I wasn't able to attend the last Maze, at Death by Audio in 2009, but it was a legendary event that people are still talking about three years later, and the pictures make it look really amazing. So I'm very personally glad that the duo behind this magic, Trouble's Sam Hillmer and Laura Paris, have decided to remount the project, this time at the new Secret Project Robot space in Bushwick. They've been having benefits for a few months now, but today, they announce their roster of performers who will be setting up inside the space every weekend for a month, starting July 12, and it's Incredible with that intentional capital I. I'm just gonna copy-and-paste from the excited email I got from Sam for y'alls:
“LAUREL HALO – MIHO HATORI'S NEW OPTIMISM – ANN LIV YOUNG – DUSTIN WONG – ZS – WIN WIN – JACK QUARTET – HUNTER HUNT HENDRIX' KEL VELHAAL – JG THIRLWELL – BABYCASTLES – LUCKY DRAGONS – DOME THEATER – NYMPH – NOVELLER – EXTRA LIFE – MICK BARR – LARKIN GRIMM – AMEN DUNES – DIAMOND TERRIFIER – C. SPENCER YEH – HIEROGLYPH THESUARUS – VAZ – GDFX – DAN FRIEL – MV CARBON – LOUD OBJECTS – BACHANALIA – DRIPHOUSE – PSYCHIC REALITY – BLACK JEANS – FUCKTON – PHONETAG – and many many other musicians, performers, artists, DJs, and performers!”
Some of these you should obviously know, and require no explanation – Laurel Halo, Dustin Wong, Zs (Sam Hillmer is the saxaphonist in that group), Amen Dunes, C. Spencer Yeh, and more. These will all be incredible performances to enjoy while taking set breaks to explore art installations and make out with your bf in a HUMAN MAZE.
Some of the others might require some introduction. For instance, if you don't know the performance art work of Ann Liv Young, now's the time to do a YouTube search.
Or have you ever had the chance to experience Loud Objects, the project helmed by Babycastles' Kunal Gupta and modern electro-classical composer Tristan Perich, and other collaborators. It features live soldering! (Bring earplugs, they aren't being ironic.)
In any case, there are two other things I must mention. In addition to the roster being announced today, Trouble is also letting us know that they have begun raising funds for their NEXT maze, which will be in Kreuzberg, Germany, so if you would like to throw them some dough on this Kickstarter here, you can help them out with this project. $10 gets you admission to the maze in NYC for one night (or the one in Germany, if you choose) and $75 gets you an unlimited pass, so as far as digital panhandling goes, this is basically just Ticketmaster without the fees and with an additional fuzzy warm belly feeling.
The other thing is that there is this video of this year's maze design, in like weird digi-sim animation, and it doesn't make it clear AT ALL what the maze is going to look like, so it's still a surprise!
