Name: BASIC w/ BCMC and Flux Bikes
Start: 2026-02-07T20:30:00-06:00
Location: 3111 N Western Ave Chicago IL 60618

$BASIC w\/ BCMC and Flux Bikes$

8:30pm.

BASIC

The trio of Chris Forysth (guitar), Mikel Patrick Avery (percussion, drum machine, electronics), and Douglas McCombs (Fender Bass VI), BASIC produced their most recent release - the three-track, 25-minute Dream City EP - over a two-day session. The recordings were done fast and live, the three members cutting them together in a room at Philly’s Kawari Sound with minimal overdubs. And although just a trio these tunes sound like more than that. Ample detail is provided by the interlocking guitars and Avery’s unique combination of electronic beats and acoustic percussion that he treats and manipulates live with various self-built electronic processors.

Shortly after the release of their debut album “This Is BASIC,” OG Tortoise bassist McCombs joined the group, and along with Philly-based core members Forsyth (Solar Motel Band) and Avery (Natural Information Society), BASIC toured the record up and down the West Coast and throughout the Northeast and Midwest US.

The chemistry between the three resulted in the development of new material almost immediately, built around their propulsive, lyrical, and strongly rhythmic improvisations (rather than songs, they call them “fields”). The results of these thematic excursions are apparent on “Dream City,” a vision of pasts and futures firmly expressed in an ecstatic state of presence, embracing and accepting changes and fusing influences to create a powerful and dynamic sound.

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BCMC, featuring Cooper Crain and Bill MacKay, unite to create provocative epilogues, warm avant-garde noir, and fiery over-driven jams to recall life’s sunnier and stranger days. Crain’s organ and synths mix with MacKay’s guitars as they draw songs from elegiac themes and spontaneous statements that are equal parts east-west, deep space, avant-rock, raga, fugue, field recording, blues and beyond

Bandcamp [https://bcmc.bandcamp.com/album/foreign-smokes]

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Flux Bikes makes long distance music. Riding on two-wheeled air and traveling near and far to discover the sonic and transportative capabilities of his bicycle tires, rims, and spokes. Rob Frye (Bitchin Bajas, Exoplanet, Separatist Party) believes in the simple power of the bicycle, pedaling to every show since the project's inception in 2010.

Bandcamp [https://robfrye.bandcamp.com/album/flux-bikes]