It only comes around once a year, so we'd probably be better off sharing some B-movie b-sides, Dario Argento soundtracks, or Boris Karloff ephemera. As it stands, the only horror on our minds is The Shining, having watched the film again for the 802nd time this past weekend.
Usual suspects Wendy Carlos and Gygoty Ligeti collaborate with Kubrick on The Shining's soundtrack, which while having nothing to do with Halloween, still has enough creepy dissonance to make a foreboding background for the little trick or treaters tonight.
Krzysztof Penderecki contributes the bulk of the soundtrack, his work is present in most of the scree scree rampage scenes. But I always found this ghostly ballroom music creepier as a kid, watching highly edited Saturday afternoon broadcasts of the film on New York's WPIX.
The Rapture emerged from hibernation recently with a few NYC shows and a handful of remixes. They turned in some pretty impressive work on a Supersystem edit, and now have turned their attention to Nordic disco pixie Annie.
The Rapture bend about the original with judicious use of 303 acid squelch; rather than being overbearing with a new toy, they create a catchy signature line at the end. And the staccato drum machine fills do nothing to diminish the sunniness of the original.
Annie also received the remix treatment by Joakim Bouaziz on "Always Too Late". Here he tackles Poni Hoax's "Budapest" with a twisted dark electro take. I was supposed to see Poni Hoax at CMJ, and I'm not sure what happened. Either they were scratched entirely from the bill and replaced by Cut Copy, or we picked the wrong time to get dinner.
Had a big birthday this weekend. Friends took me to Capone's for the Alldisco party. Tucked away in the art ghetto of Williamsburg, it's an unpresuming little bar; though it has that hipster vibe, it's not a condescending crowd in the least. If this place had existed back when I was wet behind the ears and living around the area at age 22, I think it might have become a favorite.
I had heard the Alldisco people spun mostly Paradise Garage type records and our Park Slope bourgie crew wanted to dance. Coming out of a gutbuster birthday dinner at nearby Bamonte's, the free pizza with every drink was the last thing we needed to see. Never thought my trainspotter ass would ever get a chance to do the white man overbite dance to Class Action's "Weekend" and other Sleeping Bag goodies. The DJs threw out a few oddities, but mostly were working to move the crowd, I seem to remember some choicely timed Human League got most of the women on the dancefloor.
We were making our way to the doors when the Klein & M.B.O. came on. The dub is quite handy for its catchy keyboard loop, but the Alldisco crew put on the weirder female vocal version. Needless to say, we stuck around a while longer.
Some excellent Alldisco longform mixes here Or, buy Dan Selzer's mix CD at RVNG
posted by Miguel |
10/21/2005
Weekend Megamixes
I've had the Mastermix site listed to the right in our mp3blogroll for a while now, although it isn't exactly a blog per se. Site was put up by an old school hip hop lover looking to digitize and share his audio cassette collection of electro and London pirate radio recordings (think early Kiss FM).
Interesting mixes there, many with the crackle of signal interference and radio static. Puts me in the mood to throw out some Steinski-ish audio collage hip hop megamixes:
Haig's astral feedback squalls on "Mad Horses" segue into mutant bump 'n funk that would not be out of place on a third Disco Not Disco compilation. So it's a bit bewildering to hear the Casio kitsch of "Scottish Christmas", released only 4 years later on a holiday themed 7'' split with Durutti Column in 1985.
"Mad Horses" was a real eye-opener for me, an immediate keeper. I sort of found "Scottish Christmas" revolting at first, but I suppose it's possible for it to reveal some certain charms if you listen closely and furrow your brow hard enough.
posted by Miguel |
10/17/2005
Steel Drum Fun
It rained for 7 days straight last week, and to block out the dreariness I must have put on this sun-drenched track about three times daily:
After all those plays on repeat it never got stale or boring. Tune had been trapped in a languor of obscurity until like 4 or 5 DJs simultaneously pricked their ears up to it and put it on various hip hop and R&B oddity mixtapes. Back in the 70's the Esso Corporation sponsored the group, fitting too, as the band had taken to fashioning their instruments from 18 gauge steel Esso petroleum drums.
