Mark Solotroff - Upcoming Shows

 

On Friday September 15, 2023, I'll be rejoining The Sodality for the first time since our January 2014 show in Rome at Destination Morgue. We'll headline the first night of Tower Transmissions in Dresden, Germany. We've got new songs to play, two of which are on a brand new limited edition 12-inch release that'll be available at the show. You can count on hearing some classics, too. Tower Promotions presents TOWER TRANSMISSIONS IX A 2 day private event of Industrial and Experimental music... 15/16th September 2023 THE SODALITY (IT) SUTCLIFFE NO MORE (UK) ANENZEPHALIA (D) JFK (UK) LILLE ROGER (S) SARDH (D) BOCKSHOLM (S) AM NOT (UK) LUGOLA (PL) DER BLUTHARSCH AND THE INFINITE CHURCH OF THE LEADING HAND (A) PRELEST (PL) HUMAN LARVAE (D) Reithalle Strasse E Dresden, Germany https://www.facebook.com/events/957509168562155 https://towerpromotions.bigcartel.com/product/tower-transmissions-ix Originally created in 1984 by Andrea Cernotto and Pier Paolo Zoppo, The Sodality bloomed under Andrea‘s guidance across the seminal works of the 80's + 90's. After some reissues, these have been remastered in 2023, for digital release, while the current line up (Andrea Cernotto, Eraldo Bernocchi, Paolo Bandera, and Mark Solotroff) is performing live again, as well as releasing new material. https://thesodality.bandcamp.com/      (NYC, 1993; Rome, 2014)     On Sunday September 23, 2023, I'll be joining Granular Breath, Dead Hawk, and Sanford Parker at The Burlington in Chicago, for my first solo synth set in several years. My new album, "Today The Infinite, Tomorrow Zero," will be out in early November, so it seemed like the right time to get back on stage. https://www.facebook.com/events/2019266491746293 Granular Breath Granular Breath is the solo project of Iowa born musician Brian Barr, vocalist/guitarist for Aseethe (Thrill Jockey). The step toward this solo project began in 2016 when Barr live-scored a short film by his Garrote partner/co-founder Joshua Ford at the Figge Art Museum. From that point on, Barr continued his solo work both in the studio and in live settings, opening for a diverse group of artists such as Thou, Big|Brave, Emma Ruth Rundle, Fuj||||||||||ta, Amigo the Devil. Barr is planning extensive touring throughout the fall of 2023 and into 2024 with Granular Breathe and Aseethe. Barr’s album “The Infinite Circles of Life and Death” is out now via The Garrote. https://granularbreath.bandcamp.com/album/the-infinite-circles-of-life-and-death https://thegarrote.bandcamp.com https://www.thegarrote.com   Dead Hawk Dead Hawk is the solo project of Mark Warm. Focusing heavily on space, nightmares and nature, Warm uses lights to control his sounds, which can shift from calm and serene into a wall of harsh tones. https://deadhawk.bandcamp.com/album/leaving-home-iii   Sanford Parker Sanford Parker is a recording artist, record producer and film composer. As an artist he’s performed and released albums with extreme heavy and industrial bands like Black Cross Hotel, Corrections House, Mirrors for Psychic Warfare and Minsk. Throughout the years he’s collaborated with members of Sonic Youth, Ministry, Napalm Death and Neurosis as well as producing and mixing albums for Darkthrone, Voivod, Brutal Truth, Pelican, YOB, Hide, Youth Code, Wovenhand and many others. Drawing from his twenty plus years of experience as a producer, mixer, and musician, he brings to the table a huge palette of sounds and an unusual collection of instruments, including modular synthesis and hand-made metal instruments, all of which combine to create a huge range of emotional textures, from outright aggression to disorienting dissonance. https://www.sanfordparker.com/ https://sanfordparker.bandcamp.com/album/sanford-parker-lash-back https://www.instagram.com/thesanford/   Mark Solotroff Mark Solotroff is a Chicago-based musician and a visual artist who has worked within the experimental, post-industrial, noise, and metal scenes, dating back to the mid-1980s. Solotroff is best known as the vocalist of both the doom band Anatomy of Habit and the heavy electronic band BLOODYMINDED, and as the founder of the early American post-industrial band Intrinsic Action. His work with analog synthesizers dates back to his earliest recordings and he continues to find new ways to work with these often unpredictable instruments. Solotroff considers several related themes, including how cities develop, both organically and through organized planning, how the human body navigates urban environments, and how people navigate and interact with each other, particularly in an age of alienation caused by severe digital fragmentation. His visual work frequently features urban landscapes, architecture, and infrastructure, and he has become increasingly active in his use of artificial intelligence in his art. He’s published three books of pictures that include his own photography, found images, and AI-generated images, all of which he processes in a manner related to how he processes sound. Website Instagram Facebook Bandcamp Spotify Apple/iTunes Amazon (author page)

