EMPEROR X LIVE SCORE
1972/2014
USSR/USA, 45 Min.
THURSDAY, MAY 15 – PERFORMANCES AT 8PM & 10PM
ONE NIGHT ONLY!
Former science educator Chad Matheny has been recording and performing music under the Emperor X moniker since 1998. A tireless promoter of DIY and former co-operator of the Florida hyper-indie label Discos Mariscos, Matheny tours almost constantly, playing in venues that defy convention. He’s played in post office lobbies, a laser tag arena – and on a single day in Orange County, he played in a beach cave, a hot air balloon, a retirement home, and the inside of a Richard Serra sculpture. Following this tradition, we’re psyched to welcome the uncompromising and ever-enthusiastic Chad Matheny to the goth bodega to live-score a brand new re-edit of a classic Soviet sci-fi flick.
But enough from me, here’s what the critics have to say:
“Evoking a strange world, it sounds like it’s played on 20th-century instruments excavated during the 22nd century and jury-rigged for tentative amplification. The sustain pedal on the piano is perpetually stuck, the guitars flare and flicker like fireworks, and a low-level headache hum thrums underneath every note. It’s a wonderfully bizarre idea of what rock music can be, and is matched only by the whimsy and imagination of Matheny’s lyrics, which cycle through various perspectives…It’s a lively and eccentric record, yet triumphant in its deep empathy and humanity.” – Stephen Deusner
“Emperor X is so special because of his particular voice. It is lo-fi pop but it is not from the bedroom, the basement — it feels like it is from the Greyhound, the MacBook, the wi-fi’ed park bench. On “Erica Western Teleport” he namedrops Firewire and Battlestar Galactica, he suggests you go get some exercise. Yet it is not hokey or “funny”, the work of a punchline-slinging folkster. It is simply precise. Muddy, catchy, personal, persistent — and precise. In this way, Chad Matheny reminds me of certain rappers: The Streets, Lil Wayne, Lil B, Big Boi. These are MCs who rap whatever images feel rightest, and fuck the universal. Sometimes our longings are broad, sometimes they are very precise.” – Sean Michaels