And then of course there is the grandaddy of all steel drum breaks:
Relentless tambourines and handclaps loaded down with too too much clanging funkiness.
posted by Miguel |
10/14/2005
Noise Fest (Part 3 of 3)
Avoidance Behavior - Live at Noise Fest This experimental unit is an early Lee Renaldo project and partnership with David Linton. Ranaldo's steel wire guitar rushes were captured by Linton onto tape, where they were looped and manipulated. Ranaldo returned the favor, splicing together freshly recorded swathes of Linton's drumming (not heard here). I imagine this would be quite disorienting at loud volume pinging off of echoey gallery walls.
Borbetomagus - Live at Noise Fest An outfit that might be familiar to the ears of avant-jazz skronk lovers. Much like Sonic Youth, this group still chugs along, though in far greater obscurity. In fact, they guested on SY's Murray Street, so I suppose the two bands remain friendly. This recording captures an aural assault of multiple dissonant brass attacks. Here's a link to their site, which includes a discography and upcoming shows.
Khmer Rouge - Live at Noise Fest It might not register these days, but it was either an incredibly gutsy or snotty move to come up with a band name such as this not even a decade out of the Vietnam debacle. This is pretty great song though, it wouldn't be out of place among the Manchester sounds developing at this very time.
For those interested in the Speed Trials, the 1983 follow-up to Noise Fest, Vinyl Mine did a pretty great breakdown and review here.
posted by Miguel |
10/12/2005
Noise Fest (Part 2 of 3)
Y Pants - Live at Noise Fest '81 This performance of "Beat it Down" might be one of the few Noise Fest recordings familiar to listeners well-versed in no wave apocrypha. Y Pants' electric ukelele and toy piano histrionics brought a feminist sensibility into the downtown avant rocker scene. A great reissue collecting together their 99 Records 7" and other singles is available at Midheaven Mailorder.
Chinese Puzzle - Live at Noise Fest '81 "Dadat Dat", performed by Chinese Puzzle with forked guitar stabs bifurcated as if by slide rule, sounds like it could just sneak past our ears as one of those post-rock dissertations from the early '90s. But then that would make it pre-post-rock, or just insert your own tired pre/post quip here.
Mofungo - Live at Noise Fest '81 Elliot Sharp was part of this downtown funk outfit, but I see Robert Sietsema was their bassist. I wonder if we're talking about the Village Voice's Sietsema of gilded tastebuds who convinces us to get lost in Corona, Queens and does all the legwork in finding the perfect place to get a banh mi in Little Italy. More on Mofungo at Trouser Press.
posted by Miguel |
10/10/2005
Noise Fest (Part 1 of 3)
This past summer the non-profit art gallery White Columns took a look back at two seminal art/music events they had hosted,1981's Noise Fest, curated by Thuston Moore, and 1983's Speed Trials, a sequel of sorts. The retrospective included a nice photocopied zine, which I am going to borrow liberally from:
Noise Trip: memoriez of Noise Fest by Thurston Moore
We had just changed our name to Sonic Youth. Before that it was the Arcadians, named after the ancient Greeks or whatever who communicated through song. And before that we were called Red Milk. Not sure where that came from. Did a few gigs at Arleen Schloss' A-Space on Broome St between Chrystie and Bowery. The Arcadians did a couple of sorta exciting gigs at CBGB, once on the bill with a group led by an ex-girlfriend of Robert Fripp's. That was pretty heavy (not). And a gig at Great Gildersleeves a predominantly heavy metal hangout that hosted an evening as presented by The Kitchen. We went on first before Glenn Branca and some ensemble led by Bill Obrecht and others. We were trying to get gigs at other joints most notably Hurrahs as that was the hot joint to go to then. Big room, loud DJing by the kid brother of Ed Bahlman from 99 Records - the only record store that had the sides we dug and a great alternative to the 70s punk bloat of Bleeker Blobs, hot mix of people. Saw some amazing gigs there. Young Marble Giants, Y-Pants, The Slits, Pop Group, Bush Tetras when they were for a while there the best band on the planet. It became even tougher to get gigs when Hurrah closed which made no sense. The owner issued a statement in Soho Weekly News that there weren't any good bands in the city they all just seemed to make a lot of noise. What the fuck. As if that was such a bad thing.
