It's a joy to be alive. It's good to be glad. Good to survive. It's great to be

Yeah. So this is definitely the official theme song to the podcast, seeing as how we've had it for episodes running now.

Two episodes. Welcome to episode three, everyone. The amazing episode three of the esoteric CD esoteric podcast. Welcome store is open.

And and for those who missed us in episode two, we wanted to thank you again for listening to us.

Yes. Absolutely.

We really appreciate it.

Yeah. Three episodes running now.

Yes.

Yeah. Think episode two is offered up to the

To the gods.

To the gods. That oh yeah. I was thinking about who the techno techno gods were and I think it's Rocco's Basilisk. I don't know if you know the story. It's like a transhumanist thought experiment where this Try to try

to say that without laughing.

This Reddit user just had, like, this thought experiment saying, what if this AI is actually going to take over the world and then become all powerful and all knowing and know who tried to stop them from existing and retroactively make everyone's life a living hell. And that was like the user's name was Rocco. And then everyone started flipping out like what? It's already happening. Fuck.

We gotta get behind Rocco's basilisk. And it actually yeah. So I think that's who that's who we offered up the episode.

To to Rocco's basilisk? That's great. Yeah. Is it did we offer it to Rocco or to his basilisk? No.

No. Who cares about Rocco? It's the basilisk. That's gonna That's good.

That's good. That's kind of very it's giving off Zardoz vibes. I love it. It's good. Who wants to go first today?

Who's first?

I did it last time. It's Leon's. Oh, it's true.

Yeah. It's true. Yeah. Leon's setting the tone.

Alright. Setting the tone. Okay. I'm gonna set the tone.

But first.

First. The first one.

The first. Yeah. So this is a a new release on Sub Rosa by this composer called Ahmed Essiad, a Moroccan composer who's still alive, who who composes contemporary classical music.

I've heard of him. Yeah. I've heard of this guy. Yeah. That's

So they they compiled his electro acoustic work that he did in a very short period of time in the 70s and it's really quite beautiful. So this is an excerpt called L'Echtur vaubanmenitek part one.

Wow. Yeah.

That's beautiful. That could go on for another hour and I'd be just okay with that.

Yeah. That's beautiful. It's yeah. So this that was Lecture Paul Bon Magnetic part one by Ahmed Desiad taken from brand new release on Sub Rosa called Ahmed Desiad Moroccan electro acoustic music in nineteen seventy two-nineteen seventy four. He basically moved to Paris in the 60s and studied under Max Deutsch and became an assistant.

And that was like really just a very short period of time where he did electronic music and before that he was just doing composition and after that he just continued doing composition. I think he's best known for like opera work, opera composition so that's like really kind of a very isolated moment in time in his work but it's like super interesting. I was reading that his main concern is like trying to translate or incorporate notions of oral microtonality and micro temporality I guess from traditional Moroccan music into like the western idiom so yeah, with with electronics, guess he was able to do that in a more direct direct way.

I love how lyrical it sounds. It doesn't sound you know, when I think electro acoustic music, I feel like just fragmented things happening and very concise things that I'm just so surprised how this ends up being this super lyrical thing. It doesn't even sound like electro acoustic music anymore to me.

Yeah. It's beautiful. I I think you can hear the fact that, you know, he comes from a more compositional background. Like the work with the voice and

Yeah. The voice is really unexpected.

I know. Yeah. It's amazing. When it comes in, it's like, wow. Someone's in the room all of a sudden.

That's right. That's exactly what I thought. Yeah. That was amazing. I thought it was one of you guys who started singing.

I just have felt the urge, you know, I was

Yeah. That that would be episode four. It's

you guys remember when we want when I was trying to get you guys to do the the noise barbershop quartet for, like, I wanted

to do, like Wow.

What was that? That's a it

was I I actually don't remember, but Noise Barbershop Quartet triggered something in me, so it must be in the back of my head.

I was trying to get together because it was a time when Jonathan and Stephen O'Dellivier and all those guys were doing, like, just ridiculous art prank stuff. And so I wanted us to get together and do, like, four vocal ranges, but, like, try and do covers of Mersbos songs and stuff to play, like, microphones

and shit

with, like, five people doing it at once.

That's amazing.

I thought it would have been great. I'm sad we never did that. That was excellent. The thing I loved about that too is that, like, I've been listening to a lot of electroacoustic stuff lately, and you kinda go through this arc of, like, all the INA GRM stuff and, you know, the official school stuff, it's become so codified that it's really hard to hear. Like, you're just like, oh, that's every first year electro acoustic piece I've heard.

You know? And then you dig deeper and, like, I've got the Parmigiani box set, and I went super deep into that catalog. And there was some really, really amazing stuff, but it, like and then it kinda becomes fresh again. But something you hear like that, it's like, oh, wow. This is this textural world and sound that I've never heard before.

