tr nch - live at artmospheric festival 2011 [anatomy 16]

the 16th anatomy has arrived: a two-hour recording of dave twomey's dj set as tr nch, at artmospheric festival 2011!

dave is a man of many hats: a world traveler (currently residing in the UK after living in japan for years), a DJ and producer otherwise known as tr nch (earlier this year, his collaboration with iori was released on the time to express label), a party promoter... he is also battling cancer, and doing it in an unconventional yet determined way while raising money for his treatment.

today, we're sharing dave's dj set as tr nch, recorded live at the fifth annual artmospheric festival in sofia, bulgaria on july 23rd, 2011. we also have a rough tracklist, but please read on, as dave and i trade words about his music, his mariana party concept, his travels, and his treatment fundraiser.

Tell us about how you connected with Time To Express and Iori for 'Barreleye'.
I met Peter at Labyrinth 2008 following email contact beginning with streams of praise from me for his T2X debut 'Trusted' EP, which is still in my record box today. That year at Laby we cemented our friendship on the dancefloor over a bottle of tequila, bad dancing (speaking for myself only of course) & air punches, which we try to continue every year at Labyrinth. Anyway, I dropped the demo of Barreleye in 2009 at my Mariana event in Tokyo right at the end of my set, at which Peter was guest DJ. I had built the crowd up as I love to just right & to be fair the crowd did go pretty wild. Peter came up to the booth & signed it pretty much on the spot! To be honest I didn't really believe him at the time so was very nice when we got it out. Iori I met in 2009 on a Mariana tour with Cio (D'Or) & Mike (Parker); it didn't take long before we were swapping ideas to and fro & 'Barreleye' was born. Talented guy.

You've played gigs across the world: Europe, South America, and Asia (and hopefully the US soon!). Can you name off any particularly memorable events you've been part of? Do you have a favorite place to play? How does travel affect you as a musician?
I can't really beat playing my own events in Tokyo to be honest. The crowd just go wild for the deep sea stuff when I play as Tr nch even if I am dropping something beatless! I was in Japan for 8 years so I guess I have some good (or maybe just noisy?) friends. The best gig I had outside of Japan was probably in Argentina back in 2006 at a place aptly named Octano in (crazy) Cordoba. I was playing angry electro tech at the time & they just went berserk. I promptly responded by staying up the whole of the next day to the detriment of the large thing in the centre of my face. Oops. Which brings me to the final part of the question: traveling makes me TIRED, mostly, but inspires me on so many levels at the same time. My father was a pilot so I guess its in my blood.

Early last year, you were diagnosed with cancer. Please talk about about your holistic approach to treatment, and please tell us about your fundraiser.
Well I was already at Stage 4 (i.e the cancer had already spread via my lymph nodes to my liver and my lungs) when I was diagnosed (over 5% survive beyond 5 years on the UK National Health Service), chemo still seems just totally counter-intuitive to me and having started doing acupuncture in Japan a few years before holistic was always going to be my approach. I am also fucking sceptical about conventional medicine in general & the pharmaceutical companies in particular. Whats the point treating a symptom if once you have got rid of it (the tumours) it comes roaring back? So, I gave up booze, late nights, all the so-called 'food' aka JUNK we eat like processed or refined (aka zero nutritional value) foods and embarked on a whole bunch of whole body treatments: healthy nutrition to flush the body with antioxidants, regular exercise, supplement programmes to boost the immune system, etc etc. You can read all about it on my fundraiser blog. Feel free to add to the donations if you can: so far my friends and family raised over 19,000GBP at last look. The money is going fast on these damn expensive treatments though…

Tell us about Mariana.
Inspired by David Attenborough's Blue Planet 'The Deep' episode we started Mariana in 2008. The concept of deep sea trench fitted perfectly with how I was feeling a year on from my first Labyrinth musically and spiritually. I realised both something that had a more outdoors than indoor vibe, that touched on nature even if not actually in it. The concept is still to immerse the crowd into the experience though the Mariana Limited parties have taken over to some extent. Mariana Limited (past guests Ben Klock, Kirk Dediorgio and next Peter Van Hoesen live) is big brother to the main Mariana event series (past guests Cio D'Or, Mike Parker, PVH, Pendle Coven, MLZ) which fully embraces the deep sea concept with multi screen deep sea visuals both analogue & digital, music, plus there is also littler sister Mariana Dub Session for the housier, etcher or dubber guests (Kassem Mosse, Delta Funktionen, next Conforce). The Tr nch DJ set & productions very much represent the Mariana sound, with my DJing as Dave Twomey the more eclectic selection based on my wide ranging love of house & techno and all things in between. As much as I am still devoted to Mariana & the Tr nch sound, in many ways my cancer diagnosis in 2010 changed so many things, including the context for me to listen to music, especially the deep stuff so I listen to less and less techno. I get up at 6 or 7am, go to bed at 10pm and rarely go to clubs. So the music is changing for sure…

