lookit that came outta nowhere

SUMMER ROUND UP

little miss nowhere — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 00:50:35 +0000

SUMMER ROUND-UP

Oh man so summer is almost over. I know it’s true because I just did my perennial trip to JC Penney in order to reap the benefit of massive mall sales and procure back-to-school clothes without holes in them. I even picked up some cheap junky jewelry in hopes of perfecting my “real adult” simulacrum. I’ll keep you posted

Oh yes, summer. A time when the substitute teaching season ends and I spend a month or two taking trains and sleeping on couches, visiting friends and strangers, wearing the same clothes every day and getting stinky…

PORTLAND

My first stop was Portland, where I spent time in a lovely trailer off of 82nd street writing my first magazine article and practicing with my new band. The article is out now in the VICE Anti-Music Issue edited by Sam McPheeters. It’s called “Keeping It Bleak: Modern Touring in America” and it’s about deathbed noise-tour as artform. I was lucky enough to get some of my own personal tour heroes Elijah Forrest (Terrors, Cavelife) and Jeff Witscher (Rene Hell, Deep Jew, Impregnable, etc) for quotes and interviews. I think both of them are amazing artists and I hope that comes across in the piece. It also includes awesome illustrations by my good friend and former bandmate Tara Tavi. To top it off, I’m also EMPLOYEE OF THE MONTH for the first time in my life! (Something that somehow never happened when I was a waitress or video store clerk.)

the photo was also taken in the PDX trailer, so CK One!

PS – I kind of like writing. If you want to hire me to write something, hit me up! erikam.anderson (AT) gmail (DOT) com

AWE

The new band is called AWE and I’m REALLY excited about it. The name came to me in a dream ok so I can’t fuck with it. It’s my initials turned all inside out. The line-up is basically the same people that played with me when I opened the Throbbing Gristle show last April. It’s my bestest NoDak friend Aaron Davis (ACRE) on bass and my lil sis Nicole on drums and vocal harmonies. Yes, that is correct, I’m forming a sister band. Is there anything cuter? They were just down for a couple weeks tracking some stuff at Studio 1510, so now I’ve got to buckle down and mix it. The AWE record is tentatively titled Past-Life Martyred Saints and will include some older stuff I recorded but never released like “Marked” and “Butterfly Knife”, but also brand new stuff. It’s going to be coming out early next spring in Europe on the truly rad Souterrain Transmissions label. At this point I don’t have a plan for the US. What’s up with the US these days? Anyone want to weigh in?

summer, PDX

So anyway, here are the bones of a new song called “Nirvana Demo Rare”. Recorded in that Portland trailer on a borrowed 4track, with help from cats. The final version will prolly have drums and bass, but here is the skeleton.

NIRVANA DEMO RARE

Mona, who helped

_

MIDWEST

Next stop was my hometown of Sioux Falls, SD. Not a single picture from that time except one of me taking a body shot of tequila out of a former high school classmate’s cleavage. Nope! Not posting it!

From there it was a little cabin on a lake outside of Minneapolis (which happens to be one of the best cities in the US fer sure). No internet, and I stayed up til dawn 3 nights in a row fishing. And drinking miller lite. Jesus christ that was the best. All catch and release, mostly little panfish and trout and of course the hideous bullhead. For those who don’t know these are quite awful creatures with a blubbery flesh body and horrible stinging whiskers. They are basically fucking cthulhu, total lovecraft fish, but also kind of a common meme/punchline in the midwest. They are like the devil whammies on press your luck.

bullhead

Cthulhu

See? Don’t they look like fucking baby Cthulhus? Which brings me to one of my favorite memes : BABIES DRESSED LIKE CTHULHU!

aw, aint he cute?

