"The Moogfest makes me feel very urban again..."
"The Moogfest makes me feel very urban again, for just a few days," writes Paris-born and now Asheville-based experimental music artist Kimathi Moore. "For a little bit of time the air and excitement takes my imagination to Oslo, Prague, Paris or Barcelona. What a great festival, my favorite in the South. From Carl Craig and Orbital to Harold Budd and Morton Subotnik, what an incredible range for a festival."
Squarepusher's set at Thomas Wolfe on Friday was masterful: "Better than God, better than Jesus, we have Squarepusher," Moore writes. "The show was excellent, like having Free Jazz artists in the world of Tron. Even Amon Tobin's cubeshow last year wasn't as good, I think. Squarepusher always kept it very musical, interlaced with ultra data bit noise, futurism, hi tech, impressive and improvisatory, and the result: Should be the soundtrack to this new, super hi tech movie Upside Down from France, that will be here soon."
Xpress asked Moore for his Moogfest post-mortem: "My favorites were Harold Budd and Keith Lowe and Squarepusher, but most of my friends' favorite act was Morton Subotnik," Moore writes. "These four names mentioned were each original, extremely innovative, creative and always knew how to keep everything on the edge, yet took us in the world of their imaginations. Each had unparalleled musicianship and creativity.
Harold Budd and Keith Lowe had a gorgeous set, unfortunately too short, but superbly executed with strong use of space and tension.
I felt like sleeping to this beautiful music, yet too afraid to do so, because it would end soon.”