Montreuil, France
October 2002

Volcano The Bear is composed of a trumpeter-singer, of a multi-instrumentalist/ violinist, of a player of the toy-piano... they continually change instruments, in a weird way, sometimes playing randomly, throwing metallic objects onto a cymbal. Much is left to chance as if the music existed without them in a natural state, and that they intervened only to add noises here, or diminish the extent of a drone elsewhere. To this add a theatrical side, as if they do not simply produce the music, but show with exaggerated poses that they participate in the creation of the musical flow.
© Soizig Le Calvez & Bertrand Le Saux
Etherreal

Arts Center, Hasselt, Belgium
12 October 2002

We have been waiting a long time, but England has finally produced a substantial avant-garde band. They come from Leicester, and are called Volcano The Bear, and they make music that cannot be classified. It is clear that they have been influenced by their heroes Nurse With Wound, This Heat, Sun Ra, The Residents, Albert Ayler, Soft Machine and Faust. One hears an occasional fragment of these, but Volcano The Bear remains particularly itself, simply because the group stands with one foot in tradition and with the other firmly in modern alienation. Volcano The Bear's music is founded on intuition and improvisation, in which a place is also reserved for ancient English folk and free jazz. Volcano The Bear is emotion, context and chaos at the same time. On the stage move three men in brown suits (without ties!) and another with his shirt hanging out, deliberately relaxed amid apparent chaos. On a table lies a prepared guitar and an electric violin, weird instruments apparently from the middle ages, electronic effects boxes and a large box of toys. As on their records (that are all worth it for the self-designed packaging and bizarre artwork of band member Nick Mott) during the concerts there are sudden moments of informal, surreal and playful beauty. Surely the show of the year! A shame that it lasted only three-quarters of an hour.
© Harry Prenger
Cut-Up