agenda

Group Rhoda + Moon & Sun

30 May

San Francisco’s Mara Barenbaum, aka Group Rhoda, makes records that sound like lullabies to a lonely self stuck inside a machine. But saving Group Rhoda from anachronism is a generous seasoning of tropical rhythm, Floating Points-ish jazzisms and a healthy working knowledge of Suicide. From Palm Trees To Pine Trees is a new audiovisual project spearheaded by Swedish/Dutch artist Monica Tormell and her band Moon & Sun, combining brooding atmospherics with eclectic exotica. The show will feature sculptures, projections and other visual arts, as well as music from a host of other loosely tropical acts.

Attend event:

San Francisco’s Mara Barenbaum, aka Group Rhoda, makes records that sound like lullabies to a lonely self stuck inside a machine. Which is not to say this is sad robot music. Instead, her voice sounds all the more human for its feeble echoing against a motorik, metallic exterior. This mechanical shell spans minimal arrangements of clockwork beats, retro futurist synths and unwinding arpeggios that could soundtrack Fritz Lang’s Metropolis. But saving Group Rhoda from anachronism is a generous seasoning of tropical rhythm, Floating Points-ish jazzisms and a healthy working knowledge of Suicide. Let’s hope she never escapes the machine.

From Palm Trees To Pine Trees is a new audiovisual project spearheaded by Swedish/Dutch artist Monica Tormell and her band Moon & Sun, combining brooding atmospherics with eclectic exotica. The show will feature sculptures, projections and other visual arts, as well as music from a host of other loosely tropical acts. Moon & Sun combines gloomy arrangements with hints of Carribean melody in tunes written and recorded across stints in Curacao, Swedish forests and Amsterdam. The German/Belgian act Moemlien weaves tapestries from animal sounds, Swedish artist Nadine Byrne will be showing films, and the finest platters shall be spun by DJ collectives Vintage Voudou and Red Light Radio’s Future Vintage.

GROUP RHODA