Electromagnetic Sound Art - Disinformation “National Grid” - MTV “Blah Blah Blah” magazine - Feb 1997

Report by journalist Craig McLean from the MTV music magazine “Blah Blah Blah”, about the live premiere of “National Grid” by Disinformation, at club Disobey, 10 October 1996 [1]. The first recorded version of “National Grid” was published on the Disinformation “Stargate” LP by the avant-garde record label Ash International (an imprint of Touch Records) in 1996 (see links). The first performance was programmed at the Disobey club night by Blast First - the record company responsible for publishing artists like Sonic Youth, Big Black, Dinosaur Jr., Suicide and Panasonic, alongside audio work by the artist Jeremy Deller, etc.

“Blah Blah Blah” was produced for MTV by Ray Gun Publishing, boasting a circulation of 120,000 copies [2] and featuring (in the case of this issue) interviews with Noel Gallagher, Robert Carlyle, Kate Winslett, Snoop Dogg and Steve Buscemi etc - giving some indication of the role that Disinformation played in influencing sonic arts practice, and in promoting what were at that time still highly controversial ideas, to audiences outside the (very small) world of the underground noise music micro-culture.

“National Grid” was also described in a full page feature covering the Disobey event, which was printed in London’s Evening Standard newspaper, with a readership of over 800,000 people. In terms of public access to information about relatively obscure technical concepts (eg - about VLF radio) and cultural trends, it’s also worth pointing out that these events took place in the earliest days of the internet - the domain name for Google wasn’t even registered until Sept 1997 - with the effect that many of the informative resources we now take for granted did at that time simply not exist.

“National Grid” was originally performed and recorded using the Upper and Lower Side-Band filter on a VLF converted shortwave radio, to musically tune interference from live mains electricity. Later versions use electric guitar pedals to tune direct-line outputs from mains electrical transformers… “Heavy Metal for the 23rd century”!

Disinformation founder Joe Banks met Craig McLean at the Disobey performance, with the photographer John Horsley visiting Joe in Tooting some time later, photographing different equipment - the photo features the Low Frequency Engineering L500 VLF receiver used to record the Disinformation track “Ghost Shells”, plus in fact the National Grid PLC team rugby shirt (donated by Tony Charles) which originally inspired the title “National Grid”.

The “small club” referred to in the article was the (moderately large) upstairs space at The Garage (music venue) at London’s Highbury Corner. Far from being a properly underground event, Blast First engaged a professional PR company to (successfully) promote Disobey to the media as an amazing “in crowd” night, attended by celebrities such as Jarvis Cocker. The event sold-out, queues formed in the street outside, and celebrity photographers from Esquire magazine and Harper's Bazaar etc were surprised to have their expectations confounded by performances from Disinformation and DJ Beekeeper (Bruce Gilbert from the band Wire).

For a full list of “National Grid” performances and gallery sound installations to date please follow this link -

www.flickr.com/disinfo/31910925141/

[1] “Blah Blah Blah” issue 11, Feb 1997, page 4
[2] “Billboard”, 24 Feb 1996, page 94

www.discogs.com/Disinformation-Stargate/release/66465

A scan of the Disobey + DJ Beekeeper beermat can be found here -

weedsuptomeknees.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/disobey-beer...

Taken on: February 25, 2017

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