thisquietarmy

Drone your winter blues away...

2012-01-24T14:16:00.002-05:00

CJLO 1690 AM proudly presents an evening of drone to help wash away the winter blues. The line up is made up of local Montreal talent and all proceeds will go towards Concordia's campus-community radio station.

THISQUIETARMY

http://www.thisquietarmy.com/

Echo Beach

http://echobeach.bandcamp.com/

Aim Low

http://aimlow.bandcamp.com/

Old Wyoming

http://oldwyoming.bandcamp.com/

$5 at the door. Doors at 9 pm.

This is a CJLO 1690 AM fundraiser.

Jackie & Judy's - 6512, Avenue du Parc (corner of Beaubien)

Adrian Aniol - Arrhythmia OST (TQA020, TQA Records)

2012-01-08T14:33:00.003-05:00

TQA020 - ADRIAN ANIOL - ARRHYTHMIA OST

Artist: Adrian Aniol
Release: Arrhythmia OST
Release Date: January 12th, 2012
Format: Limited full-length CDR in a handmade deluxe packaging
Promo: tqarecords@gmail.com

We also prepared a press kit here, which includes the one-sheet, press photos & artwork:
http://thisquietarmy.com/records/press/TQA020/

The CD is currently available for pre-order with a 5-track preview:
http://thisquietarmy.storenvy.com/products/226222-tqa020-adrian-aniol-arrhythmia-ost-cdr

Details:

Adrian Anioł is a Polish composer & sound designer.

TQA Records is proud to present his "Arrhythmia OST", the follow-up to "It Falls Apart", his debut release on dark cult American label Utech Records (Locrian, Horseback, Nadja, Mamiffer, James Plotkin, Daniel Menche, etc.).

The score to the late James Hartley's film of the same title is a dark & mysterious journey filled with haunting subsonic ambiances and claustrophobic layers of frigid soundwaves. Ambient and minimal, yet emotionally charged with terrifying imaginative visuals, overbearing industrial atmospheres and loud startling percussive effects, Adrian Anioł has created an incredibly captivating and powerful film soundtrack.
Initially self-released digitally in March 2011, the record was slightly reworked & remixed by Adrian Anioł, mastered by Eric Quach (thisquietarmy) in November 2011 & released in January 2012 by TQA Records.

Adrian Anioł's "Arrhythmia OST" is TQA Records' 1st full-length physical release, which consists of a compelling black top & black bottom CDR, hand-stamped with black acrylic ink. The disc is placed on a hub inside a folded insert, which slides into a thick 80lb A7 grey printed envelope. The package also includes a set of 4 oversize 5x7" photographs and is strictly limited to 100 handmade & numbered copies.

++

Adrian Aniol - Arrhythmia OST (TQA020)

01. The Opening 02:27
02. Informis Pravitas 03:30
03. In A Darkened Room 04:47
04. Lament 02:11
05. Thoughts Become Noise 02:40
06. 3AM Revelations 02:50
07. The Others 04:20
08. The Permanence 01:49
09. Arrhythmia (In A Heartbeat) 02:11
10. In Black Twilights 02:55
11. The Way Of All Flesh 02:08
12. The Dark Night Of The Soul 03:03
13. Slowly Downward 04:55
14. In Control Of All Things 02:54
15. The Closing 06:05

This recording was made for a 38min independent movie "Arrhythmia" directed by James Hartley (September 13, 1979 - April 22, 2011). Please note that this album was recorded using low-end techniques with purpose.

Composed, arranged, written, performed, and produced by Adrian Anioł.
Saxophone performed by Russell Johnson.
Cello and strings performed by Paul Martin.
Arrhythmia was assembled and mixed by A. Anioł at Withinwithout Studios.
Soundtrack consultant: Dorota Rus.
Mastering: Eric Quach.
Art direction: 21grams inc.

Un après-midi ambiant (Lévis, 2011-12-11)

2012-01-05T17:34:00.001-05:00

Some records I've listened to

2011-12-26T12:31:00.000-05:00

Here are some records that caught my attention this year, in no particular order. By no means a complete list nor a reference, as there are quite a few records I still haven't had time to listen & explore, due to my busy music-making schedule - sometimes you just want to go back to old comfort records in-between creative sessions...

++

The Soft Moon - The Soft Moon (Captured Tracks)
Ringo Deathstarr - Colour Tripp/Sparkler (Sonic Unyon/Club AC30)
A Winged Victory For The Sullen (Erased Tapes/Kranky)
Tim Hecker - Ravedeath, 1972 (Kranky)
Low - C'Mon (Sub Pop)
Epic45 - Weathering (Make Mine Music)
Mogwai - Hardcore Will Never Die, But You Will (Sub Pop)
Explosions - Take Care, Take Care, Take Care (Temporary Residence)
Earth - Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light 1 (Southern Lord)
Esmerine - La Lechuza (Constellation Records)
Birds of Passage - Without The World (Denovali)
Labirinto - Anatema (Dissenso)
The Haxan Cloak - The Haxan Cloak (Aurora Borealis)
Aun - Phantom Ghost (Denovali)
Le Révélateur - Fictions (Gneiss Things)
Talvihorros - Descent Into Delta (Hibernate)
Birds of Passage - Without The World (Denovali)
Liturgy - Aesthetica (Thrill Jockey)
Wolves In The Throne Room - Celestial Lineage (Southern Lord)
Timber Timbre - Creep On Creeping On (Arts and Crafts)
Duchess Says - In a Fung Day T! (Alien8)
Grails - Deep Politics (Temporary Residence)
Ensorcelor - Crucifuge (Media Tree)

Here are some records which I've heard a promo or early version in 2011, that I look forward to in 2012:

Adrian Aniol - Arrhythmia OST (TQA Records)

Monarch - Omens (At A Loss Recordings)

Elika - Always The Light (Saint Marie Records)

thisquietarmy / TQA Records News 2011#6

2011-12-22T19:26:00.003-05:00

For those who don't know, I have a mailing here:
http://groups.google.com/group/thisquietarmy?hl=en

Add yourself to receive it. Here's the latest one.

++

Hey,

First of all, I would like to thank you all for your incredible support in 2011, and also to all the labels, publicists, reviewers & promoters that have been involved - so much has happened, including a successful European tour & of course all the following releases:

Vessels CD (Aurora Borealis), Orange CD/LP (Lunasylum/Orange Milk), Valley LP (Basses Frequences), Resurgence 2xCD/DLP (Denovali), Unconquered DLP (Denovali), Ghidrah CDR (Brise-Cul), Parallel Lines CDR/DVDR (TQA Records), Electroluminescent/Giant Claw 2xCD (TQA Records), More Hope for Japan 4xCD compilation (Oxide Tones), Sequence2 DL compilation (Sequence), Canadian Drones CDR compilation (0bpm), etc.

Here's to hoping that 2012 will turn out to be even better!

# 30% OFF ALL THISQUIETARMY DOWNLOADS FOR X-MAS

A lot of you are probably getting ready for travels, leisure or family, leaving your CDs & vinyls at home. So here's a 30% discount off for your digital downloads needs on thisquietarmy's Bandcamp. To fill up your iPod, just use the coupon "xmas" at checkout (valid until 12/31): http://thisquietarmy.bandcamp.com

# RESURGENCE + UNCONQUERED DLP NOW AVAILABLE

I received my copies of Resurgence DLP & Unconquered DLP. These wonderful deluxe items are quite heavy, glossy gate fold with 2x 180g slab of PVC, by far my proudest releases. Only the black copies are in the store, as I received a very limited quantities of colored version, which have been reserved for local friends & fans. If you're so inclined, email me privately and maybe I will have a couple of colored copies left to spare. Montreal: you can find copies at Cheap Thrills, Atom Heart, L'Oblique, Soundcentral & Phonopolis. http://thisquietarmy.storenvy.com

Resurgence has received mostly glowing reviews from reputed zines & papers all over Canada, USA & France, Germany, UK, Austria, Italy, The Netherlands, Poland & more. All of them have been posted as I get them, through my facebook & twitter account.

Here are a few:
CANADA - http://hour.ca/2011/12/22/thisquietarmy-resurgence/
CANADA - http://www.montrealmirror.com/wp/2011/12/08/music-reviews-62/
CANADA - http://www.textura.org/reviews/thisquietarmy_resurgence.htm
FRANCE - http://www.w-fenec.org/indus/thisquietarmy,7121,resurgence.html
FRANCE - http://www.indierockmag.com/article16308.html
ITALY - http://www.storiadellamusica.it/Thisquietarmy_-_Resurgence_(Denovali_Records,_2011).p0-r4392
GERMANY - http://www.blueprint-fanzine.de/home/index.php4?page=cat&Rub=2&EID=5969
GERMANY - http://www.musikreviews.de/reviews/2011/THISQUIETARMY/Resurgence/
GERMANY - http://www.musikansich.de/review.php?id=10830
AUSTRIA - http://www.demonic-nights.at/2011/11/thisquietarmy-resurgence/
POLAND - http://www.wiadomosci24.pl/artykul/ciemna_strona_mocy_thisquietarmy_resurgence_220738.html
UK - http://musosguide.com/thisquietarmy-resurgence/19502#more-19502
UK - http://www.attnmagazine.co.uk/music/5201

# THISQUIETARMY IN ROCK-A-ROLLA MAGAZINE

thisquietarmy is featured on the latest issue of UK's Rock-A-Rolla Magazine, Issue #35 - "thisquietarmy" appears on the cover (fronted by the mighty Acid Mothers Temple), a full-page article/in-depth interview & a featured review. Pick it up!

# TQA RECORDS; OTHER RELEASES FOR 2012

I'll be spending my holidays working on those 2 label releases I mentioned last month, for January 2012. Lots of designing, burning, printing, cutting, gluing, hand-packaging... Also, TQA Records now has a facebook page, please join to keep up: http://www.facebook.com/tqarecords

+++ TQA020: Adrian Aniol - Arrhythmia OST. A mysterious Polish composer whose music is incredibly dark & intense, slow & frigid with eerie subsonic textures - listen to his tape, just released on Utech Records: http://adriananiol.bandcamp.com/album/it-all-falls-apart

+++ TQA021: Aidan Baker / thisquietarmy - Document: Eurotour 2011. This will be an extremely limited 3xCD box-set, featuring a collaborative live set as well as a solo set from each of us. It will also include a tour report, flyers, photographs & more.

+++ thisquietarmy + Yellow6 - Death Valley 2xCD. This will be out on Basses Frequences, early 2012. It will include a bonus track left off from the session, a collaborative live track & a remix by Fear Falls Burning (Dirk Serries, who also did the mastering), as well as a booklet with more beautiful Death Valley landscapes. A special discount will be available for those who bought the vinyls.

+++ Year of No Light/thisquietarmy 12" split. A split/collaboration is in the works, it will probably come out on French label Destructure. More details soon.

+++ thisquietarmy/Parallel Lines. A split from our separate sessions, live at the Christ's Church Cathedral in Hamilton where we performed last fall. The sound of the crashing reverb of that cathedral is huge & incredibly intense. Also, a Parallel Lines semi-studio album will be released next spring.

# AUN/THISQUIETARMY EUROTOUR 2012

I will be joining fellow Montrealers, label mates & friends AUN on tour next spring. It will start the day after their appearance at the mighty Roadburn festival, from April 14th to April 28th. The tour is already being booked - Bochum (DE), Berlin (DE), Hamburg (DE), Copenhagen (DK), Basel (CH), Nancy (FR), so far - more to be updated: http://www.denovali.com/booking - we might extend the tour for another week and try to head to the UK as we're looking into the possibility. If you have ideas, offers or suggestions, please write to me or to Denovali Booking: booking@denovali.com

Thanks for reading as always,
Have a wonderful holidays!
Eric / thisquietarmy & TQA Records

http://www.thisquietarmy.com
http://www.facebook.com/thisquietarmy
http://www.facebook.com/tqarecords
http://www.twitter.com/thisquietarmy

Reviews & Interview updates

2011-11-10T18:26:00.005-05:00

Interview in french with thisquietamy by Pelecanus:

http://www.pelecanus.net/entrevue-thisquietarmy-avec-eric-quach.html

Topics: Resurgence, Denovali, European tour, etc.

Aidan Baker & thisquietarmy - Orange LP (Orange Milk Records) reviewed by Foxy Digitalis (9/10):

http://www.foxydigitalis.com/foxyd/?p=20269

"All I can say is that this was one thought-provoking, experiential, affinity-inducing listen."

Parallel Lines - 11:3:11 3" CDR/DVDR (TQA Records) reviewed by SSG Music (8.6/10):

http://www.ssgmusic.com/october-in-review/

"Eric Quach (AKA thisquietarmy) has long reigned as the slow rolling prince of Canadian guitar exploration, but within the trio of Parallel Lines, the cautious momentum of his solo work comes into contact with the sporadic world of post-rock and jazz."

thisquietarmy + Yellow6 - Death Valley 2xLP (Basses Fréquences) reviewed in german by Thepostrock.de:

http://www.thepostrock.de/basses-frequences-zusammenkunfte/

thisquietarmy - Vessels CD (Aurora Borealis) reviewed in french by W-Fenec:

http://www.w-fenec.org/indus/thisquietarmy,7025,vessels.html

Aidan Baker & thisquietarmy - Orange CD (Lunasylum) reviewed by Heathen Harvest (4/5):

http://heathenharvest.org/2011/10/01/aidan-baker-thisquietarmy-orange/

"Flawless execution in both shape and sound makes this my favourite ambient release of this year up to this point."

Aidan Baker & thisquietarmy - Orange CD (Lunasylum) reviewed by KZSU Standfor Radio Station:

http://zookeeper.stanford.edu/index.php?action=viewRecentReview&tag=983099

thisquietarmy + Yellow6 - Death Valley 2xLP (Basses Fréquences) reviewed in french by New Noise Mag:

Aidan Baker & thisquietarmy - Orange LP (Orange Milk) reviewed by Animal Psi:

http://animalpsi.com/2011/08/orange-milk/

thisquietarmy - Vessels CD (Aurora Borealis) reviewed by Foxy Digitalis:

http://www.foxydigitalis.com/foxyd/?p=15724

"Listening to Vessels is like being on the deck of an old warship, ducking and dodging whizzing bullets and booming cannonballs. Quach takes pains to temper his music’s beauty with a buzzing roughness; quiet interludes feel decidedly too quiet as we await the next vigorous rush of sound."

