We don’t really need to wait for better times (or I’d rather say worst times) to deeply tune with the sound of “[No]Surrender”, a release that according to the words of its forgers can be considered as an uncut manifesto against social injustices, considering that social injustices are getting almost ordinary in our times. The combination of Francesco Giudici‘s piercing guitar drones and Simon Grab‘s softly noising entities getting out of his no-input-mixing-setup met the documentary photographic art by Aline d’Auria, the author of the portrait in the cover artwork, who captured the expression of a seemingly indestructible concierge who got stripped away the house where she lived for half a century on her first day of retirement. “Social injustices are implanted into our society, and the powerful are not willing to make way for real change. Urgency is the force driving us, both in musical improvisation and in life. Our sounds are war sirens against an ongoing disaster”, so they say, Simon and Francesco. Let’s get deeper into this interesting release by the words of these artists, whose attitude leaves hope in a cruel society, and whose actors get constantly narcotized by media-driven illusions.
Chain D.L.K.: Hello there! How are you doing?
Simon Grab & Francesco Giudici: FG: Fine, thank you! Hope you are doing well too.
SG: Personally I’m doing great, my privileged ass allows me to have a passionate life while probably a majority of the world’s population has no access to decent education, enough food, working their butts off to feed the rich.
I got up this morning reading about the war in Ukraine, massively present in the media, with a continuous wave of solidarity in the air, which should make me feel positive about our society. Unfortunately, at the same time, it lays open a deep racist behavior by dividing refugees into good and bad, on an individual, communal, and on structural level. And while we have to get Putin to Den Haag immediately, we should not let our hypocritical politicians get away with their past and ongoing actions, supporting the weapons industry, inviting multinational corporations into tax heavens sucking resources all over the place to enforce geopolitical power. Sorry I already got carried away, so back to your question: We should ask the underprivileged how they are doing more often than ever, and listen to what they have to say.
Chain D.L.K.: Can you tell us something about your individual artistic/musical paths, and how did they meet?
Simon Grab & Francesco Giudici: FG: I played guitar in many bands, from punk to indie, from electro to noise. I am now more and more into improvisation, and I like the fact that you simply don’t know what you are going to play. I am also curator of the musical part at Spazio Lampo, a cultural space in Chiasso where we create unique art pieces by inviting artists from different fields (contemporary arts, architects, musicians, visual artists, … ). Furthermore, I invited, among the others, Roedelius, Jochen Arbeit (from Einstrzende Neubauten), Paolo Spaccamonti, Matt Eliott, etc., and of course, I invited Simon Grab twice, once as a DJ for a party in a tunnel, and the second time as a musician, to play a sleep concert, which was a fantastic experience that later leads us to play together.
SG: I first found pleasure as a guitarist in a funk for its groove and precision, went on to punk and ska to discover furious energy and power, on to experimental radiophonic pieces cutting reels, and to noise to widen my perception of musical boundaries. Dub and jungle have introduced me to sound system culture, and enjoying the lower frequencies.
For a long time, I considered these musical steps and genres as something separate, and my social environment wasn’t always fond of my escapades, leading to many doubts. I started earning money from music production quite early, together with close friends, expanding into the commercial music whore business, fulfilling the wet dreams of empty-minded and coke-filled agencies – a great experience, but I’m glad to be away from that. Currently, I’m focussing more on smaller independent structures, such as the art space Spazio Lampo where I met Francesco.
Chain D.L.K.: “Urgency is the force driving us, both in musical improvisation and life.” So you said in the introductory words of [No] Surrender. Can you explain this statement?
Simon Grab & Francesco Giudici: SG: Which stories have to be told, which questions asked, which sounds need to be played, which systems overthrew? Urgency has a political aspect, I use music as a form of expression, the message may be found in the frequencies, playing in the now and musically communicating with each other, by constantly questioning and wisely reacting to the given setting. The way we collaborate, exchange, discuss, and get organized is a choice. It’s an attitude that ideally corresponds with the way we choose to be responsible in life.
