by: Sergio Martinez
Night cats and vampires need sounds to guide them from hot spot to hot spot. From club to rave, from dive bar to after hours hang out. They crave for the sounds that agitate their skin, for the sounds that lure them to corners otherwise not visited.
Friday nights, if you’re straying away from the LA undergrounds or rooftops, there’s a radio freakquency provider of such audio clues: KUCI 88.9 FM’s Digital::Nimbus, electronic audio frequencies steered by two cool felines themselves, Pietro & Francesca, aka Pietrobot and Freakquency Modulator.
And to be frank, Digital::Nimbus operators understand their audience’ schedules well: every Friday night from midnight ‘til 3am –officially, the noctambulists’ office hours-, long stretches of wicked electronica soundscapes radiate from their university compound. I really get that Pump-Up-The-Volume-Christian-Slater-Home-Pirate-Radio-Station kind of feeling just describing these guys DJ endeavors.
But damn, where else do you find these exquisite data soundscapes? Digital::Nimbus tagline should be: the sound of data… if you don’t believe me save your next re-read of Gibson’s Neuromancer for a Friday night and make sure D::N is playing in the background. You’ll understand immediately. Pietro and Francesca are invisibly steering you –with the help of music - to the very near future…
… data clicks and buzzes all around you, LED lights blink and stare, blink and stare… the aphonic on/off sounds of an amplified mic drip their operatic noises in the background. It feels like being inside a capsule, sounds muffled, earphones on:
FFFFFFFFFfffffffff---sssssshhhhhhhhsssssss--bliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiippp---
I look at my watch. It’s only 1:20 am…
Stretched out in bed, I think: there’s still time to head out and check the last couple of hours of the brand new burlesque show playing at this really cool bar right in the corner of… No, no Rockola, no Elvis, no Ricky Martin this Friday, this bar plays nothing but Digital::Nimbus all night long… I’m not sure if they realize how Fifth-Elementish this mixture of minimalist IDM music and burlesque can can’s really looks.
Close to 3 am, I snap out of the surreal mode. What am I doing out here, dancing, surrounded by cabaret girls all wearing can can dresses, so far away from home? I forget how I got here… the girl to my right, staring awkwardly in my direction, seems to be waiting for an answer or reply as if we had been having a very deep and meaningful conversation.
Maybe we were. I simply can’t remember.
A cute boy passes next to us and I wink goodbye to her, saying nothing. Of course, the boy is soon devoured by the crowd and as I enter the dancing pit myself, I forget hour, obligations, tiredness and dive head first into ecstasy mode:
Yooooohooooooooo!!!
This is Berlin –somewhere between 1890 & 2080-, Burlesque and Electronica are finally married. Cabaretronica sounds emanate from the wall sized speakers. My brain is not mine and it obeys me no more. I find myself yelling against the monster monitor speakers: Long live glamour and data glitches… Long live glamour and data glitches. I’m dancing in the middle of the dancing floor, dancing and dancing and dancing… until, uh, well, I can’t quite remember any more…
Someone I don’t recognize brings me back home.
With my clothes still on me, the light of early morning finds me in the baby-in-the-womb curled position. I’m sucking my own thumb. It’s barely 4:30am and I’m really cold.
Did I actually go out last night or was it all the side effects of too much Nimbus Data Crunching plus the Santa Cruz orange crush?
I can’t tell, I swear. And I’m not trying to make it sound glamorous.
For all I know it was nothing but a vampire dream visiting me with way too many convincing details. Or, it could’ve been that the hypnotic data sounds being picked up from the radio funked up my brain beyond my control.
Still, one thing for sure I remember: Digital::Nimbus creators are having a kick ass n5MD Label release and Live Music 'On-Air' party this coming January 20th –vampire hours, 10pm til 3 am-. I know for sure I plan to attend.
It promises to be wicked, packed with industrial electronic debris and the line up should give you a bit of a hint: Another Electronic Musician, Bitcrush, Damiak, Keef Baker (UK), Portland, Run Return & SubtractiveLAD (Canada)
If you spend enough time out there clubbing, you’ll probably recognize most of the DJ’s above. If you haven’t lately, check the event’s site for some cool mp3 samples from all participating musicians… go to www.digitalnimbus.com
OK fellas, dig it and get your booties out there. Fangs and teeth need some sharpening every once in a while.
Digital::Nimbus airs every Friday night/Saturday morning from midnight-3am.
View the original article on Socal.com.
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