Purity Device

Purity Device are an Experimental rock band from Brisbane, Australia. The group started in 2007 as a studio project for Greg Reason and Steven E. Cameron, who felt limited by the standard format of prior bands they had been involved with. Purity Device have since expanded to eight members and issued ten CDs, becoming an integral part of Brisbane's underground music scene. By combining elements from an unusually diverse array of genres, the group stand out as one of very few Brisbane acts that doesn't sound like any other previously established band.
Biography
First incarnation
The first EP, Purity Device, was issued the day of their debut performance in July 2008. The group appeared as a four piece consisting of Greg Reason, Steven E. Cameron, Alex Hodgins and Kenneth Vanderbyl and the performance was recorded and issued as a limited edition live CD later that year, thus beginning the practice of releasing limited disks to augment the proper studio recordings. In an review of the debut EP, the group was compared to Nine Inch Nails, Muse, Autechre, A Perfect Circle, Coil and Ulver, indicating that even at so early a stage of their career they had already begun fusing drastically different styles of music to forge a unique sound of their own.
In August, Purity Device's remix of 'Thems Burnt Puppies' appeared on Re:Enactment's Remix, which was included on the USB edition of their Regicide EP. A collaboration with Departures (a Nu jazz/Classical music group that shares several members with Purity Device) appeared on the later group's Patipada EP in December on 777 Operations, a record label founded by Purity Device member Greg Reason.
Seven-piece lineup
Debut album The Single Act of Being was issued by 777 Operations in February 2009 and featured a seven-piece lineup that included new members Hik Sugimoto, Ian Buchanski and Greta Kelly. The album explored a vast array of different styles including Electronica, Ambient music, Shoegazing, Drone music, Industrial music, Noise music, abstract Hip-Hop, Death metal, Avant-garde, Pop music, Psychedelic and Art Rock.
A seven-piece incarnation (with Fahad Albader replacing Kenneth Vanderbyl) went into the studio on Friday the 13th of March 2009 and recorded a live session which was issued unedited as the limited 2009-03-13 Live in the Studio. April saw the release of Building a Home: The Single Act of Being demos, another limited release that was to be included on the long-delayed art edition of The Single Act of Being.
Another remix for Re:Enactment was issued, this time on the limited edition Steels EP which was given away at Re:Enactment's May 2009 appearance at Fortitude Valley venue the Zoo. Reason also released an album with Tetra, an ambient group he'd formed with future Purity Device member Jim Grundy (also of Re:Enactment).
The Four Flavours era
Rather than putting out a second album, the group instead chose to issue a series of four EPs that each explored different aspects of the group's eclectic sound. First in the Four Flavours series was The Rain in May, a record that explored acoustic textures and appropriated Folk music into the Purity Device sound alongside more familiar Doom, Ambient and Rock sounds. June's The Snow was an album-length Ambient record that introduced elements of Post rock to the band's sound. The Hail, issued in July, expanded the Noise and Power electronics leanings evident towards the later half of The Single Act of Being into a torturous album-length EP that showed the influence of Throbbing Gristle and Whitehouse.
The fourth and final release in the series is The Shine, which was supposed to be issued in August to conform to the pattern of monthly EPs maintained for the rest of the series. As Reason acknowledges in his liner notes, "things didn't exactly run to schedule". They spent much longer developing the songs than they had planned, finally issuing the disk in January 2010. The record draws from the Pop and Rock side of the band and introduces elements of Trip-Hop with 'Undone'.
Most recently, the Purity Device track 'Rivers of Enkephalin' was used in the Revue Factory Productions short film Kill Kane and Brisbane/Tokyo Hip-Hop artist Tigermoth remixed 'The Great Perpendicular Path' and is streaming it from his Myspace page. The group are currently at work on two collaborative records with Avant-jazz saxophonist Elliott Dalgleish, who previously appeared on 'Tsaparang' from Patipada and 'Active Denial System' from The Single Act of Being.
Remix/Reform
