As all of Paisley Babylon, I write a lot of music using the theremin, and as half of Binary Partners I perform live using the theremin exclusively as of late. My last five shows have featured the theremin as my main instrument, and the one coming this Saturday 1 Feb is no exception.
I will perform theremin duties once more on stage as half of Binary Partners at Jerry’s, located at 1938 W. Division Street in Chicago. This show will likely be the most insane one to date as I’m running a ridiculous number of effects pedals and creating a theremin sound so large and threatening that some could mistake it for natural phenomena.
That’s NOT to say that this is a NOISE show per se–it is NOT that–but with this setup the theremin is capable of damn near weaponized volumes of sound. I prefer to use such things as punctuation, not as the whole sentence, as it were. But the loud-quiet-loud approach worked great for The Pixies, so why not with BP?
I’ve been using the theremin more and more in my soundtrack work and it’s gratifying that more people are interested in these sounds. It should be said, I’m no Clara Rockmore–I have no interest in playing sonatas with my instrument. Call me the J.G. Thirlwell of the theremin and you’re barking up the right tree.
Come out on Saturday to Jerry’s to see what all the fuss is about.
–Joe Wallace
