John Wiese is an artist, composer and arch-collaborteur from Los Angeles, California, who has recorded alongside a myriad of other musical luminaries, such as Wolf Eyes, SunnO))), Die Monitr Batss, Lasse Marhaug, Evan Parker, C. Spencer Yeh, Thurston Moore, Cattle Decapitation, Merzbow, The Locust, Smegma, Yellow Swans, Daniel Menche and Bruce Russell. He has toured extensively throughout the world, covering Europe, Scandinavia and Australia as a member of Sunn O))), the UK as part of the Free Noise tour (a tentet including Evan Parker, C. Spencer Yeh, Yellow Swans, etc.), and the United States alongside Wolf Eyes.
Toted as parasympathetic drone aesthete and noise maven, Wiese’s meticulous sonic mode of operation is an adroit mixage of concrete ruthlessness, bubbly hypnosis and mash-up cassette psychosis. ‘Much like Japanese electronic composer Ryoji Ikeda,’ Pitchfork elaborates, ‘Wiese excels in making clean, precise cuts between drastically different sounds, building a drop-dead dynamic capable of stepping from almost-absent rumbles and hums to furious noise burst’. Wiese exhibits a conscientious, microscopic attention to detail, producing visceral sounds recorded straight to tape and digitally processed with faultless precision.
Having appeared at the 52nd Venice Biennale alongside Italian artist Nico Vascellari and installing sound exhibitions at Tokyo Tech, Tokyo and Family, Los Angeles, Wiese is in Christchurch to present his Battery Instruments Installation, an extension of his performance and recorded work into the protracted and enveloping space of the gallery.
[Images: Paul Johns, Matt Akehurst]