Kim Gordon, a beautiful artist girl who had relocated from LA. to NYC, and I started hanging out. We began Sonic Youth from the loose jamming I had going on with Anne DeMarinis who was living with Vito Acconci. We rehearsed at Vito's in Brooklyn. Kim was working at Annina Nosei Gallery, had curated a show there. White Columns was a gallery directed by Josh Baer, son of white canvas painter Jo Baer. Not sure how Kim met him or why she became involved with his new White Columns scene but she did and curated a show there called the Record Cover show where artists displayed record covers. Around this time (this is all 1979-81 period I'd hazard to guess) she mentioned to me that Josh would like to do a music event at the space and would I like to pick the bands. Yes I would. Especially in light of the Hurrahs dude thinking there was nothing happening. I knew there was. There was a lot of weird experimental avant activity coming out of A-Space alone. There was the whole Mofungo gang of lower east side hepsters referencing Beefheart before Lamonte Young (Lamonte was more Rhys Chatham territory and to a more remote extent Branca). There was the whole conflux of Soho-ites involved with the Chatham/Branca guitar plexus axis: Rudolph Grey, Jules Baptiste, Lee Ranaldo (who wasn't in SY yet - he came in the band pretty much immediately after Noise Fest - in fact our first rehearsal as such with Lee was at White Columns in preparation for some weird gig at a Just Above Midtown/Downtown Gallery opening - Barbara Ess played bongos w/us for that gig(!)).
I called the event Noise Fest in reaction to what the Hurrah jerko had said and to reclaim the term noise from its derisive status. I made a short list of bands. Branca was of advice leading me to people like John Rehberger and Mark Cunningham, who was mythological to us as he was in the group Mars, probably the most notoriously "out" no wave group of the 70s. All the musicians and bands responded and were ready to play. A lot of them knew of each other but not everyone had really ever cohabitated so much together and, as such, Noise Fest was a watermark event in that a community of disparate yet contemporary avant garde post no wave punk experimentalists got to hang out, meet each other, and feel connected. It was great. Bands started calling me to be involved. Just about anyone who did call I said yes to. The fest grew from a one to two to four to five to six to nine day event. Insane. Some band from Georgia called Vietnam strode in because they heard about this thing brewing and asked to play. Sure, why not. The female drum machinist was a young Sue Garner who stayed in NYC and has continued creating fantastic music. Kim curated the attendant wall art show which had its own opening I believe. A lot of this is fuzzy I tell ya. I remember one afternoon during some kind of soundcheck when John Belushi and some pals walked in to see what was happening. Belushi's hang out was this 2nd story party joint in a building on Spring and Varick, a block or two away. He was chomping on a cigar and looked bemused, but not fully sold. When Lee Ranaldo and David Linton played as Avoidance Behavior their music was so harsh and shattering that the entire audience sat on the floor with their fingers in their ears. A woman who lived up the street came over in her bare feet, shaking, and complained about the din. She was incredulous as to how this was happening unregulated on her block. In tears she pointed to the ear plugged audience watching Lee and David kill. "What the hell is this?"- she was so confused. Elliot Sharp called me to play and I said sure though I had not known of Elliot at that point. He was more part of whatever free improv scene existed along with a young John Zorn and others. This was a group not represented only because of my not being too aware of it. But I granted Elliot a gig on the night Branca was to play. Glenn had put together his evening pretty much and wasn't into the intrusion of someone he hadn't chosen being stuck in he middle of it. So I had to call Elliot and say it wasn't going to happen. Highly unprofessional, but what did I know? The etiquette of booking was not exactly something I had experience with. Certainly Elliot was bummed by such crapola and in retrospect it's a damn shame he wasn't there - or Zorn, or any number of avant loft jazz improv cats. Whatever, it was loose, and it all just happened. Me, Kim, Anne, Josh and Barbara Ess sat around White Columns daily and had fun just coming up with ideas. Barbara did a t-shirt design, flyers were made, sometimes in editions of one. There was a main poster which went through two permutations as the roster was adjusted. Some staple zine catalogue of the art show which I don't even recall (Lee says he has one). I tried to get some of the new first generation hardcore bands but they were so young they couldn't seem to dial the phone. I liked the Beastie Boys who had done a couple of gigs around the art world but they were way scattered. But their friends the Primitives responded and they became the representatives of that scene. They were amazing in their very unschooled attack. The 14 year old lead singer with a mohawk had a lot to say about Ronald Reagan. Innocent times.
