Gesamtkunstwerk ft. Lightening Glove, Basic House & Rejections at Islington Mill

Arriving mere weeks after the fallout from Vatican Shadow’s riotous headline set, Gesamtkunstwerk delivers perhaps its most tantalising line-up to date, which in light of the aforementioned is high praise indeed. Just in time for the first release off Gnod’s Telsa Tapes imprint, the Czech Republic’s Lightning Glove (pictured) make their live debut this Friday at Islington Mill. Precursory listens from the this troupe of degenerates suggests a wry eye cast across the formative sounds of TG and Swans, reinvigorated with mechanic machismo and call to arms gravitas. Those that have witnessed the groups fury in their homeland profess a gloriously traumatic experience, a whirling dervish of barked vocals and blistering bass. Returning is Stephen Bishop – aka Basic House – whose stratospheric rise in the collective conscious of the dancefloors wet arts in the past year has been richly deserved. Helming the acclaimed Opal Tapes, Bishops curatorial excellence has received high praise from Resident Advisor, Fact Magazine, Boomkat and the Boiler Room, plus his legions of dedicated listeners – counting the likes of Huerco S, Wanda Group, MCMXCI and 1991 in his singular roster of game changing musicians. With Basic House, the auteuristic streak at the heart of Opal Tapes is turned outward, using the proponents of dance music as site from experimentation where a dazzling array of austere influences and palpable textures (from dub to musique concrete) are smudged into entirely new sites of sonic art and ferric beauty that massages the head and the hips. Inspired by the dystopian classic High Rise, Opal Tape’s latest signing Rejections is a fitting ode to JG Ballard. Seas of static hiss are massaged by crumbling distortion and punctured by gloomed out and ghostly percussion as something that sounds like a dying machine growls its final lament. It all threatens to careen out of control, were it not for the industrial-inspired use of controlled feedback feeding the wailing beast more electronic beats to satiate its hunger. Absolutely punishing live. Opening the proceedings are three singular voices from the Gnod camp; Negra Branca, Dwellings and Druss. Playing together for the first time in this incarnation, the prospect of hearing beautifully seraphic vocals glue the opposing forces of strafing techno excursions and jackhammer house kicks must make those preceeding them on stage an intimidating prospect. A mere £5 in advance and only £7 should you wish to pay on the door, Gesamtkunstwerk has consistently proved itself an invaluable source of outsider art and music in our northern climes and acts as a perfect summation of Gnod’s ongoing ‘Got No Obvious Destination’ residency at the mill.

Fri 5 Jul, Islington Mill, James Street, Salford, M3 5HW, Tel: 0161 278 6404, 10pm – 6am (last entry 2am), £5 adv / £7 otd, www.skiddle.com