TQA Store: one-day 25% Halloween sale!

2011-10-31T12:52:00.001-04:00

"Trick or Treat!"

Well, I don't know any tricks... So here's my treat: a 25% Halloween

sale!

Use coupon "Halloween2011" to get your discount - the offer will

expire in 24 hours from now.

https://thisquietarmy.storenvy.com/

Happy halloween!

11.11.11

2011-10-31T12:47:00.003-04:00

11.11.11

CABARET PLAYHOUSE

5656 du Parc

+++ ALASKAN [ Post-Metal, Sludge, Heavy ]

http://alaskan.bandcamp.com/

https://www.facebook.com/alaskanband

+++ SHOW OF BEDLAM [ Saint-Vitus meets Babes in Toyland ]

http://showofbedlam.bandcamp.com/

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Show-of-Bedlam/231634652456

+++ THISQUIETARMY [ Drone, Shoegaze, Cinematic, Doom ] *

http://thisquietarmy.bandcamp.com/

https://www.facebook.com/thisquietarmy

+++ PARAZITIK STATIK [ Noise, Ambient, Harsh, Horror, 50's fiction ]

http://myspace.com/parazitikstatik

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Parazitik-statik/104700172939794

* with rumors that Alaskan's drummer will be joining thisquietarmy on stage at some point...

RESURGENCE + UNCONQUERED PRE-ORDERS

2011-10-23T10:31:00.003-04:00

Pre-orders for RESURGENCE 2xCD / 2xLP / 2xLP+7'' & UNCONQUERED 2xLP have started!! 3 new tracks from Resurgence can be listened here: http://www.denovali.com/thisquietarmy/

cinema+sound2011 | Montreal

2011-10-06T19:31:00.002-04:00

I've been added last-minute to this cinema+sound2011 A/V event, happening tomorrow friday - I'll be performing at 10pm.

Check the details here: http://cinemaplussound.blogspot.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=233355073379949

Parallel Lines - Cathedral live excerpt

2011-09-29T16:01:00.001-04:00

Here's an excerpt of my project Parallel Lines - live drums, synth & guitar improv in a cathedral in Hamilton a few weeks ago... Enjoy.

Cathedral A1 by Parallel Lines

thisquietarmy - Resurgence (teaser)

2011-09-28T15:08:00.001-04:00

Sherbrooke show - October 1st

2011-09-24T21:33:00.003-04:00

PiedBo Dancing présente :

à ne pas rater: un one man band culte de Montreal, un duo inédit Franco/Quebecois

et un autre duo inédit de Sherbrookois mais de musique électronique composée..

que faire de plus pour susciter ta curiosité maladive?

avec/

---------------------------------------------------

thisquietarmy (Montreal): ambient/drone/shoegazer/experimental

---------------------------------------------------

est un guitariste soliste de montreal branché sur 20 000 pédales pour te faire atteindre le nirvana....

tu crois en l'amour? viens te tester !

lui en tout cas n'a plus rien à prouver.

www.thisquietarmy.com

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcgpAjjILmc

www.youtube.com/watch?v=NyKPE4T2nTU&feature=related

www.myspace.com/thisquietarmy

www.facebook.com/thisquietarmy

---------------------------------------------------

.cut featuring Gibet (Montreal/Lyon): experimental/post-rock/progressive/electro/noise

---------------------------------------------------

est un duo instrumental "post-rock/experimental" basé entre Montreal et Lyon (France).

ils produisent une musique sombre et évolutive (veut dire qui ne respecte pas les critères de durée de la chanson populaire classique)

un peu comme si tu contemplais l'effroi tout en réconfortant ton angoisse de la stagnation de ce monde perdu à jamais...

www.dotcut.org

www.myspace.com/dotcut

www.youtube.com/watch?v=HU8ci5QwTfg

www.facebook.com/dotcut

---------------------------------------------------

Paf Dignitas (Sherbrooke): fusion/electronique

---------------------------------------------------

est un duo batterie / saxophone / électronique.

Vous êtes tannés d'écouter des bands qui copient l'esprit des années 80 sans rien y comprendre ?

Paf Dignitas est fait pour vous, enfin un band qui réécrit (ou plutôt recompose) la fusion électronique des années 80-90 avec

tous les clichés qui vont avec mais tout en y apportant une vision contemporaine..quoi que...

une bouffée d'air frais!

http://pafdignitas.bandcamp.com/

http://me.voir.ca/piedbodancing/

www.myspace.com/piedborecords

Parallel Lines 2x3" CDR/DVDR - 11:3:11

2011-09-13T14:36:00.005-04:00

Grab it now!

http://thisquietarmy.storenvy.com/products/155114-parallel-lines-11-3-11-2x-cdr-dvdr

The second recording from Parallel Lines was captured live on video by Wearepostrock at Divan Orange in Montreal, part of the Under The Snow Festival on March 11th 2011, opening for Esses & Sianspheric.

Completely improvised and totally unrehearsed, tri-city trio /// Pascal Asselin on drums + Ryan Ferguson on synth + Eric Quach on guitar /// gets together once again and put themselves in danger on stage for some thrilling moments. Whatever happens happens: downtempo ambient, psyched-out shoegaze, tension, buildups & explosions.

This will be released as a 2x3" CD/DVD on TQA Records, handmade & limited to 100 copies - just in time for their next performance for the Hamilton Art Crawl at Christ's Church Cathedral on September 9th, 2011.

1. 11:3:11 - Part I

2. 11:3:11 - Part II

3. 11:3:11 - Part III

4. 11:3:11 - Part IV

Hamilton shows - Sept. 9 & 10

2011-09-07T21:10:00.002-04:00

Friday Sept. 9th: AKUMU + PARALLEL LINES

Christ's Church Cathedral

252 James Street North

Hamilton, ON

The New Harbours music series returns with deep bass soundscapes and hypnotic visuals from AKUMU (Deane Hughes) and psyched out shoegaze from PARALLEL LINES (Pascal Asselin, Ryan Ferguson and Eric Quach).

http://www.musicbyakumu.com/

http://parallellines.bandcamp.com/

http://www.facebook.com/NewHarbours

https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=254421037924474

8pm doors

Pay what you can / Donation

Saturday Sept. 10th: New Harbours Supercrawl Edition w/ W.A. DAVISON and THISQUIETARMY

Christ's Church Cathedral

252 James Street North

Hamilton, ON

Crawl in a different direction with polymedia performance artist and founder of recordism, W.A. DAVISON. This will be a SONGS Of The NEW EROTICS performance - expect otherworldy sonics, surrealist theatre, and general weirdness. Also performing wll be THISQUIETARMY (Eric Quach), conjuring cascading drone magic from six strings.

http://www.recordism.com/SOTNE/SotNE.html

http://www.thisquietarmy.com/

http://www.facebook.com/newharbours

https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=253930627974874

Pay what you can / Donation

Vessels CD restocked!

2011-08-24T11:43:00.001-04:00

If you missed out, they are available again at the store: http://thisquietarmy.storenvy.com/products/140198-thisquietarmy-vessels-cd

Would a 35-mins live drone set, sped up at 500%, sound like Justin Bieber?

2011-08-17T21:11:00.002-04:00

This is the ultimate test.

Recorded in Ghent on May 31st 2011, Belgium at Huis Ligy, a crumbling 15th century mansion. The audio/video was time-stretched 500% faster, and the sound was pitched down 2.4 octave to avoid the chipmunk effect for this video.

Meet Skully

2011-08-16T21:58:00.001-04:00

New TQA webstore

2011-08-15T23:00:00.006-04:00

We now have a brand new store!

There was something comforting about having all the releases on one page. To add a picture, a description and a paypal button whenever there was a new one. However with the constant increase in new outputs, it became more and more difficult to update my website in a non-frustrating manner. The page is also getting more clogged with each one, and with the popular increase of self-managing webstores out there, I needed to make the move to something more convenient.

I give you:

thisquietarmy.storenvy.com

You'll find everything on the first page, but more importantly the categories will help you to browse the items that you might've missed. And you'll know which items were newly added to the store... I would also suggest to register to the site for faster checkouts.

To commemorate the opening of this store, I've made a promotional coupon available for 15% off any items that you will purchase until the end of the week (Aug. 21st). Just enter the code: "TQASTOREOPENING" to claim the rebate when you checkout.

Thanks for your continuing support!

Added this week (very limited quantities! like 5 or so) :

- GHIDRAH - The Guitar Years CDR (Brise-Cul Records) - collab between thisquietarmy, AUN & Maggot Breeder/Reuel from Squalor.
- V.A. - Golden Classics 2xCDR (Chat Blanc Reocrds) - featuring an exclusive track by Mains de Givre.
- V.A. - Kito Sounds #3 (Chez Kito Kat) - featuring an exclusive track by Mains de Givre .
- V.A. - Canadian Drones Vol. 1 (0bpm) - featuring an exclusive track by thisquietarmy.

Aural Diptych #6: Electroluminescent / Giant Claw

2011-08-09T20:57:00.004-04:00

Aural Diptych #6: Electroluminescent / Giant Claw

Release date: July 14th, 2011

Preview: &amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href="http://tqarecords.bandcamp.com/album/tqa018-ads06-electroluminescent-giant-claw"&amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;TQA018 / ADS06 : Electroluminescent / Giant Claw by TQA Records&amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;

Double-split 3" CDR placed on a heavy stock folded & printed insert, packaged in a felt-textured harvest yellow envelope, with printed artwork by New York City-based artist Elayne Safir. It includes two sets of diptych photography by Montreal-based artist Meryem Yildiz. Inner artwork by Keith Rankin. This releases comes with a digital download code with bonus tracks. LIMITED TO 100 COPIES ONLY.

ADS06 features two psych cosmic synth kraut lovers. Electroluminescent (2nd release on TQA) from Hamilton, ON - presents 'Lost Time', a ambient-driven conceptual storytelling inspired by french new wave cinema, Eric Rohmer's six moral tales in particular. Meanwhile, Giant Claw reciprocates madly with a massive dose of heavy-psychedelic bubbly chiptunes, fittingly titled 'Nuclear Hellearth'.

Disc 1 : Electroluminescent - Lost Time ++ 1. Two Means Yes / 2. Hidden in Books / 3. Faith and Fate / 4. Mystery Collection / 5. A Single Chance / 6. In The Afternoon*

Disc 2 : Giant Claw - Nuclear Hellearth ++ 1. Nuclear Hellearth pt. 1 / 2. Nuclear Hellearth pt. 2* / 3. Open Fields / 4. Nuclear Hellearth pt. 3

* Bonus Digital Tracks (download included)

PURCHASE HERE: http://thisquietarmy.com/records/#tqa018

Catch up on reviews

2011-08-09T20:44:00.007-04:00

Vessels #44 on the National Campus Radio Chart for July 5, 2011: http://www.chartattack.com/charts/campus-radio/2011-07-05

Norman Records reviews Valley: http://www.normanrecords.com/vinyl/126548-thisquietarmy--yellow-6-valley

Montreal Mirror reviews Vessels (album of the week): http://www.montrealmirror.com/wp/2011/06/16/music-reviews-37/

Avant-Garde Metal reviews Vessels: http://avantgarde-metal.com/content/beyond2.php?id=131

Drowned in Sound reviews Vessels: http://drownedinsound.com/releases/16210/reviews/4142604

Emoragei Magazine reviews Vessels: http://www.emorageimagazine.com/old/musique/26/thisquietarmy-2039

The Hour/Ottawa Xpress reviews Vessels: http://hour.ca/2011/08/04/vessels-2/

Indie Rock Mag reviews Vessels: http://www.indierockmag.com/article13388.html

Norman Records reviews Vessels: http://www.normanrecords.com/cd/125183-thisquietarmy-vessels

Rock-a-Rolla reviews Vessels & Orange:

The Silent Ballet reviews Vessels: http://www.thesilentballet.com/dnn/Articles/tabid/55/ctl/Details/mid/411/ItemID/4032/Default.aspx

Textura reviews Vessels & Valley: http://www.textura.org/archives/t/thisquietarmy_vessels_valley.htm

The Pacific Theatre

2011-08-01T21:19:00.001-04:00

DEATH VALLEY LPs diptych completed

2011-07-19T15:29:00.002-04:00

Hamburg

2011-06-16T15:03:00.001-04:00

The last show of the tour at the Markthalle in Hamburg, this time with our friend Erik K. Skodvin aka Svarte Greiner & Nadja. Unfortunately, the big bulk of my pictures of this day is from this rest-stop. Here's Leah (of Nadja) being sad about her fictitious dead mama...

Mini-vibrators, travel pussy, etc. okay nothing special, except that it was in one of those men's room where you usually leave change for maintenance...

Corny big...

Gurken-snack! Get one pickle for the road...

I played in Hamburg two years ago, on my first Eurotour at the same venue, Markthalle and we stayed at the same Superbude hostel - so I don't really have anything new to add. The experience was pretty similar, and I had taken more pictures: here.

However, we requested to have monitors on stage this time, so I could hear myself way better and I felt that I played a much better set than last time... There was a pretty good turnout, and a pleasant atmosphere throughout the whole evening.

I also requested as a joke to eat a hamburger in Hamburg, just for kicks. I believe I ordered the Tom Jones special burger from the Hollywood Canteen, which had pineapple in it, with a side-order of potato wedges & cheese. Greasy!

I'd also like to give a nod up to Faridee, who flew all the way from Mexico City the same day, landed in Hamburg at 9pm and went straight to the venue to catch us play... !

To top it off, I also sold more merch in Hamburg than any other cities on the tour. That was a good feeling, especially considering that I had to pack everything up for my flight the next day, as I was booked for the Suoni Per Il Popolo festival and playing with Locrian, Mamiffer & House of Low Culture the day after. Could not miss that. It was a quick end to the tour...

