Ludo Mich / Jennifer Walshe / W. Ravenveer

Hypnagogic Tapes 003 contains recordings of two performances by Antwerp artist Ludo Mich. Side A of the cassette is a recording of the duet ‘We Are Robots, But We Are In Love’ that Ludo Mich and Jennifer Walshe performed live at the Hunters Moon festival in Ireland in 2012. Side B contains ‘The Bells’, recorded with Antwerp musician W. Ravenveer (Erwin van Looveren) in 2016. In both recordings Ludo can be heard in full swing, as he descends growling, grunting and screaming into regions beyond the grasp of his audience and surfaces again cleansed and pure. On side A of the cassette Ludo and renowned Irish vocalist Jennifer Walshe enter into a duet in which it is impossible to tell whether it is an embrace or a stranglehold. It is a passionate and violent affair, accompanied by Walshe’s accordion, recorder and percussion instruments. Side B is a collaboration with musician W. Ravenveer (Erwin Van Looveren) from Antwerp. Their improvised piece ‘The Bells’ – Quasimodo dissected live, his hump turned inside out and worn as a madcap – was recorded by Frank Vranckx in Antwerp in 2016.

Ludo Mich (1945) has walked and trespassed the line between life and art since the early 1960s. Ludo was trained as an artist in his hometown Antwerp, where he was part of the vibrant and international art scene of the 1960s and 1970s. Influenced by sources as varied as dadaism, Yves Klein, Piero Manzoni, Dutch Provos, Fluxus and Situationist International, Ludo developed into a anarchic and subversive performance artist and a gifted filmmaker. With a keen eye for new developments in the technical field, he also emerged a pioneering artist in modern media such as video, holography and electronic music.

Hypnagogic Tapes is run from Ireland by Willie Stewart of Woven Skull, whose documentary Ludo Is Fantastic has just premiered. The cassette is beautifully packaged in a cardboard box and comes with inserts and a download code. Limited edition of 70.