I actually found the beginning super funky. Like, it had this, like, really awesome, like I'm like, wow. This could be manipulated into, like, a dance track. Like, it was so it I loved it. Like, there's something really different and different happening than that whole program.

You

know? Yeah.

So it's and it's really interesting how programmatic that stockhouse I was listening to Tony Stockhausen trying to find something right, you know, that I because I still love him, but, like, went down this crazy stockhouse in rabbit hole, and it was like, there's just there's this thing where you put it on, and it's like, oh, yeah. That's this thing. You know? And it's really hard to get past that, and that just doesn't feel like that. It's amazing.

Yeah. Like, the framework is very apparent Yeah. Yeah. Most of the time, and it's hard to get past that.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I can hear you. Oh, go ahead.

Go ahead. Justin,

when you were talking about the the beginning part of it, I actually really appreciate how how texturally different it

was. Mhmm.

It's like kind of a it's a very mono, know, like kinda synthesizer sound that's like hard panned really artificially, but then when the the kind of atmospheric sorry, yeah atmospheric sounds come in and the voice, the palette it's like kind of like from two d to three d. There's like a shift in that way which I liked a lot.

Yeah. It's like spatially is really wow.

It's really beautiful. So this is just an excerpt of a piece. Can't wait to hear the whole piece eventually.

Yeah. There's two parts. Okay. Two parts of it. So they're about the same length.

Yeah. And I'm trying to but something that's funny to notice also is that a lot of sounds will reappear in other pieces so you really do get a sense that it's like experimentations you know when he's like trying stuff out but yeah no I I well I chose this piece the the other stuff is there's a lot of different stuff on the on the whole album so it's worth worth checking out for

sure. Yeah very cool.

It brought to mind a piece. So, Jacob, if you're good, I can play something next. Is that alright if I go next in line? You go ahead. It brought me something.

You go ahead. You go ahead.

It brought me to a thought of a piece of music that I want. It felt really complimentary to it, so I'm gonna play that. Like, a master class.

Wow. Wow.

Wow. Wow.

Good. Wow. That was really, really enjoyable. Please tell us more, Justin.

Yeah. This is Otto Willeburg Willeburg from, I think, The UK. I love his artist bio, responsible low end solutions. Like, that's

I was gonna I was gonna comment on that.

That's entirely what this is. And and to me, this is, like, the mega brain of bass playing. Like, it's just it's What year is this, Justin? Like, this year. Like, last year.

Like yeah. And he plays apparently with Charles Hayward from, like, this heat sometimes, UK based, super interesting. Like, it's to me, this is, like it's so interesting how this relates to the last track because I feel like they're Absolutely. It's nice.

I see it.

The beautiful way these have Yeah. Like, that vocabulary that's broken up open by those early electroacoustic studies have created stuff that results in this. You know? Like, there's, like, so much so much continuity and through I was thinking too a lot about other tracks that I wanna play and how you were like, through our thread, you were talking about that Carl Craig track and being like, oh, I don't know if I can play this. And I'm like, it's all like, the most incredible thing to me is that, like, experimental music is so threaded through everything now.

You know? And, like, it's a part of just this, like I mean, it's so interesting. This piece is, like, incredibly minimalist, super thought through in terms of, like, technical study. Like, it's a technical study of side chaining in a really academic way. You know?

Mhmm. And then it's also just this virtuistic, like, crazy, like, mega brain solo bass playing. It's un like, just unimaginably sick. And you're like, I love that all of that kind of can coexist. And then, you know, just throw in a little bit of melodica, you know, like Yeah.

To make it Technicolor at some point. You know, like, what?

Structurally, it really mirrors the the Sia track that that I just played. It's like you got the the the bass noodling, like, the kind of electronic element, and then all of a sudden it opens up with the melodica and

No. It's why I had to play it. I was like, this is, like, the most beautiful answer to that track. So thank you, Jacob, for letting me step in there. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I needed to I needed to do it.

I was feeling it. So so you're up, buddy. I can I can

rift I can rift to that?

I can do that.

I can totally I'll rift it out. Let's let's see. I'm totally in this one. Let me let me just get this. Okay.

Hold on a second. Okay. There we go. We'll put a bit of this. So that was that was Joan LaBarbara, aptly name titled album Voice is the Original Instrument, is the name of the album, and the piece is Voice Piece one Tone Internal Resonance Investigation.

She's a, you know, I'd wake up in the morning, she'd sing me a song and I'd be really quite connected.

It's such a strong statement. It's incredible.

Yeah and where she takes it too. Know

it's just without end. Can yeah there's so so many folds to unfold. Really, It's really beautiful. I

was just getting into it. I'm like, let's keep going. The thing with music like this too is that I wish people would just leave it the fuck alone. You know? Like Like this.