Copyright © 2023 Mark Solotroff, All rights reserved.

ANATOMY OF HABIT: V13 Premieres Black Openings

 

Repost from EarsplitPR

 

ANATOMY OF HABIT: V13 Premieres Black Openings From Experimental Post-Punk/Doom Outfit; LP To Drop This Friday

Posted on February 23, 2023

V13 is currently streaming Black Openings, the latest full-length from long-running experimental post-punk/doom outfit ANATOMY OF HABIT. The premiere comes on the eve of the record’s official release, Friday, February 24th.

Elaborates vocalist Mark Solotroff, “Releasing Black Openings in a timely manner, as a follow up to our previous album Even If It Takes A Lifetime, was an important milestone for us, as it demonstrates the momentum that we’re building as a band. It was critical to not just release a single album, after the long gap that trailed Ciphers + Axioms. Furthermore, knowing that we’re about fifty percent finished with our next album, we feel confident that we can maintain the forward push that we’ve been working hard to develop.

“It’s not just about releasing albums, although that feels really good. It has to do with the fact that this lineup has experienced consistency and fluidity in our ability to collaborate and to create new songs. We may still labor over them, to make sure they’re ready to perform and to record, but there are always one or two new ideas in development. As for Black Openings, I think it encapsulates exactly what ANATOMY OF HABIT is all about. It contains the important balances that we strive for, between darker and brighter, heavier and lighter, slower and faster. Well, look, we’re not becoming a speed metal band, but we can shift into a higher gear, from time to time. It’s always an exciting moment when we finally share our latest music with a broader audience. The opportunity to make new connections and to learn how people interpret our work, in their own way, is always rewarding. We hope that this album resonates with people who already listen to us, and we look forward to hearing from new listeners who discover us through Black Openings. As this album makes its way into the world, we’ll be working hard to wrap up the next one. What’s our next milestone? It’ll be an album with four songs. You heard about it here, first.”

Stream ANATOMY OF HABIT’s Black Openings in its absorbing entirety at THIS LOCATION. 

Thematically, Black Openings continues to elaborate on Solotroff’s expressions of love and loss, the abstracted and vanishing self, and complexities within the creative process. It further explores the concept of obliteration, and it propels the idea to a dreadful new terminus point. The concept of the inner drive that keeps pushing a person forward, which Solotroff explored on Even If It Takes A Lifetime takes on a new meaning here, when the harrowing black hole of the title track opens up and swallows you.

Black Openings was recorded with Sanford Parker, who has been working with the band in the studio for over a decade, including on their 2014 Relapse Records-issued Ciphers + Axioms. Parker also handled mixing duties while Collin Jordan (Boiler Room Mastering) took care of mastering.

Black Openings, which comes adorned in the artwork of Solotroff, will be released on CD, LP, cassette, and digitally. Find preorders at THIS LOCATION.

Formed in Chicago in 2008, ANATOMY OF HABIT has been described as a hybrid of doom metal, post-punk, death rock, early-industrial, psychedelic, and shoegaze. Although they’ve experienced significant membership changes since forming, today’s band, which includes Alex Latus (guitar), Isidro Reyes (metal percussion), Skyler Rowe (drums), Mark Solotroff (vocals), and Sam Wagster (bass, lap steel), represents their longest-standing and most prolific lineup. The band credits their treasured chemistry to their intertwining histories as friends and collaborators. Rowe and Latus have made music together since they were teenagers, growing up in Indianapolis’ heavy music scene, while playing in the band Still. Rowe and Wagster create sweeping, pastoral instrumental music together in Mute Duo. Reyes and Solotroff are old friends who’ve played together for many years and they continue to record and perform in both BLOODYMINDED and The Fortieth Day. This deep connective tissue contributes to what the band describes as consistently effortless writing sessions and innately unified live performances.