What other sorts of music do you listen to?
These days I actually don't listen to that much music and when I do its chilled stuff: ambient, world music, etc. Toumani Diabate is the man! Since I can remember, whenever I walked into a room I immediately put music on, much the way so many people do with TV or these days with Facebook. Instant gratification. These days I see the concept of mindfulness as being so important to my recovery (and the future of mankind actually!!!) that in general silence gets a fair old run and music gets put on less and less, which of course makes me enjoy it all the more when I do.

What's next for Mariana?
I'd reeeeeally love to get a label going, but at the moment I have to focus on my health. If I write music for fun it's all good, and some days the creative juices really get going as a result of my healthy lifestyle I think… BUT, the minute I start trying to finish things I am such a god damn amateur that it immediately becomes a stress, which is the big no no. Acceptance & patience are the only way for me right now, though both those and a bunch of Tr nch tracks continue to be works in progress! Next year???

Finally - your anatomy mix. It was recorded live this summer at Bulgaria's Artmospheric Festival. Tell us about the festival, and what you were aiming to do with this set.
The festival is the brain child of a bunch of creatives/djs/experimentalists from Sofia & I followed Donato Dozzy, Natural/Electronic.System & others before me as guest so I put a lot into this gig, aside from the fact that for obvious reasons I haven't been playing out much this last year and half. Misho, the lovely guy who booked me has been a big Tr nch fan since I started it so the set was for him really, and the crowd who got onto the floor to move their asses. The set was my 3rd or 4th using Ableton so was interesting for me to see how things would develop in a festival situation, but I have to admit the second half after i switched to trusty old vinyl and serato that things started to really get going.





Souyan - Perfect Tundra
Hironori Takahashi - Medue (Obtane Puppetmachine remix) - sadig005
Shackleton - Fireworks - Honest Jon's
Terence Fixmer - Electric City (Function remix) - EDLX
Ryan Elliott - Abatis - Ostgut
Convextion - Salmo - AW
T++ - Storm - Erosion
Monolake - Excentric - Monolake
Mike Parker - Minos - Geophone
Tr nch - Challenger Deep ft. Jacques Picard - Unreleased
Donato Dozzy & Neel - Voices From The Lake (drop 2) - Prologue
Cio D'Or - Pailetten - Prologue
Mathew Johnson - Learning To Fly dub - Minus
Mike Parker - Caesura - Geophone
Shackleton - Next To Nothing - Crosstown Rebels
Iori - Dial - Prologue
Redshape - Nightshade (Tribute To Ramin) - Styrax
Ness - Diagnostic Sequence - Prologue
Go Hiyama - Waru - Stroboscopic Artefacts
Marcel Fengler - Thwack (Norman Nodge remix) - Mote-Evolver
Peter Van Hoesen - Side Hope In Honesterror - Time To Express
Mike Parker - Ringing Bass - Prologue
Kangding Ray - Or - Raster Noton
(no ID)
KV2X - Sequential - Field
(no ID)
Nick Dunton - Between Worlds (Sandwell District)
Mike Parker - Geophone 14
Nuel & Dozzy - Aguaplano 1111?
Revolt - The Tone - Choo Choo
Sandwell District - Immolare (Function version?)
Sleeparchive - Hospital 06 - Sleeparchive
Trybet - Nautical Two - Geophone
Stamp Series # ?
Ness - Imaging - Prologue
Dasha Rush - Wave Traveler - Sonic Groove 
Iori - Lapis - Prologue
Alva Noto - Berlin - Raster Noton
Michaelangelo - Om69 - Labrynth / Moby - Go
Jacopo Carreras - 4temp4 - Orange Mistake
(incomplete tracklist, feel free to add in any missing ID's!)

i believe this is the first anatomy mix extracted from a 'live' performance, and i'm happy it's coming from a deep techno head like dave. big thanks to him for sharing it. if you like the music and/or if you like dave's story, please consider making a donation - however small or large - to his treatment fundraiser to support him in his inspiring fight against cancer; you can follow his quest at his mindlessfullness blog. for dave's musical pursuits, the mariana page is under construction for now, so check out MYM tokyo and his myspace pages for more info. enjoy!