Dresden

2011-06-14T18:27:00.002-04:00

My power supply for my Digitech Space Station pedal (which is also the same one for my Digitech Jamman) blew up the day before, so I had to find a store to get a replacement... It's a peculiar 9VAC with a 5.5 mm female tip. Turns out it's not that common in Germany. Though, I found out that Just Music had them on their website, but I had my german-speaking friend Stefan call both Berlin store to make sure they had it in stock... Turns out, they didn't! So I walked over to Noisy Rooms, an rehearsal/store/rental place near Bis Auf Messer to see if they had anything... nothing but generic Boss power supplies. The last resort was to get some kind of universal power supply at Conrad, an electronic store. Again, it was a complete fail... so, we headed to Dresden, which is our second-to-last show of the tour... I'd figure something out.

Also travelling with us was Jérémie Mortier who was playing drums with Aidan Baker this time.

We arrived at AZ Conni late afternoon, a fully equipped alternative cultural center. We were welcomed by Ralph, who had snacks prepared in the backstage, and also a lovely meal brewing in the basement kitchen for us.

This bill was with Khuda, a heavy instrumental duo from Leeds, UK. It was good to meet and share the stage with them...

Some snacks & ping-pong exchanges later... Aidan & Jérémie soundchecked.

I was setting up behind them, because I had to figure out a way to play my set with one power supply for both the Jamman & the Space Station. It was kind of frustrating. On top of that, the show has to end at 11pm sharp, which meant starting at 8:30pm. So I had 5 minutes for my soundcheck, and I didn't bother setting up the projections for this show... Result: improvised set w/ alternate versions of some structured parts, which turned out alright in the end.

From the merch table;

During Khuda's set...

Found in their merch box:

Dresden was only 90 mins away, so we went straight back to Berlin to enjoy another day off there the next day.

Berlin

2011-06-13T14:40:00.012-04:00

Back in Berlin for the week including two shows, one Teufelsberg expedition & one trip to Tempelhof airport. Okay let's try to make a condensed entry for all of that stuff, June 9-15 (Dresden 6/14 + Hamburg 6/16 separate entries).

Oberbaum bridge at sunset, where they found that WWII uxo a couple of weeks back:

The first show was June 11th, at Bei Roy in Neukölln, southeast of the city - between semi-industrial & suburbia, this area is the new haven for students and artists. In fact, Bei Roy is a 5th floor loft located above and overlooking automotive garages.

Surrounding the venue was a Turkish wedding in this sketchy place. Some dressed-up guests were wandering around, seemingly lost, as if they were going to this secret rave and had just been given directions at the map point.

Next to all that, there was a huge hotel complex called Estrel. According to their site, it's Europe's largest convention, entertainment and hotel complex with 1125 rooms & suites, 5 restaurants, 2 bars, a concert hall, and a beer garden in front of the hotel by the canal. In this beer garden, there's this neon sculpture of a swan raping a woman:

Illuminated, at night (stolen from the web) - bright red womb:

A wiki-search later, and this sculpture is also known as Leda and the Swan. So yeah, this is what Neukolln is about... There's so much culture-clash, Berlin is awesome!

Back to the gig. Bei Roy is also known for its all-night parties it seems, it's the new hipster hotspot. Apparently gigs don't usually start before 11pm and best of all, there is no volume restrictions! The PA consisted of two chain-hung vintage speaker cabinets, fueled by a vintage mixer. Needless to say, that made my set sounded really loud and dirty!! The room quickly filled up during the course of my set, but people were pretty attentive the whole thing and their reactions at the end of my set was pretty furious! Berlin wins in the best crowd of the tour category. Here are some witness accounts found online shortly after the gig:

"saw thisquietarmy and Nadja tonight... no volume restrictions so they ripped the venue apart!" / "Heavy and loud as promised. Great performance!" / "Earth shaking Drone madness." / "Saw him in Berlin tonight. Absolutely huge performance." / "thisquietarmy walked between drony soundscapes & punishing industrial beats, a really talented artist that deserves way more attention!" / "sounded like a shoegazing army not like a one-man-show"

Here's a proper review in German: http://kotzboy.com/?p=7357

The monday evening in-store gig at Bis Auf's Messer - best record store located in Friedrichshain was somewhat very different. The PA was pretty shitty and it kept distorting, even for the improvised ambient set that I was doing and I wasn't feeling it at all... Aidan joined me about half an hour into my set, and it was a tiny bit better... However in the middle of it, I got really distracted by one of my pedal's power supply crapping out, out of the blue. It was really strange. It just... died, while I was playing.

(Photo by Meryem Yildiz)

I was also pretty exhausted from climbling Teufelsberg (literally the Devil's Mountain) right before performing the gig. On the top of the mountain lies an abandoned US spy station, a relic from the Cold War, which was built over a Nazi college. To my surprise, the site was pretty easy to access, so it made for a pretty nice expedition.

Inside the top sphere, the natural acoustics and reverberation were phenomenal... there were people singing and playing guitar, or clapping.

Great 360 degrees city view throughout the whole site...

Band looking for credibility, shooting a video...

Expedition crew...

You can read more about it on this spy station here: http://www.abandonedberlin.com/2010/06/teufelsberg-abandoned-spy-station.html

On one of my other day off, I borrowed Leah's bike to check out the defunct Tempelhof airport, an iconic airport during WWII. It is now opened as a city park, with various events happening throughout the year. This space is huge! And biking on a runway is awesome.

http://www.tempelhoferfreiheit.de/

Bratislava

2011-06-08T13:34:00.002-04:00

We drove through Austria, into Slovakia.

Entering Bratislava...

This is the Danube river...

This is the venue, Obluda...

We were greeted by our young promoter and his gf (18 years old, maybe? cute!). They took us for a drink, then they pulled out some snacks and sandwiches from lunchboxes, which were made by the promoter's mom (double-cute!).

The show was well-attended enough; though there was this guy doing interpretative dance for both Aidan's & my set...

We slept at the promoter's band's practice space, which they vacuumed and cleaned up all afternoon for us. The bed consisted of a comforter on the floor, with two sleeping bags, two tiny pillows and a nightstand with more sandwiches, instant coffee, tea, bananas, cookies & incense! That didn't look so comfortable, so we pulled out extra sleeping bags and covers from the car, and padded up individual beds for the night... wasn't that bad.

I'm hoping this says that this building passed the inspection for rats and rodents...

The storm caught up with us in the morning, so we fled the scene as we had a long drive back to Berlin, through Czech Republic... our Budapest show being canceled before the tour.

Ljubljana

2011-06-07T14:22:00.002-04:00

Ljubljana baby! I was looking forward to Slovenia the most, I don't know why (Laibach! ok, no). I don't really know much about the country, even after reading the wiki page. Somehow, it seems like an "exotic" place to play for us North Americans. Maybe Belgrade or Zagreb would've topped it off...

Anyways, Rok the promoter, met up with us early afternoon and walked us a bit into the city. We had some pretty good falafel at Falafel...

went to Behemot, an English bookstore...

and was stuck in a coffee shop for an hour because of a mega storm upon us...

This is the radar image of the storm on Rok's laptop, we were right in the middle of the red...

The storm wouldn't end, so we had to call a cab to get back to the venue for soundcheck; the driver was pretty insane, btw! We almost got killed like 3 times along the way... It was also supposed to be a really short drive, but I have no idea where he went. Surprisingly, the fare was pretty cheap.

This is the venue & its surroundings, Menza Pri Koritu part of the Metelkova club and youth centre, ex-squats turned into a hub for creative leisure activities, arts & crafts, independent political action and cultural productions.

There was less people attending than expected, but Ljubljana wins the prize for the best sound guy and best sound of the tour... I think it sounded great from the stage and we even got a nice mixed soundboard/live recording (haven't heard it yet, but I have a feeling it could be usable).

Another highlight was meeting Mojca, whom I've known for more than 13 years (on and off) through the inter-webs. We met on opendiary.com around '97-'98, and we used to swap mix CDs. It was really nice to meet her after all those years! Back then, I didn't even play any guitar. But music brought me to Slovenia & that's kinda crazy/surreal if you think about it.

Rovereto

2011-06-06T13:45:00.012-04:00

From Switzerland, back to France and through the French alps by way of Tunnel du Mt. Blanc...

To Italy on the other side...

A storm a-comin'...

Up in the Italian Alps to the province of Trento...

Into Rovereto... (long drive)

We played a place called The Hub, which looks like some kind of... office/workshop space; people "looking busy" with their laptops on wide tables. Even after asking them what their purpose was, I still can't explain it... So I had to look it up on their website, here's what it says (italian google-translate): "We are facing a global crisis in the economic, social and ecological, innovative solutions are needed to address the numerous challenges that present themselves every day. The Hub was created to facilitate these solutions by creating a global network of collaborative spaces in which entrepreneurs and social innovators get together to make their ideas and plans for a sustainable society. We believe there is a shortage of good ideas in this world, but a serious lack of support structures for concrete form. The Hub offers you the chance to work, meet people, learn new things, create networks of collaboration and take off your projects . All this within a space equipped, welcoming and stimulating contact with a community of local and international innovators."

Um. Yeah. The Hub network expands everywhere in the world, from Amsterdam to Helsinki to Johannesburg to the likes of Halifax, Melbourne, Sao Paolo, Tel Aviv and... Rovereto? Alrighty then.

Oh yeah, I forgot. So it looks like we're indeed performing there tonight, it's on the calendar after all...

In the basement, where there's a nice arched space...

It was strange, yet interesting... It was a Monday evening after all, we don't complain on Mondays. On a side note, I may have one of the worst pizzas there (yes, in Italy). The espressos were great though!

Geneva

2011-06-05T11:00:00.005-04:00

Much like in Belgium, from the Flemish-speaking of Ghent to the French-speaking Brussels earlier in the week, a three-hour drive west from the Swiss-German speaking Zurich takes you to a French-speaking Geneva. I guess this is one of the beauties of Europe.

We arrived on a sunday afternoon, the city was quiet... Seems like everyone was cramming for their monday morning exam at the local Boreal Café, or maybe they were all at Les Bains de Paquis. Some sightseeing shots:

Banks!

Chess!

Mike Wong asian fast-food! (notice the Nike swoosh and the inverted McDonald's arch)

Synagogue! (pour la culture... meep)

No idea!

The gig was organized by Fernando of Cave12, the infamous nomadic series of diverse experimental music in Geneva (since 1989), which recently won a prize from the city for their dedication to the cultural music scene - ours was #221 à l'Écurie:

This was one of the best gig atmosphere of the tour - it was well attended, everyone was respectful and the venue (live room/pub division) was great. The soundcheck was also perfect. Lesson learned: when a soundcheck is too perfect, it means that the sound of the actual gig would be severely lacking as we don't take in account the body masses present in the room...

Unfortunately for me, the difference was quite destabilizing in this room, and I thus understood the importance of using stage monitors, even in a quadraphonic amplifier setting. The common mistake with this setting is that sound guys assume that because there are speakers at the back of the room coming towards you, that you would presumably hear the same sound as the audience. In theory, this is true... but in an empty room! (The same thing happened in Hamburg two years ago, I had forgotten about it... ). Nonetheless, that was a personal quirk and I think the performance was still well appreciated.

It was also really nice to meet Gaétan from three:four Records, as well as ex-Montrealer Jen from [sic] who currently lives in CH, and Marianne, an old acquaintance from Montreal who was doing one-year internship at the Graduate Institute.

Obligatory shot of the shower-in-the-kitchen apartment configuration:

Zürich

2011-06-04T21:04:00.007-04:00

I was looking forward to heading to Switzerland as we had a much significant guarantees for these shows. This usually means better confidence from the promoters that people will attend, i.e. worthwhile!

Also, everything is more expensive in Switzerland as the cost of life is higher. The promoter booked us a room at Kafischnaps, which was a trendy café with a designer-style themed-room hostel. The shared-bathroom was pretty fancy and I had the best shower of the tour so far... Everything was looking up already.

The promoter insisted on picking us up at the hostel for some reason, so we waited for him there. We'd transfer our gear and merch into his red BMW (side note: Auburn Lull was playing on the stereo), and drove us to Bazillus Club, which is usually a jazz club. It was interesting. Somehow, we were playing with this swiss-german industrial band called Krankenzimmer, which attracted a fairly industrial-goth crowd... Not exactly out of place for us, I didn't mind at all. After my set, one new fan girl even told me that I should be playing the Wave Gotik Treffen festival in Leipzig, which was happening on the upcoming weekend. Sure, I'd play if I was asked!

Since we saw that they were charging a 30 CHF cover for our show (also available was a 70 CHF V.I.P. cover to get the best seats in the house), we asked how much we should price our merch items. We were told 25 CHF, which translates to roughly 20€/25$! We thought it was a bit steep, even for Zürich standards - so we tuned it down to 20 CHF... On a side note, my 8" pizza was 25 CHF (paid by the promoter).

The gig went well, despite the unusual vibe. However, as soon as the 5-piece industrial band started to play, we couldn't wait to get back to the hostel as it was pretty loud and we were tired. The night ended up pretty late, we didn't have our car and our checkout time was at 10am the next morning.

On the way back, we passed through a prostitution strip (Sihlquai next to Limmatplatz, I think), which was pretty invading and graphic! A quick search on the internet revealed that prostitution is legal and on the rise in Switzerland, which is creating problems... so much that the Zürich police is launching drive-in sex boxes to enable prostitutes to conduct their business without disturbing the neighborhood... Goodnight, Zürich.

Metz

2011-06-03T20:51:00.007-04:00

We stayed at our friend Sam (Chez Kito Kat), who lives right in between Luxembourg and Metz, which was great as it would only take 45 minutes to go to town. We took advantage of it and stayed in most of the day, caught on sleep, emails, relaxing in the sunny backyard while LPs were spinning at 33 1/3 rpm. It was a nice day.

We played at a place called Eurofoot Café, which... sounds exactly like it is: TV screens and football jersey everywhere, very football-themed with fooseball and pool tables, ugly dirty blue foamy/bubbly-like wall textures. The place looked horrible. However, the promoter & his crew did everything they could to try and embellish the place to create a warm atmosphere, taping walls of paper to cover up all the junk.

But we still weren't into the vibe of the place, so much that we didn't even bother setting up the merch table for this gig. We had to wait for the football match to end before we could start playing, some people were playing pool while we played and there was this strong smell of artificial coconut that was really grating the whole time. Again, the show was poorly attended; the locals said it's because it was a Friday and small town people just want to party and get wasted... I took the opportunity to try out a pretty new noisy/heavy song that I haven't been able to play live yet, and I thought I did some pretty unusual improvisations as well - too bad I didn't record this set as I really enjoyed played that one!