“…a long, lovely journey that you can settle into, trusting that you’ll be alternately unsettled, soothed, creeped out, pummeled, and exalted… Sheets of shimmering guitars appear like torrential rains, giving way to a quiet interlude and a sinister sense of ritual catharsis…” – The Chicago Reader

“It’s power that truly defines the ANATOMY OF HABIT sound across time and personnel changes, and ‘Black Openings’’ own muscular sound, appended by junk percussionist Isidro Reyes’ rhythmic counterpoint with Rowe’s heavy pulsing and guitarist Alex Latus’ slack-tuned atmospheres, truly shines as one of Chicago’s finest active live acts.” – Invisible Oranges on Black Openings’ title track

“The extended instrumentation is top notch and never overbearing or gimmicky, and perfectly blends in with the heavier more ‘metal‘ passages and the hypnotic vocals. Perfectly making accessible to listeners their experimental nature, ANATOMY OF HABIT is a unique and engaging band.” – Infernal Masquerade
 

ANATOMY OF HABIT:
Alex Latus – guitar
Isidro Reyes – metal percussion
Skyler Rowe – drums, vibraphone
Mark Solotroff – vocals, analog synth
Sam Wagster – bass, lap steel, piano, keyboard
 

 

http://anatomyofhabit.com
http://anatomyofhabit.bandcamp.com
http://www.instagram.com/anatomyofhabit
https://www.facebook.com/anatomyofhabit/
https://open.spotify.com/artist/25eNG0mU6r1UiaTn55Tffs

Anatomy Of Habit's New Album "Black Openings" Announced

Repost from EarsplitPR

ANATOMY OF HABIT: Experimental Post-Punk/Doom Outfit To Release Black Openings LP February 24th; New Track Streaming + Preorders Available

Long-running experimental post-punk/doom outfit ANATOMY OF HABIT will release their fourth album, Black Openings, on February 24th.

The follow-up to their 2021-22 album, Even If It Takes A Lifetime, was recorded with Sanford Parker, who has been working with the band in the studio for over a decade, including on their 2014 Relapse Records-issued Ciphers + Axioms. Parker also handled mixing duties while Collin Jordan (Boiler Room Mastering) took care of mastering.

The three-song offering opens with the title track, which will align with what fans envision when referring to an archetypal side-long ANATOMY OF HABIT song. It’s built from three distinct movements that range from a calmer opening section, to an extended atmospheric instrumental passage, to an escalating mass of pure heaviness. “Formal Consequences” starts off the B-Side and it introduces greater shimmer to the band’s sound, with vocalist Mark Solotroff’s voice submerged in a vast swirl of guitar atmosphere. Album closer, “Breathing Through Bones,” is a mournful ode that links back to earlier ANATOMY OF HABIT compositions like “After The Water” and “The Decade Plan,” but here, the group ups-the-ante with a vein of taught, slow burning tension. Along with the band’s core instrumentation, listeners will recognize piano, organ, analog synth, and vibraphone, similar to the array of sounds on Even If It Takes A Lifetime.

Thematically, the album continues to elaborate on Solotroff’s expressions of love and loss, the abstracted and vanishing self, and complexities within the creative process. It further explores the concept of obliteration, and it propels the idea to a dreadful new terminus point. The concept of the inner drive that keeps pushing a person forward, which Solotroff explored on Even If It Takes A Lifetime takes on a new meaning here, when the harrowing black hole of the title track opens up and swallows you.

In advance of the record’s release, today the band unveils “Breathing Through Bones.” Notes Solotroff of the track, “I believe that we all enjoy playing ‘Breathing Through Bones’ live. I certainly love singing it, and each time we play it, I feel like I’ve found my ideal place in music. When Sam [Wagster]’s bass begins to chime, it should be clear that this is an unparalleled ANATOMY OF HABIT song. The pace is slow and somber and there’s a great deal of space left open in the composition. We hear traces of Alex [Latus]’s guitar in the opening panorama, while Skyler [Rowe]’s drums start up with a minimal, deliberate beat. Isidro’s scraping metal enters, sounding like something from a subterranean hell-scape. Then my first reverberating vocal begins, two-minutes in, and then the five of us are completely locked-in together.