Lester Bangs called me from a phone booth and said he wanted to write about Noise Fest because if there was one thing he knew about it was noise. I invited him down, not only to see the bands, but for himself to play. I told him he could do anything he wanted. He was billed on the last night, on the makeshift marquee outside, as The Lester Bangs Explosion. He showed up after we had locked the doors of the gallery and were strolling east on Spring St., really young and lost in the glory of what went down the entire time. I recognized him as he came galomping down the street, he had a record under his arm. "Lester! it's over! Yr too late!" all smiles. He seemed a little inebriated but certainly not fall down drunk. He was real happy about the record he had just got: A Taste of DNA. He loved DNA. I was impressed, we walked together towards somewhere, Lester split to god knows where.
Anne DeMarinis taped everything, or at least almost everything (John Rehberger's music was performed off a boat just down the street on the Hudson River). Josh had a connection with Rosetta Brooks at ZG Magazine, a new UK contempo-art essay zine and ZG agreed to release the tapes as a cassette. When Branca started up Neutral Records, Sonic Youth were his first release. Plus I got asked to work there calling distributors and stores to see if they'd carry our records. I was replaced by a UK refugee from Rough Trade called Peter Wright who had a much better handle on such biz. I just wanted to rock. One of the last things I did at Neutral was distribute the Noise Fest cassette. I remember we had them all in a big garbage bag. I would haul the bag from record store to record store - there weren't that many - maybe ten stores at the most - some of them took one or two on consignment. The rest I gave to the artists and to whoever wanted one. I kept one for myself which I lost for years but finally found. I think I have the Barbara Ess t-shirt buried somewhere though it's been ages since I've peeped it. If the Noise Fest did anything it brought noise home to the artist punks who utilized it. The downtown art/music scene was activated and energized by it and a certain collective camaraderie was established. A lot of us still maintain good friends and memories from it. There was one weird band from Brooklyn called Fakir who had this really messed up sounding 7" which they brought in and asked if they could play. They were kind of young and hippiesh and how they came to find me in White Columns I'll never know. I said they could play and they were awesome, odd and sensual, as opposed to some of the mostly stringent angularities being projected by the Soho heavy squad (tho Glenn B and yeh Kim G had complete boner popping stylez). I wonder whatever happened to those kids. Anyone know?
thurston moore 2005
Sonic Youth - Live at Noise Fest '81 If this doesn't sound like the Sonic Youth you're used to, it's because Lee Ranaldo and Steve Shelley had yet to suit up. The inclusion of Anne DeMarinis and the experimental bent of this fledgling quartet left them with a feline no-wavey bounce undistinguished from other bands of that era. But not too long thereafter the shredding commenced. GripperThe Primitives - Live at Noise Fest '81 Moore mentions the 14 year old lead singer in his piece above. Pretty good hardcore racket for a buncha politically aware teenagers. Fakir - Live at Noise Fest '81 Possibly the best recording to emerge from this Noise summit in terms of both fidelity and substance. Some serious paranoid feedback cityscapes married to disorienting synth bloops and squiggles.
posted by Miguel |
10/07/2005
Liquid Liquid Revisited
I remember a couple years ago having a cigarette in front of Max Fish, waiting for some friends to show up. The Lower East Side was gentrified then too, but at this point it was still riddled with basement practice spaces for bands, and you'd occasionally have to step over a stray amp or watch for open cellar doors. So I'm waiting and I hear a familiar bassline. Melle Mel's "White Lines". But it's not some dot com DJ practicing, it's an actual band. For fuck's sake, is that a perfect imitation of Liquid Liquid's "Cavern"? Is this the final gasping of the discopunk endgame, just forgo writing original songs and become a 99 Records cover band?
After a few minutes they stopped and started up "Cavern" all over again. Still waiting outside, it dawned on me that the facsimile was so good it must actually be them. Sure enough, six months later Liquid Liquid announced they got back together and played sporadic dates in NYC and overseas.
