Joshua Abrams formed Natural Information Society (NIS) in 2010. With Abrams' orchestration of traditional & contemporary instrumentation, NIS creates long-form psychedelic environments informed by jazz, minimalism & traditional musics.

Current & former band members include Lisa Alvarado, Jason Adasiewicz, Mikel Avery, Ben Boye, Hamid Drake, Ben Lamar Gay, Emmett Kelly, Norberto Lobo, Artur Majewski, Nick Mazzarella, Jeff Parker, Frank Rosaly, Jason Stein, Kuba Suchar, Nori Tanaka & Chad Taylor. In 2015, Natural Information Society & Bitchin Bajas collaborated on Automaginary (Drag City).

“it’s patient, layered music that’s always heading somewhere, sometimes spare and sometimes complex and shimmering.” - Ben Ratliff, New York Times

“Abrams discovers new levels of mood and tone; his pieces seem to escape time completely. “ — Marc Masters, Pitchfork

Saxophonist Raymond MacDonald presents the next stage of his solo project, Desire Lines, with The Gathering of MacDonalds, released on the Hundred-year Gallery label in 2025. The piece takes as its starting point an ancient bagpipe pibroch by Donald MacDonald. Attempting to perform pibroch on the saxophone is, in a sense, doomed to failure: the instrument cannot reproduce the continual drone and layered melodies that are fundamental to bagpipe music. Yet this impossibility becomes the creative starting point. Using extended techniques including circular breathing and multiphonics, MacDonald attempts to interpret the pibroch through the saxophone. In the process, the failure to reproduce the original becomes something new, a transformed, unpredictable piece in its own right.

“It feels startlingly new, in terms of how the music is extrapolated, how the players relate, even as it feels like an ur-music, primal, body-centered, essential.” - David Keenan, The Wire

Access Guide and Tickets for Personal Assistants

You can view/download The Glad Cafe's Access Guide here. If you require a ticket for a Personal Assistant/Gig Buddy (at no extra cost), please contact kim@thegladcafe.co.uk.