“Across three verses and three choruses, the song continues to increase in strength, volume, depth, and density, and it builds towards a climax that takes nearly ten-minutes to arrive at. If I had to explain the song to someone, I might use words like ‘resolve,’ ‘tranquility,’ ‘pulsation,’ ‘structure,’ ‘stillness,’ ‘doggedness,’ ‘entanglement,’ and ‘patience.’ That might get you somewhere, but I never like to give it all away. While I’d be tempted to write a dozen more songs like this, we’ve already succeeded in going in several new directions as we continue to write, but I know that this one will always burn bright for me.”
 

Stream ANATOMY OF HABIT’s “Breathing Through Bones” at THIS LOCATION.

Black Openings, which comes adorned in the artwork of Solotroff, will be released on CD, LP, cassette, and digitally. Find preorders at THIS LOCATION.

Black Openings Track Listing:

1. Black Openings
2. Formal Consequences
3. Breathing Through Bones

ANATOMY OF HABIT will celebrate the release of Black Openings with a record release show February 11th at Cobra Lounge in Chicago with additional performances to be announced in the weeks to come.

2/11/2023 Cobra Lounge – Chicago, IL * Record Release Show w/ Kill Scenes, Twice Dark [tickets]
 

Formed in Chicago in 2008, ANATOMY OF HABIT has been described as a hybrid of doom metal, post-punk, death-rock, early-industrial, psychedelic, and shoegaze. Although they’ve experienced significant membership changes since forming, today’s band, which includes Alex Latus (guitar), Isidro Reyes (metal percussion), Skyler Rowe (drums), Mark Solotroff (vocals), and Sam Wagster (bass + lap steel), represents their longest-standing and most prolific lineup. The band credits their treasured chemistry to their intertwining histories as friends and collaborators. Rowe and Latus have made music together since they were teenagers, growing up in Indianapolis’ heavy music scene, while playing in the band Still. Rowe and Wagster create sweeping, pastoral instrumental music together in Mute Duo. Reyes and Solotroff are old friends who’ve played together for many years and they continue to record and perform in both BLOODYMINDED and The Fortieth Day. This deep connective tissue contributes to what the band describes as consistently effortless writing sessions and innately unified live performances.

ANATOMY OF HABIT:
Alex Latus – guitar
Isidro Reyes – metal percussion
Skyler Rowe – drums, vibraphone
Mark Solotroff – vocals, analog synth
Sam Wagster – bass, lap steel, piano, keyboard

 

http://anatomyofhabit.com
http://anatomyofhabit.bandcamp.com
http://www.instagram.com/anatomyofhabit
https://www.facebook.com/anatomyofhabit/
https://open.spotify.com/artist/25eNG0mU6r1UiaTn55Tffs

Anatomy of Habit announce new album

 

