St. Vincent, Arca, Ryoji Ikeda and More to Perform at Red Bull Music Academy Festival Los Angeles
In October 2017, the Red Bull Music Academy will bring its forward-thinking curatorial spirit to the West Coast for the inaugural Red Bull Music Academy Festival Los Angeles. Featuring new shows from artists including St. Vincent, Ryoji Ikeda, Arca and Sophie, as well as a slew of club nights, concerts and conversations with creative trailblazers, the month-long program celebrates the musical and cultural diversity of Los Angeles, showcasing the city’s ever-evolving sounds.
In addition to the world premiere of a technicolor new direction from St. Vincent and the staging of the world’s largest synth orchestra by Ryoji Ikeda (with help from 100 powerful car soundsystems and their owners), RBMA Festival Los Angeles will also present a new audiovisual show from Arca at Open Beta, a temporary multimedia performance space created, transformed and directed by visual artist Taran Allen. In addition to Arca’s one-off show, the Open Beta space will be the site of a series of individually crafted audio-visual experiences that explore various musical worlds throughout the festival, playing host to far-out and ferociously danceable electronic music (with Jlin, Total Freedom, Silent Servant, Christoph De Babalon and more); experimental performers with uncommon intensity (with Yves Tumor, Amnesia Scanner, Sadaf and more); and a brand-new performance from pop futurist SOPHIE.
In a nod to California as a cradle of hip-hop, electro and rap innovators Uncle Jamm’s Army – whose ranks include Egyptian Lover, Arabian Prince and more – will take the stage following a public conversation with crew member and LA hip-hop statesman Ice-T. The festival also spotlights the connection between Mexican metal bands and LA’s Latinx metal bands with the three-stage Todo Es Metal, and presents a special club night together with Rail Up, the collective regularly making LA dancefloors quake with sounds from the African and Latinx musical diaspora.
Over the last decade, the collective of artists who belong to the Brainfeeder label have mapped out a musical movement that has resonated around the globe, articulating a creative vision that is intrinsically linked to the city of Los Angeles. Two shows at the RBMA Festival Los Angeles will feature two of the label’s most prominent artists: Flying Lotus and Thundercat.
No festival in LA would be complete without a foray into the world of film, so the Academy invites two directors to dive into the role music plays in some of their best-known works: Edgar Wright, the unpredictable mind behind Shaun of the Dead and Baby Driver, and Floria Sigismondi, whose unique eye can be glimpsed in everything from Marilyn Manson music videos to the Hulu series The Handmaid’s Tale. Bollywood’s “disco king” Bappi Lahiri will also make a rare public appearance to discuss composing for Indian cinema before launching into a performance of some of his mind-boggling hits.
As part of its Studio Science series, Red Bull Music Academy will also host conversations with mixing and mastering expert Benjamin Tierney, who helped shape the sound of LA’s spiritual jazz scene with his work on albums by Flying Lotus, J Dilla and Kamasi Washington; legendary mastering engineer Bernie Grundman, whose Midas touch helped turn records like Michael Jackson’s Thriller and Prince’s Purple Rain into gold; and Sylvia Massy, the force behind the book Recording Unhinged, whose ear can be heard in the works of Tool, Johnny Cash, Slayer and more.
For the full calendar of events and to buy tickets, visit la.redbullmusicacademy.com.
