Flyer for next show in Paris (for my birthday !) :
In a nutshell : This guitar looks normal, but it is connected to the USB plug of a laptop... It can plays melodies (ducks, ice cubes tuned to Central Java Pelog scale, train whistles, birds, Iranian santur, etc...), it can play simultaneously several sounds, I mean chords (like slowed down burmese crickets + re-tuned Burmese gongs in "Barry Lyndon" Haendel's Sarabande), it also starts, stops or modifies rythmic patterns.
(Naing Naing live at Musiques Volantes festival, Metz, Fr. July 2008)
Naing Naing's virtual tabla consists in playing either tabla samples on finger pads or performing genuine tabla rythmic pattern with non-tabla sounds or even both at the same time as in the live versions of "Mind the step" (metamorphosing footsteps in a staircase into a tabla composition) and "Toadstools" (with each finger triggering 3 types of sounds simultaneously : drums, tabla bols and rythmic frog samples).
Concrète Pop rocks !!! Naing Naing "Quack addict" live in the streets of Paris, June 21st, 2008:
Members:
This is primarily François (aka Naing Naing)'s solo project
Collaborators:
- Djengo Hartlap has help me a lot at the beginning with the technology and still does all the mastering process. He also co-wrote "Brosse a Danse" & "Ice Cube Music 2".
- Miss Maya (Tear of a Doll) sings a few songs at most of the shows.
- Orkhan Murat (Tear of a Doll, Nosfell) played the turkish drum sample.
- Franck Sinistra (Fisherman, El Justiciero, Marijane Miracle) sang "Toad Fever".
Maya, Orkhan and myself also play(ed) in Tear of a Doll.
Check this video (the live pictures are from a gig with NoMeansNo in Sept 1996 at the Bataclan, Paris, two days before I moved to Burma):
Influences
Naing Naing is mainly influenced by Naing Naing itself ("self-referential" as they say...)
But I love the work of hundreds of musicians. Some of my favorite artists are :
Naing Naing's top 50+ :
Venetian Snares
Autechre
Melt-Banana
Ramones
Victims Family
The Beatles
Motörhead
Pink Floyd
At the Drive-In
Dead Kennedys
Soft Machine
Johann Sebastian Bach
Morbid Angel
NoMeansNo
Jimi Hendrix
The Locust
Captain Beefheart
Neurosis
Fantomas
Voivod
Converge
Black Sabbath
Mr Bungle
Aphex Twin
Dwarves
Slayer
Discharge
Judas Priest
AC/DC
Iggy Pop
Sepultura
The Who
Spermbirds
Hans Reichel
Experimental Dental School
Frank Zappa
The Residents
Rattus
Bad Brains
Sleepytime Gorilla Museum
Kaaos
Matmos
Emperor
King Crimson
John Coltrane
Magma
Rage Against the Machine
Blevin Blectum
Siege
Meshuggah
The Ruts
John Lee Hooker
The Doors
Avskum
The Accüsed
Tom Waits
Buzzcocks
Zakir Hussein
Nile
Boredoms
Napalm Death
Ludwig van Beethoven
Gamelan Music of Bali
Costes
Ergo Phizmiz
The Cramps
Led Zeppelin
MDC
Björk
Asta Kask
The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion
Nikhil Banerjee
Melvins
Dmitri Shostakovich
An Albatross
Kemialliset Ystävät
Crucifix
Secret Mommy
Keuhkot
Flag of Democracy
Lightning Bolt
Sibelius
The Beach Boys
Sunn O))
Movies: I see significantly less movies than before since I started this time-consuming project. Faves were Brazil (Terry Gilliam), Alice (Jan Svankmajer), all Stanley Kubrick's films I saw were brilliant, Kurosawa, Jeunet & Carot and many others... and also "Dr Knock".
Writers: George Orwell, William Burroughs, JL Borges, Henri Miller, Abe Kobo, Hunter S. Thompson, Kadare, Georges Perec, William Styron, Celine, Both Murakami (Haruki & Ryu)
Painters: Hundertwasser ! and a few more...