In April 2010, the group announced via their homepage that they would soon be releasing an album of remixes and reconstructions of material from The Single Act of Being. Amongst the artists contributing to the record are UK Electronica legends The Black Dog and Bola, both revered innovators who rose to prominence from Warp's . Other contributors include Tetra, Re:Enactment, Secret Killer of Names, Palindromic Resonance, Institute of Reason, Tigermoth, Subsea, Nic McConaghy, Ambersound and the group's own Greg Reason.
Days after this announcement, The Black Dog assembled a free DJ mix for FACT magazine and opened the set with their remix of 'The Thought Police'. Remix/Reform marks the first time The Black Dog have ever remixed an Australian artist and also the first new music by Bola since 2007's Kroungrine, breaking the silence that was (incorrectly) rumoured to indicate retirement from the industry.
Themes
The Single Act of Being features many tracks that appear to be based on science, psychology, theology and science-fiction. First track 'Rivers of Enkephalin' namechecks a chemical secreted within the human brain in order to numb the body to intense pain. 'Miasma' refers to poisonous gas emissions, 'Active Denial System' refers to a "directed energy weapon", 'Euclidean Curve' namechecks Greek mathematician Euclid, 'Vovchanchyn' namechecks a Ukrainian mixed martial artist, 'On the transformation of Romance into Guilt' was represented on the Purity Device Myspace page by a paragraph of text from a John C. Lilly psychology book, 'Synaptic Modulation' refers to the effects of stimulants on the human brain, 'The Great Perpendicular Path' refers to Tibetan Buddhist traditions documented in The Tibetan Book of the Dead (the demo version even features spoken excerpts from the book) and 'The Thought Police' refers to George Orwell's dystopian Science fiction novel Nineteen Eighty-Four. The group posted literary accompaniments for each track on their Myspace page as a countdown to the release of The Single Act of Being.
The Four Flavours series were based partly upon life experiences and current events in the lives of members of the band. The Rain dealt with "guilt, confusion and finality", The Snow deals with perception and The Hail is a comment on modern societal structure and its "over-stimulation, confusion and deceit".
Temple of Purity
In early 2009, Purity Device founded a club named Temple of Purity. The group has not circulated much information as to the specifics of the club but the liner notes of each CD release contain different promises of "extensive audio, video and print", "far too much content", "content both extensive and exclusive", "propaganda and audio tapes", "more than enough" and "clear light transmissions". The later appears to be a reference to Buddhist theology as expounded in 'The Great Perpendicular Path' and the Temple of Purity paperwork, designs and literature the group have made available are all composed in the manner of the writings and stationary of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn.
Artwork
Most of the art, photography and design on Purity Device CDs is by Greg Reason for his graphic design company 777 Design. Steven E. Cameron did the design for the self titled EP and Rachael Otto assisted in designing The Single Act of Being. Several releases also feature the photography of Tim Howard.
The group has taken pre-orders for a forthcoming "deluxe boxed art edition" of The Single Act of Being. The set was thought to be made available around April 2009 but ended up not materializing at all during that year. The box is to include a copy of the album on CD and cassette tape, a copy of the limited CD Building a Home: The Single Act of Being demos, three lyric sheets handwritten individually by the band, an autographed manifesto, two art prints (one signed), an original drawing by Greg Reason, a copy of Reason's notes from the making of the album, two stickers and a numbered certificate of authenticity.<ref name="myspace1"/>

Discography
Albums
*The Single Act of Being (Feb 2009)
Singles/EPs
*Purity Device (July 2008)
*The Rain (May 2009)
*The Snow (June 2009)
*The Hail (July 2009)
*The Shine (Jan 2010)
Limited edition releases
*2008-07-16 Live at the Fringe Bar, Brisbane (Oct 2008)
*2009-03-13 Live in the Studio (Mar 2009)
*Building a Home: The Single Act of Being demos (April 2009)
*2009-05-23 Live at Club 206, Brisbane, Australia (Oct 2009)
*The Hi-Fi Companion (Mar 2010)
*2009-12-19 Live at Wavell Heights Community Hall (Mar 2010)
Appearances
*Re:Enactment - Remix (Aug 2008)
*Departures - Patipada (Dec 2008)
*Re:Enactment - Steels (May 2009)
*The Source - Tasmania DVD (June 2009)
*Kill Kane - short film (Mar 2010)
*The Black Dog - FACT mix 144 (April 2010)

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