Don’t worry, I’m not super-maternal yet, despite all the time I spent in the Midwest. I can’t even take care of a dog

BALTIMORE

From there I got a real cheap ticket to NYC, and from there ran down to Baltimore for what was apparently the last ever Whartscape. It was really really lots of fun. So much so that I didn’t take a single picture! Saw lots of friends and the whole time was so hot and sweaty it was like a constant sauna. Also spent some time debating about which is more intimidating, West Oakland or West Baltimore. I had always felt really unsure and on my toes when I had visited Baltimore in the past, but friends that come visit us in West O feel the same way. I’m still kind of tripped out by Baltimore, with its blue flashing police cameras in the streets and hovering black helicopters that actually yell at people. Even the bar down the street from Peter’s they have to buzz you in and take down your driver’s license number in case you stab somebody. But in West Oakland we don’t even have a bar, so that’s that. We decided that both were intense in different ways. In Baltimore I noticed that ppl you pass on the street won’t really look at you, (which seems kind of Southern in a way) but in Oakland you basically have to make eye contact and greet everyone you come across or else it’s sketchy. The last time I didn’t I had a group of boys holler at me “What’s up? You bad-ass bitch! You exotic-ass bitch!” Which I think was kind of a compliment but so funny that this blonde-haired blue-eyed cornfed girl would be so exotic out here in Oakland. Funny, but true.

me and lil sis pose for a West O xmas card

As always, a big highlight was visiting Tarantula Hill and seeing whatever progress on the house that’s been made since the last time through town. A sauna! A rooftop garden! A lightbox synthesizer from 1960! And to top it all off, Carly even gave me some of my favorite homemade lipgloss made out of beeswax from HER OWN BEES that she keeps herself in beehives on the roof. What a woman!

Carly, Elijah and me @ T-Hill

NYC

From there it was back to NYC for just a few days. Apparently everyone lives in Greenpoint now so that’s where I spent almost all my time. My friend Will was having an art party/real-time photo collage, where he hired a model off of Craigslist and invited friends to come over, bring an object, and stage a still-life involving all objects and the model. The actual scene of the shoot was kept very secret, behind a big white sheet so that people couldn’t peek at what one another was doing. We got there late so we just sat around drinking wine in the gallery with the other participants who were waiting for their turn to set up their shot. We also invented a new meme I really liked that boiled down to “I’d rather listen to Henry Rollins doing spoken word on a TOOL album than listen to Fugazi!!!” Here are some pics.

By Will Rahilly

Will Rahilly and Dan

From there we split: me, Leif and Mario. 3 Midwesterners in the big city. And for some funny reason we ended up doing pretty much exactly as we would have done if we had been back in the dusty rural Heartland instead of buzzing Brooklyn: first we did karaoke, then we got Miller Lite and went back to Zeljko’s apartment where we drank, listened to Danzig, talked metal and stayed up until dawn.

Here is an awesome video of Mario playing guitar with a prototype of Leif’s new pedal. This is especially great because Mario is actually an accomplished composer with a release on Tzadik and performances of his work taking place all over the world. He recently told a former professor that he was in a new metal band and his professor said, “Mario, grow up!” But this here proves why he’s got all the cred:

Yes Leif’s pedal is still in prototype right now but it’s going to be fucking crazy. Midi-sync stereo programmable tremolo patterns with tap tempo, feedback function and the ability to import settings into your ProTools sessions. WHA??? Basically a game-changer.

Here is a scrappy little video I took of him playing around with it plugged into a Big Muff and a volume pedal. Poor lil baby can’t even really play guitar (although he’s real handy with a viola) BUT LISTEN TO HOW FUCKING SWEET IT SOUNDS when he’s just basically holding it! Fuck.

Check back for more updates on this, the first run should be available soon…

MIDWEST PART II

And from there it was home again home again jiggedy-jig. Back to the cabin on the lake where I was supposed to be working on more music but instead spent most of my time fishing and watching TV (which is really a wild time for me, since I haven’t had TV in about 10 years). The best (besides having no internet) was being able to go fishing with my grandparents. I love them and feel so lucky to have all 4 of them still around to tell me stories about the “olden days”, as I call them. This grandpa grew up around the Minnesota Iron Range 60 miles from the Canadian border and has the best accent I have ever heard and supreme comic timing. He wears wooden clogs and goes out to the barn every morning to feed the kittens. Apparently though he used to be a real hooligan, as he just told me a story of one Halloween where he and some friends tipped over an old lady in an outhouse with the DOOR FACING DOWN! Grandpa!!!_

Grandpa hammin' it up! must run in the family

OAKLAND

Ok I guess this is the real home again home again. EASTNILE has some crazy shit coming up. First of all is the online launch of SHINKOYO, which is a digital media label spanning New York, Baltimore and the West Coast. Besides releasing physical formats, the label will also be trafficking in digital 7″s, video art and even experimental opera and performance. I’ve been dreaming of putting the Some Dark Holler stuff into digital LP format and this looks like the place to do it…