You get the the techniques that she develops, and then people build these enormous spectral choirs of people doing this, and it gets all angelic, and it just gets garbage. Like, and there's this just to keep it so tight and so simple and so raw, it's oh my god. It's so beautiful.

It's just you

don't need anything else.

But it also leaves room for the appreciation of you know the minute details and everything.

It's so intimate too I find. There's like such an intimacy to it which is also rare sometimes in experimental stuff because there's always kind of, like, you're always behind an instrument, you're always behind something, and here it's just so raw, but it's so quiet. Like, you can hear a purr almost. It's amazing.

Yeah.

It really reminds me of, like, some of the remember that beautiful Akio Suzuki record that we sold a ton of in the store that was that Kosuguian live, like, thing at the monastery, and about three quarters of it was just the rain.

Like

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Nothing until, like, I think the first Shekahashi note came in, like, after twenty five minutes of just rain sounds. Mhmm.

And, like, what I love about that kind of work in this is just, like, if you let it, it draws you into this state of attention and listening that's so profound. You know? Like and it's just, like, it brings you there. Like, it's a vehicle to bring you there. It's so, yeah, so beautiful.

Really well well put, well said.

Yeah. Absolutely. What you were saying Jacob about how intimate it was, yeah, it's it's like such a very entrancing listen and then when there were some people coughing in the audience it was like so it was like a super extremely fast zoom out all of a sudden when you're like oh wow okay this is happening in like a space with like other people and it was really kind of jarring but yeah that was really really beautiful.

Yeah she's wonderful yeah.

Yeah thanks for sharing that. I have a little bit of a another piece that I think will require a little bit of patience but it's absolutely worth it I guarantee it. It's the whole side of a record so it's gonna require a little bit of indulgence but it's every second is worth it so here it is

If I had somebody else's voice, I could tell you how I feel. It would be inaudible body rock till resonant or revenant or reverent till resonant right now, right now, so I can tell you how we do. We begin to describe what we do from just behind. Are we still up in it? Tomorrow, we was over there is what we've been trying to say or sing.

Dang. The thing of it is, damn. Goddamn a room, all that hammering, all that all that commotion, all that grind ourselves to dust. Can you give enough to blow us all away? No.

No. But we can, man. That's how we do. Our damage is pyrofloral, pyrolytic, the heating of our organic biomass such as in the absence of oxygen in the wake of summer in the the hottest days of all time. And then tomorrow is gonna be the hottest day of all time.

Pyrofloral emergent or affected or afflicted. Afflicted, physical or poetic. Angelic with burn. Angelic, laid down. Soul gelic.

Soul gelic. Wet chemical process. Base be sweating. Gut fluid florid involves the formation of an inorganic colloidal suspension. Soul.

And gelation of the soul in a continuous liquid phrase, gel, to form a three-dimensional network structure. Solgelic, pyrolytic, communitic, reducing solid materials from an average particle size to a smaller average particle size. Littler, smaller by crushing, grinding, cutting, vibrating, violating,

violating.

Can you give enough to blow us all away? That's what Rodney asked about. Can you make what we already do you remember? How did the people have? Let it get around and get on in.

Complicity in Scar City, Arkansas. Complexity in Complichita, Louisiana. Here go a box with a lid on it. If you open it, if you open it, If you open it, you can If you open it. If you open it, can come.

If you open it, you can come. If you open it. If you open it. If you open it. If you open it, you can come.

If you open it, you can if you open it, you can come into our if you open it, if you open it, if you open it, you can come into, you can come into our world. Up in here, you look like Cuddy doo. House look like he up. If so, don't you wanna go? Live, remote, preoccupied with breathing and black as a machine ecology, Iron Man.

All over the pan, all over the basin, do own chant, carry pauses and actually live inside them. Gift double. To see things and say can hear them very, Pearl. From then beginning all gone inside, remember threshold, surround our separateness with bands. But if I were a bell, exhaustion makes life everlasting.

When I dance with you, I am the move mover. Baby, you're a solid sender. We pound plenty, baby. Softened in our program, our transubstantial fade and cross fade bodies, baby. Take this and think about me in the first place.

Again, in the real presence of my skin, baby. You shook me. Your hand is my pocket. Baby, I'm a pocket man. Your hand is in my pocket.

I fixed broken rockets. You are my starship. You all I need. You sinned for me, and I can't keep myself from coming, baby. As I am,

I have

what I already have. I'm yours. Crushing, grinding, cutting, vibrating. Precision and humility in experiment is written on the way you customize your uniform. A ritual of lotion and stillness in the morning before you make it into work on the edge of your train.

On the edge because you're driven to the edge in your violent correctness. Over the edge of what you're listening to like You might be one. You might be someone that needs listening to. You might need somebody too. You might need somebody.