FG. For me, urgency also means that you have to play when it’s time to express yourself. Not later, once you are done with work or with the dishes, it has to be done now. This is even more true when improvising, playing is a priority when you feel it.
Chain D.L.K.: Besides the role of urgency you explained in the previous question, the driving force, to say it so, of [No] Surrender is social injustice, that is something most of us experience. How did it impact your sound? Are any specific stories or events that had a stronger influence, that you want to share?
Simon Grab & Francesco Giudici: FG: It’s the story of the failed power systems that are implanted in our societies. In Switzerland, one of the richest countries in the world, there are people working but remaining poor, there are precarious jobs and bad working conditions that go directly to the advantage of the people employing them. Just an example: part-time occupations are presented as an opportunity to balance life and work, but are in fact mostly an advantage for employers because, by law, they don’t have the obligation to pay for the second social security pillar. But most of the people working part-time are women, who would like to increase their occupational time, but their employers won’t let them do so.
Inequalities are growing, directing more capital and resources to the richest and less to the poorest, as we saw with the pandemic. More equality in the distribution of economic resources, for instance, and a more just society will lead to advantages for all the population. There are studies showing that more equal societies are doing better in their health systems, for example, with positive consequences not only for the poor part of the population but also for the rich ones in comparison to the rich ones in less equal societies. But the neoliberal paradigm continues to lead people to think that it’s ‘natural’ (I hate this word…) and that there are rich people and poor people: it’s not fucking natural, it’s cultural, and it could be counterbalanced with more progressive taxation, for example.
The interesting thing is that, as you said, we’re all exposed to ‘experiences of social injustices. Some are easily noticed, as they are more evident: racial or gender discrimination in the street or other simple everyday situations. But at the same time, most of the population has no idea of how the system is giving advantage to the ones who are already in a position that gives them more opportunities. Opportunities are not equally distributed among the population, and with my work, I am trying to show that and make people realize, for instance, how the wealth is distributed among the population in the canton of Ticino. Another example: do you have any idea how many people in Switzerland are homeless? Most of people will say ‘none’, but study results show a different picture.
If you then look at the inequalities between countries, the divergence is incredible and unimaginable for us living in Europe. The colonialism that European countries started decades ago in Africa is still going on, for example with the exploitation of raw materials in order to produce our computers and watches. Another big social injustice of our times: the climate crisis – and who could really solve the problem? The biggest multinationals are responsible for the most pollution on earth, and here, too, there is no awareness among people of this social injustice.
SG: Enough said, nothing to add.
Chain D.L.K.: Most of the media uses social injustice as a way to attract the audience. In your opinion, does it help to define social injustice itself or does it belong to the concept you wanted to focus on and explain through art?
Simon Grab & Francesco Giudici: FG: Media of today are mostly shit. It’s really hard to find a newspaper, a blog, a radio show that really helps to understand what’s going on. I think this has two reasons: media are constantly accelerating and reporting news more and more rapidly, which in some cases really isn’t the most suitable way. For example, when reporting from a war, which is too complex to understand in itself. Secondly, media have to sell their information to most of the public, leading to ‘sensationalism’, a keyword in selling a newspaper/web page, blog, TV show, etc. These are some main reasons why media are shit, Bourdieu was already saying this in “Sur la television” in 1996.
SG: We definitely need more media education adapted to the current media shareholders’ retrace. We and our kids need to be able to handle the overflow of content. Social injustice in mainstream media only gets attention when the story evokes some sort of self-pity hidden behind empty or false empathy, or if it can celebrate the mothering, reinsuring the cemented path of white supremacy.
On the other hand, there are some research-driven models in the niches of alternative media, pursuing fact-based journalism combined with ethical awareness. There’s also a long history of community-based media with a huge value through the diversity of voices. They usually grew out of a necessity to show other perspectives, and are mostly from a suppressed point of view. These structures grew organically and could be seen as anarchist media formats.
Overall, we need ways to think and talk about difficult issues and re-evaluate structures and systems that have often grown over hundreds of years. We also need to allow complexity and find ways to communicate the effects of large-scale problems on every single person’s life. Humanity is on the edge – with climate change, and political and social injustices – and the same old promises of growth and success are just not what we need anymore.