(Re-posting from Earsplit) ANATOMY OF HABIT: Chicago Experimental Post-Punk/Doom Collective To Release Even If It Takes A Lifetime Full-Length December 10th; New Track Streaming At Invisible Oranges + Preorders Available Posted on “…apocalyptically heavy and thoughtfully complex…” – Invisible Oranges Chicago-based experimental post-punk/doom metal collective ANATOMY OF HABIT is excited to announce their third album, Even If It Takes A Lifetime, set for release on December 10th, 2021. This will be the first of two new albums ready to be unveiled to the public. ANATOMY OF HABIT – Alex Latus (guitar), Isidro Reyes (metal percussion), Skyler Rowe (drums), Mark Solotroff (vocals), and Sam Wagster (bass + lap steel) — recorded both offerings with Sanford Parker, shortly before the pandemic, with mixing (by Parker) and mastering (by Collin Jordan) carried out during the long shutdown. Along with the band’s core instrumentation, listeners will hear piano, organ, analog synth, and vibraphone woven into the songs. Even If It Takes A Lifetime is comprised of three tracks. Opener “A Marginal World” is the shortest song that the band has ever released, clocking in at under seven-minutes, and showing a greater urgency than often seen from ANATOMY OF HABIT. Lyrically, it describes a distinctive bond between two people that ends with a sudden rupture. Things begin to stretch out with “Your Pure Breath,” a 14-minute song that ebbs and flows between calmer, slower passages and heavier sections that propel the listener into a more frenzied pace. The album then shifts gears, as the long, atmospheric beginning of “Now We Finally Know Ourselves” builds into a dense, psychedelic soundscape, from which the band emerges with their more familiar play with contrast, over the song’s 19-minutes. Thematically, the album continues band leader Solotroff’s reflections on love and loss, the creative process, the abstracted and vanishing self, and a sense of absolute obliteration. The potentially nostalgic album title may allude to a sense of hope and may indicate that all is not lost, or at least it may point to an inner drive to keep pushing forward. In advance of the record’s release, today the band debuts opening psalm, “A Marginal World,” now playing at Invisible Oranges. Elaborates SOLOTROFF, “When you release a new album, you never really think to yourself, ‘It’s going to be seven years until the next one comes out,’ but that’s what happened. After Ciphers + Axioms was released in late 2014, life happened, along with all of the things that involves, both good and bad. Add a global pandemic to the mix, to complicate things even further. So, we decided to take things into our own hands and get this album out into the world before another year or two suddenly passed us by. ‘A Marginal World’ kicks off the album. It’s the shortest song that we’ve ever written and it perfectly encapsulates some of the things that were absorbed into the black hole of these past several years, even if it only makes sense to me, or to us, or to a very small circle of friends outside of the band. My bandmates – my friends – and I are extremely happy that Even If It Takes A Lifetime is finally seeing the light of day and we hope that it clicks with some people out there, whether it’s the music, the lyrics, or the mood.” Adds Invisible Oranges, “On the band’s new album Even If It Takes A Lifetime, their first in seven years, it’s like nothing changed. Still apocalyptically heavy and thoughtfully complex, ANATOMY OF HABIT‘s lost time simply vanished. It’s 2013 again and I’m watching ANATOMY OF HABIT at the Cobra Lounge, completely leveling the place, my friends and I all damaging our necks and brains and minds to the swirling mass of volume.” Read more and stream ANATOMY OF HABIT’s “A Marginal World” at THIS LOCATION. Even If It Takes A Lifetime will be released on CD, handsomely packaged in a six-panel digipak designed by Jonathan Canady, a longtime creative associate of the band. A cassette version will also be released, with light blue shells and a four-panel insert. The packaging for all formats will incorporate a series of lush, corporeal cyanotypes by New York-based artist Alexandra Lerman, a close friend of Solotroff. A vinyl edition will follow at a later date. Find preorders at THIS LOCATION. Even If It Takes A Lifetime Track Listing: A Marginal World Your Pure Breath Now We Finally Know Ourselves ANATOMY OF HABIT will celebrate Even If It Takes A Lifetime with a record release show December 8th at The Empty Bottle with additional performances to be announced in the weeks to come. ANATOMY OF HABIT: 12/08/2021 The Empty Bottle – Chicago, IL * record release show w/ Human Impact, Child Bite [info] ANATOMY OF HABIT formed in Chicago in October 2008. Although the band has experienced significant changes since forming, this is their longest-standing and most prolific lineup. It’s no wonder that they’ve gelled the way they have. Rowe and Latus have known each other since they were teenagers, growing up in Indianapolis’ heavy music scene and playing together in the band Still. Rowe and Wagster have been creating a strong body of work together in the pastoral instrumental Mute Duo. Reyes and Solotroff are old friends who’ve played together in both BLOODYMINDED and The Fortieth Day, for many years. This deep connective tissue has contributed to consistently effortless writing sessions and solidly fused live performances. The band incorporates elements of doom metal, post-punk, death-rock, early-industrial, psychedelic, and shoegaze. The band’s last album, Ciphers + Axioms, was released by Relapse Records. Once Even If It Takes A Lifetime completes its full cycle, the band intend to follow up with their next album, Black Openings. ANATOMY OF HABIT: Alex Latus – guitar Isidro Reyes – metal percussion Skyler Rowe – drums, vibraphone Mark Solotroff – vocals, analog synth Sam Wagster – bass, lap steel, piano, keyboard http://anatomyofhabit.com http://anatomyofhabit.bandcamp.com http://www.instagram.com/anatomyofhabit htts://www.facebook.com/anatomyofhabit/

Anatomy of Habit - September 11, 2021

 https://www.facebook.com/events/979081045997225

TONIGHT!

