The last week of the Tainan residency is coming to an end. We’ve started the packing and wrapping up of projects, ideas, and connections.

It’s been a time of many things. One such thing has been the wonderful opportunity to be based in a single location, a home-base if you will, where we can settle to concentrate on projects, as well as use it as a launchpad to tour from. A place that we can travel away from for shows over weekends and then return to familiarity to rest, reset and regather.

It’s a privilege to travel to play shows. It asks a lot from locals to spend precious time and energy on the committed organising and hosting events. We always aim to make it worth their while. Sometimes we were able to jump on an already existing show, and other-times a show was initiated in response to our interest in an area. To all those people (Lars, Fang Yi, Immanuel, Rex Chen, Reuben, Deng Yao) we offer up our thanks and gratitude.

The moving around has also provided a snapshot opportunity to witness what is happening with experimental music in Taiwan. It seems healthy and burgeoning scene. There are stable venues (as stable as a venue can be) that offer space for regular performances, there’s people on the ground with ongoing energy to organise, people with musical curiosity to draw upon to perform, and people who hold the important role of ‘appreciative audience’.

From the early stages of our organising, it quickly becomes apparent that Taiwan is well-networked. Various people freely shared information on who we should make contact with in other centres, and often the crossover of names and emails was frequent. People across the cities and regions seemed to have a current handle on who was organising elsewhere, interconnection is a healthy sign of an active and vibrant community.

We had the chance to play a range of venues: livehouses like Revolver in Taipei, cafe’s like Night Cruising in Hualien, Catmeoworm in Taichung, Jiang Shan Yi Gai Suo in Hsinchu, and gallery spaces like Fotoaura and Ting Shuo Hear Say in Tainan. 

And it’s been a real treat to see, and hear, the many acts that we shared shows with. The follow list here is order of performance – check them out:
Kina:suttsu x E-Da (Japan), Colour Domes 彩色穹頂 , Your Futagono Tamashi & 林子寧 Lin Tzu-Ning, Christoven (Singapore) & Pablo Liebhaber (Germany), Fang Yi Liu & Cia Himâin Li, Jonáš Gruska (Slovenia), Stefan Voglsinger (Austria), Nick Tsai, Lai Shi Chao & Xiao Liu, DJ Rex Chen, Jun-Yang Li, Alexis Baskind (France/Germany), Reuban Zahl, Tanehiko Sekijima & Kentaro Tamura (Japan), Chang Deng-Yao, Kaiyu Lin, Huang Ching Yi, Franki Wals, and Zihning Tai 戴孜嬣.

Included in our tour schedule was our end of residency show at Ting Shuo. We spoke about our history of music making, through mr sterile Assembly to the current projects. Chrissie facilitated a drawing workshop, based on a practice by US illustrator Lynda Barry. Check out Chrissie’s drawings at Picture This, she’s beautifully captured to paper some of our most memorable moments. To wrap up the evening, DSLB/vma presented a joint performance to the good people of Tainan. Thank you Ting Shuo for hosting us!

In our last week, we met up with musicians Fangi Yi Liu, Chen En He, Ooonie, and Nigel at Ting Shuo for an afternoon of improvised goodness. A full afternoon of sound-making with new friends, audibly solidifying the beautiful connections we’ve made over the last seven weeks.

And finally, Kieran had an opportunity to present vegetable.machine.animal at TNNUA, the Tainan National University of the Arts. Over two hours Kieran discussed, demonstrated, and performed v.m.a to students from ethnomusicology and music departments. Alice, from Ting Shuo, brilliantly supported with interpreting skills. The performance became very cosy as the students got closer and enveloped the stage. It felt like a mutually lively and interactive conversation spanning from mycelium, punk rock, Mad Max, Bruno Latour, and tips for students wanting to explore musical improvisation.

Many thanks and gratitude to everyone we’ve met over theist two months. You all made us feel so welcome, you freely offered suggestions of things to do or places to eat, you stopped and wanted to chat, and you took interest in the projects and sounds that we brought to Taiwan. Our experience would have been so much less for not having had met you. Till the next time.
And finally, our immense thanks to Alice, Nigel(and Esme) of Ting Shuo Hear Say for enabling this trip to become a possibility. It will certainly be one that remains in our memories with great fondness.
Gratitude galore!!!
xxx