2018 edition of Hassle Fest is kicking off tomorrow and we put together a playlist to celebrate the occasion!
This year’s HF will feature 17 participating venues and over 30 acts (from places as far as away as New Zealand) with Aaron Dilloway, The Gories and Abdu Ali being some of the more prominent names on the bill. Get your tickets here and/or head over to our archives to read about the history of the fest.
Artists featured in the playlist
Wendy Eisenberg
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]improviser and composer who plays guitar and banjo and sings, sometimes alone, sometimes all at once[/perfectpullquote]
Andy California
Solo project of Andy Mcbain from The Monsieurs and Tunnel of Love.
Minibeast
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]A project devised by musician Peter Prescott (Mission Of Burma, Volcano Suns, Kustomized, Peer Group) as an outlet for his interest in instrumental music.[/perfectpullquote]
Solei
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]Painter, looper, symbol seeker[/perfectpullquote]
See also – Atlas Lab
Charlie Looker
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]Composer, vocalist, multi-instrumentalist: Psalm Zero, Seaven Teares, chamber works, ex-Extra Life[/perfectpullquote]
Upper Wilds
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]Upper Wilds is the new band of Brooklyn-based musician Dan Friel (Parts & Labor). Guitar Module 2017 serves as a launchingpoint for Upper Wilds, a band comprised of Friel on guitar and vocals, bassist/vocalist Zach Lehrhoff (Ex Models, Pterodactyl) and drummer Jeff Ottenbacher.[/perfectpullquote]
Robert Beatty
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]Artist and electronic musician who performs solo under the name Three Legged Race. He is a long-running member of the bands Hair Police, Eyes and Arms of Smoke, and C. Spencer Yeh’s Burning Star Core. Through Beatty’s collaboration with video artist Takeshi Murata, Three Legged Race has performed at the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing, China; Deitch Projects, New York; the Mattress Factory, Pittsburgh; and the New Museum, New York. In 2013, Beatty released the acclaimed “Soundtracks for Takeshi Murata” (Glistening Examples), a collection of his audio work for Murata. Beatty’s performances and recordings explore the repetition and decay of simple musical themes, evoking minimalist sci-fi soundtracks, clouded hypnotic landscapes, and primal industrial techno. He lives in Lexington, Kentucky.
Graham Foundation
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Drahla
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]Blending wiry, dark post-punk with unpredictable art-rock, Drahla have established themselves as a formidable and distinctive band across their two sold out 7” singles and the 2017 Third Article EP. Formed in late 2015, Drahla quickly found their identity in Yorkshire’s fertile music scene with their minimal yet robust bass-heavy sound. Their reputation as a fervent live act is ever-growing, with the band being asked to share stages with the likes of Parquet Courts, METZ, Ought, Buzzcocks, Hookworms, The Cribs and more.
Captured Tracks
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Lina Tullgren
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]Lina Tullgren is from Southern Maine just over the border of the northernmost seacoast of New Hampshire. It’s an unexpected location for artistic incubation, but if you grow up anywhere surrounded by family and friends and weirdos interacting at all times with their own interpretations of creative output, osmosis is bound to occur. Shifting in trainings and traditions, the 23 year old eventually found herself a voice with the electric guitar, uniquely flavored and shaped from the many years of fiddle lessons and classical technique. The shifts in genre and in instrumentation are stark, but important. Lina’s morphing interaction with music has mirrored a growing determination to harness her ability to melodically and lyrically express complex emotions.
Captured Tracks
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Twig Harper
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]Psychonaut, musician, underground researcher and folk technologist. Twig Harper mixes text and electronic unconstrained convulsions in the full on experimentation and creation of backlashing gems of confusion.Former member of seminal duo Nautical Almanac. [/perfectpullquote]
Rhizome DC
Wax Chattels
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]Peter Ruddell (keyboards/vocals), Amanda Cheng (bass/vocals) and Tom Leggett (drums) make up Wax Chattels, the self-described “guitarless guitar music” trio from Auckland, New Zealand. The band is just a couple years old, but has made a reputation for its intense live shows, one of which inspired Captured Tracks and Flying Nun to sign Wax Chattels immediately for its self-titled debut album. (Captured Tracks has also been reissuing much of the Flying Nun’s stellar ’80s and ’90s catalog.)
NPR
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Germ House
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]Germ House is the solo recording project of Justin Hubbard, formerly of Boston band Turpentine Brothers. Live the band is augmented by Hubbard’s wife & musical partner Tara McManus-Hubbard (Mr. Airplane Man / Turpentine Brothers) & Joe Ayoub (Marked Men / Shangalang).
Trouble in Mind
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Abdu Ali
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]Abdu Ali is an independent music artist, writer, and multimedia arts curator based in Baltimore and Brooklyn. Ali hasreleased five musical projects, all notable for his idiosyncratic blend of punk, futurism, Baltimore Club Music, and rap music, with lyrics yielding poetic uprise.[/perfectpullquote]
Beverly Tender
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]Beverly Tender is a Christmas tree falling over in slow motion. Alf singing his favorite song. It is Tristan Brooks and Molly Hastings throwing their hats at your feet. Smart riffs eaten by the worst chorus pedal. You want to join the band, and you can.[/perfectpullquote]
Red Shaydez
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]Red Shaydez’s new single [Self-Care ’18] is a song that promotes taking care of oneself all year long and not letting what we do for a living get the best of us. Self-Love![/perfectpullquote]
Sunk Heaven
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]Sunk Heaven is the solo music project of Austin Sley Julian, based out of New York City. Sunk Heaven is building and breaking instruments to construct a temporary outcry. Sunk Deep into a metallic disfigurement.
Ramp Local
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Horrible Earth
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]Boston Grindcore[/perfectpullquote]
iLL Addicts
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]Seven-member rap collective from Boston, MA. Drawing influences from acts like Odd Future and Wu-Tang Clan, one could describe their sound as a combination of lysergic acid and vanilla cheerios. [/perfectpullquote]
Timeghost
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″] Providence, Rhode Island’s Adam Morosky pours modular synthesis, drum machines, found sounds and spoken prose into dense, hot compositions, then squints delightedly at the results. His methodology is a tug of war between chaos and control, allowing stray sounds to cycle off at random, but giving them space to work their way back into the fabric.”
Louis Pattison, The Wire [/perfectpullquote]
Brain Famine
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″]Brain Famine was formed as studio project, summer 2011 in Weymouth, MA by Chris & John after years of playing in other bands.
Matt jumped in on bass in 2012. First full-length “Exploding Paranoid Universe” released in Oct 2015.
Brain Famine’s sole purpose is to create a violent collision of shredding thrash, grind, and death metal. [/perfectpullquote]