WEST Australian electronic music producer, Pogo, has posted a video online asking for assistance in overcoming a 10-year ban from entering the United States.
Pogo, the stage name of 24-year-old Nick Bertke, was incarcerated for three weeks in the US - two in a county jail and one in a federal detention centre – after being apprehended without a working visa while touring in America in September 2011. The ban took effect the following month but Bertke has just launched his online campaign this week.
"America is really the last place on earth I want to be banned from," he says.
According to Bertke, his promoters the Agency Group failed to advise him about appropriate documentation and subsequently removed him from their list.
"I have close friends in America, I have unique work opportunities there and I've been speaking with lawyers and consulates who are telling me the odds are very heavily against me," he says on the video.
Bertke says he was unaware he was unable to work in the United States as he had always previously travelled there on a visa waiver. "This was news to me because I have toured the States before," he says. "I've played shows in the States, I've given talks …. And I've done all of this on a visa waiver."
Bertke is best known for his mash-ups created from film fragments, such as Upular, which was entirely composed using chords, bass notes and vocal samples from the Disney Pixar film Up.
"It's been my passion since I was about 16 to take small bits of voice, chords, musical sequences, sound effects from my favourite films and piece these sounds together to create completely new music that hopefully captures the essence of that film," he says.
Electronic music producer Nick Bertke, 24, better known as Pogo, is facing a ten-year ban from entering the United States.Picture: www.youtube.com/user/Fagottron
He has more recently set out to create a "world remix", funded on Kickstarter.
"The goal of my project is to travel the world capturing sights, sounds, voices and chords, and use them to compose and shoot a track and video for each major culture of the world," he says. He has already created tracks for Bhutan, Johannesburg and New York City and next up is Tibet.
"I see the potential here to travel the world in search of sights and sounds of our cultures, religions, people and their passions, their lifestyles and piece those sounds together to create tracks and videos that capture the human spirit," says Bertke.
Bertke has over 22 million views on YouTube and more than 230,000 subscribers to his YouTube channel.
Nick Bertke received a ten-year Order of Removal issued in October 2011 after working in the US while on a visa waiver.
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