Chain D.L.K.: Francesco, I read about your research as a sociologist and demographer. Any word about them? Have they been somehow helpful for [No] Surrender?
Simon Grab & Francesco Giudici: FG: I work as a sociologist at the statistical office of Canton Ticino. In my work, I am trying to identify the fields where it is urgent to produce knowledge. I am studying social and economic inequalities, gender inequalities and work-life balance problematics and inequalities, and nonstandard employment relationships and nonstandard careers as a determinant of mental health issues. These interests have brought me to many of the thoughts and findings laid out in previous answers. Generally, Simon and I are both very involved and worried about how the world and humanity are doing. ‘War sires against social injustices’ is the motto we found to describe this sound.
Chain D.L.K.: Are there any ways to artistically represent the same theme you developed on [No] Surrender that you completely disregard? If so, which ones and why?
Simon Grab & Francesco Giudici: FG: I think every form of art could and should get involved with these problems, from video to photography, from dance to theater, from contemporary art to music, etc. We are musicians and improvisers and combined our music with the work of Aline d’Auria in this project. But it’s not only up to the artists to raise awareness and try to give the unheard a voice. It’s the responsibility of everyone. Politics. Society. Family. Education. Even religion, if you want.
Chain D.L.K.: Simon, I enjoyed both the aural and the visual collaborative output “Diamonds” with Togolese rapper Yao Bobby and an attached remix by Asian Dub Foundation’s Dhangsha. Any word about that?
Simon Grab & Francesco Giudici: SG: Thanks, I’m actually still vibing when I think about our concert series in March 2022. Yao and I were touring the UK with Dhangsha, who did these mad minimal and radical solo sets. Once again it was such a good exchange, listening to each other’s concerts on those great sound systems, and discussing our approaches to music and life. Dhangsha literally considered this tour as something of the best that he’s been part of since the nineties. We all learned a lot again and advanced on our paths.
Yao and I will soon be releasing our double album WUM on Bristol-based LavaLava Records. For the music video of the first single Lekeo, we worked with Jonathan Jaeggi and Tobias Kubli (who also worked on the Diamonds clip), in collaboration with contemporary dancer Carlos Becho and choreographer Rafal Pierzynski, using a thermal camera that produces out of this world images, on the edge of being perceived as a computer generated animation. The video premiered in The Wire Magazine in March 2022. On stage, it’s a pleasure to collaborate with Yao. Even though we do have some structure in our sets, we also have lots of room for improvisation, which we both enjoy a lot. More to come soon 🙂
Chain D.L.K.: Let’s go back to [No] Surrender. I saw you choose the pic of Madame Rochat from a photographic set by Aline d’Auria. Why such a choice?
Simon Grab & Francesco Giudici: SG: the portrait on the cover of Madame Rochat by Aline d’Auria shows a person who, after being treated unrespectful by the landlord (who kicked her out of the apartment the day she retired from her lifelong concierge job) starts to get involved in tenancy law, and uses this knowledge to stand in for the remaining people in the building. The bottom line is: Madame Rochat made a small step into activism, which had a large impact on her personal life and those around her. Still, it’s an unheard story that would never enter the mainstream media. To us, Madame Rochat is a role model, who didn’t give up and keeps on fighting, despite being caught up in a system, that is really not working in her favor.
Secondly, we wanted to avoid the ‘standard’ genre aesthetics, which definitely exist. The usual experimental drone project would probably rather choose some dark black and white undefined noisy organic picture. Our cover art questions this self-referential streamlining, which is very present in various music scenes, something we consider quite conservative and contrary to what we are doing.
Chain D.L.K.: I saw you kept one track “Forest Spirit” out of the physical release. Just a problem with the format, or is there any other reason? Any comment on this track?
Simon Grab & Francesco Giudici: FG: Yes, this was a decision we had to make due to the limited running time of vinyl LPs. Still, ‘Forest Spirit’ fully belongs to the album. The title is a reference to the fact that ‘nature’ will always take back everything through time. There is no escape from ‘natural’ processes, human beings are just a small part of everything.