You might need somebody. You might need somebody too. A lot of this is found. A lot of this is found in what we have. Almost all of this belongs to you.

Are you gonna give me some? No. You're on your way to work. Little sister, that's alright. That's alright, young man.

Bye, baby. The unspeakable tower is what they did. Our shit got some names and sometimes they sound good at the bottom of it. Therefore, against that little pill head fucker to correct people's pronunciation. For trade.

Fotran. Ain't really got to where we got somewhere to go. Premature precepts dripped from deferred foreskins brought out from nowhere with forceps with no receptacle. But early on, my grandma cleft my palate with okras and blues. Mimi said, don't listen to them blues.

She knew she should because her shoe moved. She knew the man playing Ray Charles was Ray Charles. She put the y'all's crea on an early stove, cooked it down to a low gravy with this tray, these little fours, your little dirty palate, a savory train between and blood sorbet, let it dry and made a vase out of it. We poured what was in it on our greens and blues and ochres, our loud flavors in the tree we danced around, the tree we made a movie around against that little pill and fucker to correct people's predestination. Four.

Four.

Four.

Four.

Four.

4.

4.

4.

4.

Bow.

Fi, motherfucker. Fume instead of kill. The incident in crosshatch is a burst of whispers. A mouthpiece and bird air in need turned out to be our desire. A video of the archive in place.

It's some indelicate news on the wall. Something in silence for everything that everybody ever wanted. Crisis for everything that ever burned inside. My baby's black representational space is another world. Black workers of the other world unite up in there, one named Peanut, the other named Bush, making shit up up in Shands Theater, which is a truck farm in exploded rows.

My baby's black representational space is the South Dakota Hills. You like the comfortable surprise of its location. See how it travels? It's other than itself, and it sells itself that way. Whose will sell for you?

Mine. Mine. My baby's black representational space is all over the place, so he got to move his body. Body cut the neurotypical field with a razor in the shape of a basketball. Somebody sing, give me body.

You can hear it bounce. My baby's black representational space is a black head on some black skin. In the city of the blemish on the blemish of delivery, the mayor's name is the mayor. But you can call her woody or few or a mole in the ground or at your service.

That's some fire music.

Yeah.

That's Fred Moten, Brandon Lopez, Gerald Cleaver, the first side off of their double lp called The Blacksmith The Flowers out now on reading ham. It's yeah this is the thing that I was writing to you about how I was like listening to this at work and I had to stop working because I couldn't take it.

It's so

yeah it's so powerful this trio had recorded another LP that came out last year which is equally excellent it's just a self titled EP LP. Fred Moten is this critical theorist and poet who is one of the most erudite people I think I know and his critical stuff just goes way over my head like I have no means of engaging with it in any meaningful way. Like I have a lot of homework to do before I get there but his poetry and his spoken performance is like his voice and his delivery is some of the most comforting thing I've ever come across. So I'm really happy about this release. Brandon Lopez is a relatively new young double bassist in New York and Joe Cleaver, the drummer, has been around for a little bit.

It's it's wild. My my friend Aaron Lumley, who I mentioned in episode one, who gave me the the amazing first track we launched the the show with, he wrote to me maybe, like, just before we started doing the podcast and was like, dude, you have to check out Brandon Lopez. Like, I guess he'd been playing with their crew there.

Sure.

And he was just like and, you know, Aaron's a sick bass player too. And he was just like, no. This guy, he's, like, on a whole other level. Like, he was just raving about him to me. And Yeah.

I checked out a bunch of stuff, and I wasn't aware of this recording. So thank you. Like and, wow, like, the bass playing. Also, a little bit, like, the first track here, like, this is really heartening to me because there's this kind of tradition and language that this track is in that is moving that language forward in a way that doesn't feel like, a lot of the time, I hear a bass, someone doing spoken word and drums, and I'm like, I'm out. You know?

Like, this is not gonna like and this is just so vibrant and alive and, like, terrifying intense and beautiful and rips your soul out. And I'm like, oh, yeah. This music's still alive. Like, this music is really yeah. And, like, deep awareness of the history of the music, but totally coming from a super raw, live place.

Like, wow. I was like, yeah. That's that's really inspiring to hear.

Yeah. And that just the narrative narrative of it is beautiful. I think all the pieces we've played so far have just an amazing sense of narrative. You know? Like, it's just it goes places, different places.

It takes you on a journey. But I tell you, know, CD Esoteric, we got some good music. Must say. Because that's that was beautiful. That's really wonderful stuff.

Go for the

good music. That was really, really beautiful. I love the sound too. Just the sound of the the instruments in the background. Just the sound of it.

It was so beautiful. Yeah. That was wonderful. That's some good music.

It does make me think a little bit about canon. I've been thinking about this every time I listen to this song that I'm gonna play. And, like, you know, I like the post everything world because you can have your own canon with your friends. And, like, there's definitely a CD esoteric canon, and there's tracks that, like, we would be like, yeah, that's canon. Like, that's totally canon.

