WFMU's Beware of the Blog

Justice Yeldham Live at WFMU Video Carnage

It was a high honor to have Justice Yeldham on my radio show a few weeks back and if you are anywhere along the route of the rest of his (last ever?) American tour, I can't give a higher recommendation for how to make a weird night.  Really.  We're talking best live set in noise on the entire globe.  Check out the archive of the full set on my radio show and hold your breath for the full set to be uploaded onto the Free Music Archive.  Thanks to Loic for filming...sorry I F-ed up the levels at the beginning of the interview, dudes!

The Week in WFMU: 8/30 - 9/5

WFMU is live from All Tomorrow's Parties in the Catskills on Sunday -- on 9/5 from 3 to 9 PM, hear live sets from both stages at Kutsher's country club along with DJs' play-by-play commentary. Full program schedule TBA, but we will be carrying Iggy and the Stooges, Mudhoney, T-Model Ford, Dungen, Sonic Youth, the Scientists, Kurt Vile, and more! This year's festival is curated by filmmaker Jim Jarmusch. Go here to listen to Marty McSorley's latest show, when he had ATP founder Barry Hogan on as a guest DJ.

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On Brian Turner's show Tuesday, Tom Lax of Siltbreeze Records pays his annual visit to the station with his latest discoveries in the realm of (mostly) outsider musicians. Hear these exciting DIY auteurs and Lax's take on them on 8/31 from 3 to 6 PM. Here is Siltbreeze's blog (Times New Viking, Puffy Areolas, Alastair Galbraith, Harry Pussy, U.S. Girls, etc. etc.) if you're curious about it.

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Overnight on Thursday night/Friday morning, Marty McSorley hosts a guest set from Spinnaface. His face is a spinna and his new release Music for the People is available for download -- check that out now. Then tune in on 9/3 from 3 to 6 AM for more.

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And later tonight (Monday -- technically Tuesday 8/31 at midnight), as DJ Keili fills in for Noah, hear her talk to Youtube sensation thecomputernerd01, craftsman of song parody videos and other funny fare.

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Last week, Billy Jam featured a charming interview with Roxanne Shante, plus interviews at Crate Diggers Park Jam from B+ (Brian Cross) and Grandwizzard Theodore's brother/mentor Mean Gene. If you go here, you can listen to the whole delightful program.

Weekends, Warriors and Watercraft

This weekend in NYC, there are a number of great happenings to choose from. At 1pm Saturday, Generation Records plays host to Tesco Vee's Hate Police as a freebie, and while you're at it, pick up a copy of the recently pressed Touch & Go: The Complete Hardcore Punk Zine '79-'83 book, which he'll be selling there. Published by Bazillion Points books, it includes every issue of the legendary zine and is over 500 pages long in full 8.5" X 11" format. Also in attendance will be DS/Dave Stimson, who co-wrote, edited and copied the zine along with Mr. Vee, so if you want the two of them to sign it for you, Generation would be the place to be. Check out this past week's edition of Diane's Kamikaze Fun Machine where Tesco Vee, Dave Stimson, John Brannon (photo, right), vocalist of  Negative Approach and Paul Richard of Adrenalin OD were guests, with program sparked by the release of the Touch and Go collection, as well as Tony Rettman's book, "Why Be Something That You're Not" Detroit Hardcore 1979-1985". With the aforementioned guests was also Ian Christe of Bazillion Points- publishers of the Touch & Go book. Check out the archive here: we spun a bunch of (mostly midwest and east coast) hardcore, had a few laughs and heard some really great recollections, along with one or two record geek moments.  Later Saturday at Santo's Party House on  Lafayette (website says 4pm but it also says Sunday-which is incorrect) is the Chronic Youth/Santos Bash with Negative Approach headlining. On that bill is the Pissed Jeans, Tesco Vee's Hate Police, Hellmouth and Mind Eraser. Other shows on Saturday: At the Acheron; Starkweather, Raw Radar War, The Communion (an upcoming guest on Wm. Berger's My Castle of Quiet program) and Panzerbastard, and at Gramercy; Exodus, Malevolent Creation, Holy Grail and Bonded By Blood.

Looking for a vacation a little further out into the future? Try this: October 22nd to the  24th in the southern California desert, there will be a 3 day Mad Max reenactment festival. Check out the details here.

Oh, you say you're a long term planner? Well, OK I've got you covered there as well. From January 24th-28th you can go on a heavy metal cruise- with, at last count, no less than 20 bands playing from Miami to Cancun and back. Roster sample: Amon Amarth, Marduk, Saxon and Trouble! 70,000 tons of metal, indeed! Happy planning!