Also exciting is the first ever festival we are throwing in conjunction with the traditionally more improv-based 1510. We’re calling it the ONE festival, for OAKLAND NEW AND EXPERIMENTAL, and it will be 4 days of music, video and performance from so many amazing acts. I helped curate this one and the lineup is definitely one of the most diverse and unique I have seen in a long time. Elizabeth Orr, Fred Frith, Warner Jepson, Holly Herndon, James Fei, Secretarial Pool, Greg Zifcak and more. I feel like these are going to be shows that really draw from the different scenes of experimental performance that are going on across the Bay Area, from the old guard of Improv to new Theatre and video works. We’re also going to take advantage of having Warner Jepson’s old Buchla synth here that was rescued from the SF Tape Music Center by having a different vintage analog synth set every night. Worth the price of admission alone! Hope to see you there <3 <3 <3

AND ONE LAST THING: This Friday we are throwing a show for Brooklyn’s beloved LIGHT ASYLUM. FER REALS, COME SEE THIS NOW BEFORE THIS BAND IS OUT OF YOUR PRICE RANGE.

EMA = AWE

little miss nowhere — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 01:24:23 +0000

AWE - Past Life Martyred Saints LP out SPRING 2011 on Souterrain Transmissions (Europe).

CALIFORNIA (BOYS)

ANTEROOM (nirvana demo rare)

BUTTERFLY KNIFE

Contact: erikam.anderson (AT) gmail (DOT) com for US inquiries.

CALI TEASE

little miss nowhere — Fri, 14 May 2010 22:41:10 +0000

Here is a short preview of a new video I’m working on for an EMA solo song: CALIFORNIA (featuring UFOs, skaters, and a homemade Danzig Tshirt–it’s really more about boys than geography, dig?)

DANZIG TAPE EXORCISE

little miss nowhere — Fri, 07 May 2010 00:52:00 +0000

EMA SOLO TAPE OUT NOW ON NIGHT PEOPLE RECORDS.

ORDER HERE.

PLEASE CLICK HERE FOR INFORMATION ON THE CORRESPONDING VISUAL ART COLLABORATION.

GREAT NEWS! The EMA “TAPE” tape is available now from Night People Records. This is my take on improvised music, but it ends up sounding kind of like a sweet girl version of Niandra Lades and Usually Just a T-shirt, which is probably one of my favorite albums EVER. It’s intimate and I think really beautiful. In conjunction with the actual tape release, I am doing an interweb collaborative visual art project, which you can find out about here, along with a short essay about the idea of TAPE. Please Contribute!

EAGLES DARE

In other news, while we are sad about our East Coast sister school ParisLondonWestNile closing its doors, productions over in West Oakland’s EAST NILE have been kickin, and our focus has been on video. Here’s quick clip from a video I’m making for a new solo song called “California (Boys)”. It involves UFOs, skaters, reptilians and hula-hooping, (naturally.) I’m still collecting footage, so if you’ve got some good UFO footage, real or fake, send it on over to me: myrobobedroom AT gmail DOT com. Here is a preview involving me shaving my head while wearing a homemade Danzig Tshirt.

CEZANNO

_

Also, our resident metaphysic Severiano Martinez has been working on the upcoming Sejayno Opera : “Cezzano“, that will be performed this month at the Baltimore Art Museum. Sejayno is a bi-coastal art collective featuring Severiano Martinez, analog synth-master Peter B. and C18 wanderer Carson Garhart. More information can be found here and here.

I don’t want to give away too much behind-the-scenes magic, but here are some shots of me filming Seve in character…

CEZANNO unveiled

HUZZAH!

AND I DON’T PRACTICE SANTERIA

I know this is last minute but I am performing tomorrow in the city at VIRACOCHA, for the debut of the NEW SENSATIONALISTS poetry movement. The party takes place in the basement which apparently used to be used for Santeria rituals. Which probably means animal sacrifice, at least. Spooky shit! For the occasion I’m working on a group exorcism involving paper airplanes. We’ll see how that flies (wink).

