From the Promoter

April’s Emergents, curated by Joe Strutt (the citizen archivist behind the Mechanical Forest Sound blog and the Track Could Bend monthly concert series) explores the borderlands between formalist rigour and the experimental “nation of tinkerers”.

Musicians can “emerge” from many points of origin, whether from academic training grounds or underground performance spaces — increasingly, it’s a mix of both. Laura Swankey has a formal “jazz” background but has been spending more time lately following in the footsteps of free-vocal explorers like Christine Duncan while Jess Forrest (also a top-notch popsmith as Castle If) is constructing meticulous fields of electronic drones that always retain a shy, humanistic warmth.

Castle If is the moniker of electronic composer Jess Forrest. Equipped with a small, yet powerful assembly of analog synthesizers, she crafts retro-futuristic “cosmic exotica” inspired by the strange sounds of the synth pioneers that forged electronica. The eerie yet comfortingly familiar echoes of lounge and library music shaped into a dream of the future.

Forrest has appeared on bills alongside artists such as Julianna Barwick, Steve Hauschildt, Grimes, U.S. Girls, and Silver Apples. She currently resides in Toronto, Canada, where she cares for an extensive collection of houseplants. Castle If has an instrumental 30-minute cassette tape set for independent release this coming April, and a full length sci-fi concept album due to follow in summer 2017.

Laura Swankey is an eclectic and skilled improvising vocalist known for her versatility, creativity and open mindedness. In the spring of 2013, Laura released her debut, self-titled quartet EP. Her international feminist avant-garde improvising ensemble JBDC, with Jessica Ackerley (guitar) and Elisa Thorn (harp) released their debut self-titled record in Brooklyn, NY in October 2015 and have a second album to be released early 2017 on HAVN Records. Most recently, Laura was featured on Toronto’s Collective Order debut EP, released in August 2016 on Longbow Records.

The Emergents Series is generously funded by Roger D. Moore.