Stooges, Mudhoney, Scientists and more: WFMU Live from All Tomorrows Parties at Kutshers, Sunday September 5th

WFMU returns for a third time to the Catskills and All Tomorrows Parties! The highly-anticipated three day festival runs from September 3-5th from Kutshers resort in Monticello, New York and our crew will be there recording and presenting some of the weekend's big happenin' deals Sunday from 3-9PM ET. The full weekend lineup, curated this year by filmmaker (and WFMU listener and supporter!) Jim Jarmusch, is here, and let's just say that WFMU's gotten some pretty severe radio lined up. Iggy and the Stooges' full set (playing Raw Power live as part of Friday's Don't Look Back night, and touring now with James Williamson on guitar!), Mudhoney, Australian post-punk godfathers the Scientists, Sonic Youth, White Hills, Fucked Up, Dungen, Kurt Vile, Hallogallo (Neu/Harmonia's Michael Rother with Steve Shelley and Aaron Mullan), and more to be announced. Keep your eyes peeled to Beware of the Blog and WFMU's homepage, Facebook and Twitter for announcements for set times as soon as we sort it all out, but tune in Sunday for some great live sets, interviews, and commentary. Some of the performances will be archived for streaming, some will not, and a few will hopefully end up for download later via the Free Music Archive, where 2008 and 2009 found a great assortment of MP3s up from the likes of Deerhoof, the Melvins, Jesus Lizard, Deerhunter, Grouper, Wooden Shjips, Fuck Buttons, Low, and more whose sets were broadcast on our air/netwaves. Tickets are still available for this year's ATP here, and if you are at the festival, look for WFMU in the between-ballroom hallway broadcasting live under our banner Sunday and say hi! Stay tuned!

To Be Led

What follows is a collection, small in size, of recordings neither sought, nor denied, but discovered through curiosity alone, or even more magnificently in one case, which came to me through the curiosity of another. There are only a handful of records in my collection that came to me in this way.  Like most, I imagine, my curiosity has led me to many more undesired than desired records.  Yet, somehow despite digging through countless depressing and humorous records, these seem worth it, regardless of whether they are all great albums as a whole.

It comes as a relief to find something no one has told you about; the record is no longer the spoken of prescription for future happiness you may never obtain.  It is not a Holy Grail. This strange and unfamiliar record has not been written on your "want list," and yet there it is before you unlike that rare coveted record you read about. The significance lies in the way it enters your life; you do not read about it, and then go get it. Only a stumble gets you there. 

Where will you be led?

#1) John Tavener - 'Opening Section' of "The Whale" (Apple, 1970).

A most unusual album from this Englishman.  It is a work based on the allegory of 'Jonah and the Whale', featuring musique concrete sounds, spoken word, operatic singing and perhaps some classical composition tendencies, yet is all clung together by a unique fabric. One cannot help but think too of Herman Melville's "Moby Dick," while hearing Tavener speak of the kinds of whales, their physical attributes surrounded by a mixture of sounds, somehow nautical. The album ends with a section wonderfully titled, "Vomit on to the sand." My mother found this in a record sale at a book store in Cleveland, OH.

Listen

#2) Vortex - 'Red Sea' from "C Album" (Soundscape Presents, 1984).

Every track on the album has something to do with the sound of the letter "C."  A wonderful album all the way through from two musicians entirely unknown to me before finding a sealed copy of this record in an abandoned record collection in a vast basement. Consisting of Ralph Blauvelt and Brad Graves, they are joined by percussionist Daniel Ponce on several tracks as well.  The musicians involved have connections with Karlheinz Stockhausen, McCoy Tyner, the works of Ezra Pound and the art of sculpture, bringing together a variety of influences to create the sounds heard here.  Listen to the wondrous sound in the background.  What is it? A bellows? Vortex excel in an area where most human beings do not, and especially those involved in improvised music: knowing when to stop. Found in Cleveland Heights, OH.

Listen

Clinic live WFMU Sessions Fresh & Vintage (mp3)

Clinic made their triumphant return to Terre T's Cherry Blossom Clinic this past weekend for a live session was chock-full of new material from their forthcoming album Bubblegum (Domino Oct 2010).

Word is Bubblegum introduces new layers of majestic orchestral pop to Clinic's distinct vintage synth-laden post-punk stylings, and you can see a video for the opening track after the jump. The live set has more of a raw garage-psych feel; a classic Stu Rutherford / Diane Kamikaze production. Starting with 5 new tunes ("Bubblegum", "Baby", "Lion Tamer", "Orangutan", "Milk + Honey") the set ends with "Shopping Bag" off of 2008's Do It!

Liverpool's surgical-masked 4-piece first stopped by WFMU back in 2001, and were actually slated to swing by on September 11th but that didn't work out so well...read what host Scott Williams had to say at the time while you listen to this incredible set which got us all hooked on Clinic (those of us who weren't already!) Here at WFMU, we've all been real het up on Clinic ever since their album Internal Wrangler showed up in our new bin over a year ago. We've been trying all summer to get them here, and lo, it's all paid off! Clinic was due to arrive here on Tuesday, September 11th - sadly, that didn't happen. Imagine our delight when - 3 days later - they showed up at our doorstep exclaiming "We're bored - we've come all the way to NYC from Liverpool, and can't play anywhere! Can we play here?" And Clinic played here, yes!

