Tuesday 4 February 2025, 7.30pm
GRAIN is a concert series and residency for experimental and improvised music, operating mainly out of Avalon Cafe, South Bermondsey.
GRAIN is curated and produced by Caius Williams and Theodora Laird. The series is focussed on programming new and adventurous music and nurturing a growing community with cross-scene and cross-generational collaboration. The residency also documents music made in and around South Bermondsey, and gives occasional workshops aiming to widen access, interest, and explore processes for improvising and collective music-making.
GRAIN will be curating a special one-off night at Cafe Oto on February 4th. Full lineup and groupings TBA soon
Caius Williams is a musician working mostly within experimental and improvised music. He has a collaborative duo with Theodora Laird (‘Crosspiece’), solo projects working with both double bass and baritone guitar, has played bass in Charles Bullen's (of This Heat) project Lifetones, and plays in Theodora’s project ‘feeo’.
Caius also regularly works with many of London’s notable improvisers, including Steve Noble, Tara Cunningham, Maggie Nicols, Tom Challenger, Mark Sanders, and others.
Recent releases include ‘Gwannach’ (OTOROKU), ‘Crosspiece’ with Theodora Laird (Cherche Encore), and ‘Worn’, in trio with Tara Cunningham and Will Glaser.
For the last two years, Caius has been curating GRAIN: A concert series and label based out of Avalon Cafe in South Bermondsey.
Charles Bullen was a member of timeless pre/post-everything trio This Heat. He grew up in Liverpool and after moving to London in the early 70’s he formed the improvising duo Dolphin Logic with Charles Hayward, which later, with the addition of “non-musician” Gareth Williams, became This Heat. After releasing two seminal albums the band split in 1982 and Bullen made an album the following year under the name Lifetones focusing on repetition and a more syncopated dub influenced sound. Earlier this year, after a series of re-issues on Light In The Attic Records, Bullen and Hayward formed This Is Not This Heat, a group assembled to realise and re-imagine the music of This Heat with several musical luminaries from the London experimental music world including Daniel O’Sullivan, Alex Ward, James Sedwards, Alexis Taylor, Frank Byng, John Edwards and Oren Marshall.
Tara Cunningham is a guitarist and composer whose work focusses on both improvisation, and pushing the textural boundaries of her instrument. Ongoing projects include; duo with bassist Caius Williams and acid-jazz group Red Snapper. She has also recently recorded part of Jack Cooper’s Modern Nature for their fourth studio album, as well as currently working with drummer Seb Rochford on his latest project for 6 guitars.
Theo Guttenplan is a drummer and percussionist from London, playing improvised and other musics. He is also interested in woodworking, crosswords, computers, and football.
Theodora Laird is a vocalist and multidisciplinary artist. Releases under her solo project ‘feeo’ have received critical acclaim. Theodora's practice has involved in tandem with an interest in situating narratives within freely improvised music, specifically through frequent involvement in the GRAIN residency.
