HAPPY BIRTHDAY, RADIOPHONIC WORKSHOP

BBC's Radiophonic Workshop, pioneers of electronic music & sound effects, would have been 50 years old this month if the Beeb hadn't dismantled it ten years ago. No matter - celebrations are afoot, such as plans for a boxed cd set, and:

this great article and video revealing how, among other things, a lampshade became an integral part of electronic music history.

The bad news: the recent death of the Radiophonic Workshop's Tristram Cary: "...credited by some as the father of tape music, originating tape music techniques in World War II. He’s notorious to the general public and sci fi fans as the composer of the music for the Daleks (pictured above, with pug) in Doctor Who (along with other music) — like an evil counterpart to Delia Derbyshire, who built the studio Cary would later use."

Tristram Cary "Trios" (excerpt) - from 1971; performers rolled dice to determine what parts they would play.

Bebe Barron, another pre-Moog great, also died recently. "The 1956 sci-fi thriller Forbidden Planet was the first major motion picture to feature an all-electronic film score — a soundtrack that predated synthesizers and samplers. It was like nothing the audience had seen — or heard. The composers were two little-known and little-appreciated pioneers in the field of electronic music, Louis and Bebe Barron." From the score to Forbidden Planet:

Love at the Swimming Hole - a romantic ballad
Battle With The Invisible Monster

I've always been a fan of the "Forbidden Planet" soundtrack (I taped it off the tv years ago) but have never seen any other recordings by them. Are there any? Supposedly they scored some short avant-garde films, but I couldn't find them on the YouTubes. However, you can see:

Sukho Lee of one of my fave local (Los Angeles) bands Seksu Roba, performing a boss tribute to "Forbidden Planet" to mark it's 50th anniversary on his tricked-out theremin.

And, right on time, Boston's dj BC has just released a dandy on-line remix/mashup tribute to the pioneers of electronic music called

"Art Raps"

which actually tames these notoriously abstract sounds by looping them into something approaching head-nodding accessibility, such as this take on Hugh Le Caine's 1955 piece:

djBC: Dripsody (remix)

Terry Riley, Jon Hassel, and others also get the treatment.

CURL ACTIVATE! Novelty Hip-Hop 12" Singles of the '80s

I was reading a story in the LA Times last week about a plane crash in Compton, and the photo of a witness to the crash caught my eye - what was that on his shirt? As you can see, it wasn't something suitable for a family newspaper. Good eye, Times editors!

I bet that guy would like these records. I sure do. They're pure low-budget fun, thoroughly funky and danceable, and blissfully uncool - not a cliche-spouting bling-bling gangsta in sight. Here's an album's worth of novelty/oddball hip-hop/funk 12" from the Jheri Curl era that I ripped from vinyl:

CURL ACTIVATE! (zippyshare link) 
CURL ACTIVATE! (divshare link)


1. Deryl With The Curl & DJ Curl Activator: "Curl Activate" (Jam-Kru Records) - samples George Clinton "Atomic Dog"
2. Akeem "The Dream" Olajuwon: "The Unbeatable Dream" (Las Vegas Records 1986) - Basketball star Olajuwon is saluted and contributes a few heavily-accented vocals; a shoe company is credited with co-executive producer - the lyrics mentions the shoe brand name three times; Dazz Band/Gap Band-type groove by the sports-obsessed Hurt 'em Bad, who is featured elsewhere in this collection with a football song. He also recorded a song about boxing, but that's if we ever get to volume two.
3. The Rappin Reverend Dr. C. Dexter Wise, III: "The Original Rap" (Fantasy Records, 1987) - Nice backing vox by The Heydons; Dr. Wise's brother Raymond is responsible for the one-guy-with-an-electronic-keyboard -and-drum-machine production. Holy hell, this is funny.
4. Chunky A: "Owww!" (MCA, 1989) - Comedian/talk show host Arsenio Hall's chubby musical alter ego. This spoof of Cameo's "Word Up" is really well produced, as opposed to the private-press primitivism of much of these other platters.
5. Chick Hearn: "Rap Around" (Outpost, 1986) - Basketball's greatest announcer gets sampled by Dave Bloom and Dave Gillerman, whoever they are. When I was a kid, I thought this record was genius.
6. Hurt Em Bad & The S.C. Band: "Monday Night Football" (Profile, 1982) - Zapp-like music, complete with vocoder.
7. Mac The Rapper: "What Is Love" (Shinola, 1987) - Featuring a computer's text-to-speech program, by Bob Mithoff, a soundtrack composer for the infamous Troma Film company ("Surf Nazis Must Die," "Class of Nuke 'em High," etc)
8. The Wilson Sisters & Speedy D: "The Magic Man" (Positive Music, 1988) - Yet another sports tribute, this one to Earvin "Magic" Johnson of the Los Angeles Lakers, the dominant team of the '80s. Record has no info, but came with a bumper sticker.
9. Rich Little: "Presidents Rap" (Broadway, 1982) - No, the veteran comic impressionist isn't rapping - these are a few Reagan-inspired comedy sketches set over music that swipes from the Tom Tom Club's 1981 classic "Genius of Love."
10. The Coach: "Take It To The Hoop" (Zuma Jay, 1984) - Another basketball-inspired song from Los Angeles. As you may have figured by now, Laker fever swept LA in the '80s. Music by the unlikely Dennis Dragon of popular New Wave club band The Surf Punks. Wait, it gets even weirder - Dennis' brother Daryl, the "Captain" of '70s EZ listening superstars The Captain & Tennille plays synth!
11. Gerty Molzen: "Walk On The Wild Side" (10 Records, 1985) - The then-79 year old German screen star and opera/classical singer covers Lou Reed in a heavy accent, as an uncredited rapper throws in random quotes from Whodini's "Haunted House of Rock" and Grandmaster Flash's "New York, New York." Truly the reason why the letters "WTF" were invented. I saw her do this on "David Letterman" when this record came out. Instead of singing "doot da-doot" for when the colored girls sing, she sang something like "zabidy-doe, zabidy-doe." For a few shows later, Dave would ask his bandleader Paul Shaffer, "I'm in the mood for some Lou Reed. Can you play a little Lou Reed?" and they'd play a tape of Gerty singing "zabidy-doe, zabidy-doe." No, it's not on YouTube - I checked.
12. The Fat Boys: "Chillin With The Refrigerator" (Sutra, 1985) - Our final sports tribute, from one of the most popular rap groups of the '80s, The Fat Boys, featuring the late great Human Beat-Box. I was shocked to find that their albums are all out of print - they had four albums that went gold or platinum. Their subject here is football star William "The Refrigerator" Perry.
13. Bobby Jimmy & The Critters: "N.Y./LA Rappers" (Ruthless, 1988) - Another comedic rap group whose albums are sadly out of print; Bobby Jimmy (The Weird Al of rap) was Russ Parr, the morning dj on Compton's legendary KDAY - at the time, America's only 24/7 rap station. In fact, I'm sure that's were I first heard this. Produced by Dr. Dre for Eazy-E's label. Bobby Jimmy & The Critters had a string of popular rap parodies that were actually almost mainstream successes. The Ice T "Colors" parody on this one is particularly hilarious.

