Aachen, Germany-based Christoph Heemann has made a name for himself as a musician, composer, remix artist, and engineer through groups like HNAS, Mimir, Mirror, In Camera, and collaborations with Charlemagne Palestine, Jim O'Rourke, Merzbow, Organum, Nurse With Wound, Current 93, and others. His artwork has graced covers for Edward Ka-Spel, The Tear Garden, Aeolian String Ensemble, Ragnar Grippe, and Ultra, and through his Streamline label he has issued music by John Duncan, Little Annie, Keiji Haino, Intersystems, Limpe Fuchs, Xhol Caravan, and more. Heemann is making a rare trip through the USA with 8 live shows scheduled beginning in Boston on Friday, October 8th. This brief interview is only a snapshot of what he's currently up to.

David Wilson, curator of the New England Synthesizer Museum, passed away on Friday, August 27th in Nashua, NH, according to the Nashua Telegraph. He was known in the community for his incredible collection of vintage synths as well as his extensive knowledge and skills at repairing the most obscure ones for various owners and dealers. A video excursion was made back in October 2007 by Brainwashed for The Eye. Dave was 49.

Over the last week the system at Brainwashed.com was upgraded. The database had to be migrated from an older version to a newer one and many things, other than the appearance, have changed. We hope everybody can find everything that was on the older version but feel free to let us know somehow if things don't work or look right!

We are sad to learn of the news of the passing of the remaining WaxTrax! co-founder Dannie Flesher. Were it not for Dannie Flesher and partner Jim Nash, Brainwashed probably wouldn't exist. WaxTrax! were responsible for the widest scale introduction in North America of bands Meat Beat Manifesto, Greater Than One, Legendary Pink Dots, and Coil in the late 1980s, all of which were the foundation for Brainwashed.com. For an excellent article on Dannie and Jim see what the Chicago Tribune had to say in their Turn It Up article. Thanks Dannie & Jim.

The staff of Brainwashed are saddened by the news of the untimely passing of drummer Jerry Fuchs. Jerry was close to many friends of Brainwashed and played in numerous groups including !!!, The Juan Maclean, and Maserati. We wish to extend condolences to his friends and family through these difficult times.

Make everyone an imaginary "Mix CD" for our new virtual Mix CD Exchange Party section. Send the tracklist (and only a tracklist) to mixcd at brainwashed. Make sure it is short enough to fit on a disc, avoid shameless self-promotion (ie don't put your own songs on it!), tell us who you are and where you are, and give it a title!

Here at Brainwashed we're devastated when we hear of labels sending music to the landfills. There's plenty of uses for spare CDs: keep some at the home, office, give to friends, leave at coffee shops, use as coasters, etc...  We're currently trying to unload some CD overruns: CDs that have no artwork. We're giving them away at $1 each and have a number of titles in the Brainwashed Commerce section. 

There's no arguing how influential John Hughes has been on most of the staff and writers of Brainwashed and we would like to take a moment to thank him posthumously for all he did for the world of music. The soundtracks to the films he either wrote, directed, or both were the templates for some of the best mix tapes that were passed around in the '80s and obscure little touches like the massive wall-sized Cabaret Voltaire poster in Ferris Bueller's Day Off get the big thumbs up in this corner of the music world. He also raised a great guy with great taste, John III, whose Hefty Records has long been a Brainwashed fave label from its inception. Our hearts go out to his family following such an unexpected passing.

Brainwashed is sad to report that the van of Kranky artist Raglani was broken into after the performance at this year's No Fun Fest. Both Joseph Raglani and Steve Hauschildt's gear was stolen—all of the gear they basically own and use. Authorities and used gear shops were notified but nothing has turned up this week. A donation fund has been set up at Kvist Records and we would also like to post the gear list in case anyone comes across a pile resembling this.

