Thirlwell performs live score to Harry Smith film at Nitehawk Cinema in Brooklyn

JG Thirlwell

On July 29 2025, JG Thirlwell will perform a live score to the legendary Harry Smith film Heaven and Earth Magic at Nitehawk Cinema by Prospect Park in Brooklyn. “Heaven and Earth Magic” is a 1962 avant-garde stop-motion animation. Its surreal imagery, drawn from cutups of 19th century catalogs, has a mystical and hypnotic quality that has entranced viewers for decades.
 
This will be a solo performance by Thirlwell in immersive four channel sound, performed on keyboards with computer / sample programs and theremin. The score was commissioned by L’Etrange Film Festival in Paris and premiered there in 2024. This is the first performance in North America.
 
The evening will open with a rare screening of Thirlwell’s 11-minute film Sonder, which was commissioned by the Frekvens Film Symposium in Gotland, Sweden in 2018. Sonder was conceived, directed and scored by Thirlwell and filmed by Sebastian Mlynarski.
Tickets available here

Foetus album HALT in mixing stages

JG Thirlwell

JG Thirlwell has been working with Ben Greenberg (Uniform, Z’s, Hubble) at Circular Ruin studios in East Williamsburg Brooklyn, mixing the final and ultimate Foetus album. Thirlwell remarks, “Ben is amazing, and the album sounds absolutely monumental and epic”. The album has been recorded over the last seven years at Self Immolation Studios at the Ectopic Ents HQ in Brooklyn, NY. As usual, Thirlwell has composed all the tracks and played all the instruments on the album, with special guest appearances from Brian Chase (Yeah Yeah Yeahs), Timo Ellis (Netherlands, Cibo Matto), Brendon Randall Myers (Scarcity, Dither, Glenn Branca), Laura Wolf, Sami Stevens, Simon Hanes (Tredici Bacci) and Jake Baldwin. The album will be entitled HALT and is slated for release on November 5, 2025 on Ectopic Ents. Stay tuned.

Xordox ‘Terraform’ album out now!

JG Thirlwell

TerraformThe third album by JG Thirlwell‘s synthesizer-based Xordox album, Terraform, is released by Ectopic Ents on May 2, 2025. The album comes on black and white splatter vinyl with download code, and six panel digipack CD. The album is released on streaming services on May 9 2025. You can purchase the album right here on this website at the Foetus Shoppe.

Terraform merges science fiction, crime noir and epic film score elements in a highly evocative and gripping melange. In this chapter of the Xordox saga, the intensity increases, as the propulsive compositions soar, tumble and occasionally explode. The video from Terraform, “Planet Xordox”, is directed by David Slade (Black Mirror, 30 Days Of Night, Hard Candy etc) and will drop soon after the album. 

Xordox will be playing in Denver on May 10 2025 at the Ogden Theater with Itchy-O and play a record release show in NYC at TV Eye on May 29 2025, with C.Lavender opening. This latest iteration of the Xordox live group is a duo that features Thirlwell alongside Rebecca El Saleh (Kitba) on additional keyboards. (Kitba)

JG Thirlwell remixes Itchy-O

JG Thirlwell

JG Thirlwell has remixed a track from the Denver percussion / performance group Itchy-O. The song Thirlwell remixed is entitled “Entangled | Unbinding”, which is on Itchy-O’s latest release, Söm Sâptâlahn.

The Itchy-O blurb reads “This re-visioning rips open the soft underbelly of Söm Sâptâlahn, dragging it screaming back into itchy-O’s chaos crucible. What was once a trance-inducing drift through the esoteric exorcism has been reassembled, reinvigorated, and re-realized with the bombast, rhythmic dissonance, and relentless momentum one expects from the 60+ member collective.”

The remix is released on April 25, 2025.

Xordox performs in NYC 05.29.25

JG Thirlwell

JG Thirlwell will be performing live with his Xordox project on May 29 2025 at TV Eye in Ridgewood, Queens. The show will be celebrating the release of the new Xordox album ‘Terraform’, which is released by Ectopic Ents in May 2 2025.

Xordox is a synthesizer-based project by JG Thirlwell. Science fiction elements brush up against crime noir and the epic film scores. With an audacious attitude and an arsenal of machines Thirlwell serves up a selection of thrilling retro-future mind capsules, all entering the cosmos and the subsequent galactic race.

