Tonight on Art Of Beatz Radio: Dark Arps (Live)

[Kuma]

Tonight!

Hour 1: DARK ARPS (The Dark Arps)

Dark Arps is a Vancouver based Live electronic PA, the latest moniker of Jon Bierman, a Canadian-raised, British-educated electronic musician.

This is where you read about the classically trained background, or how, falling in love with 80's electro-pop at the age of 3 he proceeded to buy every Bowie and Depeche Mode albums on vinyl, in duplicate, so he could beat-juggle with them just as soon as he was tall enough to reach the decks.

Sorry. No.

It was the late 90's and, in the UK, electronic music had firmly established itself as a legitimate musical form, manifested by countless top-40 dance hits throughout the decade. Bristol's bands, Massive Attack, Portishead and Roni Size/Reprazent were keeping it real. And yet, with the acid house and rave scenes furiously bubbling underground for the previous 15 years, the British government had been coming down hard on dance music. The Criminal Justice Act of 1994 empowered police to stop a rave "in the open air when a hundred or more people are attending, or where two or more are making preparations for a rave." Electronic music was famously described as being "wholly or partially characterized by a succession of repetitive beats". Partially correct, your honour.

Alas, the government's primitive understanding of dance music and their attempts to disrupt and disperse outdoor parties did little to slow our cultural movement.

The end of British high-school torture was punctuated by two very important albums. DJ Shadow's "Endtroducing...", credited by the Guinness Book of records as the "First Completely Sampled Album", and in the Summer of 1998, a duo from Wales called Hybrid released their debut album, "Wide Angle". Futuristic, orchestral, emotive, evolving. Enveloped by banging breakbeat, house and techno beats and bass. Constantly danceable, yet genuinely musical. This was to define the precepts of Bierman's musical motivations.

At university, and inspired by the seemingly endless slew of talented musicians around him, Bierman began learning the scientific art of sound engineering and music production. Better late than never. Squandering student loans and charitable donations from parentals he bought mixers, microphones, synths and samplers. From then and throughout the 2000s, he formed and toured with a 10-piece breakbeat orchestra "Keiretsu", recorded numerous band demos, EPs and albums, ran an on-location "instant live" mobile recording and CD manufacturing facility (working with the original members of 80's prog-rock supergroup "Asia", Johnny Cash's band The Tennessee Three and Alabama 3, responsible for the theme tune to "The Sopranos"). He continued to improve his programming, sound design and beat-making abilities with electronic releases and remixes on small, indie breakbeat labels such as MOFO and Play. Throughout all this, he has made sure to keep his musical palate as broad as possible. Chamber choirs, folk troupes, hip hop drummers and MCs, orchestral composers, rock and funk covers bands, techno, house, breaks and drumnbass producers and DJs, it didn't matter, there was always something to be learned about music from anyone who cared to show you.

Back in Canada for the first time in 19 years, Dark Arps is Bierman's latest solo project. A mixture of techno, breaks and progressive house, overlaid with synths, sampled instrumental melodies, warped tonal textures and atmospheres, and supported with incessantly danceable beats and infectious basslines, it is music for the head, heart and feet. Constantly musical, evolving, progressing, segueing, modulating and jumping, sometimes dark, and yet also positive and upbeat without being saccharine, its the kind of music he wishes he could hear more often. And, finally, it's LIVE. Beats, synths, atmospheres and melodies are triggered, mixed and effected on-the-fly using Ableton Live and a selection of MIDI controllers and hardware synths. Tracks evolve, break down and crescendo organically. Danceable grooves are mandatory and ever-present and no two sets are ever the same. Thanks for reading. Now go listen.

Hour 2: Kuma and Motomasa (Art Of Beatz)

Sixty minutes of dancing about architecture.

On your radio via 102.7 FM, here in Vancouver.
Streaming worldwide via Vancouver Co-op Radio
On Facebook, just search for Art Of Beatz

12-2 am PST
3-5 am EST
8-10 am GMT

-=< Art of Beatz - Electronic Goodness >=-

AOB: Smelling salts in the face of depravity and Bieberism