Words And Music For The Now Generation

Imagine Mrs. Miller fronting The Shaggs...

"Love...Wider Than The Ocean" is a 1972 private pressing by Mas & Hope Kawashima, two Japanese-Americans who sing and play their own hymns on side one. This one's my fave, clunky rhymes over primitive piano:

Mas & Hope Kawashima - "The Road of Life"

Quothe the liner notes: "Following the trend of the current Jesus Movement, these new, original songs express the feelings of young people searching for something to believe in and to hope for. The words and music are written for the Now Generation with their concerns for love, pollution, ecology, war, racial tensions and frustrations of living in a technological age."

Though perhaps not as charming as "The Road to Live," this tune is of interest for it's sheer ineptness: ham-fisted guitar, lyrics that don't scan - I literally cannot make either rhyme or reason out of this one:

Mas & Hope Kawashima - "Demonstrate, Demonstrate Your Faith" - advice for the student protesters

Side two finds them massacring the classics - in Japanese. Beethoven gets such an overhaul that maybe Captain Beefheart should do it and call it "Owed T'Joy" (har har!)

Mas & Hope Kawashima - "Ode To Joy"

The address listed on the back cover: 666 (!?!) NW 4th Ave., Ontario, OR.



Big thanks to li'l bro Paul Fab!

Raphi Does "She Blinded Me With Science"

From YouTube: "My nine-year-old son was diagnosed with autism at age three... and is completely nuts about 80s hi-tech musical wiz Thomas Dolby. Here he does his version of TD's biggest hit...on pretend instruments he made himself, and doing percussion, vocals and all instruments orally."

I recorded the mp3 off the video. It's a great performance, full of uninhibited energy, and is actually quite accurate - I swear he knows all the lyrics. Recording quality's not great, but that's not his fault.

Raphi "She Blinded Me With Science" (video)
Raphi "She Blinded Me With Science" (mp3)

MARCH MASHUP MADNESS

New Illegal music, if you're in the mood for

Groovy '60s Lounge A-Go-Go:
DJ Magnet "Shop Around If You're Horny" - Fantastic mix of Tweet, Smokey Robinson, even the Sonics' "Have Love Will Travel" from this Denver dude, all served over a big beat.

Chill:
Phil RetroSpector "Beatlemania" Even if you're tired of the Beatles, check out this Philip Glass/Fab Four combo; utterly unlikely, but works a treat. Mr RetroSpector is an early contender for Rookie of the Year on the internet scene.

Novelty:
RIAA: "Chicken Slacks" Sam Cooke dances with a chicken, as "Twistin The Night Away" meets Ray Stevens' henhouse version of "In The Mood." As silly as it gets.

Surrealism:
RIAA: "Running With The Devil Bunnies" Van Halen's "Running With The Devil" meets Twink The Toy Piano Band's "Hoppity Jones" (and a bit of a '40s kiddie record by Al Trace and his Silly Symphonists), and various hallucinatory sound effects; this is the sound of you losing your mind.

Keepin' it surreal, homies...