Mining the Audio Motherlode, Volume 80 (MP3s)

Give the Drummer Some's
Favorite Downloads from the MP3 Blogosphere

How do you improve upon perfection? That's a question that's been rattling around inside my illuminated helmet ever since reading about a heretofore unknown May 1940 version of "Body and Soul" by Coleman Hawkins, which reportedly surpasses the utter magnificence of his celebrated recording of the tune committed to wax six months earlier.

On the strength of his historic 1939 version of "Body and Soul"—which only hints at the melody before launching into an improvised narrative of riveting emotional complexity—Hawkins established the tenor saxophone as the dominant voice in jazz and, if you believe the critics, single-handedly ushered in the age of the modern jazz solo. While a few writers and historians have had a chance to hear this newly uncovered gem (read Ben Ratliff's account here), the rest of us will have to wait until it's new owner makes it officially available for public consumption.

As a consolation, take the next three minutes and give a listen to Coleman Hawkins's original work of genius, followed by the wonderful Eddie Jefferson's note-for-note "vocalese" interpretation of Hawkins's performance:

Coleman Hawkins (left) and Eddie Jefferson.

Coleman Hawkins: Body and Soul (mp3) from 1939   |   Eddie Jefferson: Body and Soul (mp3) from 1959

Now on to this week's treasures...

Ray Terrace  ~  "Oye el Cuchy Frito Man"
(Blog: Cuchyfritos)
From the album: Abaniquito (mp3)

Cuchi Cuchi Cuchi
Boffo boogalooist Ray Terrace brought in his famous brother Pete (Pedro Gutierrez, who later gave up music to practice medicine back in Puerto Rico) to arrange this set of Latin jazz smokers from 1965. Manny Roman and Willie Torres handle the vocal duties while the band churns madly.

Benny Hess  ~  "Wild Hog Hop
(Blog: Rockin' Gypsy)

High on the Hog
Bennie Hess's papa, Vestral (yes, Vestral!) worked on the railroad with the legendary "singing brakeman" Jimmie Rodgers, who stayed at the Hess household in Texas on occasion, enthralling young Bennie with his yodeling. (Though Hess was a first-class huckster, promoter and bullshit artist, this appears to be fact.) Handing down the love of music from father to son continued when Bennie tossed his 4-year-old son, Troy, on stage as "America's Singing Souvenir." (Hear Troy sing his breakout number: Please Don't Got Topless Mother (mp3).

Phraiwan Lukphet  ~  "Kham Tuean Khong Phi"
(Blog: Monrakplengthai)
From the cassette: Wiwa Sauen (mp3)

Good Luk
Legendary luk thung singer Phraiwan Lukphet crooned the themes to numerous beloved Thai films cementing his eternal popularity. I don't know what he is singing in the devastating numbers, but the melancholy is so thick you could cut it with a parang.

James "Wee Willie" Wayne  ~  "Travelin' From Texas to New Orleans"
(Blog: Don't Ask Me ….. I Don't Know)

Wayne's World
There seems to be a bit of a Internet conundrum about the original authorship of the New Orleans R&B classic "Junco Partner." It's about 110% certain that record label exec Bob Shad, who'd received royalties on the tune going back to 1951, didn't write a damn thing. Many credit James Waynes, aka James Wayne, aka Wee Willie Wayne as the first to record, if not compose, the number. (If you were inclined to not necessarily believe everything the colorful Mr. Wayne had to say, who could blame you.) This collection delivers "Junco Partner (Worthless Man)" and 17 other jump blues monsters.

A.V.R.O. Dansorkest  ~  "Conducted by Hans Mossel"
(Blog: Música Ácida)*
[Password = mza-acid]
From the album: Boris on the Bass (mp3)

Amster Amster Dam Dam Dam
Dutch national radio A.V.R.O. launched a dance orchestra in 1935, but it was disbanded after its conductor was implicated in a "minor sex scandal." A year later a new band was formed under the leadership of clarinetist Henri Emile (Hans) Mossel. Mossel would perish at Auschwitz in 1944.

*Note: This terrific blog has been shuttered, but the download is still active. Click on the link above to go straight to the Megaupload page where the download is hosted.

Listen to my radio show Give the Drummer Some—every Friday, 9 to noon—on WFMU's new web stream Give the Drummer Radio.
Send your email address to get on the mailing list for a weekly newsletter about the show, the stream and Mining the Audio Motherlode.

