Thurston Moore talks No Fun Fest
 

Thurston Moore talks No Fun Fest


The Sonic Youth frontman reflects on the noise scene and his place in it.

By Hank Shteamer

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Most know Thurston Moore as the frontman of the avant-rock institution Sonic Youth, but he also moonlights as a purveyor of take-no-prisoners experimental music. When working in the latter mode, Moore often collaborates with members of the local noise scene and performs with various side projects as part of No Fun Fest, that community’s annual multinight powwow. While gearing up for a Saturday 16 No Fun appearance by Sonic Youth itself, Moore took some time to reflect on the fest—an event that he actually christened.
You’re constantly collaborating with various members of the noise community. What do you find inspiring about these artists and their scene? And what led to the decision to perform at No Fun Fest ’09 with the full Sonic Youth lineup?
I find a similarity of intent with the harsh noise musician and the improvising free music or free-jazz musician. And that is the desire to involve one’s creative sense with the essence of sound and music. A distinction would be that the free improviser generally is relative to the jazz tradition as per historical technique, whereas the noise musician is in defiance to traditional tropes and is like an alien mapping out new steps. But the desire to resolve with an impressive spontaneity, whether dark and hellish or universe-embracing, is inherent to each. Carlos Giffoni, the curator, has asked SY to perform in some capacity each year. We decided to do a full SY setup this year for no other reason than we haven’t done it yet. Ironically, to some extent, Lee will be a no-show, as he has plans to revel in Cannes that weekend. We will be joined by a couple of other noise-icians, most notably Bill Nace.
Carlos Giffoni told me that you came up with the name for No Fun Fest on the spot. Why did you pick that name? Were you playing on the idea that noise is widely viewed as an unfriendly genre?
Most listeners of music I think consider pure noise music as unlistenable and not a lot of fun. It ain’t Blondie. The name came to me because Stooges titles generally rule for any event that is to be evocative.
How do you think Carlos has managed to grow an event as successful as No Fun within a genre this esoteric?
Because Carlos answers his own muse. He likes what he likes and doesn’t kowtow to other people’s strictures of what noise is as a genre music. He, rightfully so, explodes the notion of noise and challenges every noise nerd’s proprietary take on it as such

No Fun Fest ’09


TONY speaks to Carlos Giffoni, the man behind the wildly successful annual noise gathering.

By Hank Shteamer

http://newyork.timeout.com/newyork/r....jpg?width=480 BUDDHA BANG Carlos Giffoni makes a racket onstage, but in person, he’s supremely chill.
Photograph: Megan Ellis

A few weeks ago, Lou Reed and his Metal Machine Trio brought the noise to Gramercy Theater, performing two consecutive nights of staunchly abstract music. The sixth annual No Fun Fest, running Friday 15 through Sunday 17 at Music Hall of Williamsburg, promises a similar din, but with a very crucial difference. For Reed, the clangorous milieu has long served as a perverse kind of sonic spa, a place to unwind when rock & roll grows tiresome. For the No Fun set, though, noise is way more than a hobby.
Consequently, you might expect the artists performing at the event to permanently assume the po-faced pose that Reed and other dabblers in the field affect. But Carlos Giffoni, a 31-year-old noise musician and promoter who founded No Fun Fest in 2004 and acts as its sole curator, is as affable as can be: Slightly pudgy, with a mop of black curls and a heavily accented drawl, the Venezuela-born performer comes off more like Jeff Lebowski than a tortured artist. Reflecting on how he’s managed to fashion such a successful event (all three nights of No Fun ’09 have sold out in advance) within such an esoteric genre, he’s humble and matter-of-fact.
“For some reason, credit card companies really like me,” Giffoni explains with a shrug, between bites of pad thai at a West Village Vietnamese joint. “I have one or two cards where I charge all the costs, and then I pay them back with the ticket sales—that’s how it’s always worked.”
Giffoni (pronounced “Gif-FO-ni”) may emphasize his logistical savvy, but his networking prowess is just as formidable. The artist moved to New York from Miami in 2000, and quickly made his presence felt on the local noise scene both as a performer and a booker. The inaugural No Fun Fest in 2004 was mainly a showcase for him and his associates, including high-profile acts such as Wolf Eyes and various offshoots of Sonic Youth—which headlines this year’s festival on Saturday 16. (It was actually Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore who dreamt up the name No Fun, borrowing the phrase from a Stooges song.)
Emboldened by the success of the first year, Giffoni began reaching out to various forebears of the current scene—like the legendary Japanese artist Merzbow, who played No Fun in ’07 and returns this year—as well as veteran acts in related genres such as ambient and psych rock. Typically there’s no intergenerational tension, though Giffoni does recall some bewilderment on the part of Hans-Joachim Roedelius, a member of the pioneering electronic group Cluster, which played last year: “I can’t remember which band he was watching, but he came up to me and he was like, ‘Why is it so loud?’ ”
Volume isn’t the only problem Giffoni has had to contend with: Sometimes the harsh sonics have yielded actual physical violence, as during one particularly memorable set by the visceral performance-art crew Macronympha. “That wasn’t safe,” Giffoni recalls with a chuckle. “All of a sudden the audience was onstage and there were things flying everywhere. I think someone got hit by a bottle and needed 10 or 15 stitches on his head.” The artist’s terminally laid-back demeanor allows him to keep cool amid the mayhem. “Whenever a venue owner comes running to you with big eyes and screaming, that’s when you’ve gotta try to talk to a few people and calm things down,” he explains.
Having mastered the arts of placating club managers and selling tickets, Giffoni is setting his sights beyond NYC. He’s currently prepping the first overseas No Fun Fest, slated to take place in Sweden in September, and he harbors dreams of someday expanding to his South American homeland. That’s not to say that he’s grown weary of overseeing the NYC event. “At least half of the times, I’ve gotten the flu right after the fest, just from physical strain,” recalls Giffoni. “But it’s what I enjoy, so I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.… Well, I do like being on the beach in the Caribbean, too, so that’s a hard choice.”
No Fun Fest runs Fri 15–Sun 17 at Music Hall of Williamsburg.

בבקשה סטיבן

(I wonder whether these things are getting translated correctly...)

אתה בעיטה בתחת אחי

Ha ha... not quite, according to one translator:

"You are a kick in the rear end my brother" :D

is says: "you are a kick in the ass brother".
:)

Well, it's close enough :D :D


To get back on topic:

SY with Bill Nace, eh? That'll excite Whorefrost!

and

Why is Lee going to be in Cannes? Something to do with the film festival, presumably, but what?

likely something to do with that rosemary movie him and his kids are in.

^^^"go get some rosemary"

w/ Sage Ranaldo, Frey Ranaldo and Leah Singer, notably. No Lee. He's probably just on a family trip. How many kids has he got, three?

http://www.screendaily.com/festivals...000861.article

he has a part (not staring) in the movie and it premiers at Cannes right around the time of no fun fest.

o cool, my " sources" did not mention Lee. My bad.

oh good. i was totally confused/somewhat concerned about the lack of lee at no fun.

yeaaaaaaaah, clarification!

Bill Nace.. fuck yeah, that excites me..
shit kicks off tommorow