A video trailer for Uncanny Valley – coming to the Hen & Chickens, London, 26-28 August 2010.

Uncanny Valley is coming to the Hen & Chickens Theatre, 26-28 August 2010.

Musicians play live with decrepit dolls, theremins and robots in this eerie entertainment, exploring our fears of the almost human – from golems to ventriloquists’ dummies.

Hot from their sell-out run on the Brighton Festival Fringe, dreamlike musical and mechanical inventors Spacedog join forces with gentleman rapper Professor Elemental, known for his YouTube sensation Cup of Brown Joy, a paean to the pleasures of drinking tea.

Death ballads, unsettling live robotics and tales of the professor’s extreme taxidermy experiments. Read more for ticket details…

Tickets are now on sale for our new show at the Brighton Festival Fringe. This year, Spacedog are teaming up with Professor Elemental to bring you a delightfully unsettling evening, probing our very human fears of the almost human, from zombies to ventriloquists’ dummies. Marlborough Theatre, 5 May 2010.

Accompanied by our home-spun musical robots, we’ll be singing songs of love, death and the uncanny as we explore the darkest reaches of your mind. With theremins, taxidermy and strange automata…

News of an extra date in the Brighton Festival Fringe: Spacedog are teaming up with Jane Bom-Bane, maestro with mechanical hats, and multi-instrumentalist Nick Pynn for a very unusual music night at Bom-Bane’s, Brighton, 13 May 2010…

It’s the press launch tonight of the Brighton Festival Fringe. This year, Spacedog are teaming up with Professor Elemental to bring you a delightfully unsettling evening, probing our very human fears of the almost human, from zombies to ventriloquists’ dummies. Marlborough Theatre, 5 May 2010.

Accompanied by our home-spun musical robots, we’ll be singing songs of love, death and the uncanny as we explore the darkest reaches of your mind. With theremins, taxidermy and strange automata…

Here are some snapshots of the Ealing Feeder – the latest version of my carillon (automatic bell rig), along with some details of the thinking behind the piece.

Thanks to everyone who came along to the Arthertz stand at the Kinetica Art Fair and said ‘hello’. The Ealing Feeder survived admirably and is now back in my workshop until its next outing. Coming soon to the Brighton Festival Fringe and Battersea Power Station…

As the sun sets over Battersea Power Station, Spacedog will be playing live in the turbine hall. Date tbc but fingers crossed for 1 June 2010.

Stay posted for more news of this hugely exciting event, including ticket details. For now I can tell you there will be music from Alex Paterson (The Orb), John Foxx and ourselves, an installation from Andy Back, projections from Ian Eames and Mike Coles and many other treats. Curated by Dennis Da Silva and Beverley Bennett, Art Hertz, the event is titled Electricity and Ghosts (after one of Foxx’ classic tracks).

See some photos of the interior of the power station…

My first test with Hugo, the 1930s vent doll who will be appearing in future Spacedog gigs. Here, you can hear him singing the Kurt Weill classic Alabama Song. Stay posted for further developments – and look out for Hugo in the Brighton Festival Fringe…

An utterly chilling poem that I stumbled on today. It’s from the pages of The Electrical Age, a pioneering gadget magazine, produced from the early 1930s by the Electrical Association for Women:

Hushaby! baby. Mother is near,
Don’t you cry, precious, take an ampere,
Cuddle down, sweet, near the dynamo’s brush,
The current will put you to sleep with a rush….