BeatRoute Magazine [AB] print e-edition - [May 2018]

PICTUREPLANE
First discussion of new record ahead of Alberta debut
It’s been a wild ride for gothstar Travis Egedy
over the more than ten years he’s created
music and art under the name Pictureplane.
Originally from Santa Fe but germinated in
Denver, the American Egedy’s journey had
and has a serendipitous link to Canadian Alice
Glass to this day.
His first major exposure came from an officially
sanctioned re-work of the song “Airwar”
by Glass’ old band Crystal Castles, and the
sonic chaos and paranoia shared by Egedy and
Glass has come to define their music all the
years since.
Glass and Egedy recently spent time on the
road with Marilyn Manson, only for the two
to witness his horrific mangling at the mercy
of his own performance.
“A huge stage prop fell on him, we watched
it happen. It’s crazy because it could have been
way worse, he could have died,” recalls Egedy.
But a working friendship spanning over a
decade (the two met on, inevitably, Myspace
in 2007) can’t be undone so easily. Glass, Zola
Jesus and Pictureplane are touring a good
deal of the U.S. and a small part of Canada
this Spring, with Egedy debuting Pictureplane
in Alberta with a side date at 9910 in
Edmonton on May 25.
Electronic darkchild Pictureplane heads to Edmonton with new material in tow.
While Egedy is hesitant to discuss on record
his absence from the Canadian touring market,
he offers something wholly better: a first
official comment on his forthcoming album
Degenerate.
“It’s going to be called Degenerate. That
word is sort of famous. It was used in Nazi
Germany to describe artists who were free
thinkers and were making sort of bizarre,
abstract stuff that Hitler found offensive. But
it’s still in use today... for someone who’s undesirable
or sort of an outcast of society.”
This comes as a reaction to the onslaught
of intolerance towards artists and art spaces
BY COLIN GALLANT
following the tragic deaths at the Ghost Ship
space in Oakland, and the resultant closing
of Egedy’s former home of Rhinoceropolis in
Denver.
“People just don’t understand really at all.
What it means to be an artist or people who
choose to create art, and need spaces to live
in to create art… I’m more than happy to be a
degenerate in these peoples’ eyes if that’s how
they wanna see me for being an artist.
Degenerate is expected later this summer
either through Pictureplane’s current home
at Anticon or perhaps via a new venture—
Egedy’s own label. Considering his self-produced
three records, track as a visual artist
(with a recent residency at Austin’s Museum
of Human Achievement) or entrepreneurship
with the Alien Body (the name he’ll also give
his label) streetwear enterprise, it’s no stretch
to imagine Egedy manifesting Pictureplane’s
next album as a fully independent release. The
real question is: will you be among the ones
who remember him from his pivotal between
state when he takes the stage in Edmonton?
Pictureplane performs at 9910 in Edmonton on
May 25. Degenerate will be released later this
summer.
44 | MAY 2018 • BEATROUTE
JUCY