How insane is Bristol's Venn Fest going to be this year? According to Venn organizer John Stevens, "You'll leave having been ravished by a bracing dervish of sound and sight, your mind a-buzz with rabidly creative thoughts about music, sweet music, in all it's freakish, uncontrollable and malevolent beauty." The festival has grown quickly from humble beginnings to become a major contender in the UK's top music festival circuit. Venn lineups always feature the brightest rising stars of the avant-garde electronica movement mixed in with blazing leftfield producers. This June, the festivities begin with astro-acoustic explorations by Murcof. An ambient electronica musician from Mexico, Murcof "oohed" and "aahed" audiences last year on his UK planetarium tour (plus a few rare stops in the US). He should feel right at home when he performs selections from his 2007 release Cosmos at the Bristol Planetarium on 5 June. Murcof is scheduled to perform twice that same night along with visual enhancements by video artiste Joane Lemercier. The next night, Friday 6 June, Pole will enchant ears on Bristol's waterfront with his mesmerizing minimal-techno/noise-dub before Matmos takes the stage and mashes up the place! The IDM afficionados will be rounded out by performances from Wildbirds & Peacedrums while Ergo Phizmiz transforms "a scout hut into an enchanted Bavarian forest of sound for three days with his installation 'Forest: Part One'." That all goes down Friday 6 June at Arnolfini Auditorium. Ergo Phizmiz - "Eloise My Dolly":For the daytime folks (and people who like to party nonstop) Saturday features live music by F**k Buttons, Philip Jeck, Infinite Livez, One More Grain, Skeletons & The Kings of All Cities. Both Saturday and Sunday feature mid-afternoon workshops for D.I.Y. types and artistic/social adventures for outgoing types. But keep it together, coz there's gonna be a big Bristol bash Saturday night at the Motion Skate Park! Not to be missed, hometown hero of heavy Peverelist will turn those sk8 ramps into bass wave carriers in no time! Afrikan Boy, Moritz Von Oswald (Rhythm & Sound, Basic Channel), Errorsmith and Black Devil Disco Club will join the fun and keep things rollin. Of course, Bristolians are known for their endurance raving, so Sunday is barely going to wind things down with Cali's own dubstep ambassador, Flying Lotus, Heliocentrics, Infinite Livez, 2 performances by Sunburned Hand of The Man and even more. Scope the festival website for full deets:http://www.vennfestival.comAfrikan Boy - "One Day I went to Lidl"(Lidl is the name of a store...)It's hard to talk about music in Bristol without thinking of down-tempo demigods Portishead. Well, a few of them will be there to represent as well, as part of The Blessing (Jim Barr, Clive Deamer and Jake McMurchie plus non-head Pete Judge of Super Furry A's).The Blessing - "Bleach Cake":So clear your calendars for the entire weekend, 5-8 June and prepare to be immersed in the audio equivalent of deep sea snorkling with all your fave rave mates!Whew, I feel a bit dizzy just imagining how wicked this is gonna be!For crazy slices of music from artists on the lineup:A Venn Festival playlist in a LastFM pop up player(the embed code looked like something that would confuse the hell out of MOG's text editor)http://www.ergophizmiz.com/In addition to all thew fun, there will also be workshops for tinkerers throughout the weekend. Like Solar Weevils-watching and tuning forks with the Elbow Orchestra and Herzog/Kinski's deranged journey overland with a huge ship in the mockumentary "FITZCARRALDO". My personal fave is the "Dirty Electronics Workshop" at 2pm on Saturday 7 June, According to the description on the "Other" stuff page:

A workshop led by John Richards, who brings his dirty electronics aesthetic to Venn in the form of the Sudophone: a DIY electronic instrument made from a junk tin can, oscillator and grip bolt. Come join the ensemble. A unique opportunity to make your own instrument on Saturday, then return the following day for a public performance at Arnolfini.

How cool is that? A Sudophone? Like Pseudo-phone or Sudophonic? Anyway, make sure to check out the other cool social/educational events on that page:http://www.vennfestival.com/other/index.htm