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FIFTH ANNIVERSARY ALL-DAYER MEGA HAIR! The Old Hairdressers, Glasgow, Sat 21 Mar RARE FILM SCREENING / PARTY STRANGE ELECTRICITY The Glue Factory, Glasgow, Sat 14 Mar
Over the past five years, the Old Hairdressers has established itself as Glasgow’s most adventurous grassroots music and arts space, hosting gigs, club nights, film screenings, plays, talks and experimental happenings.
‘We rarely say no to anyone who has an idea for an event’, says programmer
Rob Churm, ‘so the space is often used by people who want to push the envelope’. Among these have been feminist collective TYCI and Prawn’s Pee, a daily publication printed on site for Glasgow International 2012. Situated opposite Stereo, in the Charles Rennie Mackintosh-designed former
Daily Record building, the Renfield Lane venue was a disused hair salon until 2010, when Churm, Raydale Dowler and Tony Swain transformed it into Le Drapeau Noir, a temporary ‘artist café’ and avant-garde performance space for the Glasgow International. The success of that project encouraged the team behind Stereo to keep the space open as a bar and the Old Hairdressers was launched. Their aim, says Churm, is to ‘bring people together, encourage creativity, facilitate new ways of thinking, and of course provide refreshments.’ For its fifth birthday, the Hairdressers is holding an all day music event entitled ‘Mega Hair!’ featuring UK underground luminaries such as Ashtray Navigations, Mick Flower and Family Elan, alongside Glasgow acts like Ela Orleans (pictured), Apostille and Sue Tompkins. ‘We don’t have a birthday party every year’, says Churm, ‘so we decided to make this one special!’ (Stewart Smith)
Few have seen Sähkö The Movie – regarded among certain technoheads as the holy grail of electronic music documentaries. Rarely screened live, it’s coming to Scotland for a special 20th anniversary night, during the Glasgow Short Film Festival. Although many won’t have laid eyes on it, some readers (especially clubbers of a certain vintage) could be in the film. Jimi Tenor (pictured), director of the 44-minute documentary, and semi-
legendary Finnish techno producer turned pop / jazz musician, remembers the mid-90s trip to Glasgow where some of the film was made: ‘Keith [McIvor, aka JD Twitch] invited me over for his club, Pure at the Barrowlands, which was a lot of fun.’ Two decades on, Tenor’s back to screen his documentary, and play live, with support from the inimitable Golden Teacher.
Tenor was a key player on Finnish ultra-minimalist techno label, Sähkö
Recordings (sähkö means ‘electricity’), founded by Tommi Grönlund in 1993. The film follows Tenor and labelmates, the excellent Mika Vainio and Ilpo Väisänen (aka Pan(a)sonic), sharing their ultra-sparse techno and self-made instruments with the world. ‘The main idea behind what we were doing was to make something simple,
nothing fancy. But hopefully a bit strange, and surprising,’ says Tenor. (Claire Sawers) ■ See list.co.uk for a longer version of this interview.
GLASGOW FILM FESTIVAL ÓLAFUR ARNALDS PLAYS BROADCHURCH O2 ABC, Glasgow, Wed 25 Feb
The TV box-set era has been rich with opportunities for musicians of a certain atmospheric style, be it Mogwai soundtracking The Returned or Choir of Young Believers earning a cult hit with ‘Hollow Talk’, the theme song from The Bridge. Icelandic composer Ólafur Arnalds didn’t just write a BAFTA-winning score for ITV crime drama Broadchurch but indeed helped inspire ‘the entire feel of the show’ according to series creator Chris Chibnall, with his ethereal cello, piano and electronic beats-based works. Being intrinsically involved with such a critically acclaimed
ratings-winner is something Arnalds calls ‘a great honour’, ahead of a special performance of music from Broadchurch at the Glasgow Film Festival. It’s had the bonus of making his job, which he admits has been nerve-wracking in the build-up to the hugely anticipated second series, slightly less daunting. ‘It’s been really great to work on a series that was so closely related to my music in the first place,’ he says, ‘(knowing) the music I write already fits the show.’ Elsewhere on his CV, Arnalds has also written music for the National Theatre of Scotland’s acclaimed stage adaptation of Let the Right One In, based on the Swedish novel then film by John Ajvide Lindqvist (and currently enjoying a run in Brooklyn).
Arnalds will be joined in Glasgow by a brass trio and a
string quartet for an evening of self-styled ‘cold and isolated’ soundscapes. Just make sure you’re coming for the right Arnalds – Ólafur admits he’s ‘lost count’ of how many times people have mixed him up with his female cousin Ólöf Arnalds, also a well-known musician. ‘It can be annoying but also great,’ he concedes. ‘I have heard many stories from record stores where people enter to buy one of our albums, but walk out with both after being confused or curious. Or both.’ (Malcolm Jack)
5 Feb–2 Apr 2015 THE LIST 69