A lot of the nurse with wound list winds up on canon. A lot of, like, you know, certain jazz tracks, like, whatever. And this and and then, you know, a lot of the music that we're playing feels canon adjacent or or, like, evolution of that. Yeah. And so and it's beautiful because, like, our canon means absolutely shit all to anyone else in the world.

Like you know? But to me, it's completely concrete. Like, I'm like, this is this body of music that made reality and is, you know, effectively classical music. So I'm gonna play a piece that I think is fundamentally canon and is, like, you know, is is a beautiful brought to mind by that track, of course, and and is one of my favorite pieces of music of all time, probably one of the things I listen to the most. So now music.

The inimitable Joe McVee. Yeah. Life changing record for me. I heard that when I was probably twenty twenty one, and it just set my life in another direction.

I've never heard this before.

Oh my god.

First time I hear this record, I've never heard it. Wow. It's it's totally like Olatanji, almost like Culture's Olatanji. It's really up there.

I mean, the whole record is it's a live broadcast from a radio station in New York, and, yeah, the the entire record is spectacular. It's Joe McPhee on trumpet and tenor sax, Byron Morris on soprano sax, Clifford Thornton on baritone horn. Mike Cull on piano. I have no idea who Mike Cull is, and that is some of my favorite piano playing on any record ever. And I'm like, I've gotta find Mike Cull wherever you are.

Like, thank you. Like, this is just like I wanna know more about everything you've ever done, like, just spectacular piano playing. And Harold e Smith on percussion, also incredible. The yeah. It's really interesting too because I was watching it on a YouTube link, and I don't know if you guys saw it, but there was, like, welcome to the new age of the oligarchs, Bernie Sanders on the side.

It's a clip. And, like, you know, this music was recorded in '71 in a time of great social and political upheaval. We're kinda there again now, that last track leading into this. Yeah. And I'm just like I mean, music is the healing force of the universe.

Mhmm. Like, bless these people for making this shit. Like, it's it's keeping me alive.

It's one of the nicest pieces of music I've heard in a while this one. It's really beautiful.

Justin you brought up the notion of vocabulary a lot over the last couple of tracks that we're listening to and how when musicians are able to transcend the just using the vocabulary like you know the healing power really comes the healing function really comes through yeah you know there's a very clear demonstration of the purpose of this music. Yeah. It's crystal clear.

It's so wonderful.

Yeah. So good. Also shout out the Hat Hut CD covers. Yes. Yellow type by the black and white picture.

That's also Canon. Yeah. Can't see.

Werner x Zirligger or whatever. Like, thank god, though. But, you know, that label started actually, in full respect, that label started to put out Joe McPhee's music. Was the reason the label started. Yeah.

So mad respect for that.

Yeah. For sure. It's

crazy. Crazy. I just found that out actually preparing for this episode. I did not know that that was the case and that made me just love Hat so much more. Was like

This is a Hat Hat is a a Swiss label? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. Yeah.

It's like crazy Euro Euro American connection in that

Yeah. For jazz,

for sure. Yeah. Yeah.

Especially that time period. Still. Still. The yeah. Yeah.

There was one other thing I wanted to say too about music and its transcendent power because this is a beautiful story from Mark Loser, who is a friend of the pod, like, amazing experimental filmmaker and film processor and amazing all around guy. And he he runs the film processing lab at Ryerson. Oh, I can't formerly known as Ryerson. I can't even say TMU or whatever it's called now. But the they changed the name, and he works there.

And he he was playing Shaky Jake, I think, from NationTime in his office the other day yesterday. And he sent me this text, and he's like, dude, it's so crazy. There's this group of electricians hanging outside of my office for, like, thirteen minutes. And I just went out, and I was like, what are you guys doing? They're just like, dude, the music you're playing is so fucking sick.

And I'm like, this is like, it is so awesome. And I'm like, just that. And it also really shows how the univocalism of capitalism like, you play this music for people, they hear it. You know? And it's all about that.

It's all about Spotify making fake music on channels with robots. You know? Like but, I mean, music, like, the the healing music transcended, and it gets through, and everyone it's so powerful. It's so powerful.

Yeah. That's beautiful. Yeah. I don't know how to follow that up.

You curveball.

Yeah. Curveball. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

That's left turn. Left don't turn.

Know. Don't even think I'm gonna do a left turn. Let me just try this thing. Let me try this thing here. I just have to find it here.

Where is it? Yeah. Let's try this. Maybe it'll work up here. Okay.

I'll have to hold on a second here.

Maybe we can put, like, one minute of of dead

air. Silence.

Yeah. Yeah.

Four minutes and thirty three seconds.

