Tuesday, May 16th, 2017
Doors at 7:00... Screening at 7:30
@ The Mini - 1329 Main St.

Borbetomagus: A Pollock of Sound

Directed By: Jef Mertens

Co-Presented with the No Response Festival

A Pollock of Sound is the first-ever feature length documentary film on the legendary improv/noise group Borbetomagus.

From 1979 on, Borbetomagus have persevered a no holds barred musical style, described and boxed by the media so many times that they remain uncategorized. Coming together in upstate NY, far away from the burgeoning NYC scene, they began having a cult status reaching as far as Northeast Asia.  With both saxophone players extending techniques beyond recognition and a guitar player utilizing metal shards besides a plectrum, the band have showcased a whole new vocabulary staying true to the word free.

Guerilla filmmaker Jef Mertens brings a raw, urgent, and unpolished vision focusing on a band that has spent almost four decades defining and redefining not just their music, but the boundaries of music itself. Band members Don Dietrich, Donald Miller, and Jim Sauter tell their story with the help of artists, writers, photographers, and filmmakers that include noted critic Byron Coley, drummer Chris Corsano, guitarist Thurston Moore, groundbreaking Japanese noise unit Hijokaidan, and Switzerland's masters of "cracked electronics," Voice Crack.

With never before seen archival footage, amazing photographic finds and never before released recordings, the film is a must see, or must listen if you will, for every Borbetomagus fan or lover of music that has labored its own definition of what sound should be like.

Borbetomagus devastating attitude gained recognition without compromise and its without those compromises that "A Pollock of Sound" hopes to be striding along.