Marshall Allen (°1924) met up with Sun Ra somewhere in the Fifties and, from then on, stayed true to the Arkestra, and eventually emerged as the leader. This rooted musician, kora builder and sax player still has the strength of an athlete, even though he's already 83. Nobody blows the horn as hard as Allen. He's also the person that still keeps the Sun Ra tradition alive. Aside from playing the music from the master, he also composes new music for the Arkestra. At (K-RAA-K)3 festival Allen will be playing with Paul Hession. This drummer started as an autodidact in several rock bands, but at the end of the seventies he was attracted by free improv and during the eighties he got involved with the British avant garde. Recently collaborations mention the names of Joe McPhee, Frode Gjerstad and Mick Beck. Well, that's enough reasons to make you check these cats out, isn't it?

Bardo Pond must be the most old school band of the new generation acid rockers. From '91 onward the band is a quest for balance between long hypnotic improvisations and space rock songs from way beyond space. Like most of their legendary predecessors this psychedelic band has won the evil game with time. Ten years ago everyone wanted to link them with the post-rock movement, and now they have transcended into the new psych scene. Bardo Pond has never cared about musical trends and stayed true to themselves. That's their secret. And the flute.

Ceramic Hobs are a punk band. Not your usual one though. Some of their members are known to be in and out of mental hospitals. Being in a band must be one of the few jobs in the world in which struggling with your mental health is regarded as an advantage. Certainly in the Hobs, because it's one of the reasons why they are so different from their peers. Think of what would have become of Warsaw when they would have met on a knackered carnival party. And then we're not even talking about the music. "Many of the ?statements? on Hobs records are somewhat hysterical in tone and are supposed to be read or heard with one eyebrow raised, like Roger Moore." or "The Ceramic Hobs are happy to live a long way from any city, are not post-modern, do not own mobile telephones, do not take cocaine, assert no intellectual property rights and have no wish to compromise their post-ironic entartete kunst to reach a bigger audience of halfwits." The roots of weird punk lies in Blackpool, U.K., 1987.

"Middle Tennessee 's finest anarchic post neo-skiffle collective specializing in kazoo-exotica", that's what the free wheeling folk collective from Nashville describes their own music. We discovered them a while ago after a tip from Josephine Foster. The band already exists for a small decennium, but just now popped up thanks to some other wonderful musicians spreading the word. Everyone who hears their self titled debut becomes an immediate fan. These musicians are honest to the bone and share their love of playing. Cherry Blossoms are ready to become everyone's 2008 favorite discovery.

So, you never heard about Dragons of Zynth? In the US of America they are "the next big thing", and they deserve to be, we would say. These hipsters from Cleveland have all the ingredients to become your new favourite band. They create a retro-futuristic space universe with a mix of soul, hiphop, dubby psychedelica and distorted garagerock. Their debut LP is produced by Dave Sitek from TV on the Radio and David Bowie is a big fan. Still not convinced? Dreaming about a mix of Bad Brains, Outkast, Animal Collective with all the attitude of a bunch of Black Panther hippies pretty much sums up what Dragons of Zynth are about.

In 2004 Richard Crandell made his appearance with an incredibly beautiful album "Mbira Magic" on John Zorn's Tzadik label. We realized that kalimbas are excellent instruments for a good party after first hearing Konono No. 1 and their friends. On the other side of the spectrum the little box also produces melancholic minimal compositions that focus on the purity of the sound and the beauty of the instrument itself. Crandell gets the maximum out of it, in a very subtle way. We are weary of using the adjective "dreamy" since the patent of Iceland, but this is as dreamy as it gets... euhm, heaven. Eat that, Mùm!

Clockcleaner play the kind of filthy noise rock we like. they titled their debut full-length "Nevermind" because they think the Nirvana album with the same title is an overrated piece of shit. And listening to their latest "Babylon Rules" we're almost starting to belief them. They listened too much to stuff like Bauhaus, The Jeus Lizard, Black Flag, Flipper, Royal Trux and Cro-Mags. They hate their audience, and they aren't afraid to also make the crowd notice that. Moreover, they use way too much drugs. Knowing they also compose modern day hardcore sailor songs, do we really still have to convince you of the fact this is the best punk rock band around these days? Clockcleaner is the punch your ugly high-brow face deserves.

