WFMU's Beware of the Blog

Cassette Culture Revisited, Part XII - Mel Torment and Boopsie (Baby)

This is a tape created by my dear friends Mark Ashwill and Julie Spodek in the early 1990s.  The tracks were recorded in their Eckford Street loft in Greenpoint, a space loaded with Mark's sculptures, paintings, musical instruments and other creations, a sturdy loft bed and not much else.  No doubt some high-cost condominium housing stands there today, as artists without endowments or trust funds can no longer afford lofts in Brooklyn.  The cassette, as far as I know, was only dubbed for a few close friends, each copy with a unique handmade insert.

Mark was a drummer, sculptor and founding member in the legendary NYC noise/performance outfit Missing Foundation, whose global reputation and familiar upturned cocktail-glass symbol endure to this day.  Despite being a somewhat intense character, Mark was also a total sweetie who could always make me laugh, especially when things were at their most hopeless.  His cavalier humor is in high evidence on the Mel Torment cassette, especially in songs like "That Was the Last Cigaret" and "Mighty Fountains of Joy."

The opening piece, "Our Goodnight Song (Goodbye)," is the gem of the collection, a haunting lo-fi spirit procession.  Other favorites of mine include "Mighty Fountains..." (with its unsettling pause-button trickery), "What Goes In, Don't Nesecarily Have to Come Out" and the screechy jazz drone of "Shadow Shift."

Our Goodnight Song (Goodbye)  | That Was the Last Cigaret  | To Boopsie (Baby)  | While Your Asleep | Mighty Fountains of Joy | Angel | What Goes In, Don't Nesecarily Have to Come Out | I Don't Even Remember | Time Never Wasted Me | My Burning Eyes | Shadow Shift

After Missing Foundation (and after this tape) Mark achieved iconic status fronting The Spitters, a shifting band of Narcotics Anonymous buddies who, for a few chaotic years, rained Stooges-like mayhem on the Lower East Side.  Mark passed away in 2000 and is missed by many; writer Maggie Estep wrote a touching obituary for Mark, which you can read here.

Julie Spodek is a vocalist, a trapeze artist (she performed at my wedding party) and a wonderful woman of many talents.  In addition to cooking up the original core concept of The Spitters with Mark Ashwill, Julie was also a founding member of the band The Gamma Rays.

Go Flemish!, Part 2: Ex Drummer

I'd been waiting anxiously to see director Koen Mortier's Ex Drummer, ever since this tantalizing review appeared in the pages of Film Comment earlier this year.  The film is nothing short of an inescapable rush of insanity and brilliance, setting a new high bar for nasty, cutting-edge cinema.  Part Gummo, part Romper Stomper, part Trainspotting, with more than a hint of Gaspar Noé's influence, Ex Drummer brings to mind nothing so much as a contemporary, punk-rock Ubu Roi, where graphic brutality, absurd flights of comedic fantasy, and social criticism form a gruesomely entertaining triumvirate.  Blind rage, domestic horror, gross sex, punk energy and the class struggle all feature prominently in the whirling narrative.

The story centers on Dries, a former tough guy turned celebrity author, who is approached by three brutish, self-proclaimed "handicapped" lowlifes (nonetheless talented, vigorous musicians) who ask him to be the drummer for their fledgling garage band.  Dries decides to take the gig, mostly because he's fascinated by the three maniacs and imagines that somehow the experience will help him garner material for a new book (it does.)  Almost inevitably, Dries begins to act out reprehensibly, all the more power-mad because he's well aware of the one foot he still has in his comfortable existence with his posh flat and beautiful girlfriend; his bandmates lash out, destructively and self-destructively, simply because they're incurably fucked up and it's the only life they've ever known.

The film is also loaded with striking camera work and a wealth of postmodern trickery worthy of Michael Haneke or Danny Boyle.  Bicycles ride backward, scenes play in reverse, and one character is forced by some unseen, punishing gravity to live upside down on the ceiling of his flat. 

With the overwhelming bulk of my movie viewing coming up mediocre these days (cable series like Mad Men and The Wire having surpassed most films in my estimation), Ex Drummer is a much-needed, bloody head-butt of fresh air and enthralling creativity.  Ex Drummer has screened at Lincoln Center's Film Comment Selects and other festivals, but has yet to be slated for a region 1 DVD release.

Vinyl Finds: Halloween Special - Zacherle Singles!

During my father's term as Program Director for WPLJ-FM (1974–1988) I was privileged to spend time in the halls and studios of what for much of that time was New York's #1 album rock station.  It was a young music freak's fantasy:  I got promo LPs, attended concerts for free, and sat in on live broadcasts.  My favorite DJs to hang with were always Carol Miller and John Zacherle.

Zacherle (aka Zacherley) had been a TV horror-film host in ghoul makeup for most of the 1950s and early 60s (there are several clips on YouTube), and in the early days of FM's popularity he was an innovator of free-form radio, when WPLJ was called WABC-FM.  Though PLJ's programming was fairly structured by the late 1970s, the form was still much freer than the computerized formats seen on the commercial FM band today.

Every Halloween, WPLJ would let Zach become a ghoul again and program his own show (he would also occasionally don his makeup and entertain at staff parties.)  One year, I'm guessing '77 or '78, I sat in the cramped studio on Halloween watching Zacherle make radio magic.  My love of horror films and rock music reached critical mass that night.  At the age of 60, Zacherle was super cool and probably more up on things than many of his younger colleagues.  I remember that he played something from the Dead Boys' first LP and also held up a copy of Pink Floyd's Ummagumma and said, "Billy, have you heard this one?"