Check out every installment of Mining the Audio Motherlode

Pakistan Disaster (MP3)

Dick Bruning  -  Pakistan Disaster

Pakistan, as you probably already know, was recently the site of devastating floods killing some 1,600 people and forcing at least 200,000 others to flee their homes in search of higher ground.

The Dick Bruning record featured here concerns an earlier Pakistan flood, the result of the Bhola cyclone which hit East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) on November, 12 1970.  Incredibly, this catastrophic storm and the resulting floods claimed up to 500,00 lives.

The Bhola cyclone was also the disaster that triggered George Harrison and Ravi Shankar to sponsor the Concert For Bangladesh, a huge relief effort for displaced refugees that was held at Madison Square Garden in August 1971.

Chicago via Columbia: CAVE & Lazer Crystal live on Talk's Cheap (mp3's)

The August 16th episode of Talk's Cheap featured live music from two bands who are part of the "Columbia Diaspora". This term's been used to describe a mass musical migration from Columbia Missouri to Chicago in the early/mid oughts, led by scene progenitors Mahjongg and Warhammer 48k, resulting in groups like Michael Columbia and Chandeliers. The Columbia expats brought a new sound infusion to Chicago -- ranging from brute sludge to new wave dance -- which has continued to develop and branch off into new forms. The expats found a home in Griffin Rodriguez/Blue Hawaii's Shape Shoppe recording studio, and may have drawn some inspiration from the city's musical history (I'm especially thinking of 80s electronic/house and late 90s rhythmic post-rock), but these sounds are not textbook 'chicago' music by any means. It's more like diaspora music from some delocalized point in the future, where electronic elements like drum triggers, computer sequencers, and vocoders have become extensions of the human body.

CAVE inhabit the more organic side of this spectrum; its trance-inducing kraut-rock grooves flow like lava. The four piece consist of three Columbia expats -- Cooper Crain (guitars/organ), Dan Browning (bass) and Rex McMurry (drums) -- plus Chicago native Rotten Milk (also of Stress Ape and the Terry Plumbing label) on synthesizer. Have a listen to Cave's live set below, check out their discography for releases on Permanent Records, Drag City (who released the Pure Moods 12'' pictured), and Important Records, and check here for tourdates as Cave explore Europe this fall,

In case the title of LAZER CRYSTAL's debut LP (MCMLXXX, Thrill Jockey 2010) didn't tip you off, they dig the '80s. Probably more for the psychedelic visions of our digital future than anything else; check out the Max Headroom-style video for Love Rhombus after the jump. The LP compiles their two previous 12'' EP's released by Chicago's HBSP-2X (aka Captcha Records). For this recording, Lazer Crystal were the trio of Nicholas Read (electronics & vocals), Josh Johannpeter (percussion), & Mikale De Graff (vocals & electronics).

There is a lot of overlap between these "Columbia Diaspora" bands -- Cooper of CAVE once played in Lazer Crystal, Josh and Mikale of Lazer Crystal are also in Mahjongg, etc. Check the Chicago tag on the FMA for more, or dig back into a time before the Free Music Archive launched with our Chicagoland FMA preview back in July '08.

The Week in WFMU: 8/23 - 8/29

This Tuesday, Diane Kamikaze delves into the history of hardcore with a crowd of very special guests: Tony Rettman, author of Why Be Something You're Not: Detroit Hardcore 1979 - 1985; Ian Christe of Bazillion Points, publisher of Touch & Go: The Complete Hardcore Punk Zine '79 - '83; Tesco Vee, frontman of the Meatmen and co-founder of Touch & Go zine; John Brannon, vocalist of Negative Approach, Laughing Hyenas and Easy Action; Dave Stimson/DS, co-founder of Touch & Go zine; and Steve Miller, vocalist for The Fix and editor of the Touch & Go anthology. They will take listeners' questions live. Hardcore History Day will be observed 8/24 from noon to 3 PM, on Diane's Kamikaze Fun Machine.

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On Wednesday evening from 6 to 7 PM, Seven Second Delay will be back at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre in Manhattan. The event will feature Prince Rama's Sanskrit chanting, comedy writer Tom Leopold, renowned speed-eater Crazy Legs Conti, and a mystery guest whom Ken and Andy will have to identify by conducting an interview. Listen... or better, stop by in person: the UCB Theatre is at 307 West 26th Street. Tickets $5.

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Late Wednesday night, Bennett4Senate welcomes Javelin -- energetic improvisers originally from Providence who have records out now on Luaka Bop and Thrill Jockey. Go here to download what they did for XLR8R's "Tune in an Afternoon" using some thrift-shop cassette tapes and little else. Hear more on Bennett's Awesome New Place, Thursday 8/26 from 3 to 6 AM.