Bad joke. Bad joke. So let's try this. Wow. I

think you just blew everyone's minds. You take a look.

That was beautiful. What was

that? What was that?

Well, this is Kyle Ganz's album called Hyperchromatica. Kyle Gan's actually an interesting composer, I don't know much about him, but he's, I guess you could say, the new hair of microtonal, just intonation kind of stuff that's happening maybe now. Obviously, there's a little bit of this kind of well tuned piano inspiration in this. And I might be wrong in this, but I think this is played by a player piano, I might be wrong, because I think he wants to get the right, you know, the right just intonations, and I think it might be played by a player piano, but I'm I'm I might be wrong on this one because I know he's done stuff like that in the past, but it sounds like from a different planet, though.

There's also this really interesting connection to Bob Ashley with him because he wrote he wrote the kind of only book about Robert Ashley.

Really? Wow.

Yeah. He wrote a beautiful biography of Robert Ashley that I read that's really incredible. That's great. That piece quotes almost directly the first piece from from Perfect Lives. Really?

It's kind of piano arpeggiations. Right. Yeah. I agree. Like, you know, the when it's like Yeah.

You're

Yeah.

And it's, yeah, it's it's and also this completely spectacular thing happened while we were listening to that. I'm it's still there. It's incredible. I wish I could turn my computer around and show you guys, but they're like, these pieces called hyperchromatica, and the most incredibly large and beautiful red cardinal just landed on a branch in my yard, and it's been sitting there the whole time we've been listening to this. And, like, the pigmentation is just, like, so hyper I'm just like, oh, thank you.

I mean, guess how birds that's how birds hear, I think. Like, this totally what it must sound like. Know, the bird was like, what's going on there?

But it's like, this is Yeah. Clearly a quote of Bob Ashley,

the bird. Yeah. It's like

Yeah. It's great. Yeah. Absolutely.

Yeah. The microtones on this recording are

phenomenal. It's

so beautiful. It's really like I don't have the right words for it but it really sounded like like Gershwin on another planet or in a cave on another planet. It's I mean it's like really pretty and like syrupy and and like really you wanna get in, you know, it's like a blanket. It's really nice and then all of the harmonics just like come out and all of a sudden you're like in a it's a completely different texture. Yeah.

And there's like all this like crazy phasing going on because of

Same.

Yeah. Yeah. It but it's still like super sweet at the same time. It's it's so good. I yeah I was not expecting that at all.

Really, really,

Oh, it's great. Yeah. I love that piece. Yeah.

So do you know when this is from?

Like, February, I would say. He's he's, like, in his he's, like, in his seventies, even later.

Yeah. He's, like, in his 2,000. I remember seeing this when it came out, and, like, I bought a bunch of records on that label and didn't pick this up, and I should have. And, yeah, this is I think it's February.

He's 70 years old now. So but he's, yeah, very much into all this kind of, you know, obviously, like, just intonation, microtonal kind of stuff, really. That's his thing very much. And how he can get to those notes really the best he can somehow so yeah.

Right I mean while I was listening to it I couldn't help but try and like figure out imagine how he reached those those

Notes.

Phones. Yeah. Yeah. And whether like with a with a pedal, like, kind of a pedal steel kind of mechanism or or or what?

I'm just reading about a computer three retune computer driven pianos.

Yeah. 2018.

2018. It's really recent.

Okay. So it really is the the player pianos, mechanically.

It is the player pianos. Yeah. Yeah. Dysclavier's.

That's yeah. That was mind blowing. Thank you, Jacob. Okay. Wow.

This is, like, some some heavy caliber stuff that's going on.

That's great. Yeah. This episode's amazing.

Well, I'm gonna take a left turn. No, never But it's okay because it's all for the best. Yeah here we go.

And

Yeah.

That's crazy you think. Amazing.

That's Thick Pigeon. The song is called Jess and Bart from the album two Crazy Cowboys. So this is from 1984. Came out on Factory Records. What?

Yeah. I thought it was like 2024.

I thought it was right now. Yeah yeah yeah.

No this is this is 1984.

That's crazy.

A record that kinda didn't get very noticed at the time but Sick Pigeon were a duo of Miranda Stanton and Carter Burwell who were in New York in the 80s and Miranda Stanton actually had a band with Kim Gordon called C. M. K. And before Sonic Youth and Thurston Moore met Kim Gordon because he jammed with Miranda Stanton and then they formed Sonic Youth so that's like the the legend thing and Carter Burwell is actually after this album he sorta quit the band and started doing film music, and he's scored every single Cohen movie. He that's that's Cohen Brothers movie.

So that's how he makes his living. He's like a film score score person. And then for this they had released a couple of EPs that came out on on another label and then got picked up by Factory. And for this record there's the drummer and the keyboard player from New Order who are playing also. So it's like kind of a really crazy conjecture of stuff but the record is really really good and very strange it's like you know very arty but this track I especially love because it completely it really feels to me like the that very epic Born Slippy track by Underworld.