During that time, Zach also presented me with copies of his two 1960 novelty singles, "Dinner With Drac" and "Coolest Little Monster"—below are all four sides as mp3s.  (Except for the comic masterpiece "Hurry Bury Baby," these songs are available on CD and are presented here just for fun, in-browser listening.)

As the 70s became the 80s, radio formats tightened, mic styles became zippier and much of the old guard at WPLJ were being replaced or moving to less-commercial stations.  In the post-disco era, FM had become the dominant force of music delivery, with a narrower presentation.  I know that it was one of the saddest days of my Dad's life when he had to let John Zacherle go.  Zach, now 90, still does Halloween radio (most recently on WCBS-FM) and continues to be an inveterate hipster and a cool ghoul.

Dinner With Drac
Hurry Bury Baby
Coolest Little Monster
Ring-a-Ding Orangoutang

Buy Zach on CD!

Happy Halloween.  May you receive lipstick of arsenic and laprobes of earlobes.

Vinyl Finds: Pork Queen - Beautiful Vision LP, 1994

All hail the mighty Pork Queen!  First let me say that it's difficult to do an Internet search on the term "pork queen," as most of the results refer to either a bizarre Midwestern crowning ritual (which I'm sure Bronwyn C. could elaborate upon for us) or some Sarah Palin-related business about squandered infrastructure dollars, and the latter is just, well, soooooo pre-econocataclysm, so three weeks ago.  I mean who can get worked up about Sarah Fucking Palin and her bridge to nowhere anymore?  As Jello Biafra put it once, "We've Got a Bigger Problem Now". 

Pork Queen were the project of Vancouver-based Trackshun Industries records founder Justice Schanfarber et al., and in their day the "band" made some gloriously unpretentious improvised music, with at least 1/2 foot planted in something that vaguely resembled rock.  This LP was issued in an edition of 300 copies and packaged in old record sleeves repurposed by the band members.  Each player personally decorated 100 copies, and as you can see, my copy is "Justice 39/100"—the sleeve a tasteful assemblage of wallpaper samples and duct tape.

Nowadays, Justice Schanfarber is a Professional Coach and Relationship Mentor, applying the principles of something called "Gender Synergy," seemingly having left the glory days of the Vancouver noise scene far behind. At least he isn't flogging a dead horse like William Bennett.  It would be great to see a CD collection of Pork Queen's vinyl releases, as most of their finer moments were captured on 7" vinyl.  Ah, 90s noise—so much better than that crap the kids are listening to today.

Side 1 - See Cops Throw Rocks

Side 2 - If You're Taking a Hippie Bath, Please Consider the Time You Take and the Mess You Make

The Inevitable Sophomore Slump After My Last Post

What to write about?  My bi-weekly dilemma.  What's on my mind?  Unemployment, mostly my own.  One can only stretch the term "freelance" so thin before one is actually just dicking around on Facebook all day.  What else?  This whole Sarah Palin thing.  And believe me, I hate that her name should even appear in one of my blog posts, forever tainting it.  I would never wear one of those "Not My President" buttons, as that would put Bush's vacuous mug square on my lapel every day.  Still, it's more than a little disconcerting that a doncha-know hockey-mom with a wild stare (see right) who's a Pentecostal and supports teaching religious-based alternatives to evolution could easily be our President within the next few years.  "Hurricane Sarah" herself has taken to the phrasing "Palin-McCain" rather than "McCain-Palin."  All signs seem to point to "this is not a person fit to run the country, should the President be unable to fulfill their duties."  It's even more distressing that, as America continues its descent into our own Dark Ages, after eight years of declining everything, about half of us seem to desire more of the same.  There are many who, much to my astonishment, seek (whether they realize it or not) the perpetuation of this roller coaster ride into financial, social and literal Armageddon.  I suppose they imagine that it will be they who are airlifted to heaven when The Rapture they so doggedly pursued finally arrives.  We are not simply in a dialog about which side of the political fence has more "haters," this is not some figurative discussion like "my dog's better than your dog" - ”this is the next four years of our lives at a very, very shaky time in this country's history, and how anyone with even the most meager observational powers could be more afraid of Barack Obama than the McCain/Palin ticket is hard to fathom.

Am I pleased about anything?  Sure.  I need my escapist pabulum too.  The original American big city, the city of brotherly love, finally has a great, brutally funny TV show, and has for several years - though not enough of you have been paying attention.  (You know you can TiVo On the Record w/Greta and watch it later.)  The FX comedy series, It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia, returned to the air for its fourth season on September 18.  The show centers on five amoral screw-ups, viciously self-serving individuals, capable of great self-debasement, who together run a dive bar in Philly.  It's a fluid ensemble piece that's like Seinfeld without money.  Seinfeld with hard drugs, trannies and cannibalism.  In fact, most episodes of Sunny are like a flaming ball of comedic chaos rolling down a very steep hill.  How a show that uses the word "bang" in almost every episode (as in "which one of us would you like to take you in the back and bang you?") can come across as consistently fresh and clever boggles the mind, but their formula is on a mighty roll.  Watch some of the promo clips on YouTube, since that's where you spend your life anyway.  I'll be watching every Thursday at 10 (the show is also repeated several times throughout the week.)  And yes, I'm a hater.  I hate Sarah Palin.  And football on TV.  And twins.

Related:  Take the Palin PBS poll and see the results.

New Netspeak

Don't you just love Netspeak?  IFHI!

