#sto let

Bittova & Vaclavek - Sto let

One Holiday, Birthday, forgive-me or just because present I would never pass up is a ticket to see the alluring, talented, offbeat and miraculously animated Czech composer Iva Bittová. Complex, narrative songs like Huljet and Sto Let turned me on to her theatrical style, only to capture me entirely days later when I couldn't escape their silent/wild choirs from my otherwise steady, environment compatible thought bubble--it most generally streaming alliterations and lost pondersome about its/my surroundings surroundings.

Iva Bittová, Huljet (Live)

Bittová first captured my hand/elite-list-of on the cusp of the millennium when I began listening to Fred Frith's atonal, guzzy time signatures out-let in bands like Slapp Happy, Art Bears (both featuring the transcendent Dagmar Krause), and his own solo project. Frith, in the late 90s, had released the black and white experimental music film Step Across the Border, featuring in one scene; with a he, bed, alarm clock; Iva Bittová.

Iva Bittová & Pavel Fajt, "Morning Song," from Step Across the Border, 1990 (Once my number one, still ranked, I love this song to heart immensely.)

Although my opening sentence might sound like a lie to someone so close to me (not to be named) who bought me a replica alarm clock from said "Morning Song" video to my hyped dismay, I swear I wouldn't reject this one. So much swearing here (a lame plea--haven't even obsessed over tour dates yet. Recently yet.)

More recently though, I've discovered a louder, tho still decades older, project from Bittová and another counterpart, Dunaj. The song is a sharper, conciser burst of punk fear that would fit along with the dissonance of other, stranger Frith projects.