NEW SENSATIONALISTS : FRIDAY MAY 7th

Artists in order of appearance:

Sara Beckley
Nora Toomey
Mark Matos
Wax Sax
Erika M. Anderson
James Marchetti
Alexander Friend/ David Petrelli

@ VIRACOCHA — 21st and Valencia 8pm — donation based bar!

Stay tuned for info on the new “Butterfly Knife” video from LA artists Dawn Kasper and Deanna Erdmann plus a post-exorcism report. Send luv hate and hugs to : myrobobedroom AT gmail DOT com

LITTLE SKETCHES

little miss nowhere — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 22:35:18 +0000

SO I’ve got some new collaborators for the Little Sketches On Tape project, including this gorgeous piece by Keren Petrie from Toronto, along with some debut works by willing and confused second graders. FMI here. The project is a collaborative art piece and if you’d like to contribute, send some images my way! email: myrobobedroom (AT) gmail (DOT) com

By Keren Petrie

In other news, Shawn Reed says he’s almost done with his version of the artwork, which means hopefully the actual tapes will be ready soon!

little miss nowhere — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 09:31:17 +0000

VIOLENT WORLD

little miss nowhere — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 02:44:39 +0000

Die Antwoord pic from Mhambi.com

J. Kit Clayton told me Die Antwoord is a hoax, and that they are an art collective that used to do Powerpoint presentations on how to rap. But for some reason I kind of don’t care. It’s strange because Leif watched the videos and said they reminded him of Borat, and I got really mad because for once I just wanted to BELIEVE in something, and root for someone and let them make me happy instead of just letting cynicism take over. And apparently this is the one time I should have been more cynical. (I mean, look at that website, right?) But as I said, I’m kind of with this guy on this one in that I don’t care. I mean, I think James Frey is a total sleazefuck, but most hiphop videos are all about fantasy anyway, and the debate about legitimacy has always been there. I mean, how’s it that different from selling suburbanites a fantasy version of “ghetto” Compton? South Africa just seems like the logical next level of exoticism.

VIOLENT WORLD

And here’s me cashing in on the exoticism of my hometown of Sioux Falls, South Dakota. It’s an excerpt of the piece I did at the Queens Muscle show a couple weeks ago. The set wove in and out between narrative and music, and this section cuts to the end of a longer story and focuses mostly on the loop/ARP/MAX version of Danzig’s “ARCHANGEL”. (Gawd he’s just so big, dumb and sexy) The whole thing is really a love letter to all the rough and tumble boys in my hometown who taught me how to throw TVs off of balconies. But in the excerpt it comes off as a little harsh; my apologies to J.H. Diamond, who bears the brunt._

I know that’s not really a “video” so much as a static shot, but video seems like the only searchable medium these days (skip to 7:30 if you get bored). So if you want more of a real video, I’ve got one for ya. It’s Psychic Handbook doing a cover of “White Like Heaven” on the day after Christmas at Rhinoceropolis in Denver. It’s a little dark and at first you can’t see the singer, so I thought in the beginning that maybe it was a record. She starts to fucking wail at about 2 minutes in and it sounds so good. I always wished I could wail like that.

I think they do a really beautiful job and it gives me the craziest feeling to watch. Kind of makes me cry actually, but also makes me wonder if now other people are more easily able to access that person who wrote the song than I do. That person: me.

One of the members was DJing at Cansifus’ comedy night at the Ivy, and he ordered a drink next to me at the bar, but I couldn’t talk to him. What did he give me by playing that song? I will never be able to put it into the right words.

WHEN THE QUEENS MUSCLE ACED INFINITY

little miss nowhere — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 05:53:08 +0000

EMA 2010

Tomorrow I’m lucky to be performing at the closing of a beautiful art show put on by 0th. It’s called WHEN THE QUEENS MUSCLE ACED INFINITY. I think that’s a great name.

I’m going to be doing some things I’ve never done before, including playing a synth version of DANZIG through a custom-built MAX/MSP / Arduino pedal and telling a story from when I was a teenage Bukowski. Hot, right? And here’s a pic of my new haircut. What a bruiser.

0th is a badass art, music and technology collaboration among Rose / Canner MEFE, Jacqui Gordon, MNDR and Caryl Keintz. Their collective output is very impressive, and the show is definitely worth seeing in person if you’re in the area.

