Damian Lazarus live @ SXSW 09

The past 10 days have been a much welcomed change of scenery for me. As I write now I’m sitting on Damian’s sofa, looking out from Echo Park onto the valley and hills of Hollywood. I arrived here primarily to film the next REBELRAVE episode, dedicated to the Droog boys and their new label, Culprit, but also to “vj” for Damian’s first show of his world tour. Read my previous post to know more about how I’m involved in this.

My time here has been full of stories to write about, and I’ve kept my close friends and family posted with essay-length extracts (according to Anna) of my daily happenings: the days spent in Damian’s studio rehearsing, flying to Texas for SXSW, staying at the “Bunker” (Droog’s villa in Hollywood), gawping at the views from the rooftop of the Standard Hotel in Downtown LA (check the mind-blowing photos from the party here), laying on the beach in Santa Monica, thrift shopping in Melrose Avenue, and tomorrow flying to Miami for the third and final leg of this trip. But I’ll delve no further than this list, and in fact I’ll keep this blog post short and sweet, and hope you enjoy the video: Damian Lazarus live at La Zona Rosa, SXSW, 18th March 2009.

The visuals were made by myself with an enormous helping hand from my friend Marko Perendja, who spent many sleepless nights and days at my side as we filmed and edited all of the content. Without him this project wouldn’t have turned out the way it has.

As Pete Tong says on Beatportal:
“By the end of the set everyone in the room was mesmerised, not only by the mad K-hole visuals but also by this unique and engaging character who looked uncannily like Fagin in Oliver Twist, mumbling, sometimes screaming into the mic (on an awkward 6” stand) over dubby dark and minimal techno beats. It rocked. Full marks for having the balls to do something original.”

Wait for it

Working with video means you get to spend a lot of time waiting for things to render. Depending on the project, I’d say that no more than 40% of my time is spent editing, and the other 60% of my time is spent waiting the elements to render.

I’ve missed making music a lot over the past few weeks, so about two days ago I started on a new track. Nothing complicated, just an average down-tempo riff with a beat. So tonight, as I worked on bringing the Laz Wabit to life (and rendering) I decided to just finish the track off and upload it here.

Every track has a history and always brings back vivid memories of the period when you made it. I know that this track will always remind me of this incredibly stressful period in preparation for the Smoke The Monster Out tour.

The Laz Wabit

Damian Lazarus’ debut album “Smoke the Monster Out” is coming out in a couple of months. To promote this release, Damian will be performing at some of the biggest clubs around the world over the next few months, starting in a couple of weeks where he will be playing at SXSW in Austin, Texas.

I’ve been producing the visuals for his show, which will also see me VJing alongside him. I’ll have to go into more detail about this at some other time, as right now I’m racing against time to get the content ready before I go to L.A. next Saturday.

So while you anxiously wait for me to write my next post about this, you can rest your eyes on Laz Wabit, who will be one of the creatures entertaining thousands of clubbers around the globe.