London Zine of Music, Arts and Miscellaneous Happenings. Monthly updates & seasonal physicals.
/ˈpɪnˌdrɒp/
1) adjective describing the silence produced when a performance leaves the audience speechless (ie: one could hear a pin drop)
2) verb to indicate the location of a particular happening
NEW September (Recommendations & Live Reviews of Avalanche Kaito, Squid & Geordie Greep)
BRAND SPANKING NEW Issue No.1
01
___No Clique Night by Improv's Greatest Hits @ Folklore, Hoxton £6 - A night of genre-defying one-time created bands. Bristol's infamous monthly night of collaborative improvisation comes to the capital! Uniting London artists from diverse musical backgrounds, embracing the unexpected and defying categorisation. Featuring members of Goat Girl / KEG / Shovel Dance Collective / Kyoto Kyoto / For Breakfast / Findom / Hill Collective / Paper Hats and a host of great solo artists. tickets
02
___PVA @ Shacklewell Arms £20.15 - Back with their signature blend of synths and dance punk, PVA perform an intimate set to celebrate 20 years of the Shacklewell Arms. Ticket also includes access to the afterparty curated by PVA and drag-pop icon Lynks! tickets
03
___Todd Edwards @ The Pickle Factory £16.99 - The only yank to be ordained UKG royalty is back in the motherland, ready to unleash his infamous cut-and-paste vocal grooves upon the small SW venue for hours and hours. A sound so recognisable it kick-started speed garage; the opportunity to see a legend in such an intimate setting cannot be turned up. tickets
05
___Cowboyy @ The Windmill £5 - A night dedicated to the best noisy bands from outside the capital. As they work on a new release, Pompey’s math-pop trio headline their familiar stomping ground, bending minds by playing their spaceship-sized pedal boards as extensions of their instruments. With support from Norwich’s sprawling post-rock family Magnolia and Stoke’s belligerent Christian Music, this is set to be a killer night. One to bring ear protection to! tickets
07
___Avalanche Kaito @ Shacklewell Arms FREE - Urban griot meets Brussels noise-rock band. Is that not the greatest tagline ever? Over the mesmerising polyrhythms, noise bursts of data and distorted guitar, energetically spits the oral history of Burkina Faso. And it’s FREE? rsvp
___George Clanton @ Village Underground £22.9 - A mainstay in the vaporwave scene with his ESPRIT空想 side project, George Clanton serves up an ethereal mix of chillwave and trip hop in his live show to support 2023’s release Ooh Rap I Ya. tickets
08
___Squid @ Moth Club £22.66 [PALESTINE FUNDRAISER] - Everybody’s favourite Krautrock post-punkers return for a Medical Aid for Palestinians fundraiser. Be sure to come for openers Tony Njoku and Bristol’s Minor Conflict. tickets
15
___Man/Woman/Chainsaw @ George Tavern £6 - With 100 gigs under their belt, the London band are making leaps and bounds. With buzz-aplenty, a new single ‘Ode to Clio’ and an EP announced for November, their explosive and snarky songwriting thrives with its symphonic orchestration. tickets
21
___Model/Actriz @ Shacklewell Arms £23.03 - Crowds heave and jerk like a tumultuous hurricane for NYC’s incredible queer noise-dance group. With burlesque-excess the frontman commands songs of industrial guitar grunts, rattling basslines and infective drum grooves. tickets
23
___Crywank @ George Tavern £11.99 - Channelling AJJ and Bright Eyes in equal measure, Manchester’s venerable Crywank promise a night of self-loathing anti-folk madness. Checking out the opening artist ‘The Last Whole Earth Catalog’ is a must! tickets
___Endless Digital Birthdays @ The Windmill - Eclectic, infective and sardonic. Dressed in all black they conjure leftfield hits comprised of ethereal gothic swells, bursts of computer noise and grooving drums. Playing the second night of their Windmill residency, the band work towards an imminent EP release.