The Trainspotting.

Yeah it does. It's true. Yeah.

And except that there's no release.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's only tension. Yeah.

It's only tension. It's like that kinda angelic tension. But yeah. So I'm I'm really into into this track and the whole record. Also, of note, the amazing record sleeve that that was showing with the dogs and the the cowboy drawing.

Lawrence Wiener did that. What?

Of course. Of course. Yeah.

Yeah. So it's it's kinda like this super mythical album. It was reissued in 2003 and there was a really pithy Super Troll review on Pitchfork that gave it 2.1 on 10. I think the the decimal is like the worst part.

Yeah. Yeah.

But I mean I was doing a little bit of research when I came on that it was like what the hell is your problem you know and I read the review and it was like totally dismissive and like you know art school and also like really like not politically correct if you read that review and I just then I realized it was from 2003 which is really like American Apparel. No not just Pitchfork but like Electroclash is kind of on the way out so like everyone is trying to be cool and like dismissing all this kind of 80s stuff. Yeah. Anyways

That was that sounded amazing.

Yeah.

It was fantastic.

I was so surprised it was from the eighties. It sounds so, like, contemporary. It's crazy.

Yeah. Absolutely. I had had a lot of thoughts after that because there's a bunch of different directions you can go, but, like, you know, I think I have to go all release after that because that's the only I feel the tension so much, so I'm just gonna go for for a 100% release after that. It's great. And, Leon, you might know this one, but it's if you don't, I think you're gonna really like it a lot.

Very nice.

Yeah. So good.

We're all talking slower now.

Yeah. For sure. So that is the makers. Don't challenge me. It's Boris Midney, who was one of the great Euro disco kind of pioneers, made a ton of huge tracks at the peak of disco.

This is '72. And from Russia, he's like a Russian expat. And this is like a it was a, like, kind of a forgotten gem that that got dug up and reissued in 2018. And, like, for me, I can't believe this is '72. It's

so crazy.

Yeah. Yeah. It's so forward looking. It's so forward looking. Yeah.

Like the yeah the the the the funky disco stuff it's just like you hear it and it's like an era and it's like really you can identify it, spot it miles away. This sounds like when it starts. Also, the the production on the voice is so

Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah. Contemporary. I mean, it's so hi fi.

Yeah. Yeah.

It's in

And then all the instrumentation is super lo fi, and the mix is incredible. Like, it's just like, what to go back to that first track again, the voice comes in and you're just like, what's going on here? I just left it, like, a total one sonic universe into another. And, I mean, vocal performance, like, woah. Fucking crazy.

Crazy crazy. Looking it up.

Do you know who the the singer is? Because I didn't see any credits

for that. I don't see any credits for this, which is really, really frustrating because the singing is incredible.

Because it like, you close your eyes, and it could almost be Tracy Thorne. Almost.

Oh, but wait. I mean, she'd be, like, five seven years old or something. But Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

That's really good. Very,

good stuff. Did you know that track, Leo? That was something I thought I thought

But it's I mean, the it's I've seen the the record. I've I've seen the the name. Yeah. I've never heard it. So

How did you come across it, Justin? How did you come across it?

Rabbit holing on weird shit, you know, just, like, chasing stuff down and being, like, five hours You know how that goes.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

But, yeah, that doesn't sound like '72. I mean, it's yeah. There's no way. I would have thought, like, if it's seventies, maybe '77, '78 or something.

Yeah. But, like, even eighties, like, that was what that track kind of pushed me. I'm like, this could be contemporaneous to that. Like like, until the little mood stuff comes in, which kinda dates it to that time period. But it's if without that, it you could place it anywhere from, like, '72 to, like, 2020.

It's crazy.

Yeah. And the the BPM on that is pretty great.

Oh, yes. Oh, yeah. The the loping and the the lyrics also are, you know, top notch Oh, yeah. Lyrics. Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah. Good stuff.

So is it my one more.

One more. Oh. You're the last track.

You got you got the closing out.

You got you're dragging us you're taking us home, Jacob.

Okay. I'm gonna try. I'm gonna try. So You do

see it, man.

I'm thinking this. I'm thinking two ways. I'm thinking on the one hand, it's Christmas is upon us in a way. Yeah. But but then also, what was the barbershop guys?

What?

The nice barbershop?

The nice barbershop. Worst. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. So maybe maybe this could be a barbershop. Not quite. Maybe not quite, but maybe it could.

Or maybe the Christmas album by the Christmas barbershop.

Shop, boys. Yeah. That's great.

Listen. I think it would be a hit. Okay. I really think this could be a hit. A surprising hit.

You gotta surprise the kids. Yeah. The kids might expect something, but we're giving them something totally unexpected.