When driving became boring, just downright tedious, we invented mobile phones and in-dash DVD systems to keep it exciting.  When communication by writing and speaking human language suddenly became frightfully dull, it became necessary to invent email and IMing to give it back its zing.  This too, unfortunately, quickly took on the breadth of a Tarkovsky film and our patience was again sorely tried.  How to give language back its cocaine-infused immediacy, so that the teenage mating ritual (which once ate up hours of phone time) could neatly be reduced to a couple of high-impact acronyms?  A further reduction was clearly necessary, and Netspeak was born.

The first few times I saw LOL, I naturally assumed that it was shorthand for "lots o' luck."  Where had I been?  Under a rock in a Sam Fuller movie?  Now that written communication had achieved light speed (Texting Championship anyone?) the need arose to constantly describe our personal state (and a great many other things) in byte-size intervals.  (If you're really laughing out loud, if something is truly that funny, you shouldn't even be able to type three letters, thus "LOL" quickly becomes a benign expression of moderate, mediocre amusement.  Of the group of people that still employ LOL, what percentage do you believe are actually "laughing out loud"?  Any of them?)

Here now are my suggestions for the New Netspeak—more jazzy, snazzy, time-saving language-reductions for the upcoming generation of idiots:

FAKTN - Fantasizing about killing the neighbors
MHOINSH - My humble opinion is not so humble
ASMB - Absentmindedly scratching my balls
IFHI - I fucking hate it
MDT - Millions of disinherited taxpayers
DBMBT - Devendra Banhart, Marc Bolan's Testicle
MRAYF - My religion ate your freedom
LMAOOAML - Laughing my ass off over at Merrill Lynch
WAAD - Wearing an adult diaper
FMUBP - From my uneducated, biased perspective
FITTM - Farting in time to music
IMHOOHMI - I'm mighty horny over old, hairy, male indigents
LFSPOF - Looking for strokable pictures on Flickr
YSPISTP - Your stupid profile is set to private
IYRAADSAMM - If you're really an activist, don't send a mass mail
TSMIAC - To Serve Man—it's a cookbook!
IHUWA - I'll hook up with anything
LSHIPM - Laughed so hard I pissed myself
LOLLOL - Little old ladies lapping on Lucifer
TBPS - This blog post sucks

Feel free to contribute some of your own.

Coming up:  I create a time-teleportation device, go back and eliminate all emoticons, even the notion of them, from our world.  ;{>

Remembering The Membranes – 1988 Interview

In preparation for the upcoming WFMU Radio Greats Weekend, I've been sorting through old tapes of my WFMU radio show (I refuse to call them "airchecks"—that's down there with saying "imprint" instead of "record label" if you ask me—"check, check, is this mic on?") and I came across this entertaining interview with England's The Membranes.  The Membranes were three (sometimes four) funny-as-hell lads from Blackpool, and for pretty much their entire existence as a band I was a huge fan.  In fact, one of my first dates with the young woman who eventually became my wife was a Membranes' show at Maxwell's in Hoboken.  This was originally aired in 1988, when the band were here on tour promoting what was then their latest album, Kiss Ass...Godhead!, and songs from the album are sprinkled throughout the 34-minute interview.  The interview was recorded in the old production room, the "B" studio of WFMU's former headquarters under the Upsala College Froeberg Hall dormitory.  The Membranes talk fast (especially John Robb, the lead singer and obvious "wit" of the band), but it's worth listening closely to hear them rap about Steve Albini, Hammer of the Gods, Slade, their favorite Beatles' albums, "cans" vs. "headphones" and where drummer Coofy Sid got his name, among many other things.  Just don't mention The Fall or visas.  If you listen hard, you can hear WFMU radio great Bronwyn C. chuckling in the background.  The presentation ends with an impromptu sloppy doo-wop station i.d. followed by The Membranes' signature song, "Everyone's Going Triple Bad Acid, Yeah!"

I present this interview here as an mp3, rather than on the radio, as it's a bit long and worthy of being preserved in its entirety.  Thanks to the generous offer of DJ Daniel Blumin, I'll be celebrating my 15 years on the air (1984–1999) with Daniel, on August 10, from 3–6 a.m. ET, playing choice excerpts of the music, humor and occasional mental breakdowns that characterized my show.  Also joining us will be musicologist, author, former WFMU broadcaster and Dark Beloved Cloud records impresario Douglas Wolk.  We'll also be presenting musical extracts from The Stork Club program.  Hear us there!

The Membranes - Interview 1988

UFO Update

[one mp3 below]

Tommy N. was a friend of mine in junior high school.  I say "friend," though in my weakness and ignorance I picked on Tom, at least verbally, as the pecking order in our school dictated that I was a dork, though somewhat less of one than Tom was.  His hair was greasy, he had acne, and he shambled up the hallways like a cross between the living dead and the tin man from The Wizard of Oz.  Tom had a glimmer about him, though, an apparent knowledge of self that seemed to cause the physical and verbal taunts to glance off of him, such that I don't believe the abuse ever affected him as much as it did me.  (To this day, I have fantasies about running into Joey R., Tony P. or Jimmy T. on a lonely country road, where I would proceed to run over them with my car, backing over them and then running over them again to make sure that they were thoroughly pulverized.  I would kill without remorse or conscience.  Someday schools and communities will learn to truly reward academic and artistic achievement as much or more than athletic achievement, and perhaps there will be fewer socially "damaged" people like myself.)