MARCH MAMBO MADNESS

Mr Mambo himself, Cachao, died recently. The mambo is one of those things that's been around for so long that it's hard to believe that someone actually invented it, and that this person was living amongst us until very recently. But he was. I had the good fortune of seeing Cachao perform live a couple of times: once, he performed a few tunes on piano - his usual instrument was bass - including an incredible version of "Guantanamera" (are there any bad versions?) that was pure old-school Cubano ala Ruben Gonzalez of Buena Vista Social Club fame. I also attended a big all-star Latin music tribute to the still-smokin' octogenarian at the Universal Ampitheater hosted by actor Andy Garcia, the dude responsible for the exhilarating '90s recording "Ahora Si" from whence comes this sizzling descarga:

Cachao: Queja africana, protesta abakua

Both Soul-Sides and Beware of the Blog posted songs of his that I was gonna post, complete with erudite, educational text. But do they have as many goofy '50s/'60s mambo novelty records as I do? I thought not. So, as a M4M tribute to el maestro:

Mickey Katz: "My Yiddishe Mambo" - ripped from out-of-print vinyl.
Bill Haley & His Comets: "Mambo Rock" - from "Rock Around The Clock"
Dean Martin "Mambo Italiano" - from "Dino: The Essential Dean Martin"
Perez Prado: "Cuban Rock" - from the King of the Mambo's groovy '60s-a-go-go album "Mambo Rock" comes this baffling psychedelic meltdown.

Buenos noches, maestro...

HAPPY ZOMBIE DAY 2008!

It's the merriest time of year - that annual celebration of rebirth, renewal, resurrection. Some call it Easter, but we call it...Zombie Day! Jesus might be the most famous fellow to rise from the grave and walk amongst the living, but he certainly wasn't the last. 'Tis the season for getting together with family & friends, gathering around the tv and watching "Night of the Living Dead" again. Or maybe "Dead Alive" or "Shaun of the Dead" for a more "modern" non-traditional celebration. I'm hoping for Zombie Day greeting cards, parties, TV specials, etc. There are plenty of Zombie Day Carols to sing as you stroll (or lurch) from door to door, bringing holiday cheer to your neighbors, starting off with two bona-fide classics:

The Cramps: "Zombie Dance" - the all-time punkabilly zombie favorite, from their classic 1980 album "Songs The Lord Taught Us."

Jan Davis: "Watusi Zombie" - faux African voodoo drums and tribal chanting, crazed surf guitars - truly one of the greatest '60s instrumentals ever. From Boss Guitar!

The Magics: "Zombie Walk" - groovy '60s girl-group action; from the essential "DOO WOP HALLOWEEN"

Zombie Girl: "Jesus Was A Zombie" - contemporary Canadian group delivers a song truly in the spirit of the season, a Gary Glitter/Alice Cooper "School's Out" stomp with an electro twist.

Here's wishing a very merry Zombie Day to you and yours on this most joyous holiday season.

RUTLEMANIA!

Monday night at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood I saw the Rutles - no, not just the 1978 film "All You Need Is Cash" (though they showed that too) but the actual original foursome. As a huge Python/Rutles/Bonzos fan from childhood, I just about fell off my chair when I read the Rutles were back - the Pre-Fab Four! A legend that will last a lunchtime. A millstone in pop music history.

The hilarious and musically spot-on Beatles parody band, which started as a sketch on an Eric Idle post-Python TV series, has strangely taken on a life of it's own with a series of Rutles tribute shows in LA and New York featuring Beatles impersonaters The Fab Four covering Rutles songs, mixed with video clips and live theater - yup, not the real Rutles but an incredible simulation. A bit confusing, isn't it? As the ads say, "Nostalgia for something that never existed."

Rutlemania! Through the 21st in Hollywood, then 4 more shows in New York.

Eric Idle and Neil Innes are working togther again, some 33 years after they first unleashed the Rutles on the world via the short-lived series "The Rutland Weekend News." A companion album, "The Rutland Weekend Songbook" is out-of-print, never on CD (except an obscure Japanese pressing), but thanks to Mrs Fab's copy she brought back from England years ago, we can now hear the original versions of songs that later appeared on proper Rutles albums, like:

"I Must Be In Love" - complete with the screams of Rutlemaniacs.

"Children of Rock'n'Roll/Startime" - 50 seconds or so of what would later be "See How The Good Times Roll."

Other non-Rutles related, but still quite good songs from the album:

"Accountancy Shanty/Football" - Years before it's appearance in the 1983 Python film "The Meaning of Life," here's the original pirate's shanty about high finance on the high seas, then a goof on soccer/football 'ooligans.

"Protest Song" - wicked Dylan parody; Innes performed this onstage with Python. But not at Che Stadium (which was named after Cuban guerilla leader Che Stadium.)

"Communist Cooking"/"Johnny Cash Live at Mrs Fletchers"
"24 Hours in Tumbridge Wells/The Fabulous Bingo Brothers/In Concrete" - parodies of: the Sinatra/Gene Kelly musical "On The Town," aged vaudvillians, modern rock.
"I Give Myself To You" performed by the Alberto Vascetomy Singers.
"Song O' The Insurance Men/Closedown"

And more HERE, courtesy of the I'm Learning To Share blog, including the Stevie Wonder-goes-to-the-laundromat funk of "Front Loader," and the new disco move "The Hard To Get."

