One of my oldest and dearest friends (and long time pen pal from LA) Damion Romero makes beautiful minimal noise music. He used one of my watercolor paintings for the entire gatefold image in his new double LP “Twins.” The original record looks amazing and it is my eleventh record cover collaboration with a musician and my first gatefold image ever.

Damion Romero – Twins
Inside watercolor painting by Seze Devres
PTapes/Tone Filth Records & Tapes, 2007
LP, edition of 500
Here is another release we have collaborated on:
Romero, Damion – Medium
(CD, edition of 500, each with a unique cover photogram)
P Tapes, 1996.

and other CD & Record covers I have worked on.

I met Kate Simko last year at the Detroit Electronic Music Festival. After playing an amazing live set she was supposed to leave on a flight back to Chicago. But she had some really really bad flight luck and could not leave town. So she returned back to the festival in complete desperation, and we were the first people she ran into. Poor Kate was in the worst mood and I immediately adopted her as my own and made sure she had a good time for the remainder of the festival. Now we have become close friends and I am so excited for her and her budding career. She is one of the few women I personally know who is making her own electronic music. Yeah Kate!

Kate Simko, She Said (Spectral)
The Bunker Podcast 10: Kate Simko
Recorded live at The Bunker on March 7, 2008.

KATE SIMKO’S TOP TEN WOMEN COMPOSERS

Kate, photo by Seze

I am not quite sure why The Greatest Show on Earth (1952) directed by Cecil B. DeMille with Betty Hutton, Cornel Wilde, Charlton Heston won the Oscar that year.  The film is way too long, over 3 hours, the plot gets a bit tiresome and the actors are better off doing acrobatic skits rather than trying to act.  However, this movie is filled with tons of gorgeous circus eye candy, amazing costumes, well trained animals, and an overall incredible use of over-saturated color.  It is even fun to watch even with the sound off. The Greatest Show on Earth reminded me of the days when my mom would take me to Madison Square Garden to see the circus when I was a kid.  We would have so much fun watching the circus together, and it filled my six year old mind with endless inspirations.

Neu! is some of the very earliest electronic music I ever heard. Their unique sound came way earlier than most of the ambient and minimal music we have come to love today. Read this awesome article on Neu here