamp.com/

Mullinax/O’Meara
Percussionist Rich O’Meara has played jazz, rock and experimental music in many local groups but is most known for his compositions for marimba, which are performed throughout the world. His work has been featured on the NPR program “New Sounds” and in the PBS documentary “The Music Instinct, Science and Song”. He has received four ASCAP Plus awards.
Jason Mullinax is a percussionist and songwriter based out of Takoma Park, MD and is an active member in the DC experimental music scene. In addition to recording and performing as Pilesar (pronounced pie LEE zur), he is known for his playful musical spirit and enjoys collaborating with other local musicians in a number of different settings.
Their duo, Mullinax/O’Meara, combines over 70 years of drumming experience and promises to be an intense ride for lovers of dense and dramatic percussion.
http://www.facebook.com/richomeara
http://www.souncloud.com/richomeara
http://pilesarmusic.com
http://pilesar.bandcamp.com

Blister
From barely audible screeches and grunts to over-modulated roars and shouts, Blister is the improvisational music project of Mr. Lucio Menegon (guitar, things) & Mr. David Grollman (snare drum, things). Both spring from the very busy and incestuous NYC free improvisation and sound art scene with other projects such as Prehistoric Horse and Fester.
http://www.kingtone.com/blister

Governor Silver & The Queen Bees
In the past, avant electronic enthusiasts Basha Teez, Amber Dunleavy, and Paolo Valladolid have all performed together in various incarnations but will be making their live debut as a trio during the fifth installment of Sonic Circuits: Off the Grid. Along with their solo endeavors, Basha and Amber perform as atmospheric noise duo Sunny Beaches while Paolo’s live and recorded projects include Domesticated Wild Drones and Croniamantal. Governor Silver & The Queen Bees invite you to come sail away on their journey of cochlear crusades!
https://soundcloud.com/bashateez
https://soundcloud.com/echolalia-1
https://soundcloud.com/daviswhite/sympathetic-bows-at-sunrise