And surviving members of the Bonzo Dog Band released a reunion album last December, but that's for another time. Ouch!

CANINUS - Dogs Sing Heavy Metal

Caninus are a Brooklyn based metal band who say about their music: "Vocals are executed by two pit bull terriers. Both were rescued days before euthanization from refuges. Caninus - all strict vegans. It has come time really to allow the animals to have their say."

Caninus: "Victim In Pain"

Metal is funny. I didn't used to think so. I used to hate it as a kid before eventually realizing how hilariously kitschy much of it is and started enjoying it on that level. Of course, I wasn't the first - metal has to be the most satirized music in history. But most metal satire isn't, like "Spinal Tap," focused on the music. It's target is the fans. Think "Beavis & Butthead," "Wayne's World," "Bill & Ted" etc. And that is key to metal's camp appeal - the fans take it so seriously. Anyone else who samples dog barks would just play it like a goofy novelty record, like the Singing Dog's "Jingle Bells." But the utter sincerity of headbangers, the straight-faced psuedo-political justification of something so ridiculous - now THAT'S funny!

Caninus: "United States of Emergency"
Caninus: "Brindle Is As Brindle Does"

GIRLS ROCK

"Girls Rock" is a documentary film opening in limited release tonight about a music camp for young girls. They form bands and write songs - in one week. "It doesn't have to be polished" they're told, and with genuine rockers like Carrie Brownstein of the band Sleater/Kinney coaching the kids, you get some real Shaggs-gone-punk moments of musical loveliness, like this one featuring Palace (pictured), an 8-year old hellion, on lead vocals:

Palace: "San Francisco Sucks Sometimes"

Another furious rocker finds a moppet declaiming, "With every passing day/It becomes clearer to me/That the only way to live/Is with nature's beauty/and harmoneeeeeey!"

The Bookworms: "The World Becoming A Wasteland"

"We'll Destroy Our Destination" slows things down to an atonal, rhythm-less grind.

Some critics bemoan the film's heavy-handed girls-as-victim messages sprinkled throughout the film. Perhaps the filmmakers thought that simply showing these gals singing and playing their hearts out wouldn't be enough justification for a film...

PLAY AN ON-LINE TOY PIANO!

HERE! Clink on the keys with your mouse and go plink plink plink. If you record anything with it, let me know.

Courtesy of French composer Pascal Ayerbe.

SPOOKY SOUNDS FROM SPACE 2: Meteor Shower

Here's another absolutely fascinating bit of spooky space sounds, courtesy of a blog call ShortWaveMusic, which, as you may have guessed, features music recorded off short wave radio transmissions. Middle Eastern tunes seem to be a favorite. But one recording captured the August 12, 2005 edition of the annual Perseid meteor shower over the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama: "As each meteor produced a trail of ionized gases, it produced an extremely short-lived ionospheric "placebo," ricocheting radio waves back to Earth." This being short-wave, haunting voices from other frequencies bleed through, and the sound phases in and out. The result is 7 minutes of dense, swirling, trippy madness.

Meteor shower radio waves

SPOOKY SOUNDS FROM SPACE

Among the "sounds of space" collected by University of Iowa instruments: the eerie sounds and bizarre features of Saturn's radio emissions captured by the Cassini spacecraft. Whooshing winds and theremin-ish wails - I love it because it sounds exactly like what I think outer space should sound like.

Saturn radio emissions

Thinking of sampling this stuff? Legendary composer Terry Riley beat you to it: the ubiquitous Kronos Quartet sometimes performs his 2002 piece "Sun Rings" using some of these sounds. Couldn't find any recording info, therefore I unfortunately cannot direct you to a cd. So just play a Sun Ra album and these sounds at the same time.

BY REQUEST: WHAT'S POLISH FOR CREEPY?

By request, I've re-upped the mp3 of bizarro '60s Polish soundtrack music

here.


In other news: Thanks to WFMU for making us one of their favorite music blogs, and hello new readers!

THE PLAYER PIANO PROJECT

Last week, I attended a concert on the campus of USC that featured new music written for that century-old oddity, the player piano. Before recordings were popular, folks bought a player piano, which was as real and playable as any piano, put it in the living room, inserted a pre-punched roll of paper and, voila! The latest rag, boogie-woogie, or Tin Pan Alley hit was automatically performed, keys pounding away like an invisible man was playing.

So what's a player piano concert like? Someone puts in a piano roll, and you watch the piano play itself. The organizer, Veronika Krausas, apparently thought that this would be too uninteresting, so she asked her acrobat friends from Circe de Soleil to change the rolls, throwing in some acrobatics along the way. And a (seemingly under-rehearsed) bluegrass band played occasionally as well. A couple artsy black-and-white silent short films played during some of the music. I don't think Ms. Krausas was trying to be weird, but the surreal combination of these elements certainly added up to a real head-scratcher of an evening.

She had nothing to worry about. It was actually quite fascinating to watch the piano play itself - some songs created geometric patterns on the keyboard, and compositions that simply could not be played by humans could be dazzling both visually and musically. Don't have any video unfortunately, but I bought the CD "The Player Piano Project" that featured all the works performed that night, such as this dizzying demolition of John William's "Raiders of the Lost Ark" theme:

Ceiri Torjussen "Raiders March"

The big name featured was James Tenney, who died in 2006, but not before creating this incredible piece. It starts slowly and deliberately, then builds to an increasingly astonishing chaotic crescendo. Whew!

