[video]
Ad Hoc Premiere: Hangedup and Tony Conrad: “Gentil The Unlucky Astronomer”
Niiiiiice.
[video]
Useful Noise: Did New York Kill Indie Rock? -
Moving to New York may be the least imaginative decision an aspiring young indie-rocker can make. That’s not to say it’s a bad decision. After all, going to med school may be the least imaginative decision an aspiring brain surgeon can make, but it’s still probably a super-useful one. And though practicing indie-rock, unlike practicing medicine, doesn’t yet require a license (though a guy can dream), it does require nurturing those sorts of professional connections that your career counselors kept saying were so important back when you were an undergrad. At the very least, it requires the presence of other indie-rockers. And New York’s probably got as many of ‘em than anyone these days.
That wasn’t always so. New York’s near-monopolization of indie-rock — or, more specifically, Brooklyn’s, or, most specifically, Williamsburg’s — is a relatively recent phenomenon. Throughout the ’80s and ’90s, the action was in college towns like Chapel Hill and Athens and in second-tier cities like Minneapolis and Seattle. There, thriving local independent rock scenes burst out of geographic isolation to attract national attention. Over the past decade, by and large, they did not. Instead, New York City reasserted its traditional role as the cultural center that dictated tastes to the periphery, its dominance bolstered by an influx of musicians, critics and fans. In mid-sized towns, facsimiles of the Brooklyn “hipster” became as common as Yankee caps, and as universally disparaged.
Long read and well worth it.
[video]
Happy birthday, Bob.
Best Google Doodle ever. It makes noises too.
“
One Sunday night in May 1976, Hughes’ idea would accidentally come to fruition. Needing a last-minute substitute DJ for the evening, she brought in Melvin Lindsey, a Howard journalism student, WHUR intern, and her babysitter, to boot. Lindsey grabbed some Isley Brothers, Delfonics, and Spinners LPs from his family’s collection and hurried to the studio. Somehow, despite Lindsey’s complete lack of experience behind the mic, it clicked. Lindsey’s silky, youthful voice was an appealing shift from many of the more forceful black DJs of the day, and his smooth soul-song selections coupled with the Sunday-evening slot to create something bigger than he or Hughes could have imagined: ‘The lines were flooded with calls. There must have been some kind of natural knack.’ The next morning, Hughes came up with the perfect name for Lindsey, and his show: ‘The Quiet Storm’. Lindsey left the station to finish his bachelor’s degree, but upon returning in November 1977, ‘The Quiet Storm’ quickly became a WHUR weeknight staple, and Lindsey became a local celebrity.
The format was simple and effective, not too different in structure from what album-oriented rock stations had been doing for years. During his evening shift, Lindsey would play long stretches of uninterrupted medium-to-low tempo soul and R&B music— at times for up to 40 minutes straight— only occasionally intervening to guide listeners along. In a very real way, Lindsey’s Quiet Storm was doing exactly what radio does best— since its earliest days, radio has brought faraway voices of musicians and on-air personalities into private homes, creating a sense of intimate community amongst listeners. ‘Lindsey’s on-the-air personality [is] that of the soft-spoken alter ego for some 220,500 listeners each night,’ wrote The Washington Post, ‘not all of whom want to distinguish between radio and real life.’ It was common for listeners to call in and complain if the tempo sped up too much.
Really psyched that my Quiet Storm retrospective is up on Pitchfork. Thanks to Mark Richardson and Ryan Dombal for letting me do it. (via marathonpacks)
——Another good read, folks.
Also: Getting used to having the YouTube links running as I read. It’s like a radio show but I’m the narrator. Or something.
Thanks to Root Blog:
Arthur Russell
Tower of Meaning
Chatham Square Productions – LP, 1983
01. Tower of Meaning (23:07)
02. Tower of Meaning (21:58)
Conducted by Julius Eastman. Produced and written by Arthur Russell
Recorded February 1981
With assistance from Beard’s Fund and NEA
Mastered at CBS
Special thanks to Tom Lee
Open Skylight Music ⓟ1983
Edition of 320 copies
As a past collaborator (instagrambient), I can say that these folks are up to some good.
The Disquiet Junto is a collaborative music-making space in which restraints are
used as a springboard for creativity. It is produced in association with Disquiet.com
Each Thursday a new Junto project is announced. Participants are expected to
upload their completed tracks to the group by the following Monday at 11:59pm
(that’s 11:59pm wherever you are).
… . .
Project Index
Updated: May 17, 2012
20: Disquiet0020-nodebeat
Make a piece of music with the NodeBeat app and one other instrument.
Start: 2012.05.17 … End: 2012.05.21
19: Disquiet0019-rojiura
Treat the provided photograph as a graphically notated score.
Start: 2012.05.10 … End: 2012.05.14
18: Disquiet0018-3x3
Make a three minute track from three sounds, alternating their relative prominence.
Start: 2012.05.03 … End: 2012.05.07
17: Disquiet0017-transition
Make a seamless transition between an original field recording and a provided, preexisting track.
Start: 2012.04.26 … End: 2012.04.30
16: Disquiet0016-backforeground
Take samples of sandpaper and dice. Make a track with one as foreground and other as background.
Start: 2012.04.19 … End: 2012.04.23
15: Disquiet0015-rgbinteract
Create sounds from colors, and make them interact with each other.
Start: 2012.04.12 … End: 2012.04.16
14: Disquiet0014-oumupo
Do a sonic-narrative version of Matt Madden’s 99 Ways to Tell a Story.
Start: 2012.04.05 … End: 2012.04.09
13: Disquiet0013-wildup
Make new music from a multitrack recording of a Shostakovich symphony.
Start: 2012.03.29 … End: 2012.04.02
12: Disquiet0012-cutpaste
Use “cut and paste” to combine two 1928 recordings of rural music.
Start: 2012.03.22 … End: 2012.03.26
11: Disquiet0011-motoring
Record an everyday mechanical rhythm, and make something of it.
Start: 2012.03.15 … End: 2012.03.19
10: Disquiet0010-reflect
Remix one of the previous Junto project tracks.
Start: 2012.03.08 … End: 2012.03.12
09: Disquiet0009-avian
Create a cross-species collaboration between bird song and acoustic guitar.
Start: 2012.03.01 … End: 2012.03.05
08: Disquiet0008-voice
Rework a spoken-word recording of Benjamin Franklin’s autobiography.
Start: 2012.02.23 … End: 2012.02.27
07: Disquiet0007-subtract
Create by removing material from an existing field recording.
Start: 2012.02.16 … End: 2012.02.20
06: Disquiet0006-cylinder
Remix three archival Edison cylinder recordings.
Start: 2012.02.09 … End: 2012.02.13
05: Disquiet0005-layer
Add sounds to a pre-existing field recording of everyday life.
Start: 2012.02.02 … End: 2012.02.06
04: Disquiet0004-mfischer
Remix the Marcus Fischer piece “Nearly There.”
Start: 2012.01.26 … End: 2012.01.30
03: Disquiet0003-glass
Record a live performance for “expanded glass harp.”
Start: 2012.01.19 … End: 2012.01.23
02: Disquiet0002-duet
Duet for fog horn and train whistle — using only those two provided samples.
Start: 2012.01.12 … End: 2012.01.16
01: Disquiet0001-ice
Record the sound of ice in a glass and make something of it.
Start: 2012.01.05 … End: 2012.01.09