Rival Consoles (live a/v) with Deru and Nordic Soul

Friday May 18th

Decibel Festival and UNION proudly present

Rival Consoles (live a/v)
Erased Tapes, London

Deru (alt ambient set)
Friends of Friends

Nordic Soul 
Decibel

Doors at 10PM / 21+

Advance tickets available at http://bit.ly/RivalConsolesUnion

UNION
4067 W. Pico Blvd, Los Angeles

ABOUT RIVAL CONSOLES’ NEW RELEASE ‘PERSONA’
Rival Consoles Persona Ryan Lee West aka Rival Consoles presents his expressive new album ‘Persona’, set for release on 13th April 2018 via Erased Tapes. The title‘Persona’was inspired by Ingmar Bergman’s film of the same name, specifically a shot in the opening credits of a child reaching out to touch a woman’s face on a screen, which is shifting between one face and another. This powerful image struck Ryan and it inspired the album’s main theme — an exploration of the persona, the difference between how we see ourselves and how others see us, the spaces in between; between states, people, light and dark, the inner persona and the outer persona. “My music is generally inward looking. I like finding something about the self within music, that doesn’t have to be specific but maybe asks something or reveals something. This record is a continuation on the self through electronic sounds. Like Legowelt once said ‘a synthesiser is like a translator for unknown emotions’, which I think sums up what I am trying to do. I think all these emotions we have make up our persona. So in a way by finding new ones you alter or expand your persona. And that is what I want my music to try to do. I deliberately aimed to be more sonically diverse with this record. I wanted to experiment more. I wanted to create new sounds and new emotions.”Recorded at his studio in south-east London, ‘Persona’ benefits from Ryan’s exploration of a dynamic production process that combines analogue-heavy synthesisers, acoustic and electric instruments with a shoegaze-level obsession with effect pedals. A greater depth of emotion and confidence can be heard across the album. From the deconstructed movements on‘Unfolding’ that starts the album with a snap of delayed snares, the apocalyptic drones of the title track and thundering drums in ‘Phantom Grip’to more restrained ambient feels of ‘Dreamer’s Wake’, ‘Rest’ and ‘Untravel’. The latter transverses six beatless minutes of undulating melodies representing “a limbo space, a feeling of ennui, of not really ever being known to others and others not ever really being known to you”.‘Be Kind’ reveals a musical connection with fellow Erased Tapes artist Nils Frahm, with its minimal approach and improvisational nature. On the more complex sounding ‘I Think So’ Ryan aims to replicate a colour collage with sound. Like a musical kaleidoscope, a flashing and convoluted mass. Written after he saw Slowdive perform live last year, ‘Hidden’ builds from whispers to landscapes of controlled noise. In an interview with XLR8R magazine, Ryan explains: “once you start trying to make a sound loud, then you turn your back on thousands and thousands of sonic possibilities. One of the best things to do is to start a track with a really quiet, weak sound.” Taking this idea to its ultimate conclusion, ‘Fragment’ closes the album as an innocent sounding ambient piece, almost nursery rhyme like, yielding time for reflection on how the persona has changed. ‘Persona’ follows the success of a series of releases — the ‘Odyssey’and ‘Sonne’ EPs, long player ‘Howl’, and 2016’s mini album ‘Night Melody’— that saw Ryan mature into what Pitchfork has called a “forward-thinking electronic musician with his own ideas about sound”. Atypical of instrumental-electronic music, Ryan has achieved a signature sound that’s unmistakably identifiable as Rival Consoles. Going beyond typical electronic music production, Ryan defines it as “songwriting with an electronic palette of sounds”. The increasingly dynamic live audio-visual show, born from bespoke performances at the Tate and for Boiler Room at the V&A Museum featuring self-programmed visuals in Max/MSP, has propelled him to play around the world. Ryan launches ‘Persona’at London’s XOYO on 12th April with further dates to be announced.

ABOUT DERU
Benjamin Wynn is an Emmy Award winning American composer, sound designer and music producer.

He earned a Bachelor’s degree in Music from the California Institute of the Arts, and has released 4 albums under the name “Deru”, as well as scored television, film, and dance.

Wynn was the co-owner and founder of a music and sound design company in Los Angeles called The Track Team along with Jeremy Zuckerman. Together they worked on numerous projects, including “Avatar: The Last Airbender” and “Legend of Korra” for Nickelodeon. They won an Emmy Award for music editing for “Kung Fu Panda: Legends of Awesomeness” in 2012, and another Emmy for the same project in 2015.

In 2007, Wynn (as Deru) collaborated with British composer Joby Talbot on the score to Wayne McGregor’s ballet, Genus, based on Charles Darwin’s book, On the Origin of Species, commissioned by the Paris Opera Ballet. The ballet premiered at the Palais Garnier in October 2007 and was commissioned for a second round of performances in November 2009. The ambitious eight-part score combines electronics with a 10-part choir and string instruments. The score is available on Ant-Zen and Dear Oh Dear Records and was featured in the 2009 documentary, La Danse: The Paris Opera Ballet.

In addition to his scoring work, Wynn is a founding member and Creative Director of The Echo Society, a Los Angeles based composer collective and non-profit organization that premiers new orchestral works in singular, one-night-only events.

ABOUT NORDIC SOUL
Sean Horton aka Nordic Soul has long been enamored with artistic expression, the creation of music, and the technology that fuses it all together. Today he is best known as founder, curator and president of the Decibel International Festival of Electronic Music Performance Visual Art and New Media in Seattle. In 2014, Sean was named #43 on Rolling Stone’s “50 Most Important People in EDM”: rol.st/1fHxj3D

Founded in 2003, Decibel Festival has become a unique platform for exposing attendees to leading-edge multimedia art from around the globe. With a focus on live performance, interactive multimedia art, state-of-the-art sound and technology based education; Decibel has solidified itself as one of the premier electronic music festivals and promotional organizations in the world. The five-day festival program averages over 25,000 attendees a year. Over the years Decibel has hosted hundreds of events, featuring over 1,000 unique performers from over 40 countries. Outside of the annual festival program, Decibel Events producers over 60 events per year, ranging from intimate club performances to massive international festival stages.

Beyond his work with Decibel, Sean is an expert deejay, producer and performer who has been turning out dance floors since the late 90s. A lover of many musical styles, Nordic Soul’s interest and roots in techno, house, hip hop, jazz, soul, industrial, ambient and dub contribute to his diverse musical palette. Since Nordic Soul’s inception in 2002, he has shared the stage with an eclectic cross section of international talent, including Bassnectar, Moby, Major Lazer, Grimes, Boys Noize, Maya Jane Coles, Ben Klock, Four Tet, The Orb, Maceo Plex, Moodymann, Duke Dumont, Simian Mobile Disco, Modeselektor, DARKSIDE, Trentemoller, Scuba, Dusky, Green Velvet, Moderat, MK, Gui Boratto, Monolake, Mount Kimbie, Matthew Dear, Theo Parrish, DJ Tennis, Justin Martin, Roman Flugel, Danny Daze and Motor City Drum Ensemble. Sean has also performed at several major festivals world-wide, including Dimensions (Croatia), MUTEK (Montreal), Communikey (Boulder) and Decibel (Seattle). Nordic Soul has released music on a wide variety of labels including K Records, Buttermilk Records, Peloton and Basic_Sounds.

Sean currently resides in Downtown Los Angeles, where he is continuing his career and musical endeavors.