24
___Ryosuke Kiyasu @ Cafe Oto £7/15/17 - You seen that guy on Instagram who travels the world smashing a snare drum against a table, surrounded by crowds, mouths agog? This is him. Active as a snare drum soloist since 2003 and drummer for avant-garde legend Keiji Haino’s band ‘Fushitsusha’, the Japanese noise artist tours his way across Europe. tickets
25
___Ugly @ Shacklewell Arms £14 [PALESTINE FUNDRAISER] - The unique London art-pop powerhouses are back (and better than ever). With their new EP of heart-melting and sometimes proggish face-melting 4-part vocal harmonies, they produce an exhilarating dissonance that is a rare find – AND THEY DO IT ALL LIVE!? One must witness openers Speedial & Salomé Wu. tickets
30
___Jake Xerxes Fussell @ Lafayette £18.13 - The American folklorist and fingerstyle maestro plays vulnerable and moving adaptations and inspirations of southern blues and folk traditions. Utterly beautiful. tickets
___Christian Music @ Shacklewell Arms £6.18 - London is not over the Fat White Family’s garage punk ejaculation of 2016 and many bands are still attempting to pick up the pieces left behind. Christian Music, however, don’t care to follow this tradition. They trade gear for shrooms, and with their new EP push the genre to its most unrelentingly noisy and psychedelic boundaries. If the band is impossible to Google, you’re going to be swallowed by the pit. A must-see for those who are missing the Shack's sold-out Osees show a week prior. tickets
31
___Bossola's “L2O” EP Release Party @ George Tavern £7 - One voice and his guitar. With the wildest hair of the all the London avant-songwriter scene, Bossola celebrates the release of his debut EP with brooding baritone storytelling and captivating live looping of distorted spanks and scrapes. tickets
P.S. We would have recommended some Geordie Greep shows but they all sold out immediately xx
by SE
Opening for Delilah Holiday, BLACK FONDU, the “abstract grime” artist (and No. 1 on The Windmill Brixton’s speed dial) put the Fitzrovia venue into a trance. The intensity and otherworldliness of his performances defy all our naïve attempts at description. He is seriously out there. Renowned for his energy, it's no surprise his t-shirt doesn't stay on for long. The pit is halved lengthwise with seating – potentially the weirdest venue architecture in London, however, BLACK FONDU is the only artist who can work it to his advantage. He crawls across the tables, up close and personal, nicking someone’s drink, spilling it in the hazy fervour of performance and later reimbursing them. He launches himself into the crowd, bouncing from body to body, impassioning all.
Anyone with ears can hear in BLACK FONDU’s lyrics the importance of family. Silhouetted against a Ghanaian flag and screwed pianos, BLACK FONDU drenched in sweat and reverb repeats the heaving refrain “mother calls”. He has no autopilot – BLACK FONDU relives every lyric as he spits it. As the song ends, eyes slightly puffy, he stares out into the crowd – high-tempo drums start to crash and he snaps straight back into his jagged, aggressive cardio.
He introduces his final song, #Music, “because what else is all this?” he asks. It’s the most batshit crazy track yet. Truly a complete abstraction from grime; a distant cousin of the genre who did acid too young. Gabba blast-beats, guttural screams, time-stretched, glitched & pitch-shifted, cycling rhythms. With a final burst of noise, he slams close his laptop. The hypnosis is broken. All that remains is a web of tangled cables and a broken mic stand. The sound guy mutters indignations but is that not the price of art? A GoFundMe is imminent.
by GKA
There’s something strangely solemn about seeing Cameron Picton, bassist of black midi, play in the Horse Hospital, an ex-equine clinic turned small venue. The audience sat in chairs, sprawled across this unique venue that specialises in the hosting of experimental performances and exhibitions. Victorian columns and asylum white walls adorn the venue left as a relic of its time, giving it provenance like no other venue in town. A choice of a glass of curated wine or Asahi in everyone’s hands, discussing their struggles, their joys and their lives. Out of thin air silence arises from a bustling crowd as he arrives on stage, quiet in demeanour.
The set opens with Picton anxiously advancing to tune his guitar while the room stares in silence. He jumps to playing pleasant progressions only to realise he is still unnoticeably out of tune. A perfectionist, he returns to tuning over minute differences even when the crowd isn’t the wiser. Playing songs with the help of a notebook, singing songs so raw and personal, his fumbling of words: it feels more intimate and sensitive seeing him perform this way.
Flowing through influences and impulsive set changes he slowly owns the stage, settling in with time as he tells stories of grievances and relationships. He talks less, becomes more confident and his voice becomes more controlled, blending beautiful, bodacious yet intricate scales and chords with the delicate lyrical content of a great songwriter. This beautifully juxtaposes cuts on black midi records where Picton takes over on vocals, where he writes with a focus on worldbuilding and more abstract topics. Here, in his solo work, Picton’s songs take place amid the tensions of Earthly relationships. Sitting alone on stage, his dynamics really shine. His voice and a classical guitar can fill the room with billowing melodies or cast the room to stark silence at the drop of a hat. Picton cycles through his psyche and shows us where his head is at. Whether it’s lyrics delving into soaking beans and death, he shows his songwriting in a new light, one to be taken seriously and appreciated for its unequivocal emotion.
DR
___California summertime by Kim Fowley (1977, US)
___Chicken Pussy by Bongwater (1990, US)
___I Wanna Lose Control by Gary Wilson (1977, US)
GKA
___Johnny johnny johnny by underscores (2023, US)
___San Francisco by I Hate Sex (2015, Canada)
___5,000 Lumens by Speedial (2024, UK)
MR
___Eutow by Autechre (1995, UK)
___Your Heart’s An Eclát by Tiernan & Joscelin (2019, UK)
___Joyride by Kesha (2024, US)
SE
___Windpower by Thomas Dolby (Top of the Pops – 1982, UK)
___This Town Ain’t Big Enough For Both Us by Sparks (Top of the Pops – 1974, US)
___Sanctuary by New Musik (1980, UK)
Pindrop is DR, GKA, MR, & SE
Contact us at @pindropzine (instagram) and pindropzine@gmail.com (email)