The journey can start from nowhere but Florence, in whose undergrowth new energies and project creations spring up, well able to win a place on the ever more crowded European scene, moving through far-sighted Holland with its avant-garde cities such as Amsterdam and Rotterdam, stopping in Cologne, German epicentre of the culture club, and finishing in a night of "full immersion" in the new nightlife of London.
As part of the project there will be also the installation Iceberg by Ciboideale, especially conceived for the Leopolda Station square: an ephemeral work that will be visible only the opening day (May 3rd), a video projection on an ice block that will slowly thaw.
The programme will also be enriched by the sonorizations of URBANsoundWORK, a project by Radio Papesse that involves radio producers, musicians and sound researchers.
CITY MIX > LONDON
in collaboration with Goodfellas, Placet Mu, Elastica Records
Ain't no doubt about it: London can be still considered the European capital of the club culture and the electronic research, a city with a constant and radical cultural renewal in which the solidity of the musical industry is able to capture the innovations coming from the underground scene. If London can boast historical clubs like the Fabric and the Ministry of Sound which are still able to attract, propose and produce the big stars of the international clubbing, and others, like the Bar Rhumba, The End, the Cargo or the Electric Birdcage, are also in the limelight.
On the other hand, even more institutional spaces of the London culture (Victoria and Albert Museum, ICA) are giving space to the new sounds and the electronic languages. Very important in the London music scene are also festivals like the Wireless at the Hyde Park or onedotzero at the ICA or radio stations like BBC 1xtra together with a capillary net of labels like Warp and Planet Mu. In this ocean of sounds the happy island is actually the Dubstep: a music genre which summarizes many years of sound made in UK.
TELEMATIK GURU (Elastica) _ live
The project was born in 2005 from an idea of Lapo Grossi and Nicholas Present (laptop set). In September 2006 with the inclusion of Luigi Savio (drum & synth), Léonard Politi (violin & electronics) and Jacopo Botti (drum & synth) it evolves in the actual project of electronic instrumental music pervaded by fresh influences from hip hop/dubstep, oriented towars post rock atmospheres. They performed live in Florence (Switch Out, EX MUD, Plasma, MUV Festival and Festival of creativity), Bologna (Link), Milan (Leoncavallo, Videodrome Festival), Rome (Rialto di Sant'Ambrogio). Always in 2007 they partecipated in the Elettrowave Challenge and, in collaboration with Switch, they inaugurated the new Florentine centre of contemporary art of Palazzo Strozzi.
NUMA CREW (Elastica) _ dj set
N.U.M.A. (new massive underground alliance) is a crew that was born in Florence in 2005 composed of the DJ and producers Lapo Grossi, Jacopo Botti, Leonard Politi (Telematik Guru) and Mk Links and Ninja (La Primiera). N.U.M.A. crew launches the production of Elastica, publishing the first release in December 2007. With its deep and elastic low sounds Maniacs is a great fusion of dubstep sounds and classic dub style. Insolence is on the contrary a darkest and aggressive track that combines harsh and hypnotic sounds with a paranoid and insolent melody. Their dj set is powerful and forceful, with the three producers/dj who alternate their presence at the console.
MILANESE (Warp, Planet Mu) _ live
The new star of the London underground club has an Italian name. It's called Milanese and has linked his fame to two of the most respected labels of the world scene: Warp Records and Planet Mu. Always poised between old school and Bristol vocalism, his constantly changing sound seems to summarize the best of British dance in recent years, from grime to electrodub, full of low sounds and wild rhythms.
After brief appearances on Warp and Arcola, above all it's important his large debut work: Extend. The sound of Milanese, from a solid dub-step base builds, above a world of captured and sampled voices and electronic sounds always dark, subtle digital solutions and dramatic and metropolitan passages.
NEIL LANDSTRUMM (Tresor, Planet Mu) _ mixed media live
Recognized as one of the pioneers of the English electronic music, Neil Landstrumm has realized, starting from 1994, records and projects for some of the most important international labels. Starting from Peacefrog and then moving to the Berlin Tresor Records his bass-game have finally come to the most important electronic label in England: Planet Mu. To explain his musical research we could talk about experimental low frequencies dancehall. After several years spent in New York, Neil makes commutes between the native Edinburgh, where he manages the label Scandinavia, and London. With his sets he has toured the world several times, carrying around his pioneering research in the field of techno recently turned to the languages of dubstep but always with a strong "rave" attitude. Worldwide acclaimed for the album Restaurant of Assassins Landstrumm represents the most credible witness to a confluence of styles that merges the Great Northern Raves of the Happy Mondays with the Bass'N'Bleep scene of Yorkshire and the slow and instinctive beat of electronic dub. It is live hardware electronics at its best.
