Machinefabriek update, June 2025

There’s not an aweful lot of hot news about my musical endeavors at th emoment, but there is a lot to come (ooh the mystery!). For now, there’s a listening party next week, and a long and embarrasing story that I needed to get off my chest...

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Painting a Picture / Picture a Painting
Album, listening party and t-shirt

On June 13, Moving Furniture Records will release my album with Giovanni Di Domenico, Painting a Picture / Picture a Painting. Giovanni, Sietse (from the label), and I are hosting a Bandcamp listening party two days prior (so that’s next Wednesday, June 11). It’ll be the first time that I’m doing this, so I’m not too familiar with the whole listening-party-thing, but feel free to join (here), and ask us anything you wish… Or just (hopefully) enjoy the music.

Oh, there’s also a t-shirt available until the release day, designed by yours truly, based on the cover painting by Christiaan Kuitwaard. Be quick if you want one of these…

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Fractal Meat mix coming up

On July 7, Grahum Dunning will play a guest mix I’ve made for his NTS show Fractal Meat on a Sponge Bone. The 70-minute mix consists of only exclusive tracks—half by me, and the other half from amazing artists such as soccer Committee, Berlinde Deman, Gareth Davis, Lucija Gregov, Roel Meelkop, and more. Once it’s online, I’ll send another Substack post about it.

p.s. talking about Berlinde Deman… Vrije Geluiden hosted a live session by her, which you can now watch/listen on Youtube. Very much worth your time!

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Blasphemous Rumours

I just had this idea that it might be nice to talk about the weirdest concert experience I’ve ever had. I’ve actually been thinking about this incident (because that’s definitely what I’d call it) an awful lot, ever since it happened—years ago. It’s not something I’m particularly proud of, but it’s a good story nonetheless…

There are no actual places or people mentioned here, because I have no idea how sensitive everything written below still is. (Yes, that’s a cliffhanger.)

It was many, many years ago, and I was scheduled to perform in a huge church. There were two other artists on the bill, and we obviously shared the backstage area—where we could leave our bags, get drinks, socialize, etc. These other artists were (and still are!) really nice folks who were instrumental in my (erm...) musical career. Which makes what happened next extra awkward.

There was a big crowd that evening. The (still unnamed) city had quite a vibrant scene, and everyone seemed to be there—record labels, promoters, and so on.

Back then, I used to make field recordings wherever I went, incorporating local sounds into my concerts to add a kind of “local touch.” This time, I left my small cassette recorder running in the backstage area.

That was not a smart thing to do, as I would soon find out.

I performed second. If I remember correctly, I used a small zither, a few effects pedals, and field recordings. Or, in this case, secretly recorded backstage conversations.

Everything was going pretty well. I was building up loops of e-bowed zither and whatnot—it sounded massive in the church. Obviously, there was a shitload of reverb, so the sound was a bit blurry, but I could work with that. Although... it also worked against me.

I turned on the tape machine. My idea was to use some backstage banter, very subtly, purely as a textural layer. But lo and behold... “Whoops, that’s a bit loud,” I remember thinking, as the recording fed into my looper pedal. There was no way to fix it on the spot. “I’ll work with it,” I thought—completely unaware that the conversation I’d recorded was actually quite clear and intelligible. I was so focused on the sound itself that I noticed too late. And before I could correct my mistake, the harm had already been done.

Oops.

The recorded conversation was about the city’s music scene. And it wasn’t friendly. There were accusations, some name-calling... Apparently, the local scene was slowly falling apart due to personal and business disagreements. What should’ve stayed behind closed doors was now pouring out of massive speakers in a church—with all the scolded parties present! I could clearly feel the tension in the room rise. I probably started sweating, too.

I did (obviously) fade out the voice recordings and tried to continue my gig in a more harmless fashion. But again—too late. I later heard there was even a fistfight outside the church.

It’s great to be able to touch people with music, but this was definitely not what I intended.

As if all this wasn’t awkward enough… we had planned in advance to end the evening with an improvised trio session. Oof. But we did it! I don’t think it lasted more than 15 minutes. And it definitely wasn’t the most inspiring set…

I didn’t talk much with the other artists after this shitshow (…); I just uttered a stupid, “Are you angry with me?” For fuck’s sake—there were multiple people in that church who had every right to be pissed off!

I don’t know if the (aftermath of the) gig was the final nail in the coffin for the city’s electronic music scene, but things disintegrated soon after that. A company quit, folks relocated—big changes.

All of this happened a long time ago, and I assume things have been back to normal for a while now. But this horrible incident still lingers in the back of my mind. And of course, I’ve never used my recorder to eavesdrop on people again.

A wise lesson, learned the hard way.

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caroline 2

One short but important last message: caroline has a new album out, and it’s everything I was hoping for, if not more. Everyone needs to listen to it:

Thanks for reading! Rutger

Rutger Zuydervelt / Machinefabriek
machinefabriek.nu
machinefabriek.bandcamp.com
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