Based in Miami, Rat Bastard is mostly known for his band, Laundry Room Squelchers, and his touring festival, International Noise Conference. The conference is going on right now in Miami, so I thought I'd show them a litle love.The INC rules are simple. "No laptops, no mixers, no drones"—three telltale signs of dry noise intellectualism. Sets are limited to about 15 minutes, but many clock in at five. Typical fare is fat dudes in ripped chicken costumes throwing wires around. People in neon spandex playing spazzy dance music with half-broken drum machines and toy saxophones. A hot dog eating context on an amplified, overdriven table. INC might not have the wide name recognition of No Fun Fest, but it is probably the festival that best represents the ground-floor noise scenes of every town it takes over.Laundry Room Squelchers close out most INC’s. The band is pretty much all Rat mangling a hopelessly detuned guitar which is wired into a few guitar amps on wheels. Sometimes he ditches the guitar and just swings long radio antennae around. A group of maniacs, the "Squelchers,” violently roll the amplifiers around and drag audience members into a writhing pile of limbs. Usually the guest Squelchers are great musicians in their own right—the most regular member, C. Lavender, just released a great tape called Meet Me At The Station.I got the opportunity to be a Squelcher at one NYC show—I ran around with a radio that kept unplugging from the PA when people picked me up and hurled me around. I thought I'd busted a rib for about a month after, and would have gone to the doctor if I had health insurance. The next day, I realized that the music had blown out the PA so hard that it had actually caught fire. I had to take out the scorched parts and solder them back together before returning the PA to its owner.
The "International" part of INC is no exaggeration—Rat has worked for a major airline for decades, and has access to free plane tickets. As odd as that sounds, it's true: Rat Bastard is a jet-setter. My first time seeing Rat was at INC Seoul. The Squelchers played after performances by great Korean locals like Jin Sangtae, Hong Chulki, and Sato Yukie. Graham Moore, who runs Blossoming Noise Records in Atlanta, played in the Squelchers that night—he was blaring feedback out of some weird homemade box that was connected to circuits that he kept slamming against his head. That was my first time going to Yogiga, which I soon learned was the hot spot for Korean noise weirdos. Afterward, everybody went to some nearby club. I was talking to Graham and Rat about their band with Tom Smith, the legendary To Live In Shave In LA and learned that they'd named their band after a Ron Jeremy… film. Then a drunk guy pressed a dollar against Grahams forehead and Graham tackled him to the ground, pinning his arms to the floor. Just another night in #noiselife.Previously - Grasshopper@natroe
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