Bitchpork 47/15/12 w/Guardian Alien (New York) Tips for Twat (Minneapolis) Apache Dropout (Bloomington) Lazy K (Kansas City) Hurricanes of Love (New York) Spires That In The Sunset Rise (Madison) Large ensemble performance of Terry Riley’s “IN C” conducted by Dan Quinlivan
Comfort Station - 4/26/12
(feat. Stephen Ptacek and Alex Inglizian)
w/Stirrup
The Bicycle Music Festival in San Francisco California is one heck of a pedal-powered mobile part. The summer of 2012 was the 6th annual BMF, and things got rolling in the afternoon in Golden Gate Park with bike-blended ice cream and smoothies, food by HotBike!, and seven acts:
Lia Rose & Tiny Television, Major Powers & the Lo-Fi Symphony, Oona, Kipchoge, Rupa & the April Fishes, and Capoeira Ijexá.
Rock the Bike rigged up the sound system and transported it via bicycles to the park. Audience members hopped on one of their fourteen stationary bikes which are wired up to power a full-range sound system including subs, a mini-line array, and loudspeakers.
Early afternoon BMF 2012
Flux Bikes interactive jam
After an awesome afternoon of music in the meadow, all of the stage/sound gear was as loaded back up onto bikes and the entire festival took to the streets. But the music didn't stop there! A mobile stage, pirate radio transmitter, and Fossil Fool the bike rapper kept the beats bumping all the way to Showplace Triangle in Portrero, where the night portion of the party took place.
Rin Tin Tiger, MC Rai, Obo Martin, Shake Your Peace!, The Genie, and Birds and Batteries.
During the 2011 West Coast tour, Flux Bikes played at the San Francisco premiere of Ben Kolak's film 'Schizcago,' and to stay with our friend Ritwik Banerji who is developing an interactive music system called MAXINE in Berkeley, CA.
One morning we experimented with recording Flux Bike sounds into the Schizcago DVD case sampler (designed by Alex Inglizian) and then hearing what Maxine had to say about it.
September 2011: Riding from Los Angeles to San Francisco, FLUX BIKES used bicycles as transportation and musical instrumentation, performing at non-profit bikes shops, farmers markets, and art spaces. Pedal Coast combines video from Marty's camera audio from rob's recording device. Special thanks to Jayve Montgomery and Colleen Rafferty for help with codecs and effects
Rob and Marty pedaled from Chicago, IL to Milwaukee, WI to perform at Truly Spoken Cycles bike shop for the Second Riverwest Fest on December 17, 2011.
with Drouge at Truly Spoken Cycles 12.17.11
- photos from www.onmilwaukee.com -
A good network of bike trails exists between the Chicago and Milwaukee. It's a beautiful 90 mile ride with options to hug the lake shore or take crosstown routes, all the while staying on mostly straight and flat rails to trails style routes.
Our gracious hosts, of Catacombz were kind enough not only to put us up for the night, but also to provide a PA, so we didn't have to bring heavy camping gear or our own amplification. We couldn't have done it without this generous help.
It was a fun winter ride; a light snow fell much of the day. Marty had gears and a cross bike, but Rob went the distance on a single-speed road bike!
After hanging with the Schizcago crew in the Mission, we played another impromptu show at the Ferry Plaza Farmer's Market in San Francisco. While we were there hunting for a good location to set up, we met Revolva, an Oakland hoop performer with a heart as big as a quadruple-sized, expanding hula, which we saw her dancing with. We were lucky to be accompanied at the Ferry Building by Sir Ritwik Banerji, accomplished astromusicologist at UC Berkeley along with Maxine, his interactive music system that is based in Max/MSP.
FLUX Tour 2011 was happy to be in San Francisco for the September Midnight Mystery Ride with the new chapter that formed there. We rode to Baker Beach (birthplace of Burning Man) for a surreal view of the Golden Gate Bridge, but were forced out of there by police shortly after arrival. Instead, a hardy crew pedaled on to Ocean Beach for a late-nite doughnut and whiskey séance.
After bidding farewell to San Francisco, we crossed the Bay and the next day gained entry to the Center for Now Music and Technologies, where we were able to record with Ritwik. These and other live recordings are now being compiled along with some tour footage for a video.
Before leaving the Bay area for Tahoe, we made sure to check out Rock the Bike's workshop in Berkeley, where we were graciously showed some of the awesome bike accessories being fabricated and told about other ongoing projects. RTB has a refreshing perspective on promoting bicycles as vehicles for social change. Be sure to check out their website, especially The Pleasant Revolution and Bicycle Music Festival! Below is a picture of their Down Low Glow ground effects lights for bikes.
