LUCKY DRAGONS

“Lucky dragons” means any recorded or performed or installed or packaged or shared or suggested or imagined pieces made by Luke Fischbeck, Sarah Rara, and/or any sometimes collaborators who claim the name.

The name “lucky dragons” is borrowed from a japanese fishing boat caught in the fallout of hydrogen bomb test at bikini atoll in the 1950’s. The crew stricken ill, and the boat itself contaminated, the “lucky dragon” became a crystalizing symbol for the previously diffuse worldwide anti-nuclear sentiment. Eventually the boat was painted black, renamed the “dark falcon”, and put into reuse as a fishing vessel, until it was retired and disposed of on the man-made trash island “dream island”, where it remains today.

Lucky dragons are about the birthing of new and temporary creatures—equal-power situations in which audience members cooperate amongst themselves, building up fragile networks held together by such light things as skin contact, unfamiliar language, temporary logic, the spirit of celebration, and things that work but you don’t know why. There have been hundreds of these simple yet shifting and unpredictable instances—with audiences ranging from the intense intimacy of one person to the public spectacle of thousands of people. At the heart of it all is playing together—building up social collectivities, re-engaging the wonder and impossibility of technological presence. It sounds—and looks—like simple and ancient patterns coming together and falling apart in a sincere attempt to let wires and screens and words become clear and crystal.

They keep a busy schedule of performances and visits and festivals and workshops and things, in the present, and in the past: the 2008 Whitney Biennial, NY’s PS1, the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, the Philadelphia Institute for Contemporary Art, the Portland Institute for Contemporary Art, the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, Frankfurt’s Schirn Kunsthalle, Los Angeles’ The Smell, NY’s The Kitchen, The Smithsonian Institute’s Hirshorn Museum, Cooper Union, the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, etc. Lucky dragons live in Los Angeles California and have recorded 19 albums which are all available for downloading.

Lucky dragons’ sister projects include “sumi ink club”—a weekly collaborative drawing society, and “glaciers of nice”—a small press and internet community.

Today’s influences: nikki de st phalle, joan didion, CoBrA group, hieronymous bosch, thomas jefferson, tina turner, allan kaprow, joan jonas, bruce nauman, mayan codices, ivor cutler, jacques ranciere, helio oticia, lygia clark, giorgio agamben, pauline oliveros, terry riley.

“Lucky Dragons… create ecstatic music that completely transcends genres. My attempts to describe what their music actually sounds like always fall short of the magic they are making. I guess you could say it sounds like—ecstatic magic. Challenging stereotypes that electronic music is cold and sterile, Lucky Dragons’ live show, though conducted via computers, is a truly great celebration of the human spirit, giving real hope for the techno-future our society is racing toward.”—Artforum

WFWF009 - Friendship / Trip 02 7” w/ Ecstatic Sunshine
The second split release in our Trip-Friendship series hosts LUCKY DRAGONS and ECSTATIC SUNSHINE.

TRACKS: LUCKY DRAGONS:  “Take Turns”
ECSTATIC SUNSHINE “Easy Is Right”