I was asked by Guido de Vries of CBK Apeldoorn to organize and design an exhibition in August and September this year with my selection of visual artists from Apeldoorn. To be honest, I was a bit hesitant at first, since I didn’t really know any visual artists from Apeldoorn and I never curated an exhibition before, that wasn’t related to one of my own projects… But the opportunity was to good to pass up.

Because this exhibition is part of Triënnale Apeldoorn, I had to write the concept and title to match the overall Triënnale theme ‘Culture, Garden & Landscape’. The title I came up with is ‘Ontbos’ (Deforest). Mostly because it touches the Triënnale theme while leaving room for interpretation. Ontbos also hints to a selection process, cutting down a forrest to see the trees…

Quite a few really good artists responded to the call! I think I have selected an interesting group of visual artists for this exhibition and am now working on design (see picture above), coördination and publicity. With grand support by the people of CBK Apeldoorn, I might add! So far this assignment is as pleasurable as it is challenging… more updates will soon follow.

Release number 20 is here! Time to celebrate? Or was that at 25?

Anyway, A Ltd. Lion Pup is the debut of Yop, a very talented Rotterdam based singer/songwriter. It’s really quite a magnificent release. Yop is a skilled songcrafter, limiting the length of his songs to the bare essential. Compact beauty. And you can download it here for free (thank you Yop!).

In fact this is a re-release of Yop’s self released 2006 original, so you could be one of those people who have downloaded most of this release already, but this version holds a previously unreleased bonus track, that makes downloading it again worth your while. The main reason for this re-release is more exposure, because if anything A Ltd. Lion Pup deserves that!

Oh, and I added some reviews of the 2006 version overhere.

Because of my pre-occupation with all these ass-crack stage-hacks I’ve been organizing lately, I’d almost forget to mention that I’m also involved in the organization of Transmissie, another event in Havenkwartier Deventer. It kicked off the 29th of February with Sound by Sculpture by Der Wexel.

Transmissie is somewhat based upon the Gerrit van Bakel exhibition in Havenkwartier Deventer, which is still open till the 13th of April. There is also a very high quality complementary exhibition in SIED (a building nearby), with work by Der Wexel, Reinier Kranendonk, André Kodde and Jos Steenmeijer.

The 14th of March, Theo Jansen comes to tell us about his beachbeasts and Pierre Bastien plays his latest mechanical orchestra. A definitive must-see!

On the 28th of March (my birthday), Joost Conijn, Jean Klare and Daan Roosegaarde tell us about their work and Let’s Make Things Derange (Jeroen Diepenmaat and Rik Marsman) play a wide range of manipulated instruments. Also can’t be missed!

Well… hope to see you there then!

At the moment I’m doing a lot of things at the same time again, so I decided to give you a short update.

First of all, I have finally made a good start with the organization of quality events for Havenkwartier Deventer! Most of these events originate from esc.rec. (my record label) and go by the name ass-crack stage-hack. Basically the ass-crack stage-hack can be anything that involves a stage, but will mainly be more or less esc.rec. related.

My first two ass-crack stage-hacks are (almost) set to go:

- February 28th, ass-crack stage-hack #1: live performance by Greg Haines + extensive Osman buffet (link).
- March 7th, ass-crack stage-hack #2: guitar duel/duet with Eugene Chadbourne, Lukas Simonis and Gitbas Jodel + dinner.

More ass-crack stage-hacks are in the making: two more exciting guitar duel/duets, a minimal techno party (by esc.rec. & DDS) and ‘The best of… Almelo‘ (by esc.rec. & Jeroen Diepenmaat). More info on the ass-crack stage-hacks soon!

I’m also assisting in the organization of Transmission, another event in Havenkwartier Deventer, which consists of a large Gerrit van Bakel exhibition, a complementary exhibition at SIED and some very, very(!) interesting lectures and performances. Transmission starts on the 1st of March and ends at April 13th. More info later.

The fourth edition of DIF is also in the making. It will probably take place somewhere in october and will be a completely different format from the other three editions. Looks very promising so far!

Besides organizing events I’m also building on several websites at the moment. On two of them I’m working together with Arthur van Beek for the first time. Nice designer!

And if all this wasn’t enough, I’m also designing and constructing some of the new Havenkwartier interior. I’ll show you pictures when it’s finished.

Three high quality free esc.rec. mp3 releases especially for you! Just in before the end of the year:

slo-fi – ’s loot (esc.rec.17)
Yoshimi! – II aka The Cheshire Rat (esc.rec.18)
Toxic Chicken – Make My Day (esc.rec.19)

Thank you slo-fi, Yoshimi! and Toxic Chicken for doing such a good job (again) and for providing these superb releases for free! I designed the cover of slo-fi’s loot. Oh, and of course I designed three new (or renewed) esc.rec. microsites to go with the releases:

www.escrec.com/slo-fi
www.escrec.com/yoshimi
www.escrec.com/toxic-chicken

I guess esc.rec.’s New Year’s resolution for 2008 will be to offer more free mp3 releases like this. I will try to focus more on a better balance between limited (cd-r) releases with unique artwork, ‘regular’ cd-r releases, online sales (which don’t exist yet for esc.rec. releases), free releases and maybe some ’specials’ for my esc.rec. subscribers.

Anyway, hope all keeps going well for esc.rec. in 2008! And the very best wishes to you ofcourse!