Luxembourg

2011-06-02T20:21:00.004-04:00

We got into Luxembourg early afternoon. The first two things we noticed was how low the diesel price was compared to all the countries we've been through so far, and how much old people there was everywhere. According to wikipedia, the country has a representative democracy with a constitutional monarch, ruled by a grand duke. It is the world's only remaining sovereign grand duchy and the country has the world's highest GDP per capita. Does this sound like a good place to play dark, underground experimental music? Hmm.

We went to check out Café Rocas, the venue where we were playing and bumped into Gianni, the new drummer from Below the Sea, who lived in Montreal for a few years. He was in the area and came to greet us - that was a nice surprise! He pointed us to the cheapest food joint in the town's center and suggested us to take a walk around the walls of the city.

As for the show, it was a nice place to play but it was not well attended at all. Not sure if the fact that it was Ascension day and that everyone was away on holidays might have been a factor in this. A lot of friends who played there in the past (Below the Sea, Electroluminescent, Arms & Sleepers, etc.) have had great experiences... Sorry to say that Luxembourg was the probably one of the biggest disappointment of our tour.

Brussels

2011-06-01T12:30:00.005-04:00

We also had a hard time filling out this date, as our Belgium and Netherlands contacts didn't pan out. So, the week prior the tour, we were just looking for a place to stay between Ghent and Luxembourg. We made it to Brussels; obligatory frites & such - here's a couple of shots of La Grande Place:

A friend of mine from Montreal, renowned tattoo artist Yann Black called in a favor to his friend Kostek from La Boucherie Moderne, a fellow tattoo artist and musician, for us to stay over at his place. Turns out, Kostek was into having a gig in his home at the last-minute. He lives in this large three-story warehouse, which he also uses as his private tattoo parlor and a jam space (basement).

Aidan & I put the word out about this "secret private home gig" through our social networks, and I took care of taking reservations by email. We got around 20 RSVPs, while Kostek invited his friends to the event. Not bad, all things considered.

We decided to use the tattoo parlor as the stage, and went to get a bass and guitar amp stacked on top of each other as our sound system... I didn't want to run any beats through those amps, nor did I want to use much distortion for a home gig.

Also, there was a guy who brought his two kids, age 6-8 maybe... and they were standing in front of the stage the whole time, chattering, making noise & being hyper! (I learned from their dad that they were wearing earplugs). It was a weird gig... But the people seemed to have appreciated. The hat was passed around, and we got a decent amount for gas - not bad considering it was supposed to be another day off. Everything went better than planned... that is, until the after-party started and it all became spiraling-ly weird from that point on.

After the show, the host decided to go to bed early while "our guests" left the premises to go home. However, our host's guests somehow decided to stay over to party... And it went on for a while. On top of that, the kids that were at the show were asleep in one of the bed's where Aidan & I were supposed to sleep in. We didn't know how to kick them out, as the guy in charge basically told us that they wouldn't leave.

Our host finally came back downstairs to kick everyone out, except of course, the kids... So he threw a couple of those self-inflatable tents in the living room. Aidan & I flipped for it and I got the bed, while he took the tent on the stage and slept in there, while the guests were slowly leaving.

But the kids woke up in the middle of the night, panicked as they didn't know where they were. They were running around, bumping into things, screaming their lungs out trying to find their dad in the dark... Aidan had to deal with all that and had tried to calm them down as they were looking on the stage into his tent to see who was up there. When the kids found their dad, passed out on the couch and unable to wake him up, they were completely traumatized and just sat at his feet, scared and quiet... I actually did not hear any of it as I was pretty passed out myself due to a Jupiler, Leffe & Chimay beers w/ a smoke-filled house intoxication... on this bed in a closed corner:

Ghent

2011-05-31T16:55:00.015-04:00

The show took place in this old 15th century mansion, not far from the University's Art School... It belongs to some artist who is currently renovating the whole place, lent to Ondergrond for this special event.

It was kind of a release party featuring our Belgian label Consouling Sounds/Lunasylum (nice to meet Mike & Miguel!), who released the CD version of Aidan Baker & thisquietarmy's Orange, and Syndrome's Floating Veins (Syndrome features members of Amen Ra). I say kind of, because it didn't really feel like one... Though, the event was well attended, it mostly comprised of hipster-ish socialite students who may not really have an interest in the music... Ghent, from what I've seen, has a pretty big concentration of young people as its University is located near the center of the city.

The mansion had two floors and several rooms. All three performing artists, Syndrome (w/ Pieces of Quiet), Aidan Baker & myself had their own room with their own stage and PA. Upstairs, they were projecting a movie in one of the rooms...

During Syndrome, from the merch room:

Aidan & I were in adjacent rooms, back-to-back against the same wall but with passageways through both sides of us. We had the idea to do an impromptu secret collaboration at the end of my set, where he would start to play from his room and his sound would bleed into mine, and vice-versa... The audience would slowly catch on and see what was going on in Aidan's room, then come back to mine... It was a pretty cool concept but I was having a hard time hearing what Aidan was doing as his PA was smaller than mine, so I faded out after about 10 minutes.

Taken by @SQNCS on Twitter:

Northern France (day-off)

2011-05-30T15:31:00.006-04:00

We couldn't get another show in the area on a monday... Though, we were offered a couple of options a bit too on the west side, and it'd be a much too long ride to Belgium the next day. So we had the day off... Instead of hanging out in mad-Paris, we decided to take a long ride in the northern countryside.

We found the gallo-roman ruins of Champlieu, where there used to be a temple, a roman theater & baths:

Then we stopped in Compiègne to grab lunch. By the time we got there, everything was about to close, from noon to 2pm (sieste time) - even the parking meters.

Then we found a pamphlet at the tourist info for Coucy-Le-Château, so we decided to check it out:

And finally, we went to see the Canadian Vimy Ridge memorial and its trenches:

Back to Wanquetin to spend the night with more food and Belgian beers! We also watched music DVDs on the big screen & projector.

Paris

2011-05-29T11:51:00.007-04:00

The show in Paris was an afternoon show, at the Parc de la Villette, a huge public park where the Villette Sonique festival was on-going for the whole week. Artists this year ranged from Animal Collective to Current 93, Glenn Branca to Thurston Moore & Emeralds just to name a few. There are two huge stages on each side of the canal, and these shows are free.

Here's Oxbow (crossing paths with them again) - by the 2nd song, Eugene Robinson had stripped down already:

We weren't part of the official programming. We were playing a showcase for one of our label Basses Fréquences at the Villette Sonique's Village Label - which is a record fair representing several labels, bands, distros & stores in Paris and all over France, such as Music Fear Satan and Souffle Continu. We also only had a 30-minute slot for both of us - so Aidan & I decided to do a collaboration, fitting as we were on tour to promote our CD/LP re-issue of "Orange". The bands played inside of this red thing:

When we got there, we weren't really sure about this... It seemed like a big mess, and the park was filled with families having pic-nics and kids running around. Who knows if people were actually going to show up for us.

As we were setting up before playing, Aidan saw that there was an available drum kit. So he told the sound guy that he wanted to play drums instead, while I went: "...??!?!@#%!". Next thing I knew, Aidan was playing the drums on top of my improvised soundscapes... Yikes, talk about putting yourself in danger on stage, but hey we're er... professionals. But I noticed that the room filled up pretty quickly and everyone was sitting and being really receptive (i.e. quiet and in their bubble)... Here's a youtube, notice the children playing football behind us:

At the label's table of the Village Label - from left to right: Arnaud (three:four Records, just met!), Jerome (Basses Fréquences), thisquietarmy & Aidan Baker - photo taken by Vincent of (MesseBasse/Douleur Fantôme). Some networking & record sales happened.

The Valley LP was supposed to be on the table, but as you may know, it got delayed again at the pressing plant. The fair ended around 9pm, we packed up and headed to the Japanese 'hood (I didn't even know there was one! Japanese restaurants and Japanese people everywhere!) to eat some noodles, near Place de l'Opéra. We also took a walk to the Louvre.

Wanquetin

2011-05-28T10:18:00.006-04:00

Wanquetin is a very small town near Arras, in the North of France. Though there are trains from Paris or Lille to Arras, the only way to get to Wanquetin is by car. As you can imagine, it is always a struggle to have people come to the Plané Ari Home Gigs.

However, the intimacy and the warm welcoming reception from Marc is unparalleled. Lifts to/from the house can be provided, as well as the possibility of lodging or even camping in the backyard. To make it even more attractive, a concert-meal option (limited seating) is offered for each event, which means that concert attendees have the possibility to stay to eat with everyone after the show: the stage is cleared and the living room gets filled with tables and chairs to enjoy a nice home-cooked late-night complete dinner with main course, dessert & coffee/tea.

I recommend any ambient/experimental/electro-folk artist and music fans to try to play or attend a show there, definitely worth the trip! Pillows, couches or chairs are provided, depending whether you prefer to lay down or not. There was maybe 15 people at our show (there were a lot of last-minute cancellation the same day), but they were a great bunch, all very attentive, quiet and respectful... Perfect ambient show atmosphere. I played a completely improvised ambient set for the occasion.

Here's a picture of Aidan Baker on stage:

If that's not enough to convince you, maybe this will:

The best beer fridge ever!!! Filled with Marc's incredible selection of amazing beers for only 1.50 euros!!! My favorite were the Corsendonk and La Chouffe.

More??? Alright. On the top floor of the house, there are 4 spare bedrooms and a separate bathroom. Aidan and I each had our own room. Behind the door of each room, the internet password is written. Enough said, why would you ever leave this house.

There's even a donkey in the backyard! Come on, Paris - you have no idea what you're missing.

Marc also runs his radio show from there, as Docteur Adams.

Bochum

2011-05-27T08:54:00.011-04:00

The first show of the tour in Bochum took place in some kind of art center called FKT. We were greeted by Dimitri from thepostrock.de & his crew who were very welcoming! We were maybe supposed to play outside, but the rain and the wind were pretty menacing a few hours prior to our arrival, so it was decided to play indoors, in this white room at the end of the hall.

There was no PA/Soundsystem, so we had to play through a SoundCity/SunnO))) amp lent by Kodiak - which, while pretty powerful (the ceiling was falling on my head, while I was soundchecking, realizing it wasn't dandruff but cement powder), it didn't have enough range for my sound... the tubes were also distorting loudly the whole time and it wasn't very pleasant.

Anyway, the whole night was resumed quite well by thepostrock.de: here (google-translate if you don't speak German).

Here's another review.

Photos by Seb Eckert:

More photos from FKT photographer Cristobal Marquez:

http://droned-in-music.blogspot.com/2011/06/aidan-baker-thisquietarmy-in-bochum-27.html

Other tidbits:

- I had a schnitzel for supper. Very german!

- Sold the most merch in Bochum - that was a great start, though it all went downhill from there, until the last show of the tour in Hamburg (which topped it off), funnily enough...

- Timo & Thomas of Denovali were at the show, and it was very nice to meet them. Denovali will be re-issuing Unconquered in 2xLP and releasing my new album Resurgence in CD/2xLP. Very excited about this new partnership! They're a lovely label...

- The hostel we were put at was some christian hostel named after this guy "enthusiastic about Jesus Christ and his church loved him with its lights and shadows", I can't remember the name now... but I did not sleep very well that night. Also, because there were drunk people yelling outside all night.

- Aidan Baker & I had a photo shoot with Cristobal in the park the next day after breakfast (where we avoided tomatoes and cucumbers, because the whole e.coli thing...). Poses with guitars, lying down on the grass, in reverse head-to-head, etc. Quite funny/awkward.

Berlin (may 21-26; pre-tour)

2011-05-26T09:29:00.020-04:00

Before the tour, I flew into Berlin a week before the tour w/ Meryem of Vessels-artwork Meryem. We stayed at Aidan & Leah's in Kreuzberg and went pretty much everywhere... !

Aside from the obligatory touristic attraction such as Brandenburg Gates, Checkpoint Charlie, Berliner Dom, Berlin Wall, Holocaust Memorial, etc. - we also went to the Museum für Naturkunde, the Dali museum, the Helmut Newton photography museum, rented bikes to the Soviet Memorial in Treptowers Park... but we mostly wanted to hang out in Kreuzberg, great neighborhood to live in.

Here are some pictures from Meryem:

Check out the rest of her photo album of our trip (must-see!): here.

We also went to a few shows! Phosphorescent at Magnet Club, Oxbow performing an acoustic-set in some gallery (ok, we actually missed the whole set minus a couple of songs, but got free beers that we took with us for the subway ride!), Lichens opening for Explosions in the Sky at the Astra; it was good to see Robert there - we hung out after the show but they had to leave pretty soon after to head to Cologne overnight. Oh yeah, what's with Explosions playing in front of 2000 people - that's just crazy... it was hot and sweaty, and the sound suffered. I still remember the shows in front of 50 people at Casa del Popolo, some 10+ years ago.

Also, Kevin Drumm at NK in Neukolln - NK is an artist run independent non-profit organization dedicated to sound arts, which has rehearsal rooms, concerts & workshops. Erik from Svarte Greiner/Deaf Center has his studio there.

On the last day, we were eating ice cream in our 'hood park while a WWII bomb alert evacuation was in effect (found under the Oberbaum bridge)... Everyone went home except those who didn't understand German nor Turkish (oh, hay).

See ya later, Berlin! Tour starts now...

Aidan Baker & thisquietarmy - Eurotour 2011 (May 27-June 16)

2011-05-24T11:33:00.004-04:00

Tour begins Friday May 27th... These are the final and official dates. Unfortunately, the shows in Hungary & Poland were canceled.

Please spread the word around! Thanks.

May 27 - Bochum, Germany @ Freies Kunst Territorium

https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=174705775921256

May 28 - Wanquentin, France @ Le Plané Ari Home Gigs

https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=203128803054621

May 29 - Paris, France @ Villette Sonic (Village Label, Free show)

https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=223504564327355

May 31 - Ghent, Belgium @ Sint-Lucas Beeldende Kunst - w/ Syndrome

https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=201144929928138

June 01 - Brussels, Belgium @ Private Home Gig - by reservation only

RSVP: thisquietarmy@gmail.com for info.

