// Date: 24 February 2011

// Venue: Elektroakustischer Salon / Berghain, Berlin

// Doors: 20:00

// Tickets: 16 € pre-sale (plus fees) / 19 € box office

// Online pre-sale at Koka36

The music Ben Frost (born 1980 Melbourne Australia, lives Reykjavík Iceland) is about contrast; influenced as much by Classical Minimalism as by Punk Rock and Metal, Frost's throbbing  guitar-based textures emerge from nothing and slowly coalesce into huge, forbidding forms that often eschew conventional structures in favor of the inevitable unfoldings of vast mechanical systems.

“…The emotional power of Frost's music comes precisely from the stark contrast between extremely basic musical material and the deadly virtual instruments he invents to perform it… This is Arvo Pärt as arranged by Trent Reznor” – Wire Magazine, 2007 On albums like Steel Wound, released on the Room40 label in 2003 (Pitchfork: “An exemplary ambient experience”), Theory of Machines on Bedroom Community in 2007 (Boomkat: “The Future of electronic music…”) and 2009's BY THE THROAT (NME: “a hollow, unforgiving, brutal yet utterly beautiful record, full of deep intricacies that won’t let you go.”) Frost’s music is more than a cerebral exercise and has an undeniable visceral presence, felt as much as heard. His compositions are created with an acute awareness of the listener and their comfort thresholds, exploiting every extreme of pitch and volume. His notorious, building-shaking performances at international festivals including Montreal’s famed MUTEK combine amplified electronics with the furious thrashing of live guitars. Frost himself has been described as “one of the most interesting and groundbreaking producers in the world today” (Boomkat). His music’s intense physicality has filled gallery spaces and driven contemporary dance productions by Chunky Move, the Icelandic Dance Company, and the acclaimed choreographers Erna Ómarsdottír and Wayne McGregor.

We have taken the liberty to add a live performance of Klimek prior to the performance of Frost. Klimek is one of the alter egos of musician and artist Sebastian Meissner, who under his various guises, has released his captivating musical experiments on renowned electronic music labels, such as Sub Rosa, Kompakt, Mille Plateaux, Ritornell and Anticipate. He works as a media artist using sound, video and photography. Employing multiple artistic personas (Autokontrast, Autopoieses, Bizz Circuits, Klimek, Open Source, Random Industries, Random Inc), his works deal with and negotiate urban/cultural/social scenarios, randomness, historical music archives and strategies of networking. He works with computer music sources, sampling and photography assembling their interrelation within geographic/historical/political discourses. His last album Movies is Magic was influenced by Slavoj Zizek's theories on film and sounds "like an orchestra restructured in the digital domain, the remnants at the core of each piece on Movies is Magic lend themselves less to conservatory comparisons than filmic ones. Large, picturesque settings produce emotionally compelling mini-narratives, while warm, open progressions balance with the multi-layered shadows that are expected from a Klimek album". (DATA BLOEM )

Meissner has also worked for the Deleuze/Guattari influenced media label Mille Plateaux and established the network platform Intifada Offspring to explore new perspectives on the middle-east.

› www.ethermachines.com

› www.random-industries.com