Eric Carle

Bizzart “Liquid Beast”

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Bizzart is an amalgam of contradictory and cohesive elements, a mishmash of sounds that treat the ears to both the good and the bad. The project is the brainchild of Arthur Arellanes who, since 1997, has released three albums of the kind of music that draws inspiration from everywhere. I would be hard-pressed to attach some kind of nomenclature to Bizzart, but there is method to the madness. To begin to understand exactly what kind of aural landscape is being manufactured here, you first need to realize that there is a smattering of ersatz and concrete systems; intertwining old and new. It would be a shame to define it simply as “of the future.” Music today is often subjugated—inter-genre influences and easily calculable carbon copies of pre-dated music are prevalent—and although Bizzart has a few particularly loud influences (Can and Saul Williams), the music is also filled with some soft and unlikely moments that speak politically and socially. Bizzart seems to have the zeitgeist by the neck; his showmanship is incontestably aligned with his music. He previewed some work from the new album as well as some old favorites and an improvisational freak-out session that has me thinking the direction will always be the same: forward.

— Lauren Arevalo