Twitch is such a fan he named his Optimo party after a song of theirs. I still can't find "Dig We Must", but a "Flextone" reissue came out this summer with remixes by Twitch and Brennan Green (another Banana Nutrament favorite).
By now I'm used to getting scooped by Fluxblog or 20 Jazz Funk Greats. But scooped by a Norweigan pop sprite? Just before putting this up I see Annie has included it on her Annie DJ Kicks mix. Looks like a promising track listing.
posted by Miguel |
10/05/2005
Black Metal Chat Room
Far be it from me to try to steal any thunder away from The Black Metal Dialogues (via Gumbyfresh), but every now and then, when I need a lighter moment, I troll Black Metal chatrooms. I don't even have to do much, these people unintentionally write funnier stuff than I ever could:
[Eisenfaust] has someone listened to the new Hellfucked album? [ATA] Anybody heard the new Akercocke? [MTIRD] analcunt [infernal vulture] ugliness shall be endeth [UglinessAndSecretions] you know what anus cunt is? [23DeadRosicrucians] I got the new akercocke [--Etoile noirE--] ackercoke argh is a big shit [UglinessAndSecretions] hey, whats you problem man? [i*am*the*black*wizards] we are children of odin and thor [Odd-Einar] u deny humans conquered the world? [infernal vulture] rats are sucessful creatures, yet eagles are near extinction [sven hoek] hahaahah [melrick] some aliens are creaters of life in the galaxy [sven hoek] and they are extradimensional entities [melrick] some aliens are daemons [sven hoek] aliens are gods [Odd-Einar] scientology is insane, cause they say aliens landed on Hawaii 7 million years ago, but the problem is that Hawaii didnt exist at that time [sven hoek] scientology is a money making scheme [infernal vulture] all is just a fucking jewish conspiracy [23DeadRosicrucians] L Ron Hubbard belonged to a sex magick cult in Florida in the 30s before he started scientology [Alex Schwarz] Satan is like Darth Vader or something [Odd-Einar] nobody listens to your feeble illogic views on nature/ humanity [sorrowtears] aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh [23DeadRosicrucians] the world as a whole has never been ready to accept enlightenment... those who cant understand it have always tried to destroy those who do... [UglinessAndSecretions] black metal man does not want to believe...he wants to disbelieve and destroy! [Odd-Einar] humans are better than animals thats an universal truth [UglinessAndSecretions] how is that a universal truth..? [noisebastard] animals dont eat mcdonalds and listen to Eminem [Odd-Einar] nobody will manage to kill Varg,he's so powerful and true, a real necrokult frostbitten bastard, krieg as hell [banananutrament.blogspot.com] can anyone recommend any Christian friendly Black Metal bands? [VikingligrVeldi] are you kidding? [SuSa] lol [SuSa] christian black metal = ass shit [NocturnoC] lol [Alex Schwarz] there is no such thing, banana nutrament [BuriedTemporarily] yeah there is [Lord of Tears] Christ's Womb is good [BuriedTemporarily] white metal [NocturnoC] lol [VikingligrVeldi] how about "Cut Your Flesh and Worship Satan"? [Alex Schwarz] it's not black metal then [Pure_Hatred] Black metal is Antichristian, it is like asking for satanic gospel [NocturnoC] then it isnt black metal [Alex Schwarz] well, black metal is the satanic gospel [Pure_Hatred] Try Satanic Slaughter, banananutrament, they are pretty christian [NocturnoC] try antichrist 666, good christian black metal [Pure_Hatred] or Impaled Nazarene [ShieldMaiden] no he shall try Archgoat [Alex Schwarz] Setherial is a good christian band [Pure_Hatred] Diabolis Arising [CrepuscolarWhisper] don't forget Havohej, songs about God's love, flowers, coloured birds and etc...
Right click "Save As" or "Save Link As" to hear music. All mp3s
will be up for a limited
time and are for sampling purposes only. If you are the artist or copyright holder and
would like a track removed, e-mail
nutramentmike`@`gmail.com and we will do so ASAP. Support artists making a living with
their music.
