Laura – a multiinstrumentalist who dropped by to discuss XyloVan mallet technology found a mood:
Thursday night jam
Mikaal, Hunter and a friend get into a groove in Swing City:
The Walking Beast
It’s been around for a while, troche but this is the first time we got to see it up close and in action. Biomass is completely obsessed with it, of course. Fire good. Mammoth earth-shaking alien-looking tank technology gooder. Here’s a clip of it showing off on the Esplanade at Burning Man 2012 – watch …
The Saucers
Our Burning Man project for this year took so much time to build that we haven’t been able to scrape together a full build log for it. But watch this space – we’ll share some pictures of how we spun plastic plates from the 99-cent store, a handful of Chinese-made LEDs and four old backpack …
We’re headed to Swing City!
We’re tickled as hell to share this news: XyloVan just learned that we will be joining Swing City in Black Rock City this August at Burning Man 2012. Swing City is dedicated to aerial gymnastics – and the XyloVan crew is about as buff as a plate of doughnuts. But we’re as likely to monkey …
Photos from Lucidity Festival 2012 – Sparks of joy
Lucidity Festival brought a lot of joy to XyloVan. Here’s what some of that looked like. If you spot yourself in any of these photos, give us a shout in comments – we want to hear from you – and thanks for playing!
Rocking the mallets at Lucidity Festival 2012
Everyone brings something glowing and unique to XyloVan. Little kids, drunks and professional percussionists hammer at the keys in a zillion different ways. People play “Chopsticks” or “Star Wars” or “Mario Bros.” or “Claire du Lune.” They goof, explore and jam. Their music is as diverse as their faces and lives. But the beauty of …
Raoul’s lucid dream
I kind of want to dedicate this set of dispatches from Lucidity Fest 2012 to Raoul, a little, sparkly-eyed older Mexican fellow who strolled up at like 2 a.m. Sunday and reminded me of the power of transformative encounters with new music. He had never seen anything like XyloVan. He kept saying, “This is … …
Chill time
Had a little party on the van’s roof deck with Marty (left) and Crystal (right) listening to Nick down below playing keys in an impromptu jam with whoever that is on stage. Calm, still, reflective and in the end quite revelatory. This is the atmosphere for lucid dreaming.
The hood trio
These three had a fantastic time hammering away on Keyboard #4 and bending it to their will. The gentleman on the right with the flashlight seems to want to help …
A little night music
This is the scene around XyloVan on Friday night at #LucidityFest. I love watching the interplay, ampoule the solo raving and overall free improvisation – and then moments of careful coordination – that occur with the random comings and goings of a festival – and particularly with this unique mix of …
Lucidity Festival 2012 – All about inner light
Now that was a hell of a thing. XyloVan is all packed away and my ears are still ringing with the music you all made together – with us and throughout Lucidity Festival 2012. There are plenty more photos and video where this came from (and still to come) but I’m too shagged (and back-to-work!) …
What is the sound of a XyloVan wash?
It sounds a little like this:
L.A. Burning Man Decompression 2011 – Photos of art, fire, music and mutation
Decom was glorious. Twice the number of installations we saw at last year’s Decom, an explosion of art cars, flamboyant fire, generosity, interactive experiences and deep, rich music. We loved talking with everyone who stopped to play the van, and everyone we met on walkabouts in this lush, dustless burn in the shadow of downtown …
L.A. Decompression 2011 – video
Just a little video clip here demonstrating how people can duet with each other on either side of the van. We wired the sound so that each side of the van can hear (but not see) the other – making it sonically transparent. Often, someone starts riffing on what comes out of the speakers, without …
Kids, darkwads, dubstep and jerks – A little feedback to the Borg on Burning Man 2011
There’s a fascinating thread over at the Burning Man Blog inviting feedback on this year’s burn. The Burning Man Organization (variously known as BMORG or the Borg) asked for feedback, and got an earful – on everything from the joys of big art and gifting to the miseries of unwanted noise and the hellacious exodus …
Burning Man 2011 – Mutant Vehicle pro tips from a first-timer
Sadder. Wiser. Exhausted. Dazzled. After building and piloting JANUS at Burning Man 2011 and living to tell the tale (Full build log here) I’ll go out on a limb to say this: Bringing a pre-approved mutant vehicle to the playa for the very first time in your life virtually guarantees that: You will work your …
Burning Man 2011 – Panoramarama
The vast expanse of the plana lends itself to cinematic views. You find yourself wandering around the desert like David Lean, previsualizing shots for “Lawrence of Arabia.” I used to hand-stitch photos together in Photoshop from whatever digital snapshot camera I was using, which was horribly time-consuming. This year, I discovered the iPhone app 360 …
Music in the night
The beauty of sharing a huge musical mutant vehicle is that – at any moment – something like this can happen: (EDIT: These blanks were once embedded Facebook videos. I quit the platform in 2018 for reasons. Sorry/not-sorry.) … or this … … or this … … or this … Thanks to THAT Damned Band, …
Built, spun and burnt – first panoramas from Burning Man 2011
Back in Silver Lake two days after leaving the playa, and I’m still foggy and bedazzled: That was the biggest, hardest, most invigorating burn we’ve ever had in eight residencies on the playa since 1996. XyloVan/JANUS took two and a half sweaty, sometimes lonesome days to build (my deepest thanks to David, Marcelle, Marcus and …