Getting back to Tommy, he was the son of older parents, and this speaks to his awkwardness at the time as much as anything else.  Entering their home was like walking into the 1950s; their mannerisms, dress and décor were a time capsule that denied 1977 was happening right outside.  Tom also viciously mocked his parents, perhaps because of how he was treated at school, perhaps because he was showing off for his guest.  Either way they allowed it, through obliviousness or quiet license.

So Tom was my friend, and a person I'll never forget for a variety of reasons.  Not the least of which was his band, who, in my eyes at least, swept the 9th grade talent show with arresting original songs that combined pop, punk and hard rock—I remember their set vividly; Tom, one of the school's biggest outcasts, was their SINGER, so perhaps I was the bigger dork after all, as at that time I would never have had his courage.  Another reason I'll never forget Tom is because we discovered UFO Update together.

UFO Update ran on local New Jersey UHF channel WTVG-68 (which also broadcast Uncle Floyd, and later became video-music channel WWHT/U68), usually on the weekends at or after 2 a.m.  A dark-haired, leisure-suited man hosted the show (I forget his name), and he seemed to often be intoxicated or at least rattled by extreme stress.  The man sat in a chair, facing the camera head on, and with a unique combination of earnestness and banality would read off a list of the latest extra-terrestrial news:  the sightings, abductions and livestock mutilations.  I remember that there were a lot of livestock mutilations.  The latter half of the show was the whizz-bang payoff of the broadcast, where the host would open up the phones (with no delay on the signal) seeking thoughtful and informed discourse on his topic.  He would occasionally get it too, though more often than not this already beleaguered gentleman was beset by calls from obscenity-spewing teenage viewers, some of whom were cruel enough to start off their call by feigning a sincere interest in UFOs, before blasting him with fucks and shits.  I can't recall whether Tom and I ever called in ourselves, though I'd like to think that we were at least sensitive enough at the time to just watch the spectacle in awe.

Despite occasional searches on Google, YouTube and elsewhere online, I've never found any information on the show, much less archived clips.  UFO Update ran for only a few years in the mid-to-late 70s, and as far as I know, only on WTVG-68.  I have a quart of plasma ready for anyone who could provide VHS or DVD dubs of the episodes, or even some more historical information.  As for Tommy, I know he's still out there, though we're almost 30 years out of touch, and I know that he too still remembers those nights we spent watching UFO Update.

Thematically concurrent mp3 selection:

The Cramps - Mystery Plane (from Ohio Demos, 1979; prod. by Alex Chilton)

Painting by Lisa Santaniello

Vinyl Finds: Mag & The Suspects - Erection/Thousands Dead (12" Maxi, 1981)

Steve M.'s house was the party house.  Through Steve and his sister J., a wildly diverse collection of disenfranchised suburban teens and twentysomethings had gathered there, some from "broken" homes, some runaways, some kicked out—others just looking for a good place to party.  This was our pre-River's Edge River's Edge, and though we never covered up a murder, we did just about everything else.  I lost my virginity under the big tree in Steve's backyard.  There were empty Budweiser cans and overflowing ashtrays all over the house, and for a while there was an "orgy room" set up in the attic (which was only moderately successful.)  I once hid in a closet in Steve's house to escape an ass kicking from a bikeless biker (for some reason, a breed so prevalent in N.J.) whose girlfriend I had slept with; I'd seen what he had done to a guy who owed him 10 bucks and I wasn't having any of it.

The inner sanctum of the house was Steve's bedroom on the second floor.  There he held court, and though the door was often locked and I wasn't always allowed in, I did eventually spend a lot of time in there, talking to Steve, who as we spoke would dole out samplings of the main feature of his room:  a staggering collection of several thousand LPs lining the walls, mostly acquired at garage sales and flea markets.  I was exposed to records like Ataraxia - The Unexplained, several years before I came to WFMU and found out who Mort Garson was.

One of the most dazzling chips off of Steve's monolithic collection was this 12" single by Mag & The Suspects, released by the very major London label in 1981, and clearly the label's singular stab at Rough Trade-style arty post-punk.  Both sides are absolutely killer, one an erotic recitation over minimalist thump, the other a deceptively carnivalesque commentary on how TV alienates us from global suffering.  This single should be at least as revered as The Normal's one-off classic "T.V.O.D./Warm Leatherette".  Right now, you can't imagine yourself humming the phrases "burning corpses are missing" or "soon, it's gonna get in, real hard" over and over, but just you wait, wait and listen.

Mag & co. released only these two songs in several formats and have virtually no Web presence.  Any biographical or "where are they now?"-style information on the band would be greatly appreciated (though to me, the record screams L.A., and would sit comfortably amongst the Posh Boy discography.)  I have never seen this record since; these mp3s are ripped from a cassette dub of Steve's vinyl.

Mag & The Suspects - "Erection"
Mag & The Suspects - "Thousands Dead"

Magic Eye Paintings Are the Magic Eye Paintings of Magic Eye Paintings

I am so rarely in on the joke that it makes me sad.  I'm almost always on the periphery, wondering at the secret whisperings of others.  "What happened to Bill?  Oh, he put on weight; his wife is cute though."  No metaphor illustrates this unfortunate social marginalization better than that of the accursed Magic Eye Painting.  I hate you, Magic Eye Paintings; I am smarter, more complex and special than you'll ever be.  Still, I don't have an ethereal image of a schooner or a terrier "hidden" inside of me.