PRESS INFO: 10/25-All Your Sisters/Echo Beds/Moze Pray/Anatomy of Habit/Sanford Parker/Capture & Exploit

Door: 7:30PM
Music: 8:30PM SHARP!
Entry: $10-15 (sliding scale)
All Ages are welcome

ChiTown Futbol (Pilsen)
2300 S Throop St, Chicago, IL 60608

Facebook event page: https://www.facebook.com/events/934891840220559/

All Your Sisters (Los Angeles, The Flenser)
allyoursistersmusic.bandcamp.com
All Your Sisters take on the post-punk paradigm is decidedly non-retro. The basic building blocks are there; heavy drum machine rhythms, pumping melodic bass lines, swaths of atmospheric guitars and cold synth melodies, but where many bands are content to wallow in the shadows of their influences, All Your Sisters sounds like the future.

Echo Beds (Denver, The Flenser)
https://echobeds.bandcamp.com/
If you were to amplify oil drums, broken cymbals, battered basses, unrecognizable tape loops, dilapidated voices and push it into the red you'd have a pretty good idea of what to expect from a live set by Denver based band Echo Beds. With the expressed intention of volume as therapy and put through the grinder of the self-practiced DIY ethos- this is visceral, political, and genre defying music.

Moze Pray (San Antonio)
https://mozepray.bandcamp.com/
Moze Pray, AKA Libby Del Barrio, is a multi disciplinary artist based in San Antonio. No Tears, is an unapologetic account of life’s feedback loop around the Wheel of Fortune. Sacrificial actions through ceremonial performance reveals a gateway founded on truth and torment. Moze Pray’s ability to combine musical production, poetic vocalization and ritualistic body performance is charged by chaos and amalgamates into a product of pure expression that defies the rose colored filters that aim to conceal the harsh realities.

Anatomy of Habit (Chicago)
https://anatomyofhabit.bandcamp.com/
Anatomy of Habit formed in Chicago in October 2008 and is composed of Alex Latus (guitar), Isidro Reyes (metal percussion), Skyler Rowe (drums), Mark Solotroff (vocals), and Sam Wagster (bass + lap steel). The band encompasses elements of doom metal, post-punk, death-rock, noise-rock, industrial, psychedelic, and shoegaze. The band's last album, "Ciphers + Axioms," was released by Relapse Records.

Sanford Parker (Chicago)
https://sanfordparker.bandcamp.com/
(BURIED AT SEA, MINSK), metal producer extraordinare (PELICAN, VOIVOD, NACHTMYSTIUM, CORRECTIONS HOUSE & a thousand others). "Lash Back" is dark, heavy and at times an unsettling blend of industrial and electric music, sure to appeal to Parker's vast and diverse fan base. For fans of Corrections House, Jesu, Mirrors of Psychic Warfare and James Plotkin.

Capture & Exploit (Chicago)
https://portrayalofguilt.com/album/the-only-thing-man-has-mastered-is-hate-pog005
Chicago Power Electronics/ Death Industrial. Capture & Exploit puts oppression, hatred, and all things violent on display. Industrial delivered in an onslaught of heavy electronics, feedback, and distorted vocals.

Press Resources:

Hi-Rez Poster: https://www.flickr.com/photos/bloodlustchicago/48719454931/sizes/o/

All Your Sisters photo: https://www.flickr.com/photos/bloodlustchicago/48838669441/sizes/o/

Echo Beds photo: https://www.flickr.com/photos/bloodlustchicago/48838846457/sizes/o/

Anatomy of Habit photo: https://www.flickr.com/photos/bloodlustchicago/48838669501/sizes/o/

Poster for Anatomy of Habit on 10/25

New BLOODYMINDED single out now!

In advance of our forthcoming album, which will be released on May 31, our new single is out now via Bandcamp (https://bloodyminded.bandcamp.com/album/bloodyminded-2), iTunes (https://apple.co/2GLG7tg), Spotify (https://spoti.fi/2GSyykv), etc.

