Greggory Clark | @greggoryclark
The third FUZE New Music Festival happens in Fredericton this weekend, August 12 & 13. FUZE is a series within the New Brunswick Summer Music Festival and this mini-fest program is one which bridges classical and contemporary music by bringing together musicians from both worlds.
FUZE opens Friday night at The Capital Complex. On the bill is CONSTRUCTIONS, a special series of concerts during which four bands have been asked to perform original sets of music inspired by a common theme. In 2016, that’s Russian composers, and Jaguar Knight will be joined for the event by Pony Girl, Indigo Poirier, and Angel of the Marriage of Contraries.
To preview the special concert, Grid City caught up with Philip Clark aka Jaguar Knight. Clark is an electronic music producer, DJ, and hosts Party Sauce on 107.3 Local FM in Saint John.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Grid City: Prior to the CONSTRUCTIONS invite, did you already have some favourite Russian composers? Hear some new ones since?
Philip Clark: I have no background whatsoever in classical music but I happen to own and enjoy a few Tchaikovsky records as well as Pictures at an Exhibition by Mussorgsky.
Where did you attend music school? Are you self taught?
Self-taught. I don’t like being told what to do or how to do it. I tried taking a few guitar lessons when I was 14 but it turned me off playing guitar for many years. Then I discovered distortion pedals. A whole new world!
Is the FUZE venue very different from the setting in which you’d normally perform?
The Capital? I love to play at that place!
“So in other words, you can expect minimal techno in 11/4 time.”
What can we expect for Jaguar Knight’s CONSTRUCTIONS set?
Pictures at an Exhibition was originally a musical narrative of a dude walking around a museum checking out the paintings. I’m saying what if the museum was inside an orbiting space platform in the future and the exhibits were all based in an unknown virtual reality being experienced remotely from a whole other dimension.
So in other words, you can expect minimal techno in 11/4 time.
What instruments do you use for a live concert? Are you performing solo?
Solo with a bunch of machines. On Friday I’ll be using a Roland TR-606 Drumatix, and a brand-new Korga Volca FM which is a badass little box, and maybe a couple other things. There will be room for improvisation – I’m also a DJ so I tend to alter a performance based on the room and the crowd response and what I had for supper and so on.
Visually, what is a Jaguar Knight concert like?
Usually lots of lasers and lights and fog machines and people having fun with their friends and dancing around and making out on the dancefloor, although Friday will probably just be a bunch of people hanging out and trying to figure out what the heck I’m trying to do.
CONSTRUCTIONS is a part of the FUZE program at The Capital Complex (362 Queen Street) Friday August 12. The night includes sets by Nuages, Greg Harrison, Brad Perry, as well as four CONSTRUCTIONS sets. The show begins at 9pm and cover is $8 at the door. A $20 weekend pass for FUZE is available online and includes the Saturday program at Memorial Hall (9 Bailey Drive).