For example, in the pattern of roses to the right, one supposedly can see a ghostlike image of "Your Mother After I Fucked Her" –€“ just not working for me.  In the "trippy" pattern below left, if one takes great care not to look too hard, supposedly the image of "Bums on a Chow Line" will eventually reveal itself.  In the third image down on the right, if one presses one's nose to it and then slowly backs away while "unfocusing" one's eyes, the magical image of "Michael Moynihan Fan Base" will show up.  NO IT WON'T!  It just won't.  Ever.

People will tell you, "Don't focus your eyes!" –€“ "Don't look directly at it!" –€” "OK, do you want me to tell you?  It's a clown—€”don't you see it?"  Nope.  No clowny for William.  What I do see are the manufacturer's deliberately obfuscating "instructions" for "3D viewing" here.  The truth, however, and by this I mean an objective, The-Beatles-were-pretty-darn-good kind of truth, is that there's NOTHING THERE!  Excuse the caps, I forget myself...but really, come on:  there simply are no hidden images within Magic Eye Paintings.  There are, however, two kinds of people.

Good writing 101 tells us to never use clichés.  In fact, Paul R. Hensel, a damn funny guy from the Department of Political Science at Florida State University says, "Avoid clichés like the plague."  But in this case I couldn't resist saying that there are really only two kinds of people (I also couldn't resist starting this sentence with a conjunction—See!  Anyone can write advertising copy!): (1) Those who pretend to see the hidden images in Magic Eye Paintings, and with a wink and a nod conspire to continually mock and subjugate person type two; (2) those, like myself, who are honest people, freely admitting that there's simply nothing there and getting treated the fool for it.

Magic Eye Paintings are also a fine metaphor for all conspiratorial shams that pit one sector of the public (the "seers," if you will) against the other ("non-seers"), similar to the classic Emperor's New Clothes, but a move executed not out of courtly propriety, but rather a subtly malicious need to forge an elite subgroup (which is usually in fact the socially dominant majority.)

Take this sentence:€“ "Wilco are the Magic Eye Paintings of Rock."  This simply says that some are "in on" the less obvious, deeper meaning of the subject, and some are not—€”the perfection of my metaphor suggesting of course that there may indeed be no inner meaning to glean.  Philip K. Dick once said when asked for "a short, simple definition of reality":  "Reality is that which when you stop believing in it, it doesn't go away."*  You all have my permission, in fact I encourage you, to stop believing and then see what's still there. 

With respect to the fact that Magic Eye Paintings as a phenomenon are somewhat passé (and the perception of them as frustrating unquestionably the fodder of 90s sitcoms), this has been brewing within me for several years; I choose not when the information is ready to be released.  Let us not forget the multi-million-dollar industry in books, prints and other Magic Eye ephemera; the allusion to some sort of postmodern, sci-fi, Sharper Image-style psychedelia (whose blasphemy simply cannot be tolerated); and most importantly the cabal that unites those irritating ball-busters in a movement against us honest, truth-seeing and truth-telling people.
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*from VALIS, copyright © 1981 by Philip K. Dick.

Vinyl Finds: Boojwah Kids - Med Beat! e.p., 1980

My vinyl-rip posts of late have been—to say the least—leaning esoteric, so here's something with a backbeat for all you rockers in the room...sort of.

Boojwah Kids were a Captain Beefheart-influenced band from Stockholm, with a scrappy post-punk sound falling somewhere near the intersection of Rustic Hinge and early Scritti Politti.  This e.p. represents perhaps their most well-known release outside of Sweden, though the full-length LP that followed it, Till Skydd För Minnet (1981), is also excellent.

Nowadays, Boojwah Kids' bandleader Ralf Nygård plays with Michael Maksymenko of Kräldjursanstalten (the other Beefheart-obsessed band from 1980s Sweden) in a new project called The Reference Group.  Boojwah Kid Olle Stockman is still rocking postmodern in the band Tow Truck Two.

Linda
Boojwah Bas-Tu/Den Pölsan Glömmer Jag Aldrig
Pöjke Moter Flicka (Kärnkraften Gör Oss Alla På Smällen)
Hatten Av/Med Oasen Mot Asen

Download insert booklet: cover and back.

Vinyl Finds: Merzbow Singles

Why do I love Merzbow's music?  Total, uncompromising sensory envelopment.  The sheer aural bombardment and crafty sonic layering of Masami Akita's finest recordings seek and destroy in the darkest corners of my psyche, wiping clean my floating anxieties and pettiest earthbound concerns.  There's simply no room left for bad thoughts.  While many a listener is sure to find this music to be one long bad thought, I (and I suspect a great many others*) find sanctuary in the bleeps, crashes, blasts and buzzes—the explosion of sound that is Merzbow.

As promised in my last post, here are some of my Merzbow singles, not all of them (apologies to those expecting the mother lode; much of my vinyl sits in storage) but the essential two I keep at the ready to listen to any time.  Masami Akita has typically demonstrated a reverence for the 7" format (especially considering his style of not-necessarily-singles-ready music) such that both of these discs are zingers that make the most of the allotted space/time.  That said, one of the singles, SCUM - Steel Cum is available as disc 35 of the Merzbox** in a presumably full, expanded form, broken out into individual tracks.  Personally, I prefer the condensed wallop of this 7".  The other, Music for 'The Dead Man 2: Return of the Dead Man' has never been digitally reissued anywhere.  Curiously, when preparing this post, I realized that both discs were release number 7 for their respective labels, and that both are pressed on see-through bright yellow vinyl.