We are all sad at the loss of Charles Cooper of Telefon Tel Aviv. Charlie went missing Wednesday, January 21st and was found on Monday morning in Chicago according to a report by CBS2 Chicago. Joshua from Telefon Tel Aviv posted the following on their myspace page Wednesday:

A stunning video trailer from brainwaves has been pains-takingly assembled from the footage captured by the amazingly talented guys of ZF FILMS and is now available to view on Vimeo. At this time no decisions have been made for a more complete project: a massive multi-DVD set of the weekend; a consise documentary style collection of highlights; or something somewhere in between include possibilities. 

It is with much regret that we announce that Charalambides has pulled out of the Brainwaves Festival. Following two family emergencies the duo have canceled all remaining commitments this year. We extend our deepest sympathies to both Tom and Christina Carter. Since their set was scheduled on the Kranky day, we hope to fill their slot with another Kranky act.

It is crucial this early in the game to get sponsors for the 2008 Brainwaves Festival.  We need money to pay for air fare, accommodations, theater rental, insurance, and various other things.  Once again we're offering three levels of sponsorship packages:

Bronze Level: your name in our sponsorship list on future ads and print materials, a link to your Web site from the Brainwaves site, eternal gratitude. ($200)

Silver Level: all the above + a merchandise table for one block (Friday night, Saturday afternoon, Saturday night, or Sunday afternoon) and two free tickets. ($500)

Gold level: all the above but the merchandise table for the entire festival duration and free ads on Brainwashed.com for a year. ($1500)

Nobody will ever be able to accuse Pan Sonic of holding back from their fans. The duo has always been quite generous: issuing albums which are double the length of the average full-length, with the exception of Kesto, a -four- disc set of all new material priced reasonably; releasing numerous albums in various configurations, either solo or with others; and even opening the floor out to their fans for offers of places to perform. This, their first official DVD release is quite a present for the fans, however, it's not a monumental accomplishment in their catalog for the more pedestrian consumer.

We're sorry for the downtime but there was a disk failure, which ended up corrupting a ton of the database data. Unfortunately, the most recent backup that was salvagable goes back to August, so a ton of us have been feverishly trying to get old content in. While we worked hard and are continue to input old file, there are some things which are gone.  If you are aware of missing files and would like to contact us, please do!  Thanks.

There are now some images to share for the Peace compilation, featuring new, exclusive, rare, and old music from 34 friends of Jon Whitney and Brainwashed. Images can be seen at flickr.com/photos/interrobang918.

Coming in under the wire at the end of the year is this flawless EP from Rjyan Kidwell. While Sketchi on Temporary Residence was the most recently released full-length album by Cex, Exotical Privates is linked to his last release on Automation, last year's fantastic and underrated Actual Fucking with Nice Nice. Billed as remixes from that LP this EP stands on its own perfectly well.

All that you see here at brainwashed.com I owe to my mom.

She brought me into a record store when I was four and I pointed to some 45s (Rod Stewart and the Bee Gees!) and she bought them for me; on my 11th birthday she brought me to my first concert (Eddy Grant!); from the time I was 13 until I could drive she would drive me to WMUA in Amherst where I began DJ'ing; and she was in the balcony at Brainwaves exactly one year ago to the weekend (the weekend before Thanksgiving).

She fought a vicious fight with brain cancer which sprung up out of nowhere in June of 2007. She withstood needles, IVs, surgery, chemo, radiation, and plenty of other medication which all had their effects and side effects.

She passed on Saturday, November 17th at 6:30pm EST in comfort, away from the hospitals, away from the needles, away from the people who would draw blood from her every four hours. She wanted out from the hospital. She wanted to be done with all the treatments and efforts.

I might be a bit biased but in all honesty, she was the most virtuous person I have ever known. Nobody, not even the people she didn't like, could ever say anything bad about her. She treated everyone with respect and decency and had a strong heart. It's no wonder that her heart was her last functioning organ which kept her alive through her final days.

Brainwashed will return in December.

Thanks for all your support and love
Jon