Designer Barnbrook's visual connection
INDIE gigs have about as much visual appeal as a decomposing sack of nappies. Most often comprising four blokes shuffling uninterestingly around a stage under the occasional flicker of a strobe, it is little wonder that attendees routinely pass out through boredom.
The peeper-pleasing potential of live dance music, however, has long been explored by graphic artists eager to unite sound and visuals in new and innovative ways.
Acid house casualty
Audiences at Roisin Murphy’s last tour were treated to a show that appeared to blend visual performance with the hospital-wall scribblings of a sectioned acid house casualty, while in Pilton, Somerset, there remains a field of trembling hippies still traumatised by the retina-roughhousing onslaught of the Chemical Brothers’ visuals at Glastonbury 97.
The latest band to marry the worlds of dance and design is Startas, who combine a minimal synth sound with live animation provided by graphic artist Jonathan Barnbrook, who joined the line-up last year.
They bring their music and art hybrid to the Deaf Institute on Sunday as part of a special tour taking in destinations such as Warsaw, Berlin and London.
Desktop electropop
“We’re a synthesiser band,” says the affable Lutonian. “We don’t believe in using software. All the stuff we do is with analogue synthesisers. It’s a very different sound to the sort of desktop electropop which a lot of people are doing now.
“There are three of us in the band; I do the visuals while the other two do the music.”
Wait a minute. That sounds like a bit of an easy ride; pressing play on Windows Media Player and nodding your head while the musicians toil with synth and mic. Barnbrook assures us this isn’t the case.
“All of the visuals are generated by me especially for each song,” he says. “Some of the animations are pre-prepared but it’s all mixed live, so if a word is sung I’ll bring it up on screen, or move the visuals in time to the beat, that kind of thing.”
“This is a way of connecting music to visuals very directly. It has a spontaneity about it; we aim to express the energy of the music in a way that record covers used to do.”
It will be the band’s first visit to Manchester, a city which arguably has contributed more than most to the relationship ‘twixt dance music and graphic design.
Sketch pad scribblers
Sketch pad scribblers such as Mark Farrow, Ben Kelly and Peter Saville all started their careers here, contributing posters, typography, sleeves and even interior design to Tony Wilson’s Factory label.
“When Peter Saville did the graphics for Factory Records and the Hacienda, it was all about the sort of minimal style, especially with the Joy Division designs, that suggested a lot about the music without explicitly stating it.
“I think in the same way as record covers, if a club looks and feels right there is some confirmation inside you that you are right to connect with the music in it.
“As a young person discovering that music and those visuals, it proved to me that there was someone out there thinking and feeling the same way.”
The trip north to his forebears’ old stomping ground will be a special one, even for an artist with a pedigree like Barnbrook’s.
David Bowie
Over the course of his career he’s designed book covers for Noam Chomsky, directed two editions of the subversive Adbusters magazine and invented typefaces including Exocet, Sarcastic, Moron and, famously among font fans, Bastard; not to mention worked with Damien Hirst and David Bowie (“a very charming, funny person [who] doesn’t take himself too seriously, he’s a real pleasure to work with.”)
All of which means that the Deaf Institute should be in for a treat when Startas play, but what aspect of the show is Barnbrook most looking forward to?
“It’s all about the moment of live performance. I’ve spent ages working on the animations for it and it’s about whether it goes right or not on the night. Each time you do it is unique and in that moment where you fuse music and visuals together, there’s some other kind of energy created.
“That’s what’s important, and hopefully the audience will feed off that as well.”
Startas appear live with DJ support from Lakes on Sunday, May 31, at the Deaf Institute, 9pm.
Published: Thu, 21 May, 2009
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