The Arthur King Presents series continues with the release of musician, songwriter and creative technologist Bill Baird's Owl, out October 19 via Dangerbird Records. Additionally, Baird is performing select West Coast tour dates, kicking off October 22 inPortland. He will be supported on all dates by Joel Jeronimo and Jimi Cabeza of DIOS; find a complete list of dates below.
The upcoming shows feature immersive visual experiences, with Baird performing inside of a white cube illuminated solely by LED lighting and projections. "It started as a daydream while looking at a book of old Italian Futurist theater costumes," Baird explains, "they'd abstracted actors into shapes and colors. Perhaps I could abstract myself into a shape too, and that shape would be projecting dream-like images, and I could be inside those images, and maybe then me and the audience could all dream together." Watch the video for the album's title track HERE.
About Bill Baird:
Originally hailing from Texas and currently based in Oakland, Bill Baird's diverse back catalog of music touches on folk, ambient and thrashed garage. Through the years he has also been involved in creating immersive sound and video installations which have appeared in museums, cultural centers and festivals around the world. Baird yet again enters completely new territory with his forthcoming album, Owl, a record which fuses various musical and conceptual elements together to take the listener on a journey. The record is heavily inspired by Conny Plank and his work with Kraftwerk, Neu! and Cluster, and is conceptually inspired by Baird's son's fascination with owls. In addition to vocals, guitar, bass and drums, Baird utilizes a multitude of analog synthesizer recordings from Oakland's Vintage Synthesizer Museum.
About Arthur King:
Arthur King is a Los Angeles-based collective allowing musicians to come together to improvise experimental music and visual art performances in unique spaces. Performers include musicians who have played with Beck, Lou Reed, John Cale, Elliott Smith, Earlimart and EELS, among others.
Arthur King Presents is a platform aimed at stimulating creative collaboration and expanding the definition of creative expression. Arthur King Presents: Album Releases is a series of one-off experimental albums curated by Arthur King members.
Changing Landscapes is an ongoing series in which Arthur King captures sounds and images from a specific environment via field recordings and uses the material to create live improvised performances in the same setting. They aim to encourage a deeper consciousness of the environment and our place within it through music and film. This entire process is recorded live, filmed, and released as a multi-media album via Dangerbird Records.
The first installment of Changing Landscapes at Grand Escalante Staircase in Utah was released this past April. Other selected works include environmental installations for which members of the collective traveled to undisclosed locations, creating and documenting unannounced live performances in their surroundings: The Boat took place on the deck of a catamaran in the Pacific Ocean near Los Angeles, Trona saw the collective venturing to the Trona Pinnacles near Death Valley, and Palmetto was a large scale site specific interactive art installation including a large scale sculpture, manipulated video projections, directional audio experiences, a live performance and short film screening.
Unknown Movie Night is a series in which Arthur King invites an audience to attend a movie screening with a live score. Neither the band nor the audience knows what film will play ahead of time, and the band improvises a live score from beginning to end. Audio is recorded and released via Dangerbird Records. Previous films have included Darren Aronofsky's Pi, Pixar's Wall-E, Planet of the Apes, Edward Scissorhands, Delicatessen andJurassic Park.
BILL BAIRD LIVE
October 22 - The Fixin' To - Portland, OR
October 23 - Vermillion Art Gallery & Bar - Seattle, WA
October 26 - Starry Plough - Berkeley, CA
October 27 - Vega's Meat Market - Los Angeles, CA
Videos