Sounds Like
Sounds unique (just check it), but has some similarities with some of the works of:
Secret Mommy, Listen with Sarah, Matmos, Hugh Le Cain, Pink Floyd, Pierre Schaeffer, Jim Fassett, Hanna Hartman, Ergo Phizmiz, Björk, BBC Radiophonic Workshop, Wendy Mae Chambers, Xerophonics, Beatle Barkers, Autechre, Pierre Henry, Aphex Twin, Reed Ghazala (for the insect instrument), Amon Tobin, Matthew Herbert and Keuhkot. Tell me if there are more...
Naing Naing (pronounced 9,9) is resuming live shows after a half year hiatus for the birth of his second daughter (who already enjoys playing with guitar strings). The next show on saturday 17th may includes the first (?) attempt to merge musique concrète with hardcore punk.
Next Naing Naing album, a kaleidoscopic array of pop concrete styles is still not finished, but the whole thing already reaches 95 minutes. So it will be released as a double CD. ("Pop Concrete" is to be understood as "Musique concrète that is not affiliated with GRM/IRCAM) not as mere mainstrean pop : It emcompasses concrete gamelan, concrete punk, concrete blues, live concrete tabla solo, toothbrush dance music and more quirky stuff such as touching melodies made of the sound of my dentist's drill set to a funky beat.
In addition a Naing Naing live CD (50 minutes) will be released soon by Chicago-based Sleepy Mammal Sounds Records. It was recorded in Nantes, France in a cool venue called Lieu Unique which used to be a LU biscuit factory.
2 - Regular propaganda :
As you can hear I try to use concrete sounds as musical instruments, merge oil and water, make unquantized computer music and risky live performance using concrete USB guitar and USB tabla. Doing so I deliberately focus on sounds that can be recognized by listeners: frogs / toads, wasp buzz, ice cubes in a glass, toothbrushing, bird calls, washing machine, obsolete diesel generator, ducks, goose, cows, pigs, dentist drill, trains, sheep, clocks, crickets, wind, eating an apple, & more.
Most of my songs are from a unique source of sound (one wasp buzz) or thematically grouped sounds (various species of frogs) that are turned into drums, bass line and melodies. But I also did a few songs with what I call "compromise" (like the toothbrush dance music which has drums samples). I finally found a tag for my music : CONCRETE POP !!!
Re-Aktion Records just got me a new digital distributor :
Javanese gamelan made of ice cubes in a glass and played with a MIDI guitar (Paris, June 21st, 2008 - Fête de la musique). Fingers play ice cube and gong sounds while the foot-controller controls the slenthem (an indonesian instrument) :
Concrète Rock'n'Roll : my Ramones cover featuring Miss Maya (Tear of a Doll) on vocals and sledge hammer, the Burmese diesel generator (again!) and various construction and civil engineering machinery sounds :
Pics by Ellie Van Brande, Antwerpen, Sept. 2007
"Animal Hop" (in the player) is a remix of LISTEN WITH SARAH that will be released on a LWS remixes sampler by Womb Rds (UK). Other tracks here are older (2000-2004) except the live songs. "Ice cube in Pelog" is a live performance of a concrete gamelan piece entirely performed on "USB guitar".
This is Naing Naing "Animal Farm Blues" (according to YouTube Insight it is mostly popular in Egypt, Libya and Iran) :
(Also available on YouTube).
NAING NAING "TOOTHBRUSH FEVER" CD (14 tracks / 60 minutes of music like this / digipack + 16 pages colourful booklet with explanations) is available though paypal here. (12 euro postpaid worldwide)(Re-Aktion rds, 2004)
But NN "Toad Fever" EP-CD (below) is out of print.
I am still working on NAING NAING second full length album (14 tracks 2005-2008) which should be released at the end of 2008... And new TEAR OF A DOLL songs are in the pipeline as well...
