At Norberg 2011 James Brewster tested out Electro-acoustic café (his espresso-bar / sound-installation) for the first time ever. The incredible response he received from the Norberg audience convinced him that the project needed to continue. So since then he has toured Europe, attaching contact microphones to espresso machines and processing their sounds while making hundreds of coffees for audiences. Bookings have included Club Transmediale in Berlin, Arts Birthday in Stockholm, and Latitude festival in England.
But for Brewster, Norberg will always be Electro-acoustic café's home-from-home. You can watch live footage from EAC at Norberg 2011 here:
He responds to the honour of being invited back to the world's greatest festival by bringing with him a host of new elements. New for 2012 will be contact mic'd coffee tables, wah-wah on the milk jug, an 'aqua tip-jar' with hydrophones, up to 3 pedal 'extra-delay' on espresso orders (single, double and XL – extra-long; the 'lungo-delay'), and much more.
Also new will be the 'Grindcore' interactive installation. This consists of antique wooden coffee grinders with metal handles, each contact mic'd and processed so that customers can hand-grind their own beans in a dense granulated cloud.
James Brewster is an English sound-artist currently living in Malmö, Sweden. He also happens to be a professional barista, and even came second in the 2010 Swedish Latte-Art Championships in Stockholm. Electro-acoustic café has also been the focus of much media attention in Sweden. The project has been filmed by national TV station SVT1, broadcast by radio station P2, and even ended up on the cover of Sydsvenskan (southern Sweden's main newspaper).
http://www.electro-acoustic-cafe.com/
https://www.facebook.com/electro.acoustic.cafe
http://www.jamesbrewster.com
Photo by Henrik Strömberg
