BOOKS FOR MANIACS: Thousand Mile Song

This might be the strangest music I've ever heard. It might not even be music.

David Rothenberg plays music with whales. Actual, living-in-the-sea whales. No, this isn't one of those corny '70s New Age albums with whale song sound effects dropped in. He actually traveled around the world, went out on boats, dropped a speaker and a mic into the ocean so he could hear the whales and the whales could hear him, and played clarinet along with their songs.

He may be crazy. He's the first to admit that. Since no-one knows what whale songs are for, he could be interfering with some important function they may have, like navigation. Plus, it's illegal. This possibly irresponsible activity led to the occasional confrontation, even shouting matches, with whale lovers he encountered on this scientific/artistic voyage.

His fascinating book/CD from last year, Thousand Mile Song, recounts his travels from the Pacific Northwest, to the Caribbean, to sub-Arctic northern Russia, listening to whale songs, playing along with them, and seeing what happened. Along the way we learn many fun-to-know facts about whales and their songs, e.g.: they have structure. They are not random noises. And these songs change - a whale will "write" a new tune, which will sometimes catch on with other whales, and they ditch the old songs. And different kinds of whales have different styles. Killer whale and beluga songs are as different as, say, punk and r'n'b.

So there's a scientific component to all this as well - to see what happens when an interloper drops in with his music. Occasionally, as in the case with today's mp3, it seems like the whales might be responding. This track, named after the boat Rothenberg was riding on when he made this recording, could be abstract electronica, or maybe a free jazz improvisation by someone like Sun Ra or Albert Ayler. But it really doesn't sound like anything you've heard before.

David Rothenberg + whales: "Never Satisfied"

I read this book last summer whilst listening to the cd on a hotel balcony overlooking the ocean, as seals were barking on the beach. You should try it!

WESTERN SOUNDSCAPE ARCHIVE

westernsoundscape.org/

The University of Utah has this insane idea to record all non-human areas of the American West. There are hundreds of wildlife/ambient recordings up so far. Read all about it.

Right now I'm in the Alaskan Arctic tundra (Brrrr!). At least, for 11 minutes. Some of the ambient soundscapes last for over an hour. It makes for addictive listening, and from both a scientific and aesthetic viewpoint, it's absolutely crucial.

Arctic National Wildlife Refuge-Beaufort Lagoon-Tundra (060605-81)

The recordings can be detailed, but you gotta pump up the volume - the levels are pretty low.

All this Arctic stuff reminds me of Tanya Tagaq. She's an Inuit (Are they Eskimos? Or are they not called Eskimos anymore?) from far northern Canada who makes singing/grunting/beat-boxing a capella music that ranges from scary death-metal growls to orgasmic moans, sometimes coming off like Bjork choking on a whale sandwich, electronically looped into rhythmic dementia. It's supposedly based on traditional folkloric styles, but with artsy folks like Mike Patton and the Kronos Quartet guesting on her albums, I'd say she's sled-dogging off into fairly uncharted territory. In any case, it is some deeply weird stuff, even for this blog.

Tanya Tagaq - Qimiruluapik

Her most recent album has the string quartet backing, but I prefer the stark (mostly) voice-only sound of her debut. And it goes well mixed with the Arctic ambience I posted above.
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WOLF VS. WHALE! SPOCK VS. THE SUNDANCE KID!

Yes, it's a steel- cage death match between two celebrity-narrated "singing" animal eco-kitsch albums. In this corner:

From 1984, inspired by a "Star Trek" film, Leonard Nimoy on ponderous narration, humpback whales on vocals, Paul Winter and Roger Payne on jazz/orchestral music:

"Whales Alive" - rather nice and soothing undersea sounds for these dog days of summer

And in this corner...

From 1971, Robert Redford on indifferent, occasionally incorrect narration (wolves have never killed man?), wolves on vocals. Halloween spooky.

The Language and Music of the Wolves

Who will win? Why, you the listener, of course!

Both of these fine selections are courtesy of one of this blogs best-est pals, windbag. Thanks, dood, live long & prosper and whatnot.

"Denizens of the Deep" - Ferrante & Teicher

Art Ferrante of Ferrante & Teicher just died at age 88, following the death of his musical partner last year. And so ends the lives of one of the very first avant-pop bands. Decades before The Beatles, The Velvet Underground, Brian Eno, et.al. fused pop music with experimentation, the two pianists were crossing the aisle. The academic avant-garde was way over on this side, and the mainstream popsters were all the way on that side - two groups that scarcely knew the other existed.

But in 1950 Ferrante & Teicher went into a New York studio to start recording this album, playing short catchy piano instrumentals with whimsical titles that unlike, say, Lawrence Welk or Montavani, also used all manner of Space-Age studio effects, and a John Cage-like "prepared piano" technique, inserting objects within the piano strings to produce unusual sounds, tho they claim that they came up with the idea on their own.

They abandoned that session, but went on to record similiar albums in the '50s like "Soundproof," "Blast Off!" (courtesy of Mutant Sounds) and "Hi-Fireworks" (courtesy of Music You (Possible) Won't Hear Anyplace Else.) By the '60s they had largely dropped the weird stuff in favor of a hugely lucrative EZ career, but a half-century later they rediscovered the tapes of the 1950 sessions and finished the album you now hold in your hands (as they used to say in the days of record liner notes).

It's moody (dare I say 'ambient'?) stuff. At a mere 27 minutes long it hardly wears out it's welcome. Track 11, "The Loch Ness Monster Stomp," is a particular fave - an alternate-universe '50s sock hop classic.

Ferrante & Teicher "Denizens of the Deep"

1. Underwater Expectations
2. Things to Come at Sea
3. Whiptailed Stingrays
4. Barracudas on the Chase
5. Spinning Steelheads
6. Floating Manatees
7. Plunging Sharks & Diving Swordfish
8. Crafty Bowfin
9. At Sea Watching Voracious Piranha
10. Searching the Seas
11. Loch Ness Monster Stomp
12. Electric Eels
13. Treacherous Octopi & Devilfish
14. Manatees & Dolphins
15. Sneaky Spiny Sturgeons
16. Ink of the Giant Squids
17. Underwater Reflections
18. A Whale of an Aquarian Finale at Sea