SCUM - Steel Cum (Vertical 1991)
Side A
Side B

Music for 'The Dead Man 2: Return of the Dead Man' (Robot 1994)
Side A (Fire; Burning Building of Waco, Texas; Taxi in the Car Wash)
Side B (The Beach)

(Be careful when clicking on the thumbnails of the sleeve artwork; some images are nsfw.)
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*Just take a look at this list from OkCupid.com of "Singles Interested in Merzbow."  Quite impressive, as never once in my single years did I consider my interest in Merzbow a potential springboard to dating.

**Incidentally, Merzbox 37 is Newark Hellfire - Live On WFMU, 1990.

Vinyl Finds: Merzbow - Dradomel LP 1992 (Hannover Interruption)

Masami Akita (aka Merzbow) is one of my heroes.  Not only is he one of the innovators of noise-as-music, with an incredible range of stylistic applications in his repertoire, he also shames most creative artists in terms of sheer productivity.  The amount of Merzbow/Masami Akita solo releases and collaborations on LP, 7" vinyl, cassette tape and CD is absolutely staggering, approximately 400 since 1980; that's an average of 14 releases per year, making him something like the Fassbinder of Noise.  The thing about his catalog, at least from this fan's perspective, is that so much of it is really very good, the constant experimentation and variation of his approach, and the collaborations with other artists bearing proof of an extremely bountiful creative spirit. 

This LP, apparently titled Hannover Interruption (at least according to Wikipedia and Discogs, though no such information appears anywhere on the package, not in English characters anyway) was a joint release of Dom Elchklang and the short-lived Dragnet Records label.  Almost everything both labels have touched is pure gold to me, and Dradomel in particular also released one of my all-time favorite LPs, Rowenta/Khan's Tiefpunkte Moderner Tonkompositionen (also 1992, now on CD.)

This album finds Merzbow in full-on, harsh-noise mode, at least at first listen.  The more one becomes acclimated to the sound, the more layers of activity emerge:  electric groans and roars, bird-call-like feedback, moog sirens, percussive analog static, thousands of pots and pans falling down a hill, even the occasional vocal.  It's this artful layering of sound (among other things) that separates Merzbow from some jag-off that just turns on a noise generator and walks away.  To my knowledge, these recordings are not included in the massive 50-CD Merzbox (Extreme, 2000) though the Merzbox does include a disc called Hannover Cloud dated 1990.

Merzbow continues his prolific tide, with some notable recent releases being Electric Dress (with Carlos Giffoni and Jim O'Rourke), Merzbuddha, and Merzbear (the latter two being part of his mostly animal-devoted Merz series on the Important label.)  In the past several years, Masami has also become an activist for animal rights, including the PETA url alongside his own merzbow.net on CD sleeves.  (Just imagining the Noise-God rubbing shoulders at a charity event with Pamela Anderson gives me a big fat grin for uncountable reasons.)

Side A Untitled
Side B Untitled

Next time:  My Merzbow singles!

Vinyl Finds: Gumpert-Malfatti-Oxley – Ach Was!? (FMP 1981)

The proliferation of good music blogs continues to stagger the mind.  Vinyl hoarders the world over are ripping and posting their collections and it's simply impossible to keep up, unless you're spending 100% of your time at the computer—even then you're bound to miss out on a lot.

Records that previously lurked only in the dark corners of my memory, my personal collection and/or the WFMU library are turning up on music blogs all over the Web.  For example, when impLOG's Holland Tunnel Dive e.p. showed up about a year ago on Mutant Sounds, I had what has now become a familiar "haven't thought about that one in years" reaction.

It's also become harder, from a blogger's viewpoint, to excavate recordings that haven't already been celebrated and offered for download elsewhere online, though I believe I may have one here.

This rarely seen FMP release turned up in the used vinyl new arrivals at Amoeba Music's San Francisco store when I was working there in 1999.  For the sheer gloat potential, I probably should have left the price tag on, which I think was $1.99.  With my employee discount, this record cost me, well—less than that—an obscene bargain to be sure.

While this LP finds drummer/electronic musician Tony Oxley at the more experimental end of his tether (i.e., not playing in a straight or out jazz combo), both sides have a warmth and delicacy that may make this record appealing to those typically wary of free-improvised music (though things do get a little wilder during the latter half of side 2.)  Personally, I have a real affection for the primordial plink-plonk of sessions like this one.

Pianist Ulrich Gumpert is a well-known figure in European jazz and a respected interpreter of Erik Satie's music, with a career that also includes compositions for film and TV.  Austrian Trombonist Radu Malfatti is another giant of European jazz, having collaborated with a veritable who's who of improvisers, but since 1981 has focused more and more on composition (perhaps this record blew his wad!)  All three players on Ach Was!? have lengthy discographies, including other recordings for FMP.

Tony Oxley continues to dazzle the world with his brilliant, intuitive playing, adding to his impressive catalog most recently with The Advocate on Tzadik.  Oxley's first releases as a bandleader, The Baptised Traveller and Four Compositions for Sextet (from '69 and '70 respectively) are personal favorites.  As an added bonus, here's a link to a download of Oxley's ultra-rare Ichnos from 1971.

Ach Was!?:
A1 - Luft Gebacken
A2 - Ach Was!?
B - Kookin' at Charly's

Jowe Head, Renaissance Man

I still occasionally (well, very occasionally) step out of my role as cubicle drone and Suburban Dad to make an artistic contribution to the world, and I'm pleased and proud to say that I'll be playing guitar for a series of performances this week with the great Jowe Head.

