Bruce Gilbert

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Bruce Gilbert (born Bruce Clifford Gilbert, 18 May 1946, Watford, Hertfordshire) is an English musician, one of the founding members of the influential and experimental art-punk band Wire, and a pioneer in the experimental noise scene.

Education and early career

He studied art in a British school and found a niche in the budding avant-garde music scene in late 1960s England. Gilbert's experimental inclinations in his musical tastes later influenced his guitar playing in Wire. While in Wire he was known as the most experimental member of the group.^{[citation needed]}

Although not formally trained as a guitarist, he provided much of the experimental guitar heard in most Wire songs with distortion pedals and other effects.

Gilbert explains how he became a member of Wire; "It all came about by accident. I was working as an AV technician in charge of a small studio at Watford college. I was fiddling about as usual, making strange tapes with one of the students. We were planning to do a Tangerine Dream-ish sort of thing, but more harrowing, not as soporific. At that time, I was unaware of the other things that were happening in Germany, the experimental, harder stuff, but I suppose that was what I was working towards, without knowing it. Then a chap who played guitar started dropping by to make use of the facilities. Somehow, the studio just became a focus for people, so some of us just started playing things together. I was very wary of where it might lead. I'm not impressed by 'technique' and to begin with, my role in the proceedings was to make sure that it didn't get in the way of what we were trying to do."^{[citation needed]}

Gilbert and his band members had no idea that Wire was to become one of the most influential and innovative bands of the punk era, with their brief, three album tenure between 1976-79 with Pink Flag, Chairs Missing and 154 before temporarily disbanding after a show at London's Electric Ballroom at the start of 1980. At this time, Gilbert formed Dome with Wire's bassist, Graham Lewis. Dome's performances were done at art galleries with visual displays that allowed audience interactivity. Gilbert and Lewis performed with tubes made of paper over their heads, thus restricting their vision. Artist Russell Mills frequently collaborated with Dome.

Late career

By the mid 1990s, Gilbert was a fixture in London's techno clubs, DJing and remixing under the name DJ Beekeeper, most often performing inside a garden shed above the dancefloor for a touch of Wire-like visual humor. Gilbert has often been quoted saying that being a DJ was just an excuse to "manipulate other people's music" - such projects include remixing "National Grid" by the group Disinformation, for publication on their double CD Antiphony.

In March 1996, he released the results of new experiments, the Ab Ovo album and "Ovo Mix" 12-inch single. His first solo album not to result from an external dance or film commissions, was described by The Wire as, "a forceful piece of work which sounds like nothing else around."^{[citation needed]}

Gilbert was also commissioned to create music for modern dance performances, with excerpts appearing on his albums This Way, Shivering Man (both combined on CD as This Way to the Shivering Man) and Music for Fruit.

Discography

Albums

• This Way (Mute Records 1984)
• This Way to the Shivering Man (Mute Records 1987)
• Insiding (Mute Records 1991)
• Music for Fruit (Mute Records 1991)
• Ab Ovo (Mute Records 1996)
• Orr (Parallel Series 1996)
• In Esse (Mute Records 1997)
• Ordier (Table Of The Elements 2004)
• Oblivio Agitatum (Editions Mego 2009)
• This Way (25th Anniversary Reissue) (Editions Mego 2009)

Singles

• "Ab Ovo" (Mute Records 1996)

References