23five presents Jeff Surak, Scott Arford, Relay For Death, & Tralphaz

The Lab and 23five Incorporated present: 

Jeff Surak (Washington, DC)
Scott Arford (Oakland)
Relay For Death (Oakland)
Tralphaz (San Francisco)

Sunday  •  November 11, 2012 • 8:00pm • $7.00
The Lab  •  2948 16th Street  •  San Francisco, California • http://www.thelab.org

http://www.facebook.com/events/282877781829996/

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Jeff Surak started in the early 80s participating in the international hometaper network. His primary projects include -1348-, New Carrollton, V., and Violet. Surak has collaborated with such artists as Alexei Borisov, Zan Hoffman, Rinus Van Alebeek, Frans De Waard, Michael Gendreau, etc. He operates in the netherworld between composed and improvised music, moving between musique concrete, drone, noise, & free improvisation using whatever sound implements at hand. Surak runs the Zeromoon label and directs the annual Sonic Circuits Festival in Washington DC.
"Like beautiful rats hugging a sinking ship."  – The Wire
http://violet.zeromoon.com/

Scott Arford (b. 1967) has been active in the Bay Area's underground music and art scene since 1995.  His work constantly strives to create an undeniable ecstatic moment, where sound, image and environment merge into a singular experience.  His Static Room and TV-IV projects create intense flickering static environments using images to create sound and sounds to create images.  Works created for Naut Humon's Cinechamber expand these projects into multi-channel video and sound installations.  His Infrasound collaboration with Randy Yau, activates architectural space with sound, literally causing buildings to shake and vibrate. More recently he collaborated with Holly Herndon and Mathew Dryhurst in Total Accomplishment, a funky, darkly rhythmic, electronic dance outfit. Arford has shown work globally including the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Sounding Festivals in Guangzhou, China and Taipei, Taiwan, Liquid Architecture in Melbourne, Australia, Sonic Light in Amsterdam, and the Center for Contemporary Arts in Kitakyushu, Japan.  His awards include an Honorable Mention in the 2005 Prix Ars Electronica. Arford received a Bachelor of Architecture from the College of Architecture and Design at Kansas State University in 1991.  He currently works at EHDD where he just competed a 14 story campus building for City College in downtown San Francisco.
http://www.7hz.org
http://www.23five.org/archives/scottarford.html
http://soundcloud.com/scott-3-3
http://www.23five.org/infrasound/

Relay For Death is a project comprised of twin sisters from the American South. Due to close proximity since inception the two have been fated to act as physical witness-one for the other - of certain pre-birth awarenesses. Embodied psychic imprints not allowing for the comfort of forgetting. Where the sense is retained, always looming, though not fully realized in the nervous half -known swarm that seems to surround them and their sound. Making references to numerous styles but conforming fully to none, the underlying coherence of this post-industrial project rests on a metaphysical vision rather than a stylistic approach. Upon hearing the often bleak and unsympathetic, sometimes frenzied arch of their recordings and live sets which are here and there interspersed with stabs of unrelenting beauty one can easily depict this duo as an atrophied hand that resignedly pushes the sinking trash sound boundary or matter-of-factly points at our existence as a terrible dream toward and everlasting reality. Their LP Birth of an Older Much More Ugly Christ (2010) on Hanson records is highly acclaimed in the genre; and They Are Heating Up The Ovens Get the Fuck Out Now (2011) released by No Rent Records is a disquieting and considered elaboration on their work. Relay For Death will be performing with Sean Hollins aka Dick Cheney, a well known Oakland native,  former chess champ, current sound experimentalist, and wordsmith, having performing with Relay For Death here and there since 2010. 
http://23five.org/artists/relay_for_death.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZe5HcCEGkM&feature=plcp
http://www.eastbayexpress.com/ebx/relay-for-death-lives-on/Content?oid=2138558.


Tralphaz is an electronic sound artist from San Francisco. He has recorded for labels such as Troniks, RRRecords, Throat, and Harsh Noise and has toured the U.S., Switzerland, and Japan.
http://www.tralphaz.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-fql2H4yP3c
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uPIqOhZjheY&feature=related

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Founded in 1993, 23five Incorporated is a nonprofit organization dedicated to the development and increased awareness of sound works in the public arena, and to the support and education of artists working with and discussing the medium of sound. 23five Incorporated has remained at the forefront in bringing the most adventurous elements of sound art to the San Francisco Bay Area. 23five has served as an important benefactor to artists such as CM von Hausswolff, Christina Kubisch, Francisco Lopez, Olivia Block, Matt Heckert, Zbigniew Karkowski, Atau Tanaka, and many more.

http://www.23five.org
http://www.facebook.com/23five