TUESDAY, JANUARY 28, 2025 MARY OCHER Bug Incision is excited to announce our first co-presentation with the Palomino, one of Calgary's core venues for independent music of all stripes in the city. Armed with two new records, Berlin's Mary Ocher returns to North America for the first time in 5 years. Ocher has been pushing the boundaries between pop and avant-garde for almost two decades, with playful and colorful form, and clever content that winks at everyone who recognizes its cultural and historical references. The critically acclaimed new album Your Guide To Revolution is a joyful ode to hope, released just six months after its predecessor, the experimental Approaching Singularity: Music for The End of Time. It was |
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picked by The Quietus as "Album of The Week" and Bandcamp's favorite Records of The Year. The albums join a series of apocalyptic and politically charged concept albums. Mary's new recordings range from post-punk, ambient and folk, to field recordings, cumbia, deconstructed techno and cosmic synth compositions - they feature collaborations with post-rock giants Mogwai, psych-rock guru King Khan, electronic moguls Red Axes, Mary's drummers Your Government, pieces by fusion harpist Dorothy Ashby and 12th century Persian poet Omar Khayyam, a homage to electronic music pioneer Delia Derbyshire and much, much more. Hermitess is the songwriting project of multi-disciplinary artist of Jennifer Crighton. Her songs, performed on harp and vocals, provide the core of the band, which features a highly distinctive soundworld infused with a strong element of personal and historical exploration, meditating on death, family, and intertwining historical aspects of her own ancestry. The music has a gothic quality to it, but not in the eyeliner and chilly synths manner; this is a more authentic and highly original take on "folk" music traditions. Crighton is aided and abetted by Richard Gallant on the hurdy gurdy and hammered dulcimer, Keith Rodger on bass, and Chris Dadge on drums. The new album from Hermitess is nearly finished and will be released this spring. Secreted Language is a brand new group from some of the busiest musicians in town. Featuring Nate Waters (Eye of Newt, Samantha Savage Smith, Temps) on reeds & FX, Brock Geiger (solo, Eye of Newt, SSS) on guitar, Keith Rodger (Horse Breaker) on upright bass, and Chris Dadge (Samantha Savage Smith, Chad VanGaalen) on drums, the group technically made their debut last October at High Line Brewing, opening for the Brodie West Quintet, but it was as a trio, while Rodger was out of the country. That show yielded promising results, and with the (re)addition of the proper fourth, this will be the first proper dissemination of this group's highly stylized approach to open-ended free improvisation. |
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SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 2025 Shane Krause (Victoria) with: +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ We are beyond pleased to be welcoming back Victoria-based multi-reedist Shane Krause after a decade-plus unintentional absence from Calgary. The last time we witnessed Krause in action, it was part of the programming for Bug Incision's 2012-2013 concert series that was funded by the Calgary 2012 initiative. He led a memorable workshop in the basement of Hot Wax Records played Weeds Cafe alongside the Bent Spoon Duo (Dadge/Munro version). Before that, Krause and Chris Dadge toured around Alberta as Raw Kites, opening for trumpeter Peter Evans, and recorded a live album with Mats Gustafsson and Christian Munthe, and they also maintained a trio called Hidden Fortress with Edmonton-based bassist and composer Thom Golub.
During that time Krause was based in Vancouver, heavily involved in various DIY improv spaces, and later relocated to Vancouver Island, calling Victoria home in recent years. Recent projects include Allotropes, a freebop trio with bassist Trav Short and drummer Miles Fuller, showcasing a mixture of Krause's compositions alongside classics by people like Ornette, Carla Bley and Roswell Rudd; improv-psych rock band Cosmic Foam; and a free improv trio with vocalist Viviane Houle and bassist Trav Short who have a solo record of overdubbed minimal woodwind compositions coming out later this year. In addition to all this, Krause (along with with Trav Short) also runs the Victoria-based monthly experimental improvised music series The Orange Light. |
Krause will be joined by a who's who of Calgary improvisors: for one set, he will be joined by drummer Erik Allen (known for his work with Amy Nelson, John Rutherford, and who is also currently putting the final touches on a new solo album), double bassist Jeff Gammon (recently relocated from Vancouver, busy member of the Calgary's jazz scene and plays in Nate Waters' new trio), and saxophonist Jonathon Wilcke (Bug Incision co-runner, Wilcke/Dadge duo, Eating Speed). In a second grouping, Krause will be joined by guitarist, composer, and vocalist Rebecca Bruton (known for her compositions, performed by the likes of Quatour Bozzini, and her new song-based project Swanherds), percussionist Chris Dadge (Bug Incision founder, producer, Eye of Newt), and third TBA. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ FACT + in-between set music by DJ Jeremy Curry |
SUNDAY, MARCH 23, 2025 KAIDEN JACKMAN'S AD HOC ENSEMBLES EVENING: The idea for this came from a combination of the usual Bug Incision ad-hoc ensembles with the game Exquisite Corpse, where artists continually contribute to each other’s pieces to create an often surreal piece of artwork. The setup for the evening is the following: Performers set up in groups of 3, chosen at random and play for an indefinite period of time. One by one, as the timers run out, a performer is swapped off with a new one also chosen at random until we cycle through all the performers and end up where we started. The music continues through the entire duration with performers adding and evolving the piece with their own spin. The lineup: Jennifer Crighton - harp wrangler extraordinaire, leader of Hermitess with new album due in May + in-between set music by DJ Jeremy Curry |
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