CHiKA + BUBBLYFISH
As many of you know, I’m a huge fan of repurposing common objects for new uses, video games, heavy tech-step music, and art in general.
CHiKA + Bubblyfish are two darlings of the New York performance art scene. They work together very well, but are also creating their careers and identities separately.
This last Thursday they performed a free show at The Memorial Union put on as part of the Starlight series hosted by the film committee. During the introduction, the “Art vs. Starlight” series was announced which will be dedicated to video art. I’m very excited about this.
The show opened with “To New World,” and “Follow the Red Dots” which was striking, by which I mean overwhelmingly trance-inducing. An impressive display of their knowledge of EDMR, and Binaural Phase shifting. After masterfully setting the mood for the show, there was a mishap with one of Bubblyfish’s Gameboys, which wiped out the rest of the show except for one song. That’s right, I said her GameBoy.
A little bit more about Bubblyfish: As best I could tell from my vantagepoint, Bubblyfish performs using a Mac Powerbook, two Gameboy Classics, a mixer, and what I’m pretty certain was a KORG Chaos Pad. This Wikipedia Article covers the technical details of chiptune music stemming from the use of the GameBoy Hardware to produce music. By observing her during the performance, I would guess that she was using is NanoLoop.
If you know me, you know that as a concept, this pleases me on so many levels. It’s DIY hardware hacking. It’s sampling pop culture and spinning it out into something more meaningful. It’s MUSIC! It’s not mainstream. It’s not distorted with the agenda of Madison Avenue.
Side note: An amusing moment for me was when Bubblyfish announced that she was having issues with her Gameboy, a member of the audience in front of me said with a tone of awe, “That was done with a Gameboy? Awesome!”.
So, to get back on track, due to the Gameboy mishap, there was only one more audio/visual performance to be experienced that night, which was “That Wicked Smile”. Highly entertaining, and unfortunately, over way too soon. I hope they can make a trip back to the Midwest sometime soon, I’d love to see a more complete show. I’m also planning a trip to NYC this summer, and with any luck they will be performing while I’m there.
More Info:
BUBBLYFISH http://www.bubblyfish.com/
CKiKA http://www.facebook.com/pages/CHiKA/57650246179?ref=mf
hi chris, this was actually put on by starlight cinema.
glad you made it and thanks for all the great pictures!!
reo said this on February 10, 2009 at 9:30 pm
ie. starlight is its own entity, but as part of the film committee, not the art committee. art vs. starlight is the new series dedicated to video art. i hope that clarifies.
reo said this on February 10, 2009 at 9:31 pm
Thanks for the clarification reo! Post updated to reflect the info. I plan to attend as many other events in the future that my schedule allows. Hope to see you there!
Christopher Benson said this on February 10, 2009 at 11:04 pm