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On My Castle of Quiet, Wm. Berger will host a live set by Métal Rouge. The group, from New Zealand by way of Los Angeles, achieves a sound "comprised equally of the forward movement of ecstatic jazz and the drugged stasis of NYC loft minimalism circa '66... a new vocabulary of unrefined free spiritual music." They donated these rare pieces to the show last winter, and are sure to impress again in person this week. Wm. Berger's My Castle of Quiet, Thursday night (Friday morning) 8/27 from midnight to 3 AM.

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Barry Hogan, founder and curator of All Tomorrow's Parties, will be on Marty McSorley's program directly afterward -- 8/27 from 3 to 6 AM. He'll do a DJ set and chat with Marty about the upcoming All Tomorrow's Parties festival, happening September 3rd through 5th at Kutsher's Country Club in Monticello, NY. 

  Then, rising electro-pop star Uffie comes to HotRod's show. Listen as HotRod speaks with the Paris-based singer, originally from Miami, about her work and long-anticipated debut album on Ed Banger Records, Sex Dreams and Denim Jeans. Friday 8/27, from 6 to 9 AM (web-only).

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Nice to hear Mike Lupica on the radio last week when he filled in for EFD. I caught his final set, which began with a song from the late 80s by indie rock's My Dad Is Dead, segued into Etta James, and continued to be great thereafter. It is here.

Concordia Sex Education: Take the High Road (MP3)

Today's post is of an album I picked up recently in a Salvation Army Thrift Store. The album contains the 19 minute soundtrack for a sex education filmstrip produced by Concordia. Each side has the same presentation, one with audible "beeps" one with inaudible tones, with the individual sides geared towards the use of two different filmstrip machines. This is the inaudible tone side. Let's all learn together.

Concordia Sex Education Series: Take the High Road (MP3)

Label (JPG)

John Mark Byers / Scene-Stealer of 'Paradise Lost'

Ahhh, I liked him best as a villain. Even though he later changed his position on the West Memphis Three's guilt, it was his terrific maniacal rants as the (most dynamic) 'star' of Paradise Lost and Revelations that I used to DJ and sample lots many years ago. This unedited chunk (2:12) of prime Byers is a delicious piece of dialogue, and if it whets your appetite, and you haven't yet seen the documentary it's stolen from then this is your prompt to pick it up and give it a look (and its sequel).  "To me, this place as I stand, is like Hell on Earth."

Enjoy.

John Mark Byers in Paradise Lost

Shamantis' slowed-down Justin Bieber: a glacial victory for fair use?

It's the first and probably last time the Free Music Archive will ever tweet about Justin Bieber (though he is the preeminent trending topic). But I just had to this week on the occasion that multiple major labels have lent their support to a hugely popular (and quite excellent) 800-x-slowed-down remix of Beiber's song "U Smile". This, despite the fact that it is arguably "an infringement of both the sound recording (owned by Universal’s Island Records) and the musical composition (owned by both UMG and EMI)" (Billboard). I mean, with the same free open source program that producer Nick Pittsinger aka Shamantis used to create this 30-minute glacial epic, it could just as easily be shrunk back into the actual song.

If you just listen, clearly this is a transformative work that meets the conditions for Fair Use. But Fair Use has yet to reconcile with US laws pertaining to sound recordings, and the influential Bridgeport ruling seems to imply that there is no such thing. Meanwhile, Soundcloud who are hosting the file are based, one of many countries where "fair use" doesn't even exist (though a court in Germany did recently reverse their decision and declare that a 2-second sound recording twisted beyond all recognition and not used as the basis of a new composition, is legal [BBC / Techdirt]).

Fortunately, there was no need for the law i this scenario as it clearly stood to benefit all parties. Beiber's tweeted about it (link) and this new form of public announcement from our young king of tweet-pop declared it to be good, it shined an interesting light on Bieber's own music for new fans (and twitter followers) who now have a much deeper appreciation for his music. All of which is invaluable in our increasingly fragmented Attention Economy.

In cases like these (#musicblogocide, for example) I often think of Lawrence Lessig's chart describing the Law as one of four forces that impact reality. Our society and the structures of the music industry are changing rapidly. Soon -- with any luck -- remixes like this which clearly just draw attention to the artist in a purely noncommcercial environment may even be declared legal! Or at the very least, we should be able to publicly acknowledge that there are certain noncommercial forums for shared creativity where the law need not interfere. Transformative remixes are already kind of impossible to stop, and seem to stand to everyone's benefit. Quite an artistic and politicized cultural statement by our friend Shamantis.

Maybe even Prince will come around to this. Or -- since he's already declared the end of the Internet -- maybe he'll simply sit back and let his music (and the people who love it) take care of spreading the word on his behalf.

