The return of paranoia

There are not many groups in the world that have influenced the course of musical history as much as the Sheffield team Cabaret Voltaire . On their records, all the “golden generation of the rave” grew - from Derrick Meya, Chemical Brothers and Orbital to Aphex Twin and founder WARP Records Steve Beckett. But their main merit, perhaps, should be considered that Cabaret Voltaire was extremely long to be at advanced current trends. It is now, during the heyday of club music, it is obvious that hits can be not only sugary pops, but also rhythmic and aggressive electronic tracks. Soil for this Cabaret Voltaire was cooked more than thirty years ago.

Their career, the active phase of which has passed from about the mid-seventies to the middle of the nineties, in some way resembles the Kraftwerk path. But if the Germans, having felt their sound, turned into an art object, a monument to themselves, then Cabaret Voltaire held on the crest and modified for almost 20 years - and eventually left an important mark on almost everything that happened in British music in these two decades. In the seventies, they were engaged in noise corporatism side by side with Throbing Gristle . By the end of the decade, he was mutated into a sharp and loose synthesizer postpage, often divided the scene with Joy Division and inspired them to experiments with electronics. In the eighties, they relied on evil energy and dance of the Gruv, thereby anticipating the Esid House, New Bit and Madchester, and in the nineties plunged (already mainly solo efforts of the founder of the Richard Kirk group) into experiments with embibia-techno and leisurely broken electronics.

Cabaret Voltaire - “Shakedown” (Live At the Hacieneda, Manchester, UK, 1986)

Already one list of labels where Cabaret managed to marked Voltaire or Richard Kirk Solo, you can write the history of music. They became a link of several eras at once - Industrial Records and Mute , Virgin and Factory Records , at the opening of which the group performed. Finally, the Sheffield Warp , whose glorious catalog, almost half consisting of classic albums of the nineties and zero, begins with the plate of Richard Kirk.

Cabaret Voltaire - "Yasha "

The last studio album CV dates from 1994, when the group has already turned into a solo project of Richard Kirk. Since then, Kirk has repeatedly talked about reviving Cabaret Voltaire , but always added that this should by no means be a nostalgic reunion with old hits. We need new material and, perhaps, even fresh blood in the form of younger participants. Kirk was limited to conversations for a long time, but in the end announced: Cabaret Cambet Voltaire will be held in August 2014 at the Berlin festival Atonal .

The place of return was not chosen by chance: in the world of experimental music Berlin Atonal is the same old and respected brand as Cabaret itself Voltaire . He founded it in 1982, Dimitri Hegeman, and in those days Clock played there DVA , Laibach , PSYCHIC TV and other patriarchs of non -standard sound. In 1990, Hegeman abandoned the festival, founding the Tresor club and switched to the promotion of techno, and last year with the blessing of Hiegeman Berlin Atonal was renewed. Now the festival takes place in the room of the power plant - a huge concrete hangar, where several clubs also live, including the same Tresor .

From most of the current Berlin festivals Atonal is different in that this is not a globalistic franchise with the same set of artists like Jamie XX and John Hopkins, and the story is completely independent. Many musicians play special programs here, someone has a performance on Atonal -The only concert of the year, but for someone-the first in more than twenty years. In addition, contrary to Berlin traditions and despite the obvious connection with Tresor , Berlin Atonal is not a giant technician at all. The emphasis and experimental electronics sounds mainly here, and at the opening the orchestra performs “music for 18 musicians” by Steve Reich.

It seems that the current world is not so far from the gloomy Tatchera Britain of the eighties, paranoia is again relevant.

The organizers, of course, allocated Cabaret Voltaire Hedlinelian slot, 11 pm on Saturday, but on the eve of Richard Kirk wandered among the audience, joining a motley crowd. Kirk announced his performance as an “audiovisual show”, which was somewhat disturbed-with excess attention to the video, the musical part of the speech often turns out to be a hackted “laptop-Lay”. But Richard came up seriously: he brought with him a whole mobile laboratory and looked like a sort of crazy professor in this environment - a suit, disheveled reducing red hair and many devices, behind which the musician is sometimes not visible at all.

Knowing Kirk, it was logical to assume that the new program would sound deliberately modern, it could well give out, for example, techno in the spirit of Diamond Version , but instead Richard began to bombard the hall with a sharp and loose sound in the spirit of CV of the beginning of the eighties. Dried drum forces, a howl of synthesizers and collages from distorted voices. All this was so similar to the recording of the times " Red Mecca ” or“ 2x45 ”, which sometimes was not quite clear whether these are really new tracks or well -prepared versions “ NAG NAG NAG " or " LANDSLIDE " .

Stylization for itself is a controversial method, but in this case worked perfectly. A concrete hangar, a dull light, a flickering video with a cut from news stories with Reagan, Thatcher and Gaddafi, harsh faces in the hall - all this harmonized with music just perfectly. It seems that the current world is not so far from the gloomy Tatchera Britain of the eighties, paranoia is again relevant. As for the Kirk itself, although he is pretty flashed in his 58, he still knows how to give out a crazy one. About twenty minutes later, the festival, where before that the embibio sounded mainly, turned into a post -apocalyptic disco. And Richard, meanwhile, increased the momentum, accelerating into some primitive Break-bit and twisting the handles of the synthesizers to squeeze more and more a roar and screech from them.

As a control shot in the head, Kirk finished the concert five minutes of noise terrorism, as if returning to himself not thirty, but forty years ago. Like all the performance, the finale came out damn spectacular, but at the end of this statement it was not a point, but a question mark. Is Kirk going to record and publish this material, does it intend to act again or will it disappear again from the scene for twenty years? There are no assumptions on this score yet.