James Tenney: "Spectral CANON For CONLON Nancarrow"

Yes, electronics can also be used to make impossible-to-perform music, but hearing (and seeing) it coming from an acoustic, and usually predictable, instrument like the piano is different, like seeing a doll possessed by demons come to life and start talking to you.

So who was this Conlon Nancarrow? Why, only the granddaddy of creative player piano abuse. Throughout his long 20th century career he, more then anyone else, revealed the artistic possibilities of an instrument most others had long since relegated to the antique store.

Conlon Nancarrow - "Study For Player Piano # 21" - Absolute insanity; makes my head swim in the best possible way.

From the album "Player Piano 3: Conlon Nancarrow Vol. 2 - Studies 13-32"

"Risque, Illicit and Adult"

"Risque, Illicit and Adult" is RIAA's 2007 collection - single tracks, compilation cuts, and miscellany, including such nuttiness as The Violent Femmes "Blister In The Sun" mixed with "Smoke on the Water." Not the Deep Purple original, but Senor Coconut's kooky electro-Latin version.

RIAA: "Risque, Illicit and Adult"

1. I Wanna Be Your Girlfriend
2. Smoke on the Sun
3. Smells like your Muddah
4. Sexy Pipeline
5. sshhaakkee yyoouurruummpp
6. Everytime You Touch Titties
7. Pacifica Fish Dance
8. Revelation Fever
9. Down at Mississippi
10. The Harder They Party
11. Candy Enema Shok
12. (Models Gotta) Fight For Their Right (To Mambo)
13. Coming To Get Bloodstains
14. Wake Me Up When Sept 11 Ends
15. Mind Control CIA
16. Guess I'm Falling Into Bubbles
17. Walking on the Moog
18. Gristle Calypso
19. Lord Only Knows (with People Like Us)

TRACK SOURCES: 1. Avril Lavigne vs The Rubinoos 2. Senor Coconut vs Violent Femmes 3. Alan Sherman vs Nirvana 4. Lords of Acid vs The Chantays 5. Beastie Boys vs Reuben Wilson 6. Gravy Train!!! vs Moby vs Rusty Warren 7. Chemical Brothers vs Los Straitjackets 8. Peggy Lee vs Son House 9. Howlin Wolf vs. Violator & Doughbelly Stray 10. Manu Dibango vs Rocker's Revenge 11. Village People vs Wayne Newton (title is an anagram of "Danke Shoen" and "YMCA." ) 12. Beastie Boys vs Tito Puente vs Kraftwerk 13. Agent Orange vs The Who Boys 14. Rudolph Giuliani vs Green Day vs Nader (winner of the Remix Rudy contest!) 15. Stone Roses, Curtis Mayfield, The Last Poets vs tv documentary "Mind Control: America's Secret War" 16. Velvet Underground vs U.S. Army Airborne 17. The Police vs Fred Weinberg 18. Throbbing Gristle vs Kon Tiki steel drum band 19. George Harrison vs Beach Boys vs My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult (with People Like Us)
Additional beats and sounds: RIAA
Artwork by Shag

CAR TUNES

Who's in the Music For Maniacs parking lot?

The Car Music Project: Believe it or not, sounds produced are made using automotive parts. Guitars, bass, even what sounds like a sax is done by blowing thru tubes: "Noodles Test Mix 1"
Wendy Chambers: Back in the early '80s, this New Yorker invented the Car Horn organ, which is exactly what you think it is. She plays popular favorites like Christmas standards, "New York, New York" and "The Star Spangled Banner."
The La Drivers Union Por Por Group - From Ghana, Africa comes this album of music made by taxi drivers using parts from their vehicles - not the modern electric horns Ms. Chambers uses, tho. They still use honk-horns. Car Horns Unplugged? "Por Por Horn to Horn Fireworks." Throw in some singing, chanting, and auto-part percussion along with the horns, and you got

"Otsokobila."

I'm sure most of you know who Negativland is, but a survey of car music isn't complete without a mention of their 2002 album "Deathsentences of the Polished & Structurally Weak," which not only made electronically-processed music from wrecked cars found in junk yards, but also included a booklet of objects found in the actual cars. Unnerving.

"Only You Can Rock Me."

Happy motoring!

Request: The Politics of Dancing

Okay, you masochists, you asked for it, you got it: By request, I'm re-upping the painful patriotic polyphony of

John Ashcroft, and

Orrin Hatch

It is election season here in the USA after all. But the greatest release by an American politico would have to be Arnold Schwarzenegger's workout album, where he shouts out commands and encouragement over such songs as

"It's Raining Men" - Uh, who's the girly-man, Ahnold?



Thanks, WFMU!

Do The Funky Didgeridoo

I've always been fascinated by non-Western approaches to Western pop. I could write entire books on Nigerian funk, Cambodian rock, Eastern European rap, Antarctic death-metal, etc. I thought I'd heard it all, but this bizarre, wonderful recording of a native Australian performing a funky James Brown tribute is a new one to me.