I first met Jowe by way of a live interview on my WFMU show in 1993, where I gave lame, super-casual interview (as was my "style" in the day) and Jowe proceeded to capsize the station's little wheezing chord organ, then rendering an impromptu performance of the song "Shiny Black Shirt," later immortalized on the Upsalapalooza compilation CD.  Jowe's mid-90s tours with the Television Personalities provided sweet entertainment and some post- and pre-gig opportunities for further socialization.  When the call came out in early 1996 to play a series of NYC shows with Jowe, I was more than ready.  I am eternally indebted to Hamish Kilgour and Lisa Siegel for this opportunity; a chance meeting with Hamish at WFMU's last record fair led to the current arrangement.  My long-time association with the station strikes again!

Jowe, as many of you know, was a founding member of the legendary Swell Maps (along with the brothers Epic Soundtracks and Nikki Sudden, sadly both no longer with us, and Richard Earl aka Bgls), blazing icons of the UK post-punk era, a "cross between Can and T.Rex" put simply, who created 2 brilliant studio LPS, a double LP of live sessions and jams, and several dynamite singles, all originally for the Rough Trade label (reissues and compilations available on Secretly Canadian, Alive, Munster and Overground.)  Jowe has gone on to front or contribute to a great many projects (The Palookas, Televison Personalities and The Househunters, to name only a few; Jowe currently fronts Angel Racing Food), as well as squeeze out a few unforgettable solo LPs, in particular 1986's Strawberry Deutsche Mark (tracks available on the Unhinged CD on Overground.)

Jowe's band this time consists of myself, Hamish Kilgour, Lisa Siegel and Danny Tunick, though the lineup will vary a bit from show to show.  Here are the dates:  a studio session for WFMU (interview with Jowe to air this Saturday, 4/12, recorded set to air in about 2 weeks, both on Terre T.'s Cherry Blossom Clinic), two nights at Cake Shop NYC (this Friday and Saturday, 4/11 and 4/12, 8 p.m. shows), Sunday 4/13 at Eat Records, 124 Meserole Ave., Brooklyn NY (5 p.m. show), and Friday 4/18 at Claude's Bar in Phoenicia, NY.  Also at Cake Shop, and The Arts Upstairs in Phoenicia, an exhibit of Jowe's artwork will be on display and available for purchase.

To further dangle the carrot, here are a few tracks on mp3 that should provide enhanced enticement to savor this very rare musical experience in the flesh:

Baby Bounce  |  Merman Blues  |  Swiss Air  |  The Palookas - Virginia's Wolf

What's On My Portable mp3 Player, Part 4

Here's me phoning one in a bit, as I had the flu for a week and didn't feel much like writing about anything.  I no longer own a Zen Micro (which started malfunctioning within a week of the warranty expiration) but I won't say which player I do use now, as the last time I did the comments section turned into an iPod defense/bashing session (and people asking me questions like "what do you use as a jukebox program?"), which I guess I started.  To put it simply, if I still did a weekly show on WFMU, this is some of what I'd be playing:

Bayan Mongol Variety Group
Originally posted on the Waxidermy blog in August 2006, then re-posted on Prog Not Frog, where I found it.  So good that it warrants re-re-posting here.  Released in 1981.

Bayan Mongol Variety Group

Bleak - Austere I & II
Epic, atmospheric Black Ambient from California 2004.  Neo-classical nightmare music.  Forget the genre labels and just listen to it.

Of Darkness...

Born Heller
Folk duo featuring the haunting voice of Josephine Foster, CD from 2004.  Where Shirley Collins and the American plains meet; gloriously languid and more than a little bent.

Good Times  |  I Am a Guest in Here

Franz de Byl - Und
NWW list obscurity (Germany 1972) that was recently made available again on vinyl.  Most of the tracks are surprisingly standard post-psychedelic folksinging.  This song, however, is great.

Birthday (The World's Gates)

Kuusumun Profeetta
Mellifluous, hypnotic, jazzy space-rock from Finland.  Vocalist Mika Rättö, a formidable talent in the contemporary Finnish underground, is also a member of Circle and Rättö ja Lehtisalo.  CDs available on Ektro Records.  K.P. @ MySpace and Last.fm

Kysymysten Sali

Leaden
Italian Depressive Black Metal.  This track is from their first, self-titled full-length from 2004.  Oddly engaging and crammed with lo-fi weirdness.

My Life In Darkness

Marianne Faithfull - Rich Kid Blues
Recorded in 1971, while Marianne was living on a wall in Soho, a homeless junkie and anorexic.  Not released until the mid-80s, several years after the success of Broken English.  A lost masterpiece, with some chillingly frail renditions.    Beware of Darkness  |  Rich Kid Blues

The Great Black Hope

It's a great time for fans of Black Metal.  Dozens of bands, new and old, are spattering off in dozens of new directions, revising and revitalizing the much-maligned stepchild child of metal.  As an adjunct to my post on Lugubrum and Silvester Anfang a few weeks ago, here are a few more great bands leading the charge to new era:

Drowning the Light
Drowning the Light is a great one-man Australian project that mixes the traditional lo-tech Black Metal sound with a mush of guitar euphony that's absolutely Kevin Shields-y, almost shoegazer in nature.  DtL are part of the "depressive" or "suicidal" movement in Black Metal, a subgenre that's brought mournful melodies and slower tempos to the forefront, rendered with a passionate intensity that's excited a lot of fans (myself included) in a manner reminiscent of the initial Norwegian explosion of the early-to-mid 1990s.  (Many of the depressive bands are quite good, and there are a lot of them, each with their own unique take on the sound:  Défaillance, Whisper, Leaden, Animus, Strid and Voluntaria are just a few of the great ones that I've heard recently.)  Drowning the Light often favor slow, circular rhythms, and chord progressions that churn along in a spaced-out, almost 50s ballad sort of way.  It's all in the ear of the beholder I suppose, but the cyclical repetitions of these songs, especially the longer tracks, are easy to get lost in.  DtL turned a corner into this interesting musical territory with four monumental full-length releases in 2007.  Of those, A World Long Dead, Of Celtic Blood & Satanic Pride and To the End of Time are my personal favorites, all sampled below.