All Dodoll Records for free & full download at last.fm (Naing Naing, Tear of a Doll / Tears of a Doll & Heimat-los) !
NAING NAING "Toothbrush Fever" is available in the USA on CD Baby.
For live shows, I use a different software and improvise parts of the songs to ensure that live versions are different from the album stuff. Some songs are performed with a MIDI-fyed guitar controlling the laptop, some songs are just played behind the laptop. The show also features Miss Maya singing on a few songs.
I have not got the chance to play with artists playing the same type of music yet, I shared shows with artists such as : Experimental Dental School, Stanley Kubi, The World/Inferno Friend Society, Tapetronic, Capsule (the one from Belgium), PAK, Stig Noise Soundsystem, DJ Rupture & Andy Moor (the Ex), Koonda Hoonda, USA is a Monster, Cheveu, Love to Love, Les Suce-Pendus, Headwar and more...
Ice cube music performed live in Paris early 2007 (This old video from an early concert is not representative of what I do now (but I just cannot capture newer videos right now) :
Free MP3, reviews, details on how those songs were made are available at www.naingnaing.com
NAING NAING "Toothbrush Fever" CD and "Toad Fever" EP are in full preview on last.fm
1 - Intro medley (Doing time + wind & rain + Le Coq Mégalo)
2 - Animal Hop remix
3 - Mind the step
4 - Greensleeves
5 - Chocolate addict at the dentist
6 - Ice cube gamelan (in pelog)
7 - Washing machine goes to Froggland
8 - Sadisco
9 - Quack addiction
10 - Rock'n'Roll Technical School (Ramones)
11 - Sarabande (by Haendel - cricket & gong)
12 - Brosse à dance
13 - Webbed
14 - Animal Farm Blues
15 - Toadstools
16 - Mi Ma La Bu
About me: Naing Naing is my Burmese name. My original French name is François. Long ago I played guitar in late HEIMAT-LOS (Pioneering Hardcore Punk in France in the 80s), then I played in TEAR OF A DOLL (that has merged Hardcore punk, Experimental, Avant / Noise rock, Prog-rock & indian music in the 90s). I also appear on some recordings by COSTES, COSMIC WURST and WIDE OPEN CAGE.
I have been involved in learning languages (mostly from Asia like Japanese & Burmese) and some exotic musical instruments: Saung (Burmese Harp) and a few others from India & Indonesia I eventually had to drop by lack of time (tabla, sitar, gamelan...) After spending 6-7 years in Myanmar (Burma), working as an interpreter for a famous humanitarian organization, I finally came back to my home town Paris in 2006. I'm the father of two half Japanese girls.
I am running the following myspace profiles :
NAING NAING (since 1999)
TEAR OF A DOLL 2nd era (since 1992)
TEARS OF A DOLL 1st era (1988-1992)
HEIMAT-LOS (1983-1988)
Tags : concrète pop ; musique concrète ; experimental music ; organic electronica ; avant-garde ; sound manipulator ; field recording ; found sounds ; frog music ; ice cube music ; insect music ; virtual tabla ; live concrete MIDI guitar ; avant pop ; concrete pop ; musique concrete ; offbeat ; weird ; brosse à danse / brosse a danse
merci de nous avoir permis de faire partie de ton cercle d'amis c'est un réel plaisir pour nous longue vie à ta musique et à celle des 60's toutes nos musicales amitiés de chez les Ch'tis
Ca va très bien mon ami : mon groupe prend son envol petit à petit, je baigne donc dans un certain enthousiasme. Dommage que je sois si loin de Paris, le hardcore avec des criquets et des crapauds ça doit être chouette quand même.
Naing Naing, I guess a few people call the instrument "aquaphone" but the official name is "waterphone". You should ask Richard Waters who is the Inventor of waterphone. And I'm sure YOU WILL LOVE this fantastic instrument if you get one!!!!!!!
Online Now!
ris