The didgeridoo is a traditional Australian Aborigine wind instrument that's considered to be one of the oldest instruments in the world. It's groany sound is pretty weird to begin with, but it's usually only used in traditional musics, or by hippies. Tjupurru, however, is clearly no traditionalist - hippie/folkies might be distressed by his use of a "Didjeribone," which slides "through different notes and tones - a cross between a didj and a trombone."

Furthermore, he plays through a "sensor implanted inside his mouth. With the addition of sampling and electronic effects, Tjupurru has enabled himself to perform as a one man band creating live samples and looping them."

Well, Tjupurru is an Aborigine himself, so he has as much of a right to mess with a sacred traditional instrument as anyone, I suppose.

Tjupurru: "Unkol James Brown" - Play this for funky hip-hoppers, and watch big question marks appear over their heads.

LEAGUE OF ROBOT MUSICIANS

The League of Electronic Musical Urban Robots.

Sounds like something out of a comic book, eh? But it's a real, Brooklyn-based organization that create ..."exotic, sculptural musical instruments which integrate robotic technology. LEMUR's philosophy is to build robots that are new types of musical instruments, as opposed to animatronic robots that play existing instruments. LEMUR's growing ensemble includes over 50 robotic instruments."

That odd object you see pictured is the GuitarBot. The four strings can be controlled separately, picking and sliding to create a sound that, indeed, would never be confused with a "real" guitar. Unfortunately, there's only one recording available on their site (and no CDs for sale), and it gets cut off:

Joshua Fried: "EmergencyBot"

To really get an idea of the wonder of these instruments, check out the videos. The vid on the bottom left is a "performance" of George Antheil's 1924 composition "Ballet Mecanique" using a veritable robot orchestra. I counted at least 14 player pianos alone. "Ballet Mecanique" was originally scored to include airplane propeller, not used here, but player pianos are certainly appropriate for this kind of group - they're among the oldest surviving forms of self-played musical instruments, dating back to the late 1800s, and have been used by avant-pranksters practically ever since.

VAMPIRA

Heath Ledger? Who!? The real tragedy that rocked my Hollywood was the recent death of Vampira. TV's original horror host, Ed Wood starlet, inspiration for this groovy slab of 1958 rockabilly:

Vampira

by Bobby Bare, whose late '50 rock recordings weren't very commercially successful, but was a fixture on the country charts in the '60s and '70s. I'd say this is his best song, were it not for the fact that he also recorded that Klassic Kountry Kristian football goof "Dropkick Me Jesus (Through The Goalposts Of Life)," a 1976 Grammy nominee!

JEWFACE

"The most offensive album ever made!"

Well, don't know about that, but "Jewface", a various-artists collection of vintage recordings, certainly is one Jewish stereotype after another, many seemingly perpetrated by Jewish performers themselves. These antiques, some dating back to 1905, were part of the ethnic stereotype humor that was wildly popular in the early days of recording. Apart from blackface minstrel shows (hence the album title) there was German, Irish, Italian, you-name-it, all performed with exaggerated accents and broad humor.

Some of these songs, like "When Mose With His Nose Leads The Band," are funny, but not in the way it's creator's intended - it's because they're just so awful! It's hard to believe this was mainstream American entertainment and that times have changed so much. But I don't think too many people will really be offended - it's all so good-natured and innocent, and we can't really judge the past by today's standards. And besides, this is such a fun tune:

Edward Meeker: "I'm A Yiddish Cowboy"

Speaking of offensive, here's an upbeat Ku Klux Klan march that makes the Klan seem like a wholesome patriotic organization mainly concerned with fighting Communism. Race isn't even mentioned! What a fine upstanding group of young men...

Johnny Rebel: "Stand Up and Be Counted"



Thanks to Spacebrother Greg for the Rebel yell (I don't even want to know where you got it!)

MORT GARSON R.I.P.

Very sad to read today that Mort Garson has died. As this LA Times article points out, Garson had plenty of mainstream success in the music biz, even co-writing a number one hit in 1963 (Ruby and the Romantics' "Our Day Will Come"), but is primarily remembered today for his bizarre '60s/'70s Moog synth records. There were lots of Moog-sploitation records being cranked out in those days, but what made Mort a strange-music superstar was his refusal to do too many cheezy remake records. Rather, like Dick Hyman and Perrey & Kingsley, he wrote most of his own material. Unlike most Moog-masters who preferred to let their instruments do all the talking, however, he also prominently featured vocalists.

"Electronic Hair Pieces" is the first album of his that I found, for 48 cents in the late '80s (it probably goes for at least 48 dollars now.) Selections from the "Hair" soundtrack done electro-stylee, it's the only Moog remake album of his that I know of. Liner notes by Tommy Smothers!

Mort Garson: Walking In Space

I think some of his best songwriting is on the "Wozard of Iz" Wizard of Oz-inspired concept album, with vocals by no less then Nancy Sinatra (recording under another name). The lyrics for this tune are a kind of beatnik anti-conformist spiel, but still relevant to today. This shouldn't work - someone who sounds like they're from the older generation trying to lay a hip rap on the kids could have been squares-ville, daddy. But it rocks.