Hellvete is one of the solo outlets that came out of the Funeral Folk horde. Demonic guitar droning and cosmic folk instrumentals are Hellvete's main ingredients. His ear damaging live concerts became quite notorious in the Meetjeslandse underground scene. For the first time, Hellvete will perform with a backing band, to emphasize the layered aspects of his song writing and off course to show off with some furious fuzz drenched drone rock. (photo: Tim Broddin)

A few people still recognize Ton Lebbink as the drummer of the notorious Mecano, once a Dutch band and art collective which emerged at the end of the seventies under the influence of British post punk. After that, Lebbink became known as the only true punk poet of the Netherlands. Until this day, this Dutchman stays literary and literally unbeaten, even on stage! Poetry on the (K-RAA-K)3-festival? You're welcome!

"The wooden lightbox: a secret art of seeing" is the new work of Canadian artist Alex Mackenzie. It is the first of a cycle of films that reflects on the early development of cinema and long forgotten ideas about moving images. In this live performance he uses a self-built hand-cranked 16mm projector. This "work in progress" is presented in ten chapters with a varied speed, according to cranking more quickly or slowly. All images are hand processed and contact printed.

This percussionist from New York became an active member of the ongoing improvisation scene in the eighties. He develops a rather unusual view on musicianship and abstracts the meaning of music with performances like musically activating a sink full of dishes. Live he simply plays a snare drum these days. Yes, only a snare drum.

The Siltbreeze label, that brought us splendid stuff such as the Dead C, Harry Pussy and Strapping Fieldhands in the past, has found a second breath. One of the best examples of this is Pink Reason, the band of Kevin Debroux. Guitar songs like we remember them from the highlights in the lo-fi era. Always honest and raw. Together with Bands like Psychedelic Horseshit, Times New Viking and Clockcleaner, a new productive scene stands up. This must be the new sensation!

Henri Pousseur is a living legend. He studied music in Liège and Brussels from 1947 till 1953 and was a part of the European avantgarde with Pierre Boulez, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Luciano Berio. In 1957 he joined the Darmstadtschule where he picked up an interest in avantgarde research, tape composition and serialism. Elise Simoens (musicologist at Matrix, Leuven and at the university of Brussels) brings you one of Pousseur's most recent compositions at the (K-RAA-K)3 festival: "Voix et Vues Planétaires" (2003/2004) is an etnographic electro-acoustic work that brings sounds and images together. "Voix et Vues" is a part of the 16 hour "Seize Paysages Planétaires" (2000), based on samples of traditional music from all over the world.

One of the coolest band names of 2007, that's for sure. This band can be a duo as well as a 5-piece combo. The line-up is household in comparison to Pink Reason and they both share a love for rawness, though they are noisier than their counterpart. "Effect pedals are only for pussies that got no originality to their playin. Also too expensive to make yr instrument sound like ice cream", dixit Matt Horseshit. This burning vehicle from Columbus, Ohio plays "shitgaze" loud enough to warp you to another cosmic level, away from new wave hippies.

The R.O.T. drone combo will be one of the most familiar bands on this festival for the solid (K-RAA-K)3 audience. During the last edition they played a spontaneous set somewhere in the back of the merch room. This time they will be on a real stage. R.O.T. likes interacting with spaces and coincidence. Very curious as to what will happen in the Brigittines church.

The legendary Silver Apples have their roots in the electronic rock of the sixties. Being a duo that used twelve oscillators, some electronic junk and a drum kit, the band soon became an underground sensation that made it into the popular alternative scene. In the nineties their first two albums were reissued and in 1996 Simeon, being the only living member, decided to reactivate the band again on his own. He recorded a brand new album with Steve Albini and a new wind raged through the Silver Apples orchard.

Alright, you already know LSD March, Suishou No Fune and Miminokoto customary of the great Les Rallizes Dénudés and Fushitsusha. Up-Tight is another band from that tradition. Dark psychedelic guitar explosions, with "acid-fried" and "drugged-out" garage jams. Up-Tight gives new meanings to the concept of power trio's.

"The unearthing of the LAFMS recordings is experimental rock history at it's most historical and hysterical - a completely bizarro and further-out counterpart to the L.A. punk scene." (Thurston Moore)

This historical collection of shortfilms shows the experimental scene in L.A. in the seventies. This scene, with Smegma as most notorious outcome, was heavily influenced by the Mothers of Invention, Beefheart, the Residents and Sun Ra, but also by the radical foundations of Fluxus and the Aktionists. They paved the road for the New Weird Americans as No-Neck Blues Band and Jackie-O-Motherfucker who nowadays are pivotal of the American expermentalists.

