Errrrr, forgive me Nevyn, but where have you been?
Alas, stuck in Portland. California is near a 15 hour drive (just to SF). LA much more. I've done the drive a few times. Portland does not have much in the way of loopers or even electronic musicians that are more than just DJs.
The two seminal live looping festivals (Loopstock and the Y2K Series- largest annual one on earth) ARE
on the West Coast of the United States. There is as much going on in the live looping world
on the West Coast of the United States as anywhere, really.
Lower west coast. Even Seattle is a bit friendlier to electronic than Portland (a town notorious for it's RAWK and now it's emo), but still far too raver based on the whole. SF is a lovely haven I adore, but far too expensive to live in.
There have been live looping tours, live looping events (in LA, San Francisco, San Jose, Oakland, Santa Cruz, San Luis Obispo)
for many years here where I live, south of you..
Yes, and the US is very tall. Those are long distances. I just thought it would be neat if any northwesterners were on here.
The complaint I've heard in the past is that people on the East Coast wish that the climate there was better for live looping compared to the West Coast.
How do you mean?
Go back and check the archives of Loopers Delight. There are definitely live loopers in Portland, Seattle, Ashland, Vancouver and
I believe there have been live looping gigs in at least Seattle.
Sure, I've put some on in Portland, and helped in Seattle. Played at some others. It happens, it's just not frequent, and it's more "electronic friendly but we're not ravers or DJs" and all the various sub avenues that fit in under that umbrella.
The *Y2K9 International Live Looping Festival* _(www.y2kloopfest.com)_ will be on the *third weekend of October, 2009*
in *Santa Cruz *and *San Jose*, as well.
Festivals like that definitely sound like worth checking out, if time/money allows, of course... but I'm more seeking avenues in the more local direction. Guess I shouldn't have been so broad in my questioning!
If you are interested in coming down to perform at it, please send me a representative CD of your live looping
performances when I send out the call for performers in the beginning of August.
Will do.
Watch for that announcement here at Loopers Delight.
Also, you should know that all the people who have put these larger, multiple artist live looping events on have been loopers
exactly like you or I.
Absolutely, who better to put such a thing on than someone who knows it from the other end? =)
I started the 1st looping festival because I was lonely and wanted to know if others wanted to come out of the woodwork
and/or their closets and participate with me.
That is part of the reasoning behind my non traditional electronic music events in Portland as well. Let's band together: the Mentality.
I booked my first tour of Europe in 2003 by 1 email to Loopers Delight, saying I was coming and did anyone want
to put on a small live looping festival as an excuse to host my trip...............This community went bonkers and I booked
a two month tour in two weeks.
Most intriguing, I'd love to hear more of the details of how it all went down offlist...
So, my advice to you is to put on a Seattle Live Looping Festival yourself.
Portland! Portland! And I definitely can't get looping specific; that's just a rarity in this town. And when speaking of pure looping only, not something that gets to live anywhere near enough.
I'll help to advise you on how to do it within no budget at all (as I did for years)
and it will blow you away at how many people will come to play; lend you equipment so you don't have to rent it;
give you a free venue; freely advertise and publicize for you, etc.
"If you build it, they will come" from the movie Field of Dreams
Yep, I'm working on it... Alas it's more about cultivating the interest at this point in time in Portland. There are a lot of strong unground scenes/sub scenes etc of rawk and electronic... most adhere to one formula per, something I've always loved about looping: as many formulas as the mind can imagine.