Mort Garson: "Never Follow The Yellow Green Road"

I have a 45 of his from the soundtrack to Son of Blob (aka Beware! The Blob) that's also all-synths and rinky-dink early drum machines, but punctuated by breakdowns with screaming people, presumably being eaten by that pesky Blob.

The Blobs: Son of Blob

Garson also recorded albums with black-magic themes. I featured Mort's tune "The Unexplained" on the "Disco Sickness" collection I put together for the 365 Project. Electro-disco...in 1973? If that's not the definition of visionary, I don't know what is.

Mort Garson: "The Unexplained"

One of his albums, "Music For Sensuous Lovers," consisted of two side-long instrumentals featuring a woman's ostensibly erotic moans and groans. In a fittingly strange finale to a career steeped in strangeness, Garson's last album was music intended to be played for your plants. The record, "Plantasia," was given away by a mattress company. Okay...well, it was the '70s...

Mort Garson: Baby's Tears Blues

More Mort: Egg City Radio has six albums available here and here. Office Naps has singles he did with "The Time Zone" and "The Big Game Hunters."

He was writing music 'til the day he died: a suite about San Francisco. Let's hope it gets released.

O Nightingale!

Stop whatever you're doing, and listen to this song now:

O Nightingale

The uncredited female singer, accompanied only by piano, starts off like Mrs. Miller's evil stepmother. And that would have been good enough right there, but the explosive finale, which suggests Nina Hagen being tortured, is the greatest thing I've heard in ages. It comes to us courtesy of an amazing website called:

Those Unbelievable Believers: The Blessed Sounds of Incredible Christian Song Demos

that is nothing but, as you might have guessed, demos by aspiring songwriters/performers. Crudely produced songs by barely-talented would-be superstars have been clogging record company a&r mailboxes for decades, and this is truly the cream of the crap, er, crop. They're not all Christian songs, tho, like "O Nightingale" and this candidate for Worst Rap Song Of All Time:

"The Safe Sex Is Just a Fantasy Rap"

But all the tunes posted are worth a listen, like the heavily-accented Casio mess "Holy Jerusalem," the ludicrous, almost cartoonishly country-twangin' "Hot Summer Nights," the vocoder in "Come Back, America!" making the singer sound like a bad Barry White impersonator...

Just wish I knew the names of these performers so they could get the credit they deserve.

THE STALACPIPE ORGAN OF LURAY CAVERNS

Hail, Maniacs! Hope y'all had a weird holiday. I sure did - I visited the Museum of Jurassic Technology and bought an album of music made out of cave rock formations. But I'll get to all that later. First some announcements:

I won't be posting as much anymore, once a week probably. When I started this here web-log, there really weren't any other strange-music blogs. There was Basic Hip, which posted vintage vinyl (not necessarily strange), Comfort Stand, a net-label that featured some outsider-music and...that was about it. And now? Well, just check my links. I still think there's a place for M4M, though.

But to make up for the fewer amount of posts, I'll start adding pictures like everyone else. Deal?

I also won't be able to host songs indefinitely. Dodgy mp3 sites have been linking directly to me, generating thousands of hits in a brief period, which lead to my host shutting me down Christmas Eve (er, Merry Christmas to you, too, guys...), which lead to me removing all my mp3s. I'll still re-up tracks by your request, they just won't be up forever.

ANYWAY. The Great StalacPipe Organ, "The World's Largest Musical Instrument," is why we're all here today so let's get to it. Put on your lantern helmet and repel with me down into Luray Caverns, Virginia, where an engineer named Leland Sprinkle noticed that striking the cave's rock formations produced musical tones. So, in 1954, he conceived of an organ with little hammers that strike a hollow rock when the organ's keys are depressed. It's quite musical, though with a limited sonic palette. Rather then the usual pipe organ bombast, the Stalacpipe Organ is quiet, ghostly. The reverberating splashes of dripping water in the background sounds like sporadic electronic percussion, adding to the ambient feel.

Organist Monte Maxwell recorded a cd in 2001 called "Midnight in the Caverns" full of popular, classical, gospel, and patriotic standards played on the Organ, which you can only get at the Cavern's gift shop. Or at the gift shop of Los Angeles' legendary Museum of Jurassic Technology. The Museum is a must-visit if you're in LA, a moodily-lit series of winding hallways and strange displays that more resembles a Victorian cabinet of curiosities, or even one of P.T Barnum's exhibits, then any modern history or science museum.

Monte Maxwell: "Amazing Grace"

Older recordings can be heard here (the original 365 Project), and Week 15 of Tape Findings.

We Wish You A Scary Solstice

I'm taking some time off and will be returning in the new year. Thanks to all you great Maniacs out there - so much of what gets covered here comes from you, so keep them tips coming. And give yourselves a round of applause.

I'll leave you for the year with this really weird holiday number by some enthusiasts of early 20th century horror writer H.P. Lovecraft performed, for some reason, in the style of Tom Waits. If you wanted to hear a version of "The First Noel" with new lyrics regarding foul-smelling fish-people, well hey, merry Christmas!

