Wednesday, August 26, 2009

The Boston Typewriter Orchestra


Does what it says on the tin: polyrhythmic percussion music with no other instruments, almost no singing, music tracks interspersed with intentionally banal office chatter ("How was your weekend?") for "Office Space"-like satirical effect. They even redact the Surfari's "Wipe Out" into "Whiteout." Funny, but with compelling rhythms.

Non-musical objects turned into musical instruments is a fascinating phenomenon. This got me thinking: when was the last time I used a typewriter? Does anyone (besides 80-year-olds?) Which makes this another fine example of artists recycling industrial society's waste.

Boston Typewriter Orchestra - "Pyramid Scheme"


8 comments:

Simon Hayes Budgen said...

Who still uses typewriters? The New York Police Department - they spent about a million dollars on them:

http://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2009/07/13/NYPD-typewriter-bill-nearly-1-million/UPI-84461247519064/

Andrei said...

this is pure genious

Anonymous said...

very cool and sensual!

Konrad Useo said...

Thanks for posting.I like it.

Mr Fab said...

Funny stuff, Simon, thx for the link. Wow, even MANUAL typewriters?! The NYPD should jam on these tunes.

Anonymous said...

Hey,are those electric or acoustic typewriters?

-- endwar

James B. said...

Reminds me a little of a Man . . .or Astro-Man? song called "a simple text file." the entire tune was a dot matrix printer printing out a text file. They would do it on tour, when they could get the printer to work.

Anonymous said...

Wow! It's BTO - Boston Typewriter Orchestra. LOL!