Recent Poster Designs

Here are four recent posters that I've designed for some friends:

Mark Solotroff with Wrekmeister Harmonies this Sunday

https://www.facebook.com/events/734253963358971/

Mark Solotroff will be playing synth at another Wrekmeister Harmonies show, this weekend (Sunday May 3), at The Empty Bottle, with Two From The Eye, Sanford Parker's new solo affair. You can listen to some tracks here: https://twofromtheeye.bandcamp.com/

English Version of The New Noise Interview with Mark Solotroff

The original Italian version can be found here:
http://www.thenewnoise.it/bloodyminded-mark-solotroff/

You have many musical projects, you play live, you are very active. And you started this thirty years ago. I admire artists like you, because you operate constantly in the underground, and without hesitations. What makes you so strong? What gives you energy?

Thank you!  I cannot imagine a life in which I do not create music, whether it is closer to industrial culture, with BLOODYMINDED, or more in the metal or post-punk realm, as with my band Anatomy of Habit.  That said, it is not always easy to continue doing this, so deep in the underground, and sometimes it becomes quite fatiguing.  The urge to create remains very strong inside of me and I love the live performance aspect too much to walk away from this.

You’re from United States, but you have created a bridge between two continents… and there was no internet at the time. Please, tell my Italian readers something about your contacts with early industrial Italian pioneers and how they influenced you.

I started listening to industrial, experimental, noise, or what have you, towards the end of my high school years.  Then, while I was in college, I became friends with Peter Sotos.  After starting Intrinsic Action and recording our first cassette, Pete gave me a list of people to contact in various European countries and in Japan.  And yes, we all wrote letters back then.  It was many years before we had access to email.  I started corresponding with Andrea Cernotto from The Sodality, first to order Mauthausen Orchestra and other cassettes from his Aquilifer Sodality catalog.  A few years later, while spending a summer in Venice, I traveled to Milan to meet Andrea, and I also met Paolo Bandera of Sigillum S (and later Sshe Retina Stimulants).  This all set in motion making many great friends in the Milan area, and, much through Paolo’s efforts and support, me releasing music by many great Italian Artists, starting with Sigillum S, continuing to Iugula-Thor, Sshe Retina Stimulants, The Sodality, Mauthausen Orchestra, Atrax Morgue, Dead Body Love, Murder Corporation.  And nearly 30 years later, Paolo just left Chicago a week ago, after a nice visit, and I will be traveling to Rome in a few weeks to perform with The Sodality, at the Destination Morgue festival.  M.B. and Mauthausen Orchestra were among the earliest underground “power-electronics” artists I heard, along with Whitehouse, Consumer Electronics, Sutcliffe Jugend and Ramleh, and for some reason, something about the Italian style really clicked with me, even though these artists and groups represent a wide range of styles.  I love Italy so much and I have great friends there, so I have returned several times.

Bloodyminded are Xavier Laradji, James Moy, Isidro Reyes, Pieter Schoolwerth and you. It’s not unusual to see collective projects in your genre, but we also have many and many (and many) “one man bands”. How do you work on a single track? Is everyone adding his sounds? Is someone driving the whole creative process?

BLOODYMINDED is certainly a band, made up of very good friends who also really enjoy working on music together.  On some recordings and at some shows, we have been lucky enough to all be together, but as we are spread out in different US cities and with Xavier in France, being a band can be challenging.  Sometimes Xavier sends recordings from France, sometimes Pieter has been unable to travel to Chicago due to commitments with his art career, so we find ways to work around that.  Sometimes we incorporate field recordings made together, or we work with live recordings, or we share computer files.  I would say that at the beginning, I was driving and controlling the creative process, but now there is much more true collaboration, which is one of the things I appreciate most about our new album, “Within The Walls.”  

In Within The Walls you worked with Sanford Parker. I’ve listened to part of his work both as musician and as producer. He seems to me too clean and too rational for a visceral band like yours. But this is just my opinion. I would like to know what has convinced you to collaborate with him.

I have known Sanford for several years and I have a great appreciation for his production style.  We have also collaborated in the group Wrekmeister Harmonies over the last two years.  I first became aware of his work with the heavy doom of Buried At Sea, which I would definitely not characterize as “clean.”  I have numerous records that he has made and I think Sanford is great at balancing dark, dense and heavy sounds with a clear production that allows the musicians to deliver everything they want and for the listener to be able to receive everything that the musicians intended.  He had asked about recording BLOODYMINDED a few years ago and the timing was finally right.  I can say that it was a very enjoyable and easy experience.  Sanford is great to work with and I have since returned to the studio with him, for the new record by my band Anatomy of Habit.