In this live iteration of Xordox, Thirlwell is joined by Rebecca Elsaleh (Kitba).

Opening act will be C.Lavender. C. Lavender “creates immersive aural landscapes which are intensely physical, emotional, and ultimately cathartic”.

JG Thirlwell contributes to new score of Bickford film

JG Thirlwell

Prometheus’ Garden is a 1988 film by the acclaimed clay animator Bruce Bickford (1947–2019), well known for his collaborations with Frank Zappa.

The film was updated in 2024 with a new reimagined score created by 28 artists, who contributed one minute each :
 JG Thirlwell, Bradford Reed, Bent Arcana, thisquietarmy, Victoria Keddie, Edley O’Dowd (Psychic TV), Ian Williams (Battles), PLQ MRX, Helms Alee, Tunde Adebimpe (TV On The Radio), Michel “Away” Langevin (Voivod), Lee Ranaldo (Sonic Youth), Tony Molina, Rob Noyes, Cumgirl8, Ego Sensation & Dave W. / White Hills, The Residents, MV Carbon, Her Space Holiday, Corset Lore, Wand, White Magic, Jonti and TheDieYoungs, Father Howl, Alicia Vanden Heuvel, Brian Chippendale (Lightning Bolt), David J (Bauhaus) and Jim Coleman (Cop Shoot Cop / Human Impact).

Prometheus’ Garden was inspired by the Greek myth of Prometheus, a Titan who created the first mortals from clay and stole fire from the gods, Prometheus Garden immerses viewers in a cinematic universe of dark and magical images, unfolding in a dreamlike stream of consciousness of competing characters engaged in a violent struggle for survival.

The new version of the film was produced by Eric White, Aaron Guadamuz & Sam Zimmerman. The NYC premiere will be a 2pm matinee on March 22 2025 at TV Eye in Queens. Tickets available here.

Xordox plays live at Itchy-O event in Denver

JG Thirlwell

JG Thirlwell‘s Xordox project will perform live for the first time in three years at the Itchy-O‘s 13th annual Intergalactic Masquerade at the Ogden Theater in Denver Colorado on May 10 2025.

The third Xordox album, Terraform, will be released on May 2 2025. For this live iteration of Xordox , Thirlwell will be joined by Rebecca El Saleh.

Itchy-O is a 57-member avant-garde music performance group based in Denver, Colorado, consisting of a drum-corps battery, pyrotechnics, Taiko drummers, and an arsenal of electronics and crowd-roving provocateurs.

Tickets for the event are available here.

Voivod with JG Thirlwell on new Ramones tribute album

JG Thirlwell

Ramones Redux and Best of Ramones redux are a pair of Ramones tribute albums that will be released in June 2025 on Magnetic Eye Records. JG Thirlwell worked with Voivod on a version of the  track ‘Zero Zero UFO’.

The albums, which are produced by Marc Urselli, also feature contributions from  Napalm Death & Thurston Moore, Arthur Brown & The Berserker Blóthar (GWAR), Kayo Dot & Ihsahn (Emperor), Venamoris (Dave & Paula Lombardo), ZENI GEVA & Andreas Bajer and more.

Anne Senstad installation with Thirlwell audio

JG Thirlwell

JG Thirlwell provides the aural accompaniment to Anne Katrine Senstad‘s new iteration in her neon installation series, ELEMENTS, entitled The Pink Room Has No Walls – Elements VIII (2024). The piece is a site specific, spatially transformative light sculpture in saturated monochromatic pink neon. It will be located at Temporal Spaces, 144 Division St NYC NY 10002. The opening is on January 16 2025 from 6pm-9pm and it will run until the end of April.

JG Thirlwell at work on a series of sculptural wall-pieces

JG Thirlwell

JG Thirlwell has been working on a series of wall sculptures, having just completed series one, which consists of seven pieces. The pieces are wood and acrylic paint assemblages, and were realized at his Self Immolation Studios work headquarters in Brooklyn in 2024. The works are various dimensions, from 27″ x 16″ to 36″ x 24″, and all feature his signature color palette of red, white and black, with two shades of gray. Thirlwell plans to continue on to create series two and three, and then exhibit the works in New York City in the near future.

You can view the whole series on his Tumblr blog here