Denver, Land of "For-Boating" Noise-Rock; MjolniirDXP and Epileptinomicon visit My Castle of Quiet, 8.10.10

It's great to see some out-of-town travelers take the long road up to the Castle. Mike R. (Epileptinomicon) and Mike R. and Zack (MjolniirDXP) are the first of several visitors from the west we'll hear this summer (Metal Rouge on 8/27, Husere Grav on 9/17.) These guys came with a ridiculous amount of gear (full drum kit, two heavy bass amps, several synths) from CO > NY in the hottest week of summer to play their unique, desert-burnt, post-Kraut, spooky art rock for Castle listeners and showgoers in NYC, Philly, Baltimore, and some other points in between there and home.

Mike R. and Zack Writer make up the duo MjolniirDXP, and their three-part set here stirs the gloom pot up quite a bit, with the added color of Zack's admittedly sunny aesthetic—resulting in a suite that veers from LAFMS/Chrome/VDO territory, into cannibal-chomp Italo horror-synth melody, and finally into full-on, Esoteric-style doom. It's always a joy for me to host a band like MjolniirDXP (Thor's weapon, plus a near-death experience, get it?), who are so appropriate to the psychedelic-horror-fuck-noise-mash that is my program, and my deepest thanks go out to Mike and Zack for hauling up all that gear and playing a controlled storm.

Epileptinomicon, Mike's solo beast, is "rock" only in the sense that there is (at least in this piece) constant wobbly rhythm, repeated themes, and a tonal center, though loops and echoed bass, and percussive phrases hover around this center—watching, leaving and returning, like a family of buzzards over a downed cow. "Morning Mug of Hearts" is gloriously hypnotic and eerie, and might even take you back to the sparser, early works of Cabaret Voltaire or SPK. The Epileptinomicon CDrs (on Mike's own Sleeping Giant Glossolalia label) are no less mesmeric, with patiently executed, long-form, grimy lo-fi nightmares aplenty.

Many thanks must go to Jason Sigal for helping to create a recording that, as one commenter put it, "really does MjolniirDXP justice." My iPhone caps of the band were especially terrible this time—as hard as I tried—so an extra special thanks to Tracy Widdess for whipping the curd.

San Franciscan art-punk from Club Foot (Subterranean, 1981 LP) mp3

The Club Foot LP is named after one of San Francisco's premier artist-run venues of the late 70s/early 80s, and documents the jazz-punk-DIY-situationist sounds nurtured therein. Originally released in 1981 by legendary local imprint Subterranean Records (Flipper, Dead Kennedys, Inflatable Boy Clams), it was recently repressed in a limited edition of 450 12'' LP's to coincide with Club Foot's 30th anniversary and an "Artifacts from SF's Art Punk Cabaret" event at the San Francisco Public Library.

Club Foot was founded by Richard Kelly, a student of John Cage who sought to "marry high art values to the vitality of underground performance art; to fuse Frank Sinatra, Roy Orbison and Albert Ayler and project that onto the art-rock stage" (this from an article on the Clubfoot Orchestra's website). The original Club Foot Orchestra was a revolving cast of characters from the local scene assembled for this LP recording, including Richard Edson (who appears on the cover) and other members of the bands who appear on this compilation: Bay of Pigs, Alterboys, Longshoremen and Naked City (not the Zorn one). The ensemble disbanded in 1983 after Richard Kelly committed suicide, and the Club itself closed its doors in 1985.

Around this time, inspired by the original Club Foot, Richard Marriott founded a new group under the same name that continues performing to this day. Clubfoot (one word) has a completely different lineup and a distinct focus on "modern music for silent film".

A clip from the contemporary Clubfoot's Nosferatu soundtrack appears after the jump.

RIP POCAHAUNTED: YOUR SPIRIT LOOMS ON, A EULOGY

I first heard of Pocahaunted in college while trying to figure out a thesis topic for a Native American Issues class back in 2007. At the time, there seemed to be a whole re-colonization of the "New Weird American" sonic landscape by an influx of mostly urban white psych // folk // noise outfits stomping their moccasined-feet and thrashing their headdresses to bands with names like Indian Style, Truman Peyote, White Rainbow, Broken Deer, Animal Totem, Totem, Totem Music, Totem Spirit Field, Neon Indian, Neon Navajo, Apache Beat, Crazy Horse, Our Brother the Native, Inca Ore, The Ghost Shirt, Creepy Teepee, Wovoka, just to name a few. I decided to look into this movement further, then discovered Pocahaunted and became unwittingly sucked in to their mysterious spook-a-delic world.

I must say that after seeing them live several times and getting to know some of the members over the years, I realized that despite their name, Pocahaunted transcends the "just another hipster band trying to be Indian" indictment. In fact, they transcend most catch phrases people try to throw at them. Conversely, they are a rotating collective of down-to-earth individuals who are constantly evolving and transforming themselves and their music to produce an alternate reality that is far from escapist, and instead perhaps even closer to the magical and sacred essence of being truly human.