H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society: "The Worst Hotel"

From their album "An Even Scarier Solstice," the sequel to the first album. Yes, two whole albums of Lovecraft-inspired Christmas music. As Louis sang, what a wonderful world.

PHONE RECORDING ARCHIVE

"Here are a bunch of phone company recordings that I have recorded off of my phone." What kind of, well, maniac would go to this much trouble? There's at least 200 here:

Phone Recording Archive

Including such standards as "Your call cannot be completed," "The number you dialed is not a working number," and that old sentimental favorite "Please deposit 25 cents." Fans of The Replacements will enjoy:

"Please hang up and try again"

Any creative re-mixers in da house?



Thanks again to sol!

365 Days - Borborygmi

My latest (and last) contribution to the quickly-winding-down 365 Project is a collection of songs by amateur singing doctors singing about hemorrhoids 'n' stuff. Hey, it was all for charity.

Borborygmi

FROM THE MIGHT-NOT-BE-MUSIC FILE...

...but is fascinating listening nonetheless, comes the Purrcast, a podcast consisting of nothing more then actual sounds of cats purring. Apart from functioning as soothing ambient music (of a decidedly bent nature), and scientifically revealing (there's actually a lot of complexity to these sounds when amplified - pump up the bass speakers and look out), it also drives cats crazy. Within seconds of playing 'em, two of our cats ran into the room, jumped on my lap, and looked around for the kitties. It was amazing.

Purrcast #3: featuring a cat named Other.

Wake Me Up When September 11 Ends

Station Manager Ken of WFMU hosted a "Remix Rudy Giuliani" contest in which contestants made music from sampled quotes of the former New York mayor and current presidential candidate. Out of over 50 entries, here's the winner: it features Green Day's "Wake Me Up When September Ends," an instrumental version by Nader (appropriate band name!), and some NPR.

RIAA: "Wake Me Up When Sept 11 Ends"

But there were plenty of other class entries, like Gary Lambert's Beatles-inspired Revolution No 9/11. And my own missus made one! Her first one, she's so proud. It uses Ok-Go (you know, those treadmill-video guys).

Mrs Fab: "Here He Goes Again"

IT IS TO LAFF

"It Is To Laff" is an outrageous, gleefully tasteless various-artists free download album not for the easily offended. The guilty parties are all using pseudonyms, and for good reason. There's actually some well-produced stuff here, and some serious songs thrown in (as anti-comedic relief?) I wonder if people writing "LOL" really are laughing out loud, but I actually did with some of this stuff, like:

DJ M.Aynot Feed "Get Ur Typewriter On" - Leroy Anderson's "The Typewriter," one of the great '50s sound-effects novelty records, goes ghetto. The opening seconds really did give me involuntary guffaws.

DJ LOL "Voicemail This Way" features a hysterical phone message; Is this for real? If so, where's it from?

SoulWacker "Smells Like Your Muddah" - Allan Sherman goes grunge.

"Turd Night!" deserves special notice as the most over-the-top insanely filthy piece of musical excrement to be flushed down the internet in recent memory, as Gwen Stefani and the formerly wholesome Bay City Rollers find their lyrics chopped up and re-arranged for scatological effect, amidst a flurry of rude sounds, song parodies, and deranged conversation. A messy masterpiece.

DJ Breakfast Burrito: "Turd Night!"

"It Is To Laff" (also available here.)

Download it, print out the artwork, and makes copies for your loved ones - your holiday shopping problems solved!

YULETIDE ZEPPELIN

"Yuletide Zeppelin" is a medley of Led Zeppelin songs played Christmas stylee by a guy I'd never heard of before but am now a big fan. This track is ingenious. Mojochronic is a dude from Berkeley, CA who sez: "I happened to be playing a family heirloom glockenspiel when Zep's "Babe, I'm Gonna Leave You" came on the TV...God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen was a something I had learned as a boy. It fit like hand in glove with Jimmy Page's guitar playing. That got the ball rolling..." And I believe this marks the first appearance of glockenspiels on these pages.

mojochronic: "Yuletide Zeppelin"


From the excellent new various-artists download album "Santastic III," compiled by djBC.

EVIL, EVIL, EVEL KNIEVEL

Another boyhood idol rides off into the sunset: daredevil stuntman Evel Knievel, a name uttered in hushed awe on the playgrounds of my youth. Well, among the boys at least: when I was gushing over Evel to my too-cool big sister, she said she didn't really care for him. "Wha...what?," I gulpled. "Why don't you like Evel Knievel...?" "Too flashy." Pshh. Girls.

Years later, when I was interning at a company that sold videos of Evel documentary footage, I, as well as my boss and other interns, forged his autograph for the 8 x 10 glossy pictures of Evel we gave away if you joined the "Evel Knievel Fan Club" set up to promote the videos. Wonder how much those are going for on eBay..?

As this site proves, there's been a lot of Evel-inspired music. Here's some cheezy '70s vinyl I ripped last night by an utterly unknown singer:

Eddie Carr: "Evil, Evil, Evel Knievel" "He's not a bird, he's not a plane/Is he a fool who's gone insane?"

The Bran Flakes: "Evil Knievel" Expertly samples words of wisdom from the man himself. Next year we should be hearing the first new album from the Bran Flakes in 5 years. Woo-hoo!