Chain D.L.K.: “Sirens” could be the perfect suite for the days we’re experiencing. Besides the adaptability to current times, can you tell us more about this interesting sonic artifact?
Simon Grab & Francesco Giudici: FG: Sirens always had an immediate impact on me, they go directly to my stomach, even though I never experience war directly. My grandparents experienced it, and I kind of think that some sort of ‘experience’ remained in my memories through my grandfather’s stories of how he survived the work camps in Poland. In the track ‘Sirens’, I added a ‘toxic rain’ with my guitar, which I feel fits perfectly with Simon’s sirens.
SG: In my latest solo releases, I sometimes call my music a ‘soundtrack for the post-human age when new species arise and take over the earth’. I use a matrix of electronic feedback to generate my sounds. The sirens are mainly self-oscillating and feed-backed filters, played like an instrument. My method of playing comes from Dub, with the sound mixer being the main instrument. It’s an unstable system and the sounds can not be reproduced. It’s always that one moment in time.
Chain D.L.K.: By its 20 minutes and 13 seconds “Wolves” is the longest track, a proper suite, whose piercing and somehow hypnotic power is really strong. How did you forge it? What did you have in your mind while forging that?
Simon Grab & Francesco Giudici: FG: As the whole album, also this track was completely improvised. But for me, it was kind of pre-imagined, especially the end. When I invited Simon for the sleep concert he played, I think for hours, slow and deep pulsations, like the breath and the heart pulse of a whale slowly dying, I actually think I was dreaming to be inside a whale, or close by. So at the beginning of this track, it’s kind of nature connected with bubbling basses and ‘frontier guitar’ (as my friends in Chiasso would say), then there is a violent drone part in the middle, which could be humans interfering and destroying nature and slowly discovering that humans are also part of the nature. The end is the inevitable, the slow death of the whole thing. I don’t know why, but the image of a dying whale is the perfect metaphor for me.
SG: Things happen when one communicates properly through sounds. The whole album is a cut of a studio recording session, capturing the Now. It is indeed a massive and epic piece. There are even some theremin-like sounds coming out of my feedback, and I have not the slightest idea how I got to them – sometimes there’s some magic going on. And honestly, I never think of any metaphors or images when I’m playing. I might interpret a piece later and give it a coherent name, but never while I’m at it. But yeah, whales, wolves, that’s what I like about our music, it tells stories to be interpreted by the listener.
Chain D.L.K.: After listening to [No] Surrender, I had that feeling you can experience at the end of some movies where you cannot but expect a sequel. Are you forging, or just imagining it?
Simon Grab & Francesco Giudici: FG: You mean another album? I would love to! But first, I would love to play live with Simon as much as we can! This album shows our first musical encounter ever. No rehearsals, no deep discussions about what it should be, just plain improvisation. I agree it’s very cinematic, a cinema for the ears. We definitely keep the process running and see what happens. Maybe the whales will be dead, humans extinct, a proper apocalyptic horror movie then… 🙂
Chain D.L.K.: Any work in progress?
Simon Grab & Francesco Giudici: FG: I am thinking about a solo album, but with a different guest on every track.
SG: I’m constantly on the go at the moment. Besides the before-mentioned album WUM by Yao Bobby & Simon Grab, I recently released the album Anthropocene Panic / Remixes on sound-space London, with contributions by Ossia, Bit-Tuner, Dhangsha, Le Crabe, Luke Lund, Aelk Minsur, Mike Hamerski, Kilim Mosh, D.C.P., and skintape. All nicely mixed on tape by DJ Marcelle / Another Nice Mess and Ink! / -ous records Zurich. I recently contributed a remix to D.C.P.’s album on Lachrymose records in Geneva, which should come out on tape soon, too. Also, I recently was in Brasil for a collaboration with electronic musician Felinto (Bokeh Versions). And I’ve also been involved in another trio with accordion and saxophone, together with Tizia Zimmermann and Tapiwa Svosve.
Visit Simon Grab & Francesco Giudici on the web:
https://simongrab.bandcamp.com/album/no-surrender