The Haunted Ruins of a Vampyric Soul from A World Long Dead
In the Fallen Kingdom from To the End of Time
To the End of Time part II from Of Celtic Blood & Satanic Pride

Wolves in the Throne Room
Wolves in the Throne Room's newest disc, Two Hunters, was released in late 2007 on Southern Lord.  In underground Metal terms, this means you've officially arrived.  The label has both great distribution and a reputation for high quality.  WitTR are from Olympia, Washington, and have a much richer musical palette than your typical BM band, one that cements them into a larger pantheon of classic rock and heavy metal music.  This is not to say that they don't have more than enough hi-speed blast beat takeoffs to satisfy the fans, only that they weave in acoustic passages, keyboards, melodic female vocals and some slower tempos to great effect, the heavier side of their sound never losing its potency.  Their epic, suite-like songs, many clocking in at 12 minutes or longer, recall Sigur Ros or Dead Can Dance about a third as often as they do Enslaved or early Ulver.  Their band page at Encyclopedia Metallum describes their ideology as, "quite different from many Black Metal bands.  In interviews Wolves in the Throne Room have shown respect for left wing politics, radical environmentalism and "eco feminism.""  Ha!  Now that's progressive.  I've posted one track from 2006's Diadem of 12 Stars below.  Also included is a track from their 2004 self-titled demo, a great piece, which nonetheless gives only a glimpse of the focus and diversity to come on their more recent albums.

Face in a Night Time Mirror Part 1 from Diadem of 12 Stars
If This Dark Age Conquers We Will Leave This Echo from Wolves in the Throne Room demo 2004

My Night at the Sleep Lab

So I've been having a lot of trouble sleeping.  Fortunately, I have this forum wherein I can compel our global readership to share their related experiences and advice.  The basic problem is this:  I don't usually have difficulty falling asleep, both due to work-related mental exhaustion as well as the fact that I take a prescription medication for anxiety also often prescribed for insomnia.  However, after anywhere from three to five hours, I wake up, and that seems to be that.  My pulse is elevated, though my mind is not particularly troubled or racing; I'm just awake, and can't get back to sleep—no way, no how.

I decided after six weeks or so of this mounting hell to avail myself of a local sleep lab, one affiliated with and on the premises of a reputable local hospital.  I'd read about these places before, and went in aware that they are basically designed to diagnose and treat a condition called sleep apnea, which I didn't really think fit my particular symptoms—but who knows, right?  I needed help and thought that it might even be an interesting experience.

I checked in to the sleep lab at 9 p.m. per their instructions.  The first thing that aroused my skepticism was that no one bothered to take my blood pressure or ask for a list of the prescription medications I take (I take a low-dose antihypertensive that I've been taking for years, plus the aforementioned anxiety pill—possibly relevant?!?!)  The room itself was less like a single hospital room, more like a single room at a really cheap motor hotel, I guess in an attempt to simulate the conditions under which most of us sleep.  (The techs kept saying, "you can watch TV now," as if this was some great gift.)

I was then hooked up to a variety of wired contacts, all connected to my body with surgical tape:  one behind each ear, two or three on various points on my skull, one below my left eye, one above my right eye, two on my chin, two on my chest and one on my back.  Then adjustable elastic strips were applied around my neck, chest and waist.  Now it's time to go to sleep!  Any time I needed to pee, Mohammed (not the Prophet, the sleep lab tech) had to unhook 2 main wires, so that I could carry the central receiver box (about the size of a VHS tape) to the bathroom with me, do my business, then come back and get re-hooked.  I was out for the first 1.5 hours, up for another hour and then basically asleep for another four hours until 6 a.m. when the techs woke me up.  Mohammed said, "Mr. Berger, your sleep was excellent."  If I'd been thinking, I might have asked him to qualify that statement.

A Personal Struggle (with Parenthetical Phrases and Italics)

A Buddhist and a Satanist walk into a bar (let's call it a juice bar, as serious Buddhists avoid all intoxicants, and both characters in this non-joke represent me, a non-drinker.)  They would both very much like a drink (though the Buddhist has eliminated all desire, he is nonetheless very thirsty; the Satanist, for his own, believes only in savoring the enjoyment of the here and now, the material life—the only one he knows exists for sure.)  The line at the juice bar, however, is impossibly long, the service is slow, and actually getting a drink might take a half hour or longer.

The Satanist says, "with the force of my will, I will my make my desire manifest; the drink shall come unto me, for I will it to be so."  Of course, nothing happens.  The Buddhist, seeing* the interconnectedness of all things, and being possessed of great compassion for all beings, resolves to wait patiently (though he knows he must soon leave to go to his Right Occupation.)

Still, the wait is long and ultimately both the Satanist and the Buddhist must leave empty-handed and dry of throat.  The Satanist curses the herd, and years later dies embittered and penniless.  The Buddhist, in time, loses everyone that he loves, grieves appropriately, but does not suffer deeply as he has long ago eliminated attachment from his mind and understands the impermanence of all things.  He too eventually dies, knowing that a drink perhaps awaits him upon rebirth into the causal continu