Also, Influencing Machine and Spastik Kommunikations are
currently taking preorders for the upcoming release of Michael Contreras' The
Pain Factory 4xDVD set.
Influencing Machine Records & Spastik Visuals
Proudly Present: The Pain Factory
A Public Access Noise Show 1995-1997
Channel 53 San Francisco, California
12 Episodes - 4 DVD Set (Professionally Printed)
16 Page Full Color Booklet
13 Hours Of Archival Footage
Edition of 350
The Pain Factory (1995-1997)
For about three decades, Michael Contreras has been one of
the most consistently intriguing artists in the Industrial Noise scene,
beginning under the name Trucido, then as Death Squad, and most recently as
MK9. Anyone who has followed his prolific output through the years has
recognized Contreras’ versatile use of multi-media elements, including text,
photography, performance, and video. Another major piece of his body of work
was almost lost, however, nearly forgotten since the mid-1990s: The Pain Factory.
In 1995, Contreras, then an employee at Channel 53, San
Francisco’s Public Access TV station, decided to curate and produce a monthly
TV series showcasing Industrial/Noise/Experimental music and film. It is
difficult to understate how subversive The Pain Factory was. In the
pre-internet era, public access TV provided the only platform by which
controversial imagery and art could be broadcast to the world at large, and
Contreras maximized the use of this peculiar medium, pushing the boundaries in
ways that were unfathomable at the time. Contreras, and the artists whose work
he projected over the airwaves to often unsuspecting viewers, were
unconstrained and confrontational—so much so that the show was threatened with
lawsuits and featured in local papers due to the extremity of the imagery.
The Pain Factory is also notable because it offers a
snapshot of the mid-1990s Noise scene. The years 1995-1997 arguably represented
the scene’s peak output, in terms of quantity and quality, and yet, it was
strikingly underdocumented. The Pain Factory offers a unique record of the
musical and visual activity of some of the era’s most significant figures and
captures the aesthetic breadth of the Noise scene at large in that era, before
rote adherence to self-imposed rules and sub-categories became the new norm in
the 2000s. The quality is also impressive. These aren’t basement camcorder
videos; The Pain Factory was a legitimate television broadcast program, and
many of the performances featured here were recorded live in the Channel 53 TV
studio.
Unless you lived in the Bay Area during the mid-1990s, it
was impossible to see The Pain Factory. Only a single set of U-matic and S-VHS
tapes exists, which Contreras himself kept safe through the years. The show was
never widely tape-traded and has never made its way onto the internet.
Contreras has spent nearly two years restoring and digitizing the entire series
in an effort to rescue them from analog oblivion. It is, therefore, a major
revelation to finally see an official presentation of this material, jointly
released by Contreras’ own Spastik Kommunikations label and Influencing Machine
Records.
This 4-DVD set features 16 page full-color booklet with
original flyers and artwork and liner notes by G.X. Jupitter-Larsen, Scott
Arford, Jeff Gunn, J. Campbell, and Michael Contreras. It contains
approximately 13 hours of footage, including nearly every performance and video
submission broadcast as part of The Pain Factory series:
Killer Bug - Xome - Stimbox - Seethe - Flat Tire - Fin -
Taint - Crawl Unit - Nihil - Spastic Colon - Macronympha - The Haters - Rotten
Jesus - Big City Orchestra - Radiosonde - Death Squad - MSBR - Scott Arford -
Frank Moore - Glass Crash - The Amputease - Dahmer Spectacle - Electronic Karma
Sutra - Not Breathing - Dr. Crystal Mess - YAU - Scott Arford - Instagon - Anal
Sadist - Stimbox - Genetic Death Cell - Hungry Ghost - GX Jupitter-Larsen -
Sirvix - Loaded - Death Squad - Moe! Staiano - UBZUB - Air-o-gant - Death Keeps
Me Awake - Instagon - Chris Cobb & Yael Bartana - Seedmouth
Limited Time Pre Order Price Until June 20th
USA / Rest of World $25.00 (USD) + shipping
Contact: influencingmachinerecords@gmail.com
CANADA / Rest of World $31.00 (CAD) + shipping
Contact: order@thepainfactory.info
Shipping Pre Orders out late June 2018
wholesale pricing available please get in touch
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tvnoise95/
Website: http://thepainfactory.info/
PAIN FACTORY PROMO 1
PAIN FACTORY PROMO 2