Their last album title, "Make it Real", is a dubbed out, trance-testament to connecting to the "real world" through entering it's dream core, its sacred center, its magical portal lined with facepaint, glitter, and palm-tree graffiti. Pocahaunted conjures the mystical through the gleaming teeth of open smiles. Making it real doesn't mean taking yourself seriously. A lone stuffed Garfield perches stoically on top of a guitar amp blaring divine riffs that swirl around keyboard stands draped with fake flowers and mics magically transformed into ritual may-poles with silk sprays of neon fabrics. Figures appear donning facepaint and sequinned outfits, like some shamanistic-alien-divas performing an exorcism on the set of 80s glam metal music video shot on Neptune.

For Pocahaunted, the concert space is an ontological theatre where the real is subverted into a dreamtime that is equally playful and tangible as it is intense and untouchable. "You've got to save yrself", they croon, and they are. Britt and Amanda are dedicated raw foodists (yes, even on tour). Leyna is moving to NYC for pilates training. They are still actively committed to running Not Not Fun (a label with a growing formidable roster of like-minded DIY psychedelic wizards and noise shamans), and continuing to make music through their various other equally mind-melting projects (Robedoor, Psychic Reality, LA Vampires, Sun Araw, Best Coast to name a few). They have internalized the sacred space their music creates and seem to be taking a break to maintain the "realness" of that space within themselves. I have no doubt that this is just the marker of one energetic phase of their creative evolution. In the meantime, Pocahaunted's ghost will continue to haunt the sonic landscape, and I gratefully surrender to its possession.

Beaming out much love to Britt, Amanda, Diva, Leyna, and Ged for your future endeavors.

A Holiday in Theatreland

Tony Coulter here, with a special it's-August-and-I'm-feeling-hot-and-lazy edition of my bi-weekly blogpost. No comments or visuals (other than record jackets) this time -- just a smattering of my favorite show-tunes-from-beyond.

See you on the other side....

Mining the Audio Motherlode, Volume 79 (MP3s)

Give the Drummer Some's
Favorite Downloads from the MP3 Blogosphere

Tremendous sadness over the loss of two exquisite artists the past few weeks:

A regal presence in the jazz world for half a century, it is bracing to recall that vocalist Abbey Lincoln was once dismissed as a being "professional Negro" (by critic Ira Gitler in Downbeat), who derided her socially conscious lyrics and unapologetic self-identification as a proud African-American woman. She will always be a national treasure.

Trumpeter Harry Beckett, who relocated from his native Barbados to London in 1954 at the age of 19, found himself again and again at the molten center of the British jazz scene in the 1960s and '70s and beyond. His vital contributions to the brilliant collective Brotherhood of Breath were a mainstay for two decades.

In memoriam...

Abbey Lincoln  ~  "A Turtle's Dream"
(Blog: π ε λ α γ ι ν ο ι)
From the album: Down Here Below (mp3)

Up There Above
I'm not one much for picking favorites—favorite singer, favorite album, etc.—but A Turtle's Dream comes as close as any for me. I'm not sure what it says about me exactly, but I have listened to this melancholy masterpiece, start to finish, more often than any other record. Do so at least once and you will spend no better 69 minutes.

Harry Beckett  ~  "Flare Up"
(Blog: Inconstant Sol)

High Strung
Harry Beckett had been playing and recording professionally for over a decade—including a celebrated stint with Charles Mingus in the 1961 film All Night Long—when he released Flare Up, his first record date as a leader, in 1970. Alongside Beckett's warm, cheerful trumpet and flugel work here is some urgent blowing from a trio of British sax titans: John Surman, Mike Osborne, and Alan Skidmore.

Plus three more...

Francois Tusques  ~  Le Piano Préparé
(Blog: 9 Grey Chairs)
From the album: Hon-Dat (mp3)

High Strung
Piano adventurist Francois Tusques was playing free jazz in Paris years before all those American cats began arriving in '68. Of course when they got there, they quickly learned to book Tusques for gigs and recording sessions. This collection of pieces for prepared piano were recording in 1972. It's a pleasure comparing the opening ditty, "On N'est pas Chez les Colonels," to quintet version of the same tune on this tremendous quintet record from the year before. (Note: Files are in the lossless FLAC format.)

Derek & Dorothy (and Nadine) Elliott
Derek & Dorothy Elliott (1972) | Yorkshire Relish (1978) | An Old Family Business (1980)
(Blog: Time Has Told Me)

Barnsley Folkers
Don't know much about husband-and-wife duo Derek and Dorothy Elliott, who haunted the Yorkshire folk club scene—occasionally with eldest daughter Nadine singing shotgun—throughout the 1970s. Each of their three marvelous collections of traditional singing have been lovingly posted at the essential Time Has Told Me.