INFO for QUEENS MUSCLE:

0th art show at 21 GRAND

Closing Performance: February 26th, 8PM
Laetitia Sonami
Ava Mendoza/Matt Ingalls/Jordan Glenn – Trio
Erika Anderson
0th

Location:
21 Grand Gallery
416 25th Street
Oakland, CA 94612-2409
(510) 444-7263
Gallery Hours: Thurs 4-8pm, Fri 4-6pm, Sat & Sun 2-6pm

http://0th.cc
http://21Grand.org

_PS– show went great! The whole evening felt really electric and high quality. I’ve got a great recording that I’d like to post, I just might need to edit it cuz my Grandma internet-stalks me and I don’t want her to hear the story about my crazy teenage exploits. I try to hide from her but she is savvy. HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRANDMA! (she just turned 80)

DAY JOB

little miss nowhere — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 19:52:42 +0000

I love these kids. They keep me tough, and also not so tough. They are, in some ways, what the last GOWNS song was about. Them vs the fatcats of the world.

And of course, FUNNY DUDE.

In other news, when I’m not telling jokes or dodging spitballs, I’ve been spending some time going over other unreleased material. I believe it could be time for the EMA solo record…

GOWNS: final release

little miss nowhere — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 23:42:25 +0000

ezra and erika 2007

As of last week, the collaboration between artists Erika Anderson, Ezra Buchla, and Corey Fogel, also known as GOWNS, has ceased to breathe.

The band had been together for about 5 years, creating in that time a small-run EP known as Dangers of Intimacy, the critically acclaimed LP Red State, a recently released Latitudes Session for Southern Records, as well as a standout appearance on the Live At The Smell DVD.

Pitchfork Media once described GOWNS as “one of the most heart-stoppingly great live bands on Earth”, and it was the same tension that produced these electrifying performances that ultimately drove us apart. Another reviewer once referred to the themes of light and darkness that ran through Red State, which funnily enough I had never noticed, but seems now like an apt metaphor for the entire experience in general.

We were tapping into some very raw emotions, and I’m ultimately proud of the risks we took. In spite of anything else, I feel like we were honest, and I feel like we were brave.

I’m also proud of the sounds we created, as though the combination of our talents created something that was rare and unique.

Before this we were just finishing work on a piece for our next record, and I think in many ways it’s one of the best things we’ve done. At 17 minutes long, it’s a good representation of everyone doing the best of what they do best: it’s got Corey’s frenetic yet graceful drum patterns, Ezra’s swelling viola drones, a rhythmic and powerful guitar line, and a vocal and lyrical style that is at once direct and oblique.

I’m posting it here as a free download, because I know people were anxious to hear something new from us, and I know we had kept them waiting far too long. I’d like to think of this as our final release.

I’m sorry we couldn’t keep it together.

STAND AND ENCOUNTER

http://somedarkholler.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/gowns_stand.mp3_

please click above to hear entire song, a short excerpt is below

Please feel free to forward and REPOST this link. The distribution of it is now in your hands.+

Like Gowns’ fantastic 2007 album Red State, this set was positively charged with desperate energies and highlighted by moments of profound focus and clarity. During those brightest moments (light and brightness being a leitmotif of Red State) it feels as though Gowns are grasping at some quintessential truth, and in so doing, tottering at the edge of oblivion. And then oblivion always wins.

======================

All members continue to be involved with other endeavors.

EMA has a soon-to-be released tape on the Iowa City-based Night People label, which is paired with a short personal essay on fidelity and nostalgia, and a collaborative art project. Find info on that here.

Also in the works is a digital LP version of the Some Dark Holler material, including a Hobo Code/graphic score of the epic “Kind-Hearted Woman”, which was performed earlier this year in support of Throbbing Gristle’s recent US tour. More info on that here.

EMA: http://cameouttanowhere.com

EZRA BUCHLA: http://catfact.net/

COREY FOGEL: http://knitdrums.tumblr.com/

Most releases remain in print, but some are down to only a few copies. Please email to inquire about Red State, Broken Bones; info on the brand new vinyl re-release of Dangers of Intimacy, here.

While GOWNS has ceased, we still have love in our hearts, and haven’t ruled out the possibility of future collaborations.

Please contact thegowns@gmail.com for more information.