Yeah. And they're gonna love it.

Okay. So let's just let's just try it. Yeah. So that was Michael Finissey, his vocal works. Or it was Michael Finissey's take on Jezewaldo, essentially.

He's a pretty interesting composer that I kind of got into a little while ago. I was just trying to discover, you know, like, new contemporary classical composers who Mhmm. Were interesting. I don't like, what are they doing these days? Is there anybody interesting doing stuff these days?

And for the most part, a lot of the stuff that I kind of found was very mathematical based or very kind of just the kind of this kind of stuff you would hear. Sure. And then I discovered this thing called the new complexity movement. I was like, what the hell is new complexity? And so it turns out it's just like group of British composers.

And what's so funny about this idea of new complexity is to, like, create composition that are so difficult that people can barely play them. And so when they can barely play them, they crack. So they crack at the at the at the, you know, performance, essentially. And then I discovered this guy who's just like, I'm not new complexity even though they're telling me I'm new complexity. And so he's just such an interesting composer who just like it's really hard to really, like, you know, frame him where he belongs.

He he has a huge interest in experimental cinema. His father was, like, a photographer, and he made this like six hour piano piece called The History of Music Through Photography, and it's just like six hours of this cloud of piano. Wow. And he just kind of this is very kind of not typical of his, but it's he takes music sometimes like almost like, you know, elements of other music come in, creep into his music, like this Jezewaldo that's, like, now it's skewed and stuff like that. So so he's an interesting guy these days.

You know? He's, in his eighties now, and and, really, he seems to just be fascinating as a person. And this piece, I thought, would be the what is it? The barbershop boys?

The noise barbershop.

Yeah. Yeah.

Off the Christmas album.

Off the Christmas album. That would be it. Yeah.

Yeah. That was really pretty. It was really pretty. Do

you do you know the Canadian composer Cassandra? I'm trying to remember her name. She's amazing. No. Cassandra Miller.

Nope. Because she's doing something really similar, and I wonder if they're I know that she lived in The UK for a while, and I wonder if they're connected. Like, it's very different in a way, but this whole taking of of other pieces and I'll I'll play something I'll play something of hers on the show at some point because I'm I'm listening to a lot of her. Oh, that was amazing. Yeah.

But it's it's it really brought her to mind, and she's from New Brunswick and, like, super exciting. I'm, like, really, really cool Canadian composer that I love.

That's amazing. I also love Michael Finissey because he he just seems like his interests are outside of music also. Yeah. So it's always interesting when someone's just into like who you know, and his knowledge of experimental cinema, there's stuff that I've never heard of. And he's and he applies that to to music and it's just so far off, you know.

So he's he's pretty punk. He's pretty he's pretty cool.

So No. It was awesome. Yeah. Yeah.

Good stuff.

And what a day.

I mean I think I think we also have the outro music, Leon, that we need to use every episode. I'd

Oh,

I I don't have that queued up. But

But you can throw it in. Like, I mean, it's like in the when you're editing, I think that I mean, we gotta use that.

So so it's the official outro music

Yeah. It's the

official since episode two, obviously. So yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Alright. Gotta drop that

in Right.

Because it's it's it's essential.

I'll I'll do that at the on the edit.

I can't tell you how much

I enjoy this time with you guys every I like I look forward to it so much between each I can't wait to

see this one. It's been a really nice reuniting with music. Yeah. I mean we all listen to a lot of music but I think with a purposeful listening is a really good

But also to listen with with friends, it seems like no one ever does that, you know, even though we're, you know, online but in the store we would listen together and there's like a sharing Because otherwise, my experience of music is just alone.

Yeah. No. The social aspect of music is so key. Like, it's it's Absolutely. Brings the friends and neighbors together.

Yeah. Great. It's great.

There was there was some great music today, I must say.

Yeah. That really

good. Yeah.

Good good work.

There is one last thing that got kinda that got thrown in the ether that I think needs to come back. I know we weren't gonna recap anything from the second episode, but I think we need to give credit to the because that got lost and it like, to the amazing people that we've lost and, you know, Chris Wrench, obviously.

Absolutely.

This wouldn't this and many other fantastic things would not be happening without his short brief eternity and what an amazing amazing person he was. And and, you know, the other folks that we mentioned, Zeelan, who who was amazing customer at the store, legendary street artist in Montreal. And there was some and Pierre

what was Pierre's

last name?

Pierre Martel.

Pierre Martel. Yeah.

Who is

a a key part of the Montreal industrial scene who we were all really lucky to know as people at the store. So I just that was one of the pieces that got blown up in the ether was us chatting about those guys, and I I think it's really nice to end this episode with mad respect to all of them and gratefulness to having known them.

Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. Alright. Catch you on the fifth Thanks, guys.

K. See you. See you. Thanks.