Place Pigalle in Seattle’s Pike Place Market 📷 by Ruby James
My friends call me Gortron or Gordotron cuz I love synthesizers, stereo echoed space-cat noises & freaked-out guitars so much. Unusual sounding atmospheres are my bag, creatively merging with music machines fits me well. This here GORDOTRONIC website features my songs, stories & photos– feel free to contact me if you wanna work together. @GordonRaphael
God, I’ve carried this new notebook around since Christmas and have not writtien anything in it yet! I’m up here on my second favorite bridge in Kreuzberg, Berlin– the one that connects Fraenkelufer to the Il Cassolare Italian punk-rock pizza place, over the gorgeous little canal I walked along to get here. My first favorite bridge is at the far end of Görlitzer Park which looks down on the water over the little improvised circus-style trailer where some brave alternative community lives and presents outdoor theatrical shows in summertime.
White fluffy cottony things were floating down all around me this sunny day as I walked past Kottbusser Tor, past the needle exchange and Fix-Point where time wearied drug-ravaged people gather round, nursing from Berliner Pilsners till their medicine kicks in. Those white fluffy cottony things come from tall trees, blowing down in these warm, sun-shiney Spring days. I am coming along nicely today, smiling inside as I listen on headphones to freshly mastered versions of my own songs. I learned and discovered so much in those years locked away in basements / garages / friend’s houses / small dark rooms where I was sure this music I was making would certainly be heard, enjoyed, loved some day by human beings with ears, minds and hearts– somewhere out there in our wide, whacked-out world.
I’ve composed about 2000 songs or pieces or noise collages or ghastly symphonies, yet I seemed never be able to take the NEXT big step to RELEASE them. The only actual real records I appeared on as a songwriter /musician were the very beautiful ones that Sky Cries Mary created. I was one of seven musicians in that Seattle band, all of whom wrote the songs together quite organically. Also- my friend at ChuckieBoy released a CD of mine called Colour Twigs. Absinthee released two songs (a cover of a Cocteau Twins song, Shallow Then Halo, and one called 100 Crymes on Cleopatra Records in Hollywood. Yes, that’s all that’s been out there up until NOW.
Even in the pre-grunge Seattle days I discovered and recorded super-fine innovative bands, aiming to start my own label, Ars Divina Network, to showcase these talents. Green River- (which later branched into both Mudhoney and Pearl Jam), Soundgarden, Bundle of Hiss, Serious Dark Angels and Feast were some of the first rock bands that I recorded which intended to sign, promote and release. There was also fabulous music by my friend Tor Midtskog called The Violet Caste that I loved quite brightly.
Young Gortron was extraordinarily scattered however, no good at all getting organized, ignorant to business or money matters; so I never really got it ALL together. Instead, some good friends and I set up a recording studio/ punk rock/ crash pad, in an old church in Ballard.
The Ars Divina Headquarters as we called it, was full of bands, artists, suave characters and general over-the top freaks. This immersive live-in art project took an immediate and funky dive towards chaos discord and drugz, creating a huge mess in which I definitely participated along with our whole cast of lovey fuzzy warm characters.
Just as things there seemed to really take off, (we had a film premiere party for Barb Ireland, and were recording the Urban Rhythm Unit) the church burnt down in a mysterious sad scary very hot fire. Along with melted drum sets, a burnt Hammond organ and ARP synth turned-to ash the curtain closed on this chapter far too abruptly.
The neighbors cheered when our place was gone. They hadn’t appreciated the young trampies ‘n wasted punx jumping onto their garage roofs, dancing on top of their cars with dirty boots or pissing outside under bright streetlights during our extremely LOUD parties.
Many years later in quite a different life I moved to London and started Shoplifter Records through Sony, thanks to Mark Chung– a supercool guy who played bass in Einsturzende Neubauten, that world-renouned Berlin based industrial band that was a massive favorite amongst our Seattle scene). Sony offered funding for any band that I could sign (wow and finally!!), so I immediately went after Miss Machine, Kill Kenada, Regina Spektor and The Satellites (now, Cicely Satellites). We put out two Miss Machine singles and had just released Regina’s mind-and-heart-bendingly fabulous Soviet Kitsch album when things started disintegrated / fell apart.
Here I am continuing on with my ideas, now armed with a more colourful psychedelic vision from lessons learned and rising from the ashes of experience. I have another new chance with GORDOTRONIC moving forward. May you find inspiration, resonance & bemusement here.
xx Gordon Raphael— Head Shoplifter
Artwork by Jess Allanic from the great UK band, Calva Louise