1) Drum Moves (Tom Recchion September 27, 1976, 12:04, Pasadena, California, b/w video, sound)
2) Mother Daughter (Joe Potts with Vetza, 1977, 4’, no sound)
3) Intransitive Verbs (John Duncan & Tom Recchion, 1977, 7:25, Pasadena, California, b/w Super 8, silent)
4) Drums By Magic (Tom Recchion April 20, 1978, 5:22, Pasadena, California, b/w video, sound)
5) It’s Halloween (Rick Potts and Tom Recchion, 1980, 14:20 min., Super 8)
6) Fever Flower #1 (Rick Potts, 1981, 7’, colour, Music : Dinosaur with Horns)
7) Fever Flower #2 (Rick Potts, 1981, 7’, colour, Music : Dinosaur with Horns)
8) Red Wrec. Said (Doug Henry, 1983, 5', 16mm, sound, color, Music : Doo-Dooettes)
9) Lost Motion (Janie Geiser, 1999, 11’ , 16mm, color, Music: Tom Recchion)
10) Eye Witness (Michael Intriere, 1999, 19:24, Video, Music by Joseph Hammer)
11) Later (Michael Intriere, 2000, 6:30, Video, Music by Extended Organ)
12) The Fourth Watch (Janie Geiser, 2000, 3’, 16mm, color, Music: Tom Recchion)
13) Apartment Thunder (Jonathon Rosen, 2005, 3:39, Music by David Toop &Tom Recchion)
14) Tunnel Lines Slow (Ships At Sea) (Jonathon Rosen, 2006, 2:50, Music by Tom Recchion)

What's there and what's not. About presence and absence, the limits of our sight and the freedom of imagination. Curated by Dirk De Blauwe

Cell
(Volker Schreiner (DE), 2006, 4'27")
Cell is a controlled montage of images with the noise of television screens in dark living rooms. An experiment in which visual beauty is the most essential part.

Futur Antérieur (a.k.a. Disciples of the Heinous Path - Part 1: The Pain of Everyone)
(Herman Asselberghs (BE), 2007, 15'00")
Herman Asselberghs' Futur Antérieur is, for the most part, a decidedly 'anti-retinal' affair: it consists of fifteen minutes of utter, stifling blackness filled with noise and an occasional glimmer of distant, shimmering twilight. Nothing points to anything, and there are no signs of meaning to be gleaned from its abysmal eventlessness in any way, 'till ...

Energie!
(Thorsten Fleisch (DE), 2007, 5'00")
An uncontrolled high voltage discharge of approx. 30,000 volts exposes photographic paper which is then arranged in time to create new visual systems of electron organization.

Black and White Trypps Number Three
(Ben Russel (US), 2007, 12’00”)
How do fans experience the showcase of their favorite band Lightning Bolt? Ben Russell focuses on a couple of people in the front row. A hypnotic experience on the ecstasy, the sweat and becoming one with the music.

The Coming Race
(Ben Rivers (Ireland), 2005, 5'00")
Thousands of people climb a rocky mountain terrain. The destination and purpose of their ascension remains unclear. A vague, mysterious and unsettling pilgrimage...

Magnetic Movie
(Semiconductor (UK), 2007, 5’00”)
The secret lives of invisible magnetic fields are revealed as chaotic ever-changing geometries . Are we observing a series of scientific experiments, the universe in flux, or a documentary of a fictional world?

More than fifteen years ago, the Swiss Paul Sacher Foundation, that preserves the archives of music of the twentieth century, sends out musicologist Dr. Albi Rosenthal to Henri Pousseur. Discovering the richness of the documents preserved by Pousseur, this musical antiquarian gets crazy. All the past, present and future documents from the Pousseur archive were granted to the foundation: the magnetic reels, scores, correspondence, theoretical writings; but also complex research, obscure sound material,... This film is about the fourth and most recent trip to Basel.

By DOMINIQUE LOHLÉ ET GUY MARC HINANT

PRESENTED BY DUBLAB, CURATED BY FROSTY (DUBLAB) & BRIAN YOUNCE (SUNDANCE)

The Labrats of dublab.com fly over from LA to bring us unseen music videos, documentaries, comedy clips, out-there animation and short films. Yes, this future roots webradio super station also specializes in eye melting magic. Dig these visions burning bright.
Films By: Andy Cahill, Animal Charm, Erik Barnes, Joel Trussell, Matt Amato, Matt Lenski, Maximilla Lukals, Miranda July, Monkmus, Ray Tintori, Roel Wonter, Saul Levitz, The Masses, Timothy Saccenti, and more...

Music Videos Featuring: Animal Collective, Aspera, Band of Horses, Battles, Bon Iver, Daedelus, Devendra Banhart, Dntel, Entrance, MGMT, My Robot Friend, The Dodos, Trans Am, and more...