June 02 - Luxembourg, Luxembourg @ Rocas - w/ Dog Bless You

https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=203951659639028

June 03 - Metz, France @ Eurofoot Café - w/ Dog Bless You

https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=198801253494509

June 04 - Zurich, Switzerland @ Bazilus - w/ Krankenzimmer 204

https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=210749585612114

June 05 - Geneva, Switzerland @ L'Écurie de l'Ilôt

http://www.cave12.org/AIDAN-BAKER-THISQUIETARMY

June 06 - Rovereto, Italy @ The Hub

http://www.last.fm/event/1943604+Aidan+Baker+-+thisquietarmy

June 07 - Ljubljana, Slovenia @ Menza Pri Koritu

http://www.menzaprikoritu.org/?p=7829&lang=en

June 08 - Bratislava, Slovakia @ Obluda w/ Pjoni

https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=213243705361711&ref=ts

June 11 - Berlin, Germany @ Bei Roy - w/ Nadja

https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=207364982635651

June 13 - Berlin, Germany @ Bis Auf's Messer

https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=198349516867024

June 14 - Dresden, Germany @ AZ Conni - w/ Khuda

https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=123059551106187

June 16 - Hamburg, Germany @ Markthalle - w/ Nadja, Svarte Greiner

https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=124937124251827

last-minute warm up show!

2011-05-14T19:18:00.003-04:00

Last-minute warm up show, Sunday May 15th at Deathouse (Fattal Lofts, in St-Henri... somewhere around 679 St-Remi) w/ Monarch (France), Alaskan & Courtaud.

Last-minute addition! Velnias from Colorado!!! Insane line-up.

New shirts for the upcoming EU tour.

2011-05-09T15:21:00.003-04:00

New thisquietarmy shirts made for the upcoming EU tour... abstract birds/lungs/roots/blood, designed by me. interpret it however you want...

If you can't make it to the shows, you can get one here: http://thisquietarmy.com/records/#tqats003

Vessels CD

2011-04-19T01:50:00.005-04:00

Just received a few promo copies of the Vessels CD... it turned out really great!

Photography by the one & only Meryem Yildiz, artwork layout & music by yours truly.

The glued-in booklet is the novelty item in this digipak... Also included, is the CD-only bonus cover song of Joy Division's 'New Dawn Fades'. Both of these elements will not appear on the LP version.

Check it out! Click to zoom:

Aidan Baker & thisquietarmy - Orange LP available!

2011-04-16T15:33:00.005-04:00

Orange Milk Records have the first batch of Orange LPs up for sale on their webstore:

http://orangemilkrecords.storenvy.com/products/80393-aidan-baker-thisquietarmy-lp

Each one of them is hand printed by Seth Graham in Brooklyn, NY - and they will have different series of colors for each batch. Available in orange or black wax.

Listen:

&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href="http://orangemilkrecords.bandcamp.com/album/orange"&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Orange by Orangemilk records&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;

++ First reviews by Fluid Radio & Attn Magazine ++

New Audio Liturgy: Friday April 8th - Brooklyn, NY

2011-04-05T01:26:00.005-04:00

thisquietarmy will be performing as part of the NYC/MTL Soundart Alliance, curated by Ha-Yang Kim & The Invisible Dog Art Center.

This will be happening this Friday April 8th, 10pm at The Invisible Dog in Brooklyn, NY.

This show is free.

An evening of audio liturgy curated by Ha-Yang Kim

Musicians from Montréal and New York’s underground soundart/noise/psychadelic/improv/avant-experimental scene join forces activating poetics of vocalizations, visceral vibrations, shimmering strings, magnificent resonance, and dynamic power electronics for ecstatic new audio liturgy.

Hahn Rowe (NYC) / This Quiet Army (Eric Quach-MTL) / Lichens (Robert Lowe-NYC) / Souffle (Riccardo Lucchesi/Jean-Sébastien Truchy-MTL) / Monstre (Philippe Lambert-MTL) / ES/IS (Riccardo Lucchesi/Jean-Sébastien Truchy/John Chang-NYC) /Ha-Yang Kim (NYC)

http://theinvisibledog.org/2011/03/23/nycmtl-soundart-alliance/

Aidan Baker & thisquietarmy - Orange re-issue + Europe tour

2011-03-31T11:32:00.011-04:00

The first collaboration with Aidan Baker, initially released as a very limited CD-R on TQA Records in 2006, is being re-issued with 4 extra tracks from the same session on both CD & LP by two new labels, Lunasylum (Belgium) & Orange Milk (USA). Different artwork & track order.

We'll also be doing a 3-week tour of Europe in support of the release, as well as our other solo outputs. Dates have already been secured for Germany, France, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Slovenia, Hungary, Poland, etc. Here's what it looks like for now:

May 27 - Bochum, DE @ K Gallery
May 28 - Wanquentin, FR @ Le Plané Ari Home Gigs
May 29 - Paris, FR @ Villette Sonic
May 30 -
May 31 - Ghent, BE @ venue TBA - w/ Syndrome
June 01 -
June 02 - Luxembourg, LX @ Rocas
June 03 - Metz, FR @ venue TBA
June 04 - Zurich, CH @ Bazilus
June 05 - Geneva, CH @ L'Écurie de l'Ilôt
June 06 -
June 07 - Ljubljana, SL @ Menza Pri Koritu
June 08 - Bratislava, SK @ Obluda w/ Pjoni
June 09 - Budapest, HU @ Dürer Kert
June 10 - Krakow, PL @ venue TBA *
June 11 - Wroclaw, PL (TBC) *
June 12 -
June 13 - Berlin, DE @ Bis Auf's Messer
June 14 - Dresden, DE @ AZ Conni - w/ Khuda
June 15 -
June 16 - Hamburg, DE @ Markthalle *

* = also w/ Nadja performance

We're still looking to fill up some holes. More details soon.

CD by Lunasy lum.

Official release date: May 2nd, 2011 (pre-order already in effect).

Also look for the "Orange" & "A Picture of Picture" CDs collector's package.

LP by Orange Milk Records.

Should be available in April/May 2011 as well.

Parallel Lines video, live at the Under The Snow festival

2011-03-29T22:54:00.004-04:00

Our friends at WE ARE POST ROCK filmed a good part of our first official Parallel Lines set (11/3/11), 100% improv trio with Pascal Asselin on drums, Ryan Ferguson on synths & myself on guitar.

Check it out:

For Japan...

2011-03-11T10:18:00.002-05:00

Parallel Lines plays Under The Snow tonight!

2011-03-11T10:02:00.003-05:00

Vessels announced by Aurora Borealis

2011-02-09T17:24:00.003-05:00

+ AURORA BOREALIS presents +

(click to read)

Release date: March 28th, 2011

For more info, details & promo,

Please email: promo@aurora-b.com

Here's a stream of the first track "The Pacific Theater",

which I uploaded on Bandcamp for previewing purposes only :

Entretien avec RING

2011-02-09T16:41:00.004-05:00

Here's an interview I did for RING magazine in France :

http://www.surlering.com/article/article.php/article/interview-thisquietarmy

You can google-translate it, it's actually not bad at all...

On a side note, there's a 2-page spread about Basses Fréquences, my french label, in the january issue of the new NoiseMag (http://www.noisemag.net/), available in french-speaking European countries - it includes a review of Aftermath & a press picture of thisquietarmy :

thisquietarmy's top of 2010

2011-02-09T16:30:00.003-05:00

Here's my top of 2010, courtesy of Textura:

http://textura.org/reviews/2010artistspicks.htm

And some additional things through the Dead Pilot Records blog:

http://deadpilotrecords.wordpress.com/2010/12/29/2010/

Top of 2010

2011-02-09T16:04:00.008-05:00

thisquietarmy - Aftermath, #14 on Textura:

http://textura.org/archives/articles/2010top10s.htm

thisquietarmy - Aftermath, dans les trésors cachés de 2010, Indie Rock Mag:

http://www.indierockmag.com/article13135.html

thisquietarmy - Aftermath,

Mains de Givre - Esther Marie,

thisquietarmy & Yellow6 - Death,

in various top 10 list of the Emoragei staff of writers:

http://www.emorageimagazine.com/old/palmares/top-2010

thisquietarmy & Scott Cortez - Meridians, #43 on Fluid Radio:

http://www.fluid-radio.co.uk/2010/12/50-for-2010-no-43/

Mains de Givre - Esther Marie, #18 on Fluid Radio:

http://www.fluid-radio.co.uk/2010/12/50-for-2010-no-18/

Mains de Givre - Esther Marie, #19 on The Milk Factory:

http://www.themilkfactory.co.uk/st/2010/12/the-2010-review/

Mains de Givre - Esther Marie, #86 on The Silent Ballet:

http://www.thesilentballet.com/tsbt/2010/90_81.html

thisquietarmy & Yellow6 - Death LP, in Noveller's top 10 of 2010:

http://www.omgvinyl.com/2010/12/31/top-ten-albums-of-2010-by-sarah-lipstate-noveller/

thisquietarmy article on Coilhouse!

2010-12-19T13:23:00.002-05:00

S. Elizabeth wrote a wonderful in-depth article about thisquietarmy, related project and label for the awesome Coilhouse magazine + blog. Go read it here:

thisquietarmy + Yellow6 - DEATH LP now available + X-MAS SPECIALS

2010-12-10T13:00:00.006-05:00

THISQUIETARMY + YELLOW6 - DEATH LP

DEATH is the first of two installments.

Tracklist:

A1. Sand
A2. Furnace
B1. Salt

Label: Basses Frequences (France)

Format: 12" 180g LP (ed. 480, 400 gold/80 black) + download
Release date: November 19th, 2010
Mastering: Fear Falls Burning (Dirk Serries)
Artwork: Eric Quach + Jon Attwood

++

NORTH AMERICA - BUY HERE: http://thisquietarmy.com/records/#bf31a
EUROPE/REST - BUY HERE: http://bassesfrequences.org/mailorder/catalog.htm or through the TQA specials: http://thisquietarmy.com/records/#anylpanycd

++

TQA(R) X-MAS SPECIALS:

ANY LP + ANY CD for 20$ + shipping: http://thisquietarmy.com/records/#anylpanycd
BUY 2 CDS + GET 1 FREE: purchase any 2 and mention the 3rd free one.

DEATH Gold LP

2010-11-27T16:37:00.001-05:00

Looks real good... Picture doesn't do it justice, apparently... can't wait to get them!

However, press plant fuck-up: 400 gold were made instead of 80, and no black. BF has now requested 80 blacks, which is now the limited color. Read about it here: http://bassesfrequences.wordpress.com/2010/11/26/update-of-death/

The LPs are making their way to the TQA store, should get them early december.

Black Friday/X-Mas Sale!

2010-11-26T12:44:00.002-05:00

BLACK FRIDAY/X-MAS SALE!

Buy any 2 CDs and get 1 free (label and distro CDs only, excluding LPs/T-shirts/books). Just make your purchases as usual and mention in the notes: "BLACK FRIDAY/X-MAS" as well as the free CD you want.

Sale effective until x-mas.

http://thisquietarmy.com/records/

First two reviews of DEATH by Textura & Animal Psi

2010-11-21T14:08:00.004-05:00

Textura review:

Animal Psi review:

‘Death’ is a collaboration between guitarists and fast-friends Eric Quach (thisquietarmy) and Jon Attwood (Yellow 6). Three tracks over 2 sides, “Sand”, “Furnace”, and “Salt” are a loosely- and minimally-themed triptych of metal-ringed vibrations and elongated effects, bleary and blurry somewhere between the abstraction of Taiga Remains and the cinemaphonics of Steven R. Smith. If necessary, a drone record, ‘Death’ defies the comfort of the category with contours of stringed strum like uneven boards with unsunken nails - snags along the surface – which reveal themselves with time, growing more and more apparent through the 7, 12, then 17 minute tracks which ultimately become a vaporous mass of bled-together tones. Gorgeous but/and longing. Available soon from Basses Frequences HERE

Pre-order for DEATH LP now effective

2010-11-19T19:25:00.001-05:00

DEATH IS UPON US!
thisquietarmy + Yellow6 - Death 12" LP

PRE-ORDER from BASSES FRÉQUENCES is now in effect!
http://www.bassesfrequences.org/mailorder/catalog.htm

If you want to make sure to get one of the 80 limited 180g gold LPs (of course black is also available) ---- you better head there right now!!

These will be shipped on November 29th.
Good luck to all the gold diggers...

Meridians reviews on Foxy Digitalis, Autres Directions, New Noise

2010-11-17T12:17:00.005-05:00

Foxy Digitalis: 9/10.

New Noise (ex-Noise Magazine): 8/10

Autres Directions:

thisquietarmy live at Christ's Church Cathedral

2010-10-29T13:07:00.002-04:00

Here's a video of my performance at the Christ's Church Cathedral in Hamilton a few weeks ago. Filmed it myself with a Canon Tx1 on a tripod, and recorded sound with a Zoom H4n, mixed and edited at TQA-HQ. I'm trying to gather more footage from a different angle to make it more interesting, but for now - watch this (10' segment, youtube friendly) :

CKUT live performance available

2010-10-27T11:25:00.004-04:00

You can listen to the live in-studio performance I did yesterday afternoon, for of the Kitchen Bang Bang Law funding drive show, which aired on the radio. Two 10-minutes improvised compositions.

You can download it in the CKUT archive:
http://tinyurl.com/25z3llv

Tuesday October 26th, 2010
Hour 2: 10'30-40'00

Aural Diptych Series #5: Noveller / unFact

2010-10-25T02:06:00.003-04:00

Aural Diptych Series # 5 : Noveller / unFact
Released: October 31st, 2010

Preview :

Double-split 3" CDR placed on a heavy stock folded & printed insert, packaged in a felt-textured harvest yellow envelope, with printed artwork by New York City-based artist Elayne Safir. It includes two sets of diptych photography by Montreal-based artist Meryem Yildiz. This releases comes with a digital download code with bonus tracks. LIMITED TO 100 COPIES ONLY.

