Halal Kebab Hut

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Biography:

‘sounds well bizarre! I like...’

Algorithmic Junkestra

Halal Kebab Hut are a band of seven improviseurs de junk (no they don’t sound like Stomp). The group is the gastrosonic brainchild of, East London-based composer/improviser/anarchist/teacher/cyclist, Simon Katan, who creates all the algorithmic fodder for the band. This takes the form of game pieces - rigourous, non-linear, rule-based structures that provide differing systems of organisation without prescribing content - that bind the performer’s actions together into complex networks of interrelations.

In case it isn’t already clear enough, all this is played out on junk - objects, deemed unworthy of serious musical activities, which are capable of producing interesting sounds - tin cans, water balloons, electric toothbrush, bubble wrap, whoopee cushion, food mixer, vacuum cleaner, hack saw, kazoos, swanee whistle, bird calls, electronic children’s toys, Casio MT-41, computer speakers in feedback loops … you get the idea.

The band has successfully implemented a revolving door membership policy - at the time of this recording the group’s members were Charlie Piper, Cimeon Ellerton, Luke Fraser, Sarah Scutt, Simon Katan, and Tom Shelton. High Brow Low Art Music was engineered by Tom Shelton and Cimeon Ellerton.

Releases:

High Brow Low Art Music (emp010)

Download: Hi-Fi - Lo-Fi :: Stream: Hi-Fi - Lo-Fi :: Download: Cover Art - Disc Art

Tracklisting:

High Brow Low Art Music @ The Internet Archive

High Brow Low Art Music @ Last.fm

Kebabish! (emp045)

Download: Hi-Fi - Lo-Fi :: Stream: Hi-Fi - Lo-Fi :: Download: Cover Art - Disc Art

Tracklisting:

Kebabish! @ The Internet Archive

Kebabish! @ Last.fm

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50:50 An Earth Monkey Productions Compilation (emp050)

Earth Monkey’s 50th release (with a few specials along the way) comes in the form of 50:50 a compilation featuring some of your favourite EMP artists and a couple of new faces that will have releases coming up. Classic Monkey fair - If you liked ::FALLING:: our last comp you’ll love 50:50

Halal Kebab Hut contributed the track Algorithmic Poetry Hi-Fi - Lo-Fi

50:50 @ The Internet Archive

50:50 @ Last.fm

50:50 also features tracks from 4th Alternative, Clutter, Dansette Curtsey, Cousin Silas, Pandacetamol, Adrian Carter, Des Slow And The Stop Pills, Radio Scotvoid, Fonik, ry-om, Good Noise Bad Noise, Susan Matthews, Andrew Deakin & The Cardboard Lung

Reviews:

‘High Brow Low Art Music, released on Earth Monkey Productions by London-based Halal Kebab Hut, is a collection of seven pieces created by several performers using diverse instruments, according to structures defined by Simon Katan. Halal Kebab Hut has an open door membership policy, and has been together in some form since 2004.

The heart of the band appears to be Katan, who produces "rigourous, non-linear, rule-based structures" that the performers use as a guide for each piece. This is reminiscent of John Zorn's game pieces, and Katan explains this in a paper entitled Halal Kebab Hut Techniques of Composition. To live out these machinations, the performers arm themselves with tin cans, water balloons, bubble wrap, whoopee cushion, food mixer, vacuum cleaner, electronic children's toys and anything else they can find that might conceivably produce a sound. The instrumentation appears to vary between pieces, but is consistent throughout a piece. This is appears to be part of Katan's design, to help prevent the listener from becoming hopelessly lost in a miasma dreamt up by a randomised computer-based composer.

Despite the premise, each piece appears to have a certain level of freedom beyond what one would normally expect from algorithmic composition. The performers explode into life from the moment the first track, Carpet Bowls , starts -- then quickly change pace as they follow the ebb and flow of Katan's instructions. A feedback conversation between devices occurs, and instruments and themes are repeated throughout the piece. In the next piece, Forking Paths, the performers appear to explore space more than the sounds their unique instruments might produce.

The instrumentation and playfulness of Carpet Bowls is full of references to toys and youth, and this is apparent even through the highly abstract nature of the piece. SPStone verges on pure noise at times, but the improviseurs de junk bring in the rains to create something on the verge of consistent.

As Katan's paper explains, High Brow Low Art Music represents Halal Kebab Hut at a particular moment in time: interpretations of the game rules may vary and the band members may have changed. However, his paper is so detailed (even including screenshots of the software used to generate the compositional instructions), that anyone who wants to reverse engineer High Brow Low Art Music is at liberty to do so, giving it an extra dimension that makes it all the more compelling.’ - Review of High Brow Low Art Music at furthernoise.org

‘Thanks buds, cracking stuff here, and very intriguing choice of bread, mmm, Afghani perhaps? ‘ - Shekaphonia

‘sounds well bizarre! I like...’ - Voltek

Contact:

More info and forthcoming gigs at www.halalkebab.co.uk

Halal Kebab Hut @ Myspace