DRONES
A unique collaborative project mixing drone-inspired works from 20th and 21st century music with the texture of immersive walls of sound from contemporary experimental metal music.
Belgian black metal band Wiegedood joins forces with BL!NDMAN [sax] to explore their interpretation of drone music, a style of music characterised by sustained, resonant and monotonous tones.
Listening to monotonous sounds requires an attention that we have lost in the overstimulated world. ‘Clock time’ increasingly dominates the musical experience, creating a tendency for listeners to interrupt the musical experience or stop early without a conscious and voluntary reason.
With this project, BL!NDMAN and Wiegedood present drone music as ‘a timeless immersive stream of sound’ that demands your attention. In one long concert, they incorporate idiosyncratic interpretations of artists from the classical music world and other more experimental music scenes influenced by the conceptual framework of drone music.
The result is a pulsating, immersive concert experience with an adapted visual lighting setting. A musically overwhelming trip that stirs the senses and leaves the listener with a completely new understanding of monotonous sounds.
BL!NDMAN & Wiegedood: artistic coordination
Eric Sleichim and Tomas Serrien: concept
Ward De Ketelaere: musical direction
Tomas Serrien: dramaturgy
Wiegedood
Levy Seynaeve: guitar, throat singing, theremin
Wim Coppers: drums, percussion, throat singing, theremin
Gilles Demolder: guitar, electronics
BL!NDMAN [sax]
Pieter Pellens: soprano saxophone, percussion
Hendrik Pellens: alto saxophone, percussion, electronics
Piet Rebel: tenor saxophone, percussion, electronics
Raf Minten: baritone saxophone, percussion
Programme
New interpretations of drone inspired works by James Tenney, Giacinto Scelsi, Klaus Lang, among others.
In addition, new works are created using drone techniques/concepts employed by artists such as Eliane Radigue, Earth, Pandit Pran Nath and Steve Reich.
Alternating with this, several songs by Wiegedood will be reinterpreted.
Press
Excerpt from the Roadburn 26 review at Never Mind The Hype:
Long endurance required for Wiegedood & BL!NDMAN
We learn that drummer Wim Coppers is making an appearance in Tilburg for the fifth consecutive year, possibly a record according to the organisers. Often this involves sheer, crushing force—think Crouch, for instance, or of course Wiegedood. This year, the latter band joins forces with the Belgian music collective BL!NDMAN in the main hall for the project Drones.
Those drawn in purely by the name, expecting a blistering wall of sound, will need to recalibrate today. The set opens slowly and ceremonially: a single saxophonist steps onto the sparsely lit stage and initiates the first drone. More saxophones follow, along with theremins, throat singing, gongs, and percussion. About the project, they say: in an overstimulated, fleeting world, we rarely have the patience to listen to monotone sounds. Drones is “a timeless, immersive stream of sound” intended to command our attention.
The audience present is thus tested and challenged. It is not easy listening—it demands stamina. The wind instruments take centre stage, with the drones built up in layered harmonics. That is where the tension arises—a sense of looming threat, reinforced by percussion. In the past, we’ve sometimes seen audiences drift away during projects like this, but that is not the case today.
A first highlight arrives when the winds introduce open, hopeful tones. White searchlights pierce through the smoke like sunlight breaking through clouds after a threatening storm. The tension is then expertly rebuilt: the wind players loop their instruments and move to large steel plates, which they play with bows. It could easily be the soundtrack to a horror film—if so, this would be the moment we’d be perched on the edge of our seats, anticipating the jump scare.
Towards the end of the set, those hoping for more than just drones are rewarded when FN Scar 16 kicks in; that merciless fury is further intensified by the addition of brass. Perhaps the set asked just a bit too much of the audience’s patience—but it was unquestionably unique.
Excerpt from the Roadburn 26 review at Dansende Beren:
What was also beautiful was the combination of Ghent’s Wiegedood and Brussels-based saxophone quartet BL!NDMAN on the main stage. The latter clearly took the lead with its brass work, giving the show a jazzy edge, while Wiegedood wove its own sound around it. It came in a stripped-down form, however, as the band didn’t deliver the devastating intensity we’ve come to expect from them at every moment. It was only during “FN SCAR 16” that that ruthlessness truly surfaced, and we finally heard the band we may have been waiting just a bit too long for. Beautiful it remained regardless, as the interplay between the two acts was flawless.
Excerpt from the Roadburn 26 review at Nrc.nl :
But while such decibels fall within the usual Roadburn Festival noise, this thirtieth edition unmistakably gave centre stage to real wind instruments. Flemish Wiegedood teamed up for the occasion with the wilfully unconventional saxophone quartet BL!NDMAN. The result was at times brilliant—when the shoegaze black metal and free jazz drones truly cross-pollinated.