ADS05 features two of the hottest names in the U.S. ambient scene today: Noveller & unFact. Noveller is Sarah Lipstate from Brooklyn NY - one-time member of Parts & Labor and Coldcave. unFact is David Wm. Sims from NYC, the bassist for the legendary noise rock band The Jesus Lizard.

On their US tour together last summer, they stopped by at CKUT 90.FM in Montreal to perform both solo & collaborative sets on the program New Shit, hosted by Lorrie Edmonds. The performance was recorded by Joe Winer & Andy White, and produced by Andrea-Jane Cornell. The release was made available for Noveller & unFact's European tour this fall, with none other than Aidan Baker. Special thanks to CKUT for letting us use the recording.

Disc 1 : Noveller - Live at CKUT

1. Toothness (for Chris Habib) / 2. Fades / 3. Redgrave

Disc 2 : unFact - Live at CKUT

1. Ox Ghost / 2. Hard World for Little Things / 3. Tell Me What You Need To Say

Bonus Digital Tracks (download included) :
Top Sister, aka Noveller & unFact collaborative set - Live at CKUT

1. Live improvisation / 2. Pre-show Practice.

PURCHASE HERE: http://thisquietarmy.com/records/#tqa017

Aural Diptych Series #4: Yellow6 / Absent Without Leave

2010-10-25T01:59:00.002-04:00

Aural Diptych Series # 4 : Yellow6 / Absent Without Leave
Released: October 31st, 2010

Preview :

Double-split 3" CDR placed on a heavy stock folded & printed insert, packaged in a crumply brown paper bag envelope, with printed artwork by New York City-based artist Elayne Safir. It includes two sets of diptych photography by Montreal-based artist Meryem Yildiz. This releases comes with a digital download code with bonus tracks. LIMITED TO 100 COPIES ONLY.

This release teams up two recurrent names that have often been tagged as ambient, post-rock & electronica: Yellow6 & Absent Without Leave.

Disc 1 : Yellow 6 - Further Loops, notes and sketches

1. 05 Aug 2010 #03 / 2. 05 Aug 2010 #04 / 3. Tuesday 25 May 2010 / 4. 05 Aug 2010 #01

Yellow6 is Jon Attwood, a guitarist who grew up in the early 80s London punk scene in which he played in many bands. Inspired by space/post-rock, he launched his solo project in the mid-90s and went on to release 9 albums on various labels including the defunct Resonant Records and co-founded Make Mine Music (Epic45, Piano Magic, Library Tapes, July Skies). On this release, he documents his experimentations with newly acquired toys such as the Fender Bass VI guitar, Boss Feedbacker & EHX Freeze pedals.

Disc 2 : Absent Without Leave - Waiting for the Snow to Fall

1. Part 1 / 2. Part 2 / 3. Part 3.

Absent Without Leave is George Mastrokostas from Athens, Greece - not a place reknowned for its ambient/post-rock scene. Yet, it works to his advantage as Absent Without Leave stretches out his arms to artists from around the world, has collaborated with the likes of Port-Royal, Millimetrik & Televise, and has released objects on labels in Canada, UK, USA, Japan as well as his own Sound in Silence. For this release, George presents a long 3-part piece called 'Waiting for the snow to fall', which somehow reminds us of a hastier, driven composition from Stars of the Lid.

PURCHASE HERE: http://thisquietarmy.com/records/#tqa016

Last performances for this year, condensed in one week.

2010-10-19T19:23:00.014-04:00

Upcoming last performances for this year, all in one week... then I'm hibernating, working on recordings, a lot of mixing to finish, a lot of ideas, a lot of side-project to work on, etc. You know the drill. Performing takes a lot of focus out of the process of creation and production...

Summary will be as follow:
- 8 thisquietarmy shows in Montreal
- 11 thisquietarmy shows out-of-town (Qc, TR, Hfx, Ott, Ham, Guelph, To, VT)
- 5 offshoot projects performances (MdG, hmqt, Ghidrah)

++

Last official thisquietarmy show planned for this year:

Saturday, October 23rd 2010, 9pm
@ Casa Del Popolo, 4873 St-Laurent, Montreal
w/ Locomotiv (heavy local psychedelic stoner, new line-up)

++

Radio appearance and live performance at CKUT:

Tuesday, October 26th 2010, 1pm
@ Kitchen Bang Bang Law, CKUT 90.3 FM
Funding drive show with Vincent Tinguely
Listen live at: http://www.ckut.ca

++

Last performance of the year, as "hi my quiet tsar":

'hi my quiet tsar' is the live decomposition and reconstruction of thisquietarmy, the guitar-based ambient/drone project of Eric Quach from Montreal. While thisquietarmy's live performances are presented as real-time multimedia installations with structured compositions to prepared videos, 'hi my quiet tsar' acts as a live lab for experimentation & improvisation and is usually performed with (but not limited to) a synthesizer, fx & loop-samplers.

Saturday, October 30th 2010, 9pm
@ Cagibi, 5490 St-Laurent, Montreal

The Finite State Machine presents:
Pearls of Light, an evening of electronic music
w/ Freida Abtan, Ad·ver·sary & Holzkopf.

Friday October 8th: Christ's Church Cathedral, Hamilton

2010-10-06T02:24:00.003-04:00

New Harbour Music Series & Art Crawl present:

thisquietarmy
Friday October 8th, 2010
Christ's Church Cathedral
252 James St. N, Hamilton
9pm + pwyc

poster by thisquietarmy

Théâtre Plaza w/ Miserere Luminis + Falls of Rauros, Sept. 24th

2010-10-03T14:30:00.008-04:00

Sepulchral Productions, Montreal's underground black metal label & promoter, invited me to perform on a bill with Miserere Luminis, a collaboration between Gris & Sombres Forêts from Montreal & Quebec, and Falls of Rauros from Portland, ME. The idea of fitting on that bill & playing for a black metal crowd seemed odd at first, but it's also what drew me in as well. I liked the challenge and I'd rather play for new people anyway. Playing in a completely different music scene is like playing in an entirely different country.

The show took place at Théâtre Plaza, which is a really nice theater (approx cap. 500?) that is being used for the weekly shoot of Belle et Bum, a musical variety show with Genevieve Borne & Normand Brathwaite on Tele-Quebec. If that wasn't weird enough, this is also where I saw Godspeed You! Black Emperor four nights in a row, in January 2002. Back then, the place was falling apart and all, which fitted the mood... But now it has been given a face lift and it's fully equipped for high-end sound and lightning.

The latter was part of the problem for my performance. When you're playing such a big venue with tech, sound, light crews... you're completely at their mercy, no matter how much instructions you give them during pre-show. As a result, my video projections, a very important aspect of my performance, malfunctioned at the beginning and in the middle of my set, then completely disappeared. It really disoriented me as the videos are more than just a visual support, they're like my virtual band mates, and they're also being used to hypnotize and draw in the ADD-ers and get them to focus. When the videos failed, the light crew started to use some disco spotlights to try to compensate, which were really distracting and totally not appropriate. Sound-wise, I also made a bad choice bringing my two Traynor tube combos for such a big space, after my two shows with Caspian (see previous entry), and I was pushing them too hard.

Nonetheless. Considering that most people had never seen me before, the response was still good even though I wasn't satisfied with my performance. Sold some merch, signed some autographs (that's always funny) & got paid well. All in all, a solid evening for me - huge thanks to Sepulchral for having me.

The other bands were pretty good too and they all really liked what I did, which is always good, coming from other musicians, especially 'metal' ones which are usually more technically skilled than myself. I hung out with Falls of Rauros after the show and the day after. I took them around, to Profusion, to the Old Port, then to Aux Vivres for dinner. They're all really nice people and we got along great. We'll probably cross paths again, soon hopefully.

Here's a couple of blog reviews of the show:
http://lunarhypnosis.blogspot.com/2010/09/miserere-luminis-092410.html
http://boulevardbrutal.com/2010/09/27/miserere-luminis-la-fin-dune-sombre-aventure/

And photos that were sent to me by Bakt El Raalis:

Next show: October 8th at Christ's Church Cathedral in Hamilton, ON. - presented by the New Harbours Music Series. My 2nd cathedral show this year... !

Shows with Caspian Sept. 18-19 in Montreal & Burlington, VT

2010-09-28T20:59:00.007-04:00

So here's a short account about the two shows with Caspian during the weekend of the 18-19th of September. The Montreal show was moved from Bar St-Laurent II in the Mile End to Loft from Hell in St-Henri. If you don't know what that means, well it's like moving a show from Manhattan to Brooklyn if the former's the really cool hip & trendy cultural artsy area, and the latter is where the cheap low-rent trashy area.

Caspian usually attracts the clean-cut preppies and yuppies, so it was interesting to see who who trek down to St-Henri for a sweaty, dirty loft show in a courtyard surrounded by industrial lofts, practice spaces occupied by a commune of squeegee-punks & their nasty dogs. I'm pretty sure some drove by it and went back home. Some didn't even find the place, as it is hard to find as it's hidden behind a huge building whose civic number was the last one on the street, next to train tracks, above an underpass, near an alley. The good thing about all this is that the venue is really small, maybe 400 square ft. of space between the stage and the backwall. The other good thing is that when it's loud, it's fucking loud, and there is no escape.

For this show, I used some amps I found in the loft... I went there early to check what I could use, as there is no PA. I found a Ampeg Bass head going through a 2x15" cab, and a Laney guitar head through a 4x12" Marshall cab. TOTAL FACE MELTER. Might have been one of my most satisfactory performance, and that says a lot. I wish I had a picture of my setup, but I only have this picture of the courtyard while I was practicing some drones at the Loft around 4pm that afternoon:

++

The next day, I was scheduled to play in Burlington, VT. More precisely: Winooski. Caspian was nice enough to do me the huge favor to drive my equipment across the border with their own stuff. Meryem joined me at the last minute for the 90 mins drive to the USA. When we arrived at the Monkey House venue, the nice guys from Black Lodge booking brought us some food that they made. We also had 2$ off bar consumption, so I had a few of the local Switchback on tap. Did you know that Burlington, Vermont is named the 4th best city in the WORLD for beer lovers?

Anyway. During the whole time, I was thinking about my show the night before with the two amps, and how I couldn't go back to playing into the PA anymore. Especially the Monkey House's, which looked like it would sound really thin & weak. I was really starting to stress about that. Finally, I asked Philip and Chris from Caspian if I could borrow their amps, and they agreed. Philip had a Fender Twin Reverb going into a 4x12" cab, and Chris had this really nice head (forget the name --- but wow, I felt bad about using it) going into an 8x10" cab. It sounded really amazing, and I think it might've been even louder than at the loft. Again, I wish I took a picture of that set-up. Thank you so much guys. I don't know what the Burlington crowd thought of my set, they were sort of Abercrombie & Fitch-ish mixed with Birkenstock-ers - a lot of them seemed uninterested, going outside back and forth during the whole evening. One Vermont Cynic didn't say anything bad about the performance, so that's good.

On the way back home to Montreal (left Winooski around 12:30am), we almost hit a deer. It was really freaky as it didn't flinch nor react... AT ALL. I've witness the true meaning of 'deer in headlights':

Ok, so that wasn't so short. I will write about The Théâtre Plaza show aka the Black Metal show, in another entry.

GAMIQ nomination & review of Meridians by EtherREAL

2010-09-25T23:29:00.006-04:00

thisquietarmy's album Aftermath was nominated for 'Best experimental album of the year' by the GAMIQ (Gala Alternatif de la Musique Indépendante du Québec). The nominees were revealed last wednesday and the winner will be determined by a specialized jury and will be announced at the gala on November 14th.

I'm not taking this seriously, of course. However, one thing is certain: the nominees were voted by the local press, media, record stores, labels, promoters, etc. So it's definitely cool to have gotten noticed by the "industry" and appear in that list. I'm up against fellow friends & colleagues Menace Ruine, Black Feelings, Grimes, Millimetrik & K.A.N.T.N.A.G.A.N.O., whom I've all crossed paths with...

On another note, Fabrice Allard of EtherREAL, a reputed french webzine, seized the essence of the Meridians EP w/ Scott Cortez and wrote an excellent review in French. Always glad to read one of his reviews.

I've just played 3 shows this week, I'll be writing about these shortly in another entry...

thisquietarmy + Yellow6 - DEATH announced by Basses Fréquences

2010-09-14T21:10:00.004-04:00

Basses Fréquences has announced the release of the first installment of my collaboration with Yellow6 titled 'DEATH' for October 2010. The recording took place in Montreal when Jon (Yellow6) was in town for the Under The Snow festival in March '09, and it was mastered by Dirk Serries of Fear Falls Burning fame!

We are happy that BF has picked it up; I personally love to deal with Jerôme, especially for this record, because it's like he was part of our band and he played a great role tying up loose ends to help us finalize the album's concept, titles & artwork. He's also very attentive to every suggestion and every detail of the production. BF is a great emerging label in the ambient scene and they are highly motivated to release quality products!

'DEATH' will be released as a 180g 12" vinyl LP + CD!
Edition of 400 = 320 black + 80 gold.

We couldn't ask better...

Read the press release details by BF: here.
Listen to samples on BF's release page for TQA+Y6: here.

Interview with The Silent Ballet

2010-09-10T16:27:00.011-04:00

Interview with Tom Meagher for TSB.

Another lengthy one. Here are the main topics covered:

- Scott Cortez / Meridians / three:four Records
- Album themes
- The Montreal music scene
- Live performances
- The ambient music genre
- Visuals
- TQA Records
- Future releases

Thanks to Tom & TSB for this coverage!

++

On a side note: TSB is a pretty active webzine that covers all genre of instrumental music & more, and I really appreciate them. They've always treated me well, all my records I've been involved in have been given fair reviews and great scores even though I have been hearing bad things about their reviews from peers, as I mentionned in a previous entry, which is unfortunate.

Perhaps "hateful" is an exaggeration and I'd gladly re-iterate the term since "hateful" isn't exactly from my point of view, but rather from the resentment I've been feeling from other artists and labels that get bitter when they get a bad review, understandably. I won't name any names, and I do feel bad for them because sometimes I also don't agree with the reviews that were given. But as usual, I find myself in this neutral zone as I understand their hostility as hard working artists & labels as much as I understand the reviewer's right for opinion. Thus, "harsh" is a more fitting term for their overall reputation. On the other hand, I do approve of the need for harsh reviews, it filters the mediocre out from the over-saturation of material that there is out there. As long as everyone plays nice and is respectful of each other!

