Friday 30th March, 6.30pm
BLANK CITY
BLANK CITY tells the long-overdue tale of the motley crew of renegade filmmakers that emerged from an economically bankrupt and dangerous period of New York history and crossed over with the East Village Art Scene and thriving music scene. It's a fascinating look at the way this misfit cinema used the deserted, bombed-out Lower East Side landscapes to craft daring works that would go on to profoundly influence Independent Film today. Unlike the much-celebrated punk music scene, this era's thrilling and confrontational underground film movement has never before been documented.
Directed by French newcomer Celine Danhier, BLANK CITY weaves together an oral history of the "No Wave Cinema" and "Cinema of Transgression" movements through compelling interviews with the luminaries who began it all. Featured players include acclaimed directors Jim Jarmusch and John Waters, actor-writer-director Steve Buscemi, Blondie's Debbie Harry, Hip Hop legend Fab 5 Freddy, Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth, Lydia Lunch, artist James Nares, photographer Richard Kern as well as Amos Poe, Eric Mitchell, Susan Seidelman, Beth B, Scott B, Charlie Ahearn and Nick Zedd. The soundtrack includes: Patti Smith, Television, Richard Hell &The Voidoids, Sonic Youth, James Chance, The Contortions, and many more.
Monday 2nd April, 7pm
GRAHAM COXON A+E SHORT FILM SCREENING AND SIGNING SESSION
BUY GRAHAM COXON'S NEW ALBUM 'A+E' FROM MONDAY 2ND APRIL IN-STORE AT ROUGH TRADE EAST AND COLLECT YOUR WRISTBAND AT THE SAME TIME, ANY REMAINING WRISTBANDS WILL BE GIVEN OUT 1 HOUR PRIOR TO THE STAGE TIME...
Q Magazine 4/5
Uncut 8/10
Clash 8/10
Fake DIY 9/10 'Album of The Month'
Total Guitar 'Album of The Month'
Graham Coxon returns to Parlophone for his new album titled A+E, which will be released on 2nd April. A+E is Coxon's first release since the acclaimed, acoustic-driven The Spinning Top.
Aptly named not only for the sense of scratchy, frantic urgency that suffuses its 10 songs, A+E finds Graham continuing with his singular vision as a truly eclectic artist. Playing all the instruments and improvising in the studio, Coxon found himself preoccupied with lyrical themes around the effects of weekend hedonism in modern Britain, on which A+E shines an outsider's light, albeit with a mordant, sharp wit.
Produced by Ben Hillier, A+E features Coxon's distinctive, visceral garage-punk-pop and is inspired by the experimental genres of Krautrock and the black & white, post-punk era - bringing to mind artists such as Neu! ('City Hall'), Can and Kraftwerk ('What'll It Take'), as well as Peter Hamill, Joy Division ('Knife In The Cast') and Monochrome Set - with hypnotic, driving grooves ('The Truth'). This may be the closet Graham has ever come to making, in a skewed sense of the word, 'dance' music.
Coxon describes the album as, "Improvisations, experiments in beats, rhythms. A chance to uninhibitedly make some sort of perversely sad, danceable and funny and despondent songs." Adding "I didn't want to get caught up in my usual struggle with trying to make things sound really posh. I didn't want lovely 60s-sounding drums and valves."
Graham will be signing copies of 'A+E' exclusively for Rough Trade.
Friday 13th April, 6.30pm
CHEMICAL BROTHERS - DON'T THINK FILM SCREENING & Q&A WITH DIRECTOR ADAM SMITH
BUY CHEMICAL BROTHER'S 'DON"T THINK' ON DVD OR BLU-RAY DISC FROM MONDAY 26th MARCH AT ROUGH TRADE EAST AND COLLECT YOUR WRISTBAND AT THE SAME TIME, ANY REMAINING WRISTBANDS WILL BE GIVEN OUT 1 HOUR PRIOR TO THE STAGE TIME...ONE PER PERSON
"...One of the best films about dance music ever made." The Guardian
"An astonishing, celluloid rush of blood to the head." The Sunday Telegraph
"The most intense music film ever" The Times
"You literally feel the noise. Without saying a word, Don't Think speaks volumes." Empire *****
"The cinematic event of the decade" Mixmag *****
"A psychedelic classic" Mojo ****
"Phenomenally exciting...could well be the most thrilling live movie ever" The Word
The Chemical Brothers; Don't Think directed by Adam Smith, has since reached legendary status. Unlike any other movie release Don't Think catalysed rave-like cinema scenes compelling elated viewers in 30 territories across the world to abandon their cinema seats, dance in the aisles and chant along with the on-screen Fuji Rocks festival crowd. From London to LA to Buenos Aires for one night only, fans across the globe were empowered and intoxicated by Don't Think, which has come to re-define the cinematic experience. The verdict from fans and critics has been unanimous... this was a one of a kind experience, definitely not to be missed!