Sounds of the City Experience  ~  "Sounds of the City Experience"
(Blog: My Best of *Dance-Disco-Funk-Soul*)
From the album: Babylon (mp3)

Shitty Experience
The year 1976 was a big one for Tiger Lily, the tax scam label created by Roulette Records' crooked boss Morris Levy. In fact as many as seventy records—Tiger Lily's entire discography—were released that year. Surely the most famous among them was Richard Pryor's "L.A. Jail," and surely one of the funkiest was this mysterious LP from "Sounds of the City Experience."

Listen to my radio show Give the Drummer Some—every Friday, 9 to noon—on WFMU's new web stream Give the Drummer Radio. Send your email address to get on the mailing list. for a weekly newsletter about the show, the stream and Mining the Audio Motherlode.

Check out every installment of Mining the Audio Motherlode

Dawn of Midi Live at WFMU

The fully improvised piano trio Dawn of Midi stopped by WFMU a few days before their debut at local jazz bastion The Iridium and painted the darkness with their abstractions. And when I say darkness, I mean total darkness. They are the first band I've ever hosted at WFMU's Love Room to turn off every light in the joint. Qasim Naqvi, Dawn of Midi's drummer, commented later that he couldn't even see his drums. Apparently this is how Dawn of Midi have played together since day one, in total darkness.

And it makes sense. Their set, as well as their debut record First on Accretions, is riveting in its restraint, so deliberate at times that you wonder if the whole thing might pull apart and just disappear.  It's a surprise, this type of patience by such a young group. The other surprise is that it's totally improvised since there are parts that sound very cohesive.  The band's music immediately evokes all kinds of interesting things, at least to me: Morton Feldman, Olivier Messiaen, Ahmad Jamal, Jimmy Giuffre's Free Fall, The Necks. Not influences per se but all concerned with the space between the notes.

The bandmembers, Qasim Naqvi on drums, Aakaash Israni on contrabass, Amino Belyamani on piano, hail from Pakistan, India and Morocco respectively, met at CalArts in San Diego, and reside in Paris and New York. I can't exactly hear how this unlikely geographic melding contributes to their music, but suffice to say DOM embodies a cosmopolitan and world aware vibe.

Thanks to Mark Koch for engineering this set.

RAELity Bites!

If there is anything that I am very sympathetic to, it would be space mysticism. In elementary school I would devour any book I came across dealing  with the Bermuda Triangle, Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, ancient aliens, Atlantis, etc. In the fourth grade my best friend Per-Johan and I vowed to spend our 30s in Tibet searching for the Yeti, convinced they were part of a tribe that would have access to the mothership. (We lost touch at some point but every day I wake up expecting him to knock on my door ready to go. Per Johan, if you read this - only two years left!) In my teens I discovered the music of Hawkwind and Coil, and have been on a steady diet of cosmic sound ever since.

I came across theebradmiller.blogspot.com a couple of weeks ago, specifically to the page dedicated to Psychic TV Live at Fondation Raelienne, making me wonder what was up with those wacky Raelians , haven't really thought about them since they said they were cloning people a few years ago. Bouncing around Google I discovered that within a week they would be celebrating their New Year in Strawberry Fields, Central Park, so I reached out to some friends and made plans to meet there. If you need some background on the Raelians you can find it here, this post is going to go on a bit too long already....

It was a beautiful, warm, sunny Friday afternoon. I rolled into Strawberry Fields to find Greg and Alexandra waiting for me on the grass a short distance from the where the Raelians were having their celebration. Greg said that I had just missed a ritual using tuning forks and it looked pretty wild. They were now meditating with a gatekeeper standing guard. Anytime anyone would come up to ask a question he would politely shoo them  away. Curiosity got the better of me so I approached him and asked him what was going on. He whispered that I should come back in a few minutes and I would know when. Eventually everyone stirred and I thought, ok, this is the time.

I approached the crowd while there was a rite going on that seemed like a baptism. A Raelian named Kelvin came up to me and we chatted a bit, he explained that it was the "Transmission of the Cellular Plan," essentially the baptism into the Raelian faith where my DNA would be  sucked into the priestess, processed in her internal computer and transmitted to an alien satellite. VALIS? I have no idea what came over me  but I had to do this. I had to take part in the Raelians most sacred ceremony. Eventually it was my turn. I stood before a priestess named Sylvie, she was from Montreal. Her assistant was next to her holding a bowl of water. Sylvie made me agree to some specifics, as in that I came there on my own free will, there is no "God", and their main cult leader Claude Vorilhon was the last prophet. Ok, well, yeah, I came there on my own, God to me is indescribable and every religion thinks their main guy is the last one, it would be kind of weird if they didn't say that so I'm cool with that, so yeah. Sure.

She dipped her hands in the water and placed them on my forehead and neck. A feeling of calm came over my body, a warm wave of  everything being right in the world. It felt amazing to be alive, in the a field in Central Park, having my DNA sent to outer space...