A TSB writer recently contacted me to discuss about it and has pointed out that most people who read the site don't pay attention to their scoring breakdown. I am also guilty of this, and I think it's pretty enlightening:

++

The Silent Ballet uses a 10 point scale with .5 increments. 5 denotes an "average" score, and anything above that is considered generally positive, whereas anything below is generally negative. The Silent Ballet editorial staff respects the views and opinions of its reviewers, and due to this practice exact scoring will differ from reviewer to reviewer. However, reviewers are asked to rate albums with the following goal in mind:

* The 5-5.5 range denotes an "above average" release.
* The 6-6.5 range denotes a "good" release.
* The 7-7.5 range denotes a "great" release.
* 8 and above marks a cd of exceptional accomplishment.

The bottom half of the scale is a mirror reflection of the top, completing the idealized bell curve, but TSB reviewers are notorious for being unable to tell a "horrible" album from one that is just plain "bad."

++

This is like the french high-school system (from France, but in Quebec) that I went to. Everything was graded on /20, but 12/20 was considered good and you needed 10/20 to pass. However, there was rarely anyone that received a grade above 16/20, especially in French literature classes. It was pretty harsh grading, but everyone who went through that school wrote in french a hell lot better than most people. Something to think about...

shows with unFact & Noveller last week

2010-09-05T19:05:00.011-04:00

I recently played shows with Noveller & unFact (David Wm Sims of Jesus Lizard) in Toronto (August 28th) and Quebec City (August 31st). It was good to meet them. Thanks to Tad & Luke for setting up the shows.

Not much to say about them; the weather was really hot and humid. I gotta say that it was difficult to enjoy traveling and performing while breathing such heavy air; the atmosphere of both shows were somehow stale, exhaustive and almost depressing. The Toronto show, a saturday, felt like a monday or a tuesday, while the Quebec show was actually on a tuesday - so that was forgivable. I've never liked Toronto, I just get this 'why am I here' feeling every time I'm there, which is like 4-5 times a year. It's hard to get a good show there too, everything is so spread out and there's no tight scene, but I'm always trying to play there because in Canada's biggest city, there's gotta people who likes ambient and I gotta try to conquer them. The urban planning of the city hurts my eyes and makes me nauseous as well - definitely one of my least favorite city, sorry. The pulled-pork Big Fat Burrito in Kensington Market, while pretty good & filling, barely makes up for it, sadly. Speaking of food, one thing I like to do in Quebec City is stock up on pizza and quiches at Le Crac on St-Jean, and put them in the freezer for times you don't feel like cooking in the next month.

Weirdly, the highlight of this mini-tour was actually Hamilton, where I did not perform but drove there a day earlier to hang out with my friend Ryan/Electroluminescent & Beth. We had a good time hitting a lot of bars in town. I barely remember what we did actually, it's a haze, which means we had a good time. We started by getting beer & food at some type of pub-house place; popcorn alligator, sweet potato fries & vegetarian nachos were consumed while playing board games. Then we went to Academia, this sketchy bar on James St. - nicely decorated with airplanes and sports memorabilia left from previous owners. It was empty but we went for the cheap 2.50$ pint. Then we stopped by The Brain where they had a unique selection of beers I've never seen in their fridge, and some weird local encounter. Later, we walked back and bumped into people coming out of a house party. Turns out, it was actually a house show and there were people from Montreal playing! Of course, it was the Hobo Cult tour, with Magic Beach, JLK and Bernardino Femminielli accompanied by JS (of Red Mass, ex-Fly Pan Am, etc.) on bass. We got in just in time for the performance of the latter, which really made our night. We all went out for more beer later at the Four Stars Corner bar or whatever it's called, where more weird encounters ensued... I'll skip the details. We did however managed to stretch the bar's closing time up 'til 2:45am! Closing time in Ontario is 2am, almost felt like we were home.

Next shows will be with Caspian on Sept. 18th & 19th. Should be good times!

Meridians 12" now available via Thrill Jockey & Pirate Ship Records in the USA

2010-08-22T18:50:00.007-04:00

Having a hard time getting your hands on the Meridians vinyl?
Shipping costs from Switzerland or Canada too expensive?

Thrill Jockey and Pirate Ship Records in the USA are now distributing it.

Artwork preview for upcoming releases

2010-08-20T00:01:00.002-04:00

This is what it's the works for late fall '10: CD/LP releases on Aurora Borealis & Basses Fréquences. More info when available, here's a peak!

More reviews and my reviews of their pointless reviews

2010-08-19T21:30:00.019-04:00

Actually, they're kind of pointless reviews. But this blog is like my scrapbook, so everything gets posted here. Et hop!

While the first reviewer claims he's a guitarist and decides to review the album based on what he thinks he knows about how I play with effects - not sure what he's trying to prove, really. I mean, what kind of reviewer write things like "Then some swooping flanger, etc. Blah."? Just for the record, no flanger was used on this album, ugh. But that's not the point. This statement is: "I fear that my familiarity with Quach’s technique prevents me from a more objective appraisal of this release". Brilliant.

The second reviewer decides to write some form of drifting prose poetry about the album, in polish. Evidently, I had to use google translate to get a feel of what was written --- unlike japanese, the polish-english translator is not bad at all. Check it out: here. Cute right? I appreciate the effort though, just writing whatever you're feeling as your own visual and emotional interpretation of the music while listening to it. But how does that justify anything about any given review score, good or bad... no idea.

And last but not least, this one is from S.S.G. The reviewer treats Meridians as a "post-rock" record, looking for "post-rock" within that record, writing this review from a "post-rock" point of view... I don't know. Essentially, the term "post-rock" is mentionned several times throughout this review and has funny statements such as: "But Meridians never claimed to go anywhere, post-rock was always more concerned about the journey itself."

... Post-rock? Seriously? Who said anything about post-rock. What the. Why. What. Why? Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought post-rock was about using the elements in rock music such as guitar, bass, drums and you know, push its boundaries out of the traditional conventional sounds and structures of rock songs. But here we have two guys making drones out of their guitars... Uhhh. I don't get it. Maybe thisquietarmy does have a little of post-rock type of guitar sound on some past tracks, but that's about it. Scott & I made a collaborative ambient/drone record, why don't you treat it as one?

I honestly don't get these reviews - but hey, thanks for writing about the records, I still appreciate them. After all, 6 + 6.8/10 + 6.9/10 aren't bad scores at all. In fact, they're actually quite reasonable - no bitterness at all here. But their content... wow, just wow.

Montreal Mirror review of Meridians

2010-08-07T01:20:00.001-04:00

Johnson Cummins reviews Meridians in his weekly column Punkusraucous:

"The real gleaming gem for me this week is the collaboration of ambient drone artist thisquietarmy (aka Eric Quach) with fellow dronester Scott Cortez (lovesliescrushing) under the moniker Meridians. On these two epic and minimalist tracks, released on a limited-edition 12-inch with a pressing of 500 on Three:four Records, the pair expertly explore the limits of space while inviting the listener into their dark and desolate soundscapes. Longtime readers of this column may notice that I’ve been fawning over thisquietarmy quite a bit lately, but with his amazingly prolific output and the results remaining this astonishing, it seems like Quach could soon become a major player in the overcrowded ambient underground."

VOIR article

2010-08-04T23:31:00.005-04:00

Olivier Lalande writes an article about thisquietarmy in this week's VOIR:

thisquietarmy: l'invasion silencieuse

Eric Quach doit m'envoyer un diagramme pour mieux retracer les collaborations auxquelles il s'est prêté sous le pseudonyme thisquietarmy. Cette année seulement, il lançait le projet Mains de givre, en collaboration avec la violoniste Émilie Livernois Desroches (l'album Esther Marie est fort bon), signait un EP en compagnie de l'Américain Scott Cortez (de lovesliescrushing) en plus d'un autre en solo, Aftermath, inspiré des œuvres de l'artiste allemand Anselm Kiefer. Et par le biais des parutions de son micro-label TQA Records, Quach collabore avec nombre d'amis pour l'emballage, etc. "Chaque parution est comme un petit projet artistique", explique Quach, qui s'est fait connaître comme guitariste au sein du combo post-rock Destroyalldreamers. "Vu que je suis seul maintenant, j'aime aller chercher des gens pour faire des choses."

Les "choses", dans son cas, sont du registre ambiant spécial-très-spatial. Une progression logique après le post-rock, selon Quach. "Ça se rejoint pas mal. C'est instrumental, atmosphérique... Et ça peut se faire seul à la guitare." Hormis d'occasionnels ajouts, Quach se débrouille en effet avec seule sa six cordes ainsi qu'une horde de pédales. Un choix d'arme qui lui permet de se produire live "pour vrai" et d'improviser à sa guise. Ce dernier élément est très présent sur scène, où il s'accompagne de visuels de son cru. "Il y en a qui se font des listes de chansons à interpréter, moi je fais des listes de visuels. Ce sont eux qui dictent où je m'en vais." Le 5 août à la Sala Rossa avec 01ek, Alexandre Saint-Onge et L'Ami Jacob.

Tokafi reviews Aftermath & Meridians, Losing Today reviews Parallel Lines, Sonomu reviews Mains de Givre

2010-08-04T23:26:00.008-04:00

Tobias Fisher of Tokafi intertwines his impressions of "Aftermath" & "Meridians" in a double-review:

Roberto Mandolini reviews Parallel Lines' 38:22 for Losing Today (in italian):

Sonomu reviews Mains de Givre:

Aural Diptych Series #3: Millimetrik / Elika

2010-07-17T16:31:00.007-04:00

Released: July 15th, 2010
Order: http://thisquietarmy.com/records/#tqa015

Double-split 3" CDR placed on a heavy stock folded & printed insert, packaged in a delicated ivory white Artoz envelope, with printed artwork by New York City-based artist Elayne Safir. It includes two sets of diptych photography by Montreal-based artist Meryem Yildiz. Also for the first time, this releases comes with a digital download code, appropriate for the current ipod-age and the inability to read 3" via sliding CD slots. LIMITED TO 100 COPIES ONLY.

ADS03 features returning artists from our roster: NYC-based electro-dreampop duo Elika and Quebec City's lo-fi electro-dub ambassador Millimetrik aka Pascal Asselin, also known as one-half of LCBO - both of which have released their first EPs on TQA(r) back in '06 & '07 respectively.

Both discs from both artists strictly features remixes of some of their best tracks by renowned names in the ambient, electronic & shoegaze scene: Auburn Lull, Engineers, Sug(r)cane, Absent Without Leave, Project Skyward, The Invisible Kid and thisquietarmy (x 3).

The release was made available for Elika's performance at the OFF festival in Quebec City, July 15th 2010, curated by Pascal's label Chat Blanc Records. Don't you love how everything is so incestuous?

Disc 1: Millimetrik / Music by Pascal Asselin.

1. On the road to Kula [Auburn Lull Rmx] / 2. Outhouse/I wish you will never leave [Sugrcane Rmx] / 3. On the road to Kula [Thisquietarmy Rmx] / 4. Les artefacts du futur [Absent Without Leave Rmx]

Disc 2: Elika / Music by Brian Wenckebach & Eva Maravelias.

1. Death & avalanches [Engineers Rmx] / 2. Let down [Thisquietarmy Rmx] / 3. Nowhere [Project Skyward Rmx] / 4. You win hearts [The Invisible Kid Rmx] / Bonus Track - digital download only : 5. Nowhere [Thisquietarmy Rmx]

Preview it on Bandcamp:

Buy on TQA Records or Bandcamp.

QRD guitarist interview

2010-07-15T16:23:00.001-04:00

58 questions about guitars & related. Pretty geeky actually, and some questions were just so random that I couldn't answer them seriously...

First reviews of Meridians 12" vinyl w/ Scott Cortez

2010-07-12T11:59:00.002-04:00

Fluid Radio:

Textura:

Norman Records:

Montreal-Quebec City-Trois Rivières-Montreal (June 8-10-11-12) recap

2010-07-10T10:59:00.000-04:00

I played my first Suoni Per Il Popolo gig at Casa del Popolo with Grouper. I played well enough. Dave Bryant from Godspeed was doing my sound and it sounded real powerful. On a local message board, he gave me huge props: "i think it was an insult that TQA was slotted first in the lineup. people should be losing their shit for this dude."

Not much to say actually about the other shows, just momentary good times. The first thing we did when we got to Quebec City was to unload the gear at the venue, ditch the cars and buy some booze. We drank in the streets all afternoon. The show was pretty good for me... I'm always attracting black metal fans in Quebec City.

Montreal at Katacombes was another story... the show kept getting delayed and I was playing last, ended hitting the stage at 2:40am. Everyone was drunk, included myself, and the sound was pretty bad. There was this guy who came on the stage and unfolded a huge flag of a shark. Then he sat down on stage and started pounding for the rest of the set... by 3:00am, I had just about enough, and the soundman was probably about to pull the plug, so I ended up doing that myself.

Monarch played again the next day at the LFH, as their powerviolence project called Rainbow of Death. They were excellent, and it was quite an astonishing contrast to see them play a 12-minutes hypercharged set after seeing their slow droney doom set half a dozen of times. We were sad to see them leave St-Henri a couple of days later.

The church show in Trois-Rivières was very special... The performers were in the middle of the dome, with 6 speakers around them. Mattresses were placed on the floors so that people could sit or lay down. It was quite a success, a lot of people attended. Even neighbors and regular church go-ers. One old lady came to hug me after my set, she must've been over 70 years old, said I played music of angels.

Toronto + Guelph shows (June 5-6) recap

2010-07-07T22:08:00.010-04:00

I should've updated this a long ago, but... laziness got in the way.

First, just wanted to say that it was fun meeting and hanging out with the guys & girl from Monarch! It wasn't the greatest tour on earth but we had a blast with our entourage at every show and for the whole two weeks that they were in town...