Monday 16th April, 7pm
CAUGHT BY THE RIVER PRESENTS... PATIENCE (AFTER SEBALD) FILM SCREENING & Q&A
The life and work of cult writer W. G. Sebald has been brought to the big screen for the first time by a Grammy nominated filmmaker. With previous work including music videos for Radiohead and Blur and the music film Joy Division, director Grant Gee has created an appropriately hypnotic film for Sebald's distinctive, evocative prose.
The film loosely retraces the east Anglian journey that Sebald took in his most influential book, The Rings Of Saturn. Interspersed with contributions from filmmakers, artists and writers - such as Tacita Dean and Andrew Motion - and extracts from his novel voiced by Jonathan Pryce, Patience (After Sebald) presents a multilayered exploration into his work.
Born in Germany in 1944, Sebald settled in England in 1970 and became Professor of European Literature at the University of East Anglia in 1987. In the subsequent period of stunning creativity, he achieved great success with seven works of prose fiction published, including Vertigo (1990), The Rings Of Saturn (1995) and Austerlitz (2001). His tragic death in a car crash at 57 was described as "an unspeakable loss to literature" in The Guardian obituary and his work maintains a phenomenal international following.
A Q&A will follow the screening. Guests TBC very soon.
Wednesday 18th April, 7pm
VINYLMANIA FILM SCREENING
In "Vinylmania" the director guides us through the grooves of an object that has never lost its soul. He investigates what makes it so legendary in a world dominated by liquid music: Nostalgia? Possession? The search for an identity?
"My mother used to wake me up with a vinyl record. It's the first thing I remember about life. Many years have passed but vinyl records have never abandoned me. And you? Have you ever listened to a vinyl record? With its unique sound and crackling that gives you butterflies. Have you ever plunged into the colours of the sleeves artwork? Have you smelled it? Music captures a unique taste, seductive." In "Vinylmania" the director guides us through the grooves of an object that has never lost its soul. He investigates what makes it so legendary in a world dominated by liquid music: Simple nostalgia? Possession? The search for an identity? A cry against the fast food music? The digital river that has no heart or soul, just ones and zeros...
From Tokyo to New York, London, Paris and Prague we meet a tribe of collectors, Djs, musicians and artists. We explore the stores where passion is transformed into fever and the factories that have resumed stamping millions of copies. Vinyl records are back!
Friday 27th April, 6.30pm
YEAR ZERO FILM SCREENING WITH BLACK MOUNTAIN SOUNDTRACK
So how on earth does a band like Black Mountain end up writing music in the name of the world's sunniest sport?
Understand, Year Zero is nothing like your ordinary bro-time surfer flick. Shot around the world on 16mm film, Year Zero is set in a near-ish future where the world as we know it has ended. Director Joe G. places the survivors in a damaged but stunningly beautiful place, a world where the reset button has been hit, where we hold onto the vestiges of the things we love, but those things become weightless, and the ensuing freedom is as exhilarating as it is scary. To simply call it postapocalyptic is to undermine the imagination that Joe G. brings to the world's remains, and Year Zero is ultimately as much a "surf movie" as it is a movie about Earth illustrated through surfing.
Given the new world set forth in Year Zero, it's as if Black Mountain have been set free of the boundaries that "making a record" impose. Much of the new material is driven by expansive, synth-driven swirls and a dangerous, rumbling low end. Outlaw vibes, to be sure. Black Mountain's psychedelia has never been anchored to any one style, time, or genre. But withYear Zero, Black Mountain go to a place that is intergalactic and downright ruthless, with a sound big enough to stand up to the vastness of the ocean, the bigness of the sun, and the lives of the people left living. Which is fucked up and heavy, no question, but so goes Joe G.'s vision, and thanks to Year Zero, now we know: Black Mountain could actually pull off being the last band on earth.
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