You start your new album with an ambient track. It’s a very good track, created with the help of David Reed (Luasa Raelon). It makes this album deeper, it prepares my mind for what’s next, switching off the light, so to speak. Why is it entitled “All The Cities Are Occupied”?

David is part of the extended BLOODYMINDED family and he has played synth live with us many times.  We have toured together and have collaborated in the synth trio, Nightmares, with Jonathan Canady (Angel of Decay, Deathpile).  It is so nice to have him on this album.  The title of the opening track came from some sort of sleep-deprived hallucinatory conspiracy among the members of  BLOODYMINDED, and was initially  inspired by the very rare minimal synth artist ADN' Ckrystall.

We have also five very short tracks (Token number…). I don’t consider them as an “entr’acte”, it seems like your version of grindcore. Why did you put these tokens between the tracks?

They are exactly like our version of grindcore, so thank you for that observation.  I do not mind them being thought of as “pauses,” as they create contrast in our music, but they are considered fully realized songs.  I started playing around with that type of “blast” song towards the end of my old band, Intrinsic Action, and from the beginning of BLOODYMINDED, we have incorporated short, sharp tracks in our live shows and our recordings.  We have played with many punk and grindcore bands and I feel that aesthetic has been as much an influence on us as noise/electronics.  The “Token” titles are a reference to the offshoot band that Isidro and I started, The Fortieth Day, and this new album has a deep connection to themes that Isidro and I have been working on for several years.

I have Territories by Locrian: I remember clearly your performance in “Inverted Ruins”. It’s not easy to remember a specific vocal performance in extreme music. Why did you decide to publish your version of “Inverted Ruins” here?

Isidro and I had already started writing “Within The Walls” when I collaborated with Locrian on their “Territories” album and I sensed a strong connection between what we were writing and what Terence Hannum had written for “Inverted Ruins.”  I wanted to end this record with a song that changed the mood from the more assaultive songs to something that allowed for closure or resolve, and this seemed like the ideal way to do it.

Why do you have English and Spanish lyrics? From my European point of view, it seems to me a way to recognize how many Americans are “hispanohablantes” and a way to communicate with everyone, because the Spanish version is very close to the English version (and it helps me to understand some meanings of it)…

BLOODYMINDED is a multilingual band, with Xavier being a native French speaker and Isidro being a native Spanish speaker, as he comes from Mexico.  We first took this approach on “Gift Givers,” and since Isidro and I fully collaborated on the lyrics for “Within The Walls,” we felt this was the best approach.  I particularly enjoy how our voices all work in contrast – the different ranges that James, Isidro and I have - and how the different languages create another type of contrast.  Living in Chicago, one hears a great deal of Spanish, and I first started incorporating elements of this culture into my music with Intrinsic Action, embedding pieces of Flamenco music into our early live shows, as I was attracted to the arrogance, the romance and the darkness of that music genre.  Although I am a slow learner, the Spanish language is a big part of my life, partly due to my long and very close relationship with Isidro and his family, and now certainly due to the fact that my wife is from Mexico.

I’ve seen videos of your concerts. I noticed that often there are no barriers between Bloodyminded and the audience. This is normal if you are into power electronics/industrial/noise. And this is normal if you are into hardcore, but in the first case I feel uncomfortable. Are you at ease in these situations? And have you ever been afraid of these situations?

Yes, playing “on the floor” has been a big part of the BLOODYMINDED experience over the years.  Probably half of our shows have been WITH the audience, rather than on a stage.  The two types of performances are drastically different.  When we play at floor level, at shows with many excited intense fans who know all of our lyrics, there is an energy that simply cannot be matched.  I think that we have to work much harder when we are on stage, specifically because of that distance.  That said, “floor” shows are very unpredictable and I have suffered several broken bones because they can be so physical and violent – even though, at the same time, they can be exhilarating and joyful shows for both the band and the audience.  I think it is rare to see so many enthusiastic people smiling at noise or dark industrial shows, and that is one reason I love playing live with BLOODYMINDED.  But yes, sometimes, when we are about to start our show, I turn around towards the audience and discover they are only inches away, and I think, “Oh god, here we go…”

Finally: are you inside or outside the gate?

Chicago is suffering through an unusually cold December so right now I am comfortably within the walls.  But having finally released our new album, after many delays, I am happy to report that I have made my way outside the gate!