Despite not playing the Toronto show, I had fun getting acquainted with everyone there for the first time. The show got moved to a house on Dupont. There was about 50 people smoking and drinking in front of the house, and we just hung out there until it got dark. We got booze at the LCBO. The police drove by the house before any band had started playing, but funnily enough they just said to get off the sidewalk and they drove off... !! Then I started to realize that it was almost 10pm by then, and no bands had played yet --- the show was supposed to be over at 11pm, which is why there wasn't any room for me to play anymore. I learned that the house people paid off the neighbors so that they wouldn't call the police (whaaaa---?) so that the show could go on much later than planned. Turns out the trick worked as Monarch started to set up around midnight and by the time they played, it was 1:30am and everything was fine! No complaints or anything. If they had thought of that before or whatever, then... why couldn't I & the other bands have played? We still don't have an answer.

We drank until late, even tried to get some food with everyone but we ended up losing the pack with the guy leading us to the burrito place (I managed to get one the next day, killer burritos in Kensington Market!) because a bunch of us bumped into this guy in the street who apparently drove from Philadelphia to catch Monarch... and he had a trunk full of beers! He gave each of us a can before he went back to the U.S. Then it started pouring. So we got back to the house and ordered some pizza for the rest of us. It was also great to meet some people that still came to the show and buy some tqa merch off me to help me out with gas money despite the cancellation. That was really appreciated.

The Guelph show the next day wasn't a great situation either, show-wise. Apparently two events were happening next to each other on a sunday evening, and they somehow decided to merge both of them together, making it an 8 bands bill! When we got there, none of the Guelph local bands wanted to start playing because they were... local. Reverse logic, anyone? So they pleaded me to start... even though my friends from the area were coming to see me and they hadn't arrived yet. In their defense, it was 6:30pm. Whatever. It took a lot of convincing but I was being a too good sport and started playing half an hour later... Surprisingly, all the kids that were at the venue came close and got into it. I don't think anyone had heard of me before either. You can imagine how atrocious it was to get through 6-7 bands afterwards... Most of them were just horrible and we had to make fun of them. But then it just got really long and we were all falling asleep. The pay wasn't worth it either... but still, good times.

Part 2 w/ Monarch! in Quebec City & Montreal later...
+ about the Suoni Per Il Popolo & the Church show in Trois-Rivières...

thisquietarmy & Scott Cortez - Meridians 12" LP out now!

2010-06-16T00:00:00.002-04:00

The collaboration between Scott Cortez and thisquietarmy doesn’t really come as a surprise. The latter acknowledges that the previous works from Cortez (under the lovesliescrushing moniker) greatly influenced his work, to the point of using the same way of writing the band’s name (no capital letter and no spaces between words) for his actual solo project. The main thing that they have in common is their unconventional use of the guitar, which they consider as a signal generator. They then process those sounds through various effects, to obtain a different result than that of the original signal until the source becomes almost undetectable. Meridians is also the first vinyl production from thisquietarmy, as it is Scott Cortez’s first under his real name.

Meridians is a cross-project between the two artists. Separated by 1.000 miles, Eric Quach (thisquietarmy) and Scott Cortez simultaneously began to record the first guitar layer for both sides on December 18th 2009 at 1pm EST. The original drone was supposed to be played like a three tones piece, with the use of a different string for each tone. They then sent the result to each other to work on the piece that the other had begun. This is how they recorded the two tracks that feature on this record.
This is definitely an unusual practice, far from the classic split exercise and the result is fascinating: abstract, radiant and hypnotic drones that intertwine with numerous harmonic structures. They created a coherent whole that goes beyond their unique recording method.

Written and pressed to be played at 45 rpm, the record can also be played at 33 rpm. Darker and more mystical, the result is stunning.

Tracklist

A. 41° 52' 50" N, 87° 42' 39" W
B. 45° 30' 4" N, 73° 33' 29" W

Available on three:four Records. Order here: http://www.three-four.net/releases/TFR005

There are a few available for Canada/USA through TQA Records: http://thisquietarmy.com/records/#tfr005

écho. musique pour égarer.

2010-06-09T20:35:00.002-04:00

thisquietarmy will play this, along with Aun, L'Oreille à 60 cordes, Martin Bournival, Antoine Bareil & Marc Bourassa --- Friday June 11th. This is worth a roadtrip from Montreal or Quebec City at least.

Toronto/Guelph shows with Monarch this weekend

2010-06-05T01:15:00.006-04:00

Hi,

Due to circumstances out of my control and some kind of overbooking mess, I've been forced out of the lineup at Brohaus in Toronto, 364 Dupont, on Saturday June 5th.

Seeing as I am still touring with Monarch!, I will still be present at the show, in case people want to buy merch --- I will have all the CDs of all of my projects, t-shirts, TQA recs' label releases, and last but not least... the 12" vinyl LP of my collab with Scott Cortez (lovesliescrushing) magically arrived at my doorstep this morning!!! I will be bringing some of those as well, as a world-premiere merch item.

I hope you're not too disappointed. Can't be more than I am for not being able to perform, it really sucks. I've been looking forward to this for weeks...

++

I will still be performing in Guelph the next evening if you can make it to that one - the venue has been changed to Van Gogh's Ear on Wyndham North Rd.

Hope to still see some of you at these.
Sorry about the last minute changes...

-eric.

The new Aftermath digipaks have arrived!

2010-06-02T12:00:00.002-04:00

A month late, but we finally got the corrected digipaks from the printers!!! Some people still think the misprinted version is cooler, but this new version is definitely as close as we wanted it to look: gone is the oddly placed catalog number on the front cover, and the weird pink halo in the inside... the print is also greener in general.

The misprinted versions has thus been called back and are now classified as a limited edition. We'll be selling the new corrected version for all orders starting today. Please head to the TQA store or the TQA Bandcamp (comes with instant download via Bandcamp) to buy it!

If you already bought the misprinted one and would like to get the corrected one, email me. I can include it in your next order or come up with some kind of arrangements...

++

To celebrate the occasion, Aftermath received a couple of positive reviews this week. First, an 8/10 by The Silent Ballet, which is has gained quite a hateful reputation lately for some harsh cold-blooded reviews in the past year or so. Some labels have even started to avoid sending material to them. Like some of my close friends who recently got burnt in their latest reviews, my past material has always been well-received by TSB. Needless to say that I was actually quite curious to see how Aftermath would fare through this new cutthroat honesty system:

And one in Vital Weekly, an e-mail magazine from the Netherlands, always nice to be reviewed by a publication that has been around for as long as them (since 1987) :

Aural Diptych Series reviews

2010-06-01T14:48:00.002-04:00

TQA Records' Aural Diptych Series are featured on Hard Format, a wonderful blog whose headline is "Reaching for the sublime in music design" --- I'm honored to be part of it. Thanks Colin!

Inspired by reputed magazines such as The Wire covering their favorite covers or art books covering CD packaging such as this one, Hard Format focuses on their favorite records covers and design packaging, some revisited old favorites but mostly new and current contemporary works being produced in the now. One of my favorite blog to spend an afternoon on, browsing their archive. Take a look:

The latest June issue of Textura also features a review of the music featured on the first two Aural Diptych Series. Mains de Givre/thisquietarmy & Quilt/Hoefizer are given the heads up by Ron Schlepper:

We do have a few left of these two releases --- limited to 100 copies only...
Don't wait up, get them while you still can: here.

thisquietarmy remixes Kino by Arms and Sleepers

2010-05-29T18:24:00.000-04:00

Between 2007 & 2009, thisquietarmy has played something like 8 shows with Arms and Sleepers in Montreal (QC), Burlington (VT), New York City (NY) & Boston (MA). We've gone a long way since, releasing a few albums, touring extensively and we've remained friends since, following each other's progress.

On August 30th 2009, I was in Boston for the release of my friends Caspian's third opus Tertia; Arms and Sleepers were opening for them. That's when they asked me to do a remix for them. A couple of months later, I received the remix kit for Kino which contained about 40 tracks for 2GB worth of files that I had to go through & familiarize myself with.

I've always felt like this song could use more intensity and I wanted to expand the potential moments of climax in that track, and make it more explosive. I thought, "what if Arms and Sleepers was played by Caspian, how would that sound?" --- of course, within the limitations of a remix. With that concept in mind, the drum sounds were tweaked to sound more like it came from a rock drum kit, distortion were added on certain lead synth tracks, I added some fuzzy/phasey guitar tracks, and I also tried make it more ethereal & noisy as to add some thisquietarmy glazing to it. It was a very fun remix to work on, and I'm glad it will be released in vinyl.

Here's the info from their label, Expect Candy:

Matador Remixed limited edition vinyl is available for pre-order through Expect Candy's website starting on April 25. The first 100 units come on beautiful clear transparent vinyl and all copies include a digital download code. The first 25 orders will also include an Arms and Sleepers European tour poster. Pre-orders ship before the official release date of May 28, 2010. The release will also be available via iTunes and other digital stores on that date. For more info and to pre-order the limited edition vinyl, CLICK HERE.

Tracklisting:

Side A
1. Matador (Uzi and Ari Remix)
2. The Architekt (Lymbyc Systym Remix)
3. Twentynine Palms (Nolens Volens Remix)
4. Simone (Amanda Rogers Remix)
5. Helvetica (The American Dollar Remix)

Side B
1. The Architekt (The Consulate General vs Boy In Static Remix)
2. The International (Arms and Sleepers Remix)
3. Kino (Thisquietarmy Remix)
4. The Architekt (Bigadiga Remix)
5. The Paramour (Elika Remix)

Grouper + Grimes + thisquietarmy - June 8th @ Suoni Per Il Popolo

2010-05-25T21:04:00.003-04:00

More info about the festival: http://www.suoniperilpopolo.org/

Mini-tour with Monarch! doom band from France in June

2010-05-24T21:08:00.001-04:00

I'll be playing the Toronto, Guelph, Quebec City & Montreal gigs, June 5-6-10-12.

More info on Monarch!: http://www.myspace.com/monarchuberalles

thisquietarmy / Mains de Givre release show pictures

2010-05-21T19:11:00.003-04:00

Some pictures of the show by Etienne Blythe:

Poster for the show:
Also reviews by New Zero Kanada blog of thisquietarmy's set and Mains de Givre's set. Oh well, some people really liked Mains de Givre as well, but can't please everyone! I don't know how it sounded in the room... so, I'm looking forward to getting and analyzing some live recordings for future considerations.

Nadja / thisquietarmy European Tour 2009 : a short film

2010-05-13T00:29:00.002-04:00

A short film by Eric Quach : thisquietarmy tours across Europe with Nadja in june 2009.

Shot with a shaky digital camera during sporadic moments of inspiration within the 3-week adventure across the landscapes of Germany, Switzerland, Italy, France, The Netherlands, Czech Republic & Poland --- the film was quickly assembled and edited in Montreal by Eric Quach in two days, merely a year after it all happened.

A new found hazy and dream-like perspective of the journey is revealed throughout the global overview of the daily change of scenery and events occurring between live performances by both bands in unusual locations such as in a small town Italian restaurant outside of Milan, in the outdoor terrace of a gallery located in a suburb of Stuttgart, on a floating barge at the quay in Lyon, at a multidisciplinary arts center in Eindhoven and in a squatted university building in Frankfurt.

Special thanks to Albanmono, SMVO, Leszek & TAC Live for some of the extra live tqa footage, without which this film would be solely about Nadja and probably would never have been made.

Featured music:

thisquietarmy - Taming the Beast
thisquietarmy - Dronewars
Nadja - No Cure for the Lonely

Nadja / thisquietarmy European Tour 2009 from thisquietarmy on Vimeo.

Norman Records recommends Mains de Givre - Esther Marie

2010-05-08T18:07:00.001-04:00

Tokafi interview with Mains de Givre

2010-05-03T01:48:00.001-04:00

Tobias Fisher of the very respected german-based publication Tokafi was kind enough to cover the release of Mains de Givre's Esther Marie with a conductive interview about this new project :

Aftermath gets a write-up in the Montreal Mirror

2010-05-01T03:17:00.002-04:00

This week's issue of the Mirror, April 29-May 5 2010, Volume 25, Number 25, p. 21: Johnson Cummins' Punkusraucous Rex column:

"On a completely different note are the dark, ambient electronics and heavily effected guitar of Thisquietarmy’s new release, Aftermath, on French drone label Basses Frequences. TQA is the solo project of Eric Quach, with his sound only becoming more dense and dramatic over subsequent releases. Quach takes his time carving melodies out of unlikely places and crescendos creep slowly as he easily moves from desolation to claustrophobia. A truly impressive and ambitious piece of work."

Aftermath & Esther Marie now available!

2010-04-30T10:50:00.009-04:00

We have received thisquietarmy's Aftermath CDs! Unfortunately there is a little misprint on the front cover (as well as a discoloration in the inside panel, not shown here) :

It would take quite some time for the pressing plant to fix their mistake. After lengthy discussions with the label Basses Fréquences, we decided to make them available as is, in time for the planned release date (today). However, measures are still being taken to correct the mistake and we will switch the digipaks of our stock CDs when the correct ones will arrive from the pressing plant... it could take up to a month. This will also mean that misprinted version will be very limited (collector's item, anyone?)

This being said --- it is really your choice. Do you want to wait for the proper artwork as it was intended to be, or are you too anxious to hear the music and want to own a copy of the limited edition misprinted version? If you fall in the latter category, place your order now! You might also have the possibility to acquire a corrected version of the digipak later, that could be included with your next order or for shipping fees --- although you know how shipping is costly these days.

NOW AVAILABLE !!!

> Mains de Givre's debut album "Esther Marie" (Textura, Canada) : gatefold jacket CD
> Thisquietarmy's 4th album "Aftermath" (Basses Frequences, France) : digipak CD
> Parallel Lines's debut album "38:22" (Dead Pilot Records, UK) : thick windowed sleeve & string CD

Take advantage of our special bundles :

Thisquietarmy + Mains de Givre + Parallel Lines = 25$ + shipping = 30$ CAN-USA / 34$ WORLD
Thisquietarmy + Mains de Givre =17$ + shipping = 22$ CAN-USA / 26$ WORLD
Thisquietarmy + Parallel Lines = 15$ + shipping = 20$ CAN-USA / 24$ WORLD
Mains de Givre + Parallel Lines = 15$ + shipping = 20$ CAN-USA / 24$ WORLD

Aftermath is also available through Basses Fréquences, Esther Marie through textura & 38:22 through Dead Pilot.