propaganda :

Boston's Weekly Dig: July-August 2003
Incus, Playing With Fire - by Saleos
(re: DarkWorld Cabaret, co-produced by addamidiom:productions, feat. dj addambombb)

Incus should not play in night clubs to a bunch of drunken clubgoers. They should be playing outside, around a giant bonfire. Alas, the local music industry relies on cover charges and bottled beer rather than warm fires and a shared bottle of wine. Incus is, after all, a rock band, so play clubs they do, many of them, all in a row over these last few days, touring to support their new, and first, full-length CD, Deadwood. The tour returns home this Tuesday to the Paradise for what lead singer Jason has dubbed, 'The Darkworld Cabaret Incus CD Release Party / First Annual Boston Body Painting Festival.'
Jason and I sat outside his house at the edge of the bonfire pit in his Jamaica Plain backyard. His house is one of my favorites. Anyone who goes there has to leave with a new idea or two about how to make one's home really one's own space; it's not so much his pagan aesthetic that's impressive (I am partial to it however), but the way that he has created an environment so conducive to his own creativity .
It was a day or two after I had seen Incus rehearse a set for the band's most recent tour. The band played for about a dozen friends that night in their studio. There were belly dancers and a punk rock girl being led on a chain by an old friend whom I haven't seen in about two years (those types of friendly coincidences and bits of serendipity are common to Incus). He now plays with the band, as does Brian Viglione. The drummer for the Dresden Dolls is also a drummer for Incus. The band is three drummers (most of the drumming is on hand drums or hand-made drums), bass, a little bit of keyboard and pretty, pretty voices; there are three singers: Jason and two beautiful Goth girls, one a blonde Angel, the other a fiery red-headed demoness. They sing like a choir amongst a phenomenal drumming madness, like a modern interpretation of an ancient goddess drum circle under a full moon.
It is difficult to describe Incus in the usual rock & roll jargon. If Rock & roll is sexy, then indeed Incus rock. But there's more to it than that. Jason notices I'm not feeling well and before we begin the interview; he 'smudges' me, enveloping me in the smoke from burning sage leaves. Then he helps me try to explain this Incus thing.
"There was always some sort of dark mystical power in the music I liked. As things evolved with the band, there was a sometimes clear, sometimes cloudy, vision that was about tone and about tension and resolve. It's about the woman's voice - the thing that makes me feel most amazing. The first song on Deadwood, 'Just One Thing,' is about a person who is being pulled all over the place by all the stuff that is going in their life. In the lyrics they're asking for that just one thing ... but I never say what that just one thing is: that when he's on his death bed, that this voice of a woman will come to him and be the last voice that sings to him and carries him to wherever it is that we go, whether that be oblivion or nothingness or to the other side or to the next incarnation - that's all he's asking for, a woman's voice."
And Jason got one hell of a woman's voice for the song, Bulgarian folk singer Yanka Rupkina whose work with the Bulgarian Woman's Choir caught his ear years ago. ?These women sing in these tight, harmonious clusters,? Jason tries to explain, and then adds, "She worked with George Harrison who called her, 'the greatest voice on the planet.'" Jason had the opportunity to both train with Yanka and include her haunting lush vocals on the new album.
But this is the kind of thing you can expect from Incus, and their record release party promises to be no less. ?The Darkworld Cabaret Incus CD Release Party / First Annual Boston Body Painting Festival? promises to be a memorable event. ?I'm really looking forward to having a big show when we come back to town - we'll be tight,? Jason assures me. But seeing Incus at their best is only part of the reason to show. Ego Likeness, a band form the DC area, comprised of violin, cello (Jason's second favorite sound after the female voice), and soothing sirensongs, will bring their darkness to Boston. The Daredevil Chicken club, "a sexy dark adult physical comedy act - acrobatic clowns - brilliant!" will be hitting the stage before taking their act to Scotland's Fringe Festival. There will be other special guests, possibly some accordion playing, and ultimately Boston's First Annual Body Painting contest. "I just like to throw a good party," Jason jokes while describing the body-painting element of the gig. "There are artists from New York coming up for this and some artists form Boston - about seven artists in all. Each artist will have one main model painted from head to toe - serious work form top to bottom - they'll have spent hours on them. These models will be at the show when the doors open and then the painters will be available to work on the public as well."
Unless you have something better to do than be wooed by delicious sounds, painted and lured into tribal dancing for the evening, The Darkworld Cabaret Incus CD Release Party / First Annual Boston Body Painting Festival, is where you need to be next Tuesday.

-Saleos