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Rachel Kerry’s “Cute” Hyperpop Experiment

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The late century’s run of prominent genre/culture movements (examples: hip-hop, techno, maybe even grunge) ended some time ago. But it was replaced by something more subtle and complex. The internet eliminates most cultural isolation, resulting in a wealth of music — both niche and mainstream — freely available to artists in their formative years. This abundance has affected how we listen. There’s no longer only one type of genre we’re into, and, in our art, disparate influences openly collide. That’s always been the case with music on the edges, and past pioneering artists often reached their notoriety through a novel ‘it sounds like X-meets-Y’ recipe. But what’s different is how this approach has finally infiltrated pop music. 

In the past twenty years, exciting and wild sounds increasingly come out of pop music, and sometimes even near the top of the charts. It’s not rare to run across a song that we’d categorize as ‘pop’ featuring elements not out of place on a previously obscure Warp Records release. I believe it was Simon Reynolds who said that one should look toward a genre’s extremes to glimpse where music is headed. That holds, but the rate at which something considered unique and experimental leaves its fingerprints on pop music is getting quicker and quicker.

I thought about this when I heard the Intern remix of Rachel Kerry‘s single, “ur so cute.” The original is a lot of fun, a catchy electronic pop song with a vocal hook that wouldn’t be out of place on a ’50s bubblegum chart-topper. There are subtle synthesized flourishes and voice tweaks that add to its charm and reveal its hyperpop leanings. But then I was given the remix by Intern. This treatment is frenzied and over-the-top, setting the tone in its first seconds with radical vocal manipulations and rhythmic tomfoolery. The adorable vocal hook is still here, but it’s partly serving as an anchor for all sorts of sonic craziness. And then there’s the ragtime piano WUT. This remix is more like a genre detonation than a collision.

Intrigued, I reached out to Rachel Kerry at her London home base to ask about this remix, what it feels like to have her song sonically mangled, and her views on the rise of experimentalism in pop music. 

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8sided: How did the remix come about? Were you specifically looking for this style of remix, or was the final result a total surprise?

Rachel Kerry: My favorite thing about this remix is that I wasn’t looking for it at all. I knew Murphy and Nick from music college and saw them post about their new project, Intern. The first single from their debut EP, “Helium Foil Giant Balloon,” was released around the same time as the original “ur so cute.” I remember listening to their track and thinking, “Hang on, I thought these guys studied classical saxophone; this is so cool!” It wasn’t long after that Murph sent a message saying they’d love to remix “ur so cute.” I immediately said yes. 

Though our sounds are different, Intern and I take our influences from similar places. We all love hyperpop, glitchy bubblegum pop, and strange dance music. I’ve taken that influence and gone in one direction sonically, and they’ve gone the opposite with their project. This means that the sound of the remix pretty much meets back in the middle at our original influences. 

8S: What was it like hearing the Intern remix of “ur so cute” for the first time? 

RK: My first reaction was to laugh, honestly. And I promise that’s a compliment. In this more experimental, hyperpop world, such a big part of it is being tongue-in-cheek, using humor, and accentuating novelty sounds. Just listen to that ragtime piano break; you can’t not smile at that.

What’s great about Intern’s interpretation is how they used everything that was already in the song to warp, stretch, distort, etc. Honestly, I couldn’t even begin to pick apart or understand everything they did, but what I can hear is that pretty much all of those crazy sounds in their version have been made by manipulating something from the original. 

8S: The remix is so different than your original. I wonder if you had any reservations when you heard it?

RK: The first time I heard their remix, no part of me had any reservations about the sound. The only thing that could be a little worrying is what my audience might think. This remix has definitely taken the song from 0 to 100 pretty quickly in terms of introducing more experimental sounds to my music. But the reception has been really positive. I think people are after something a little out there and exciting right now. 

8S: Was your original song ripe for this kind of remix?

RK: I purposefully wrote the song to be as simple as possible. It only has two chords and just a couple of different instrument sounds. I wanted it to sound innocent, you know? It’s cute, and it’s about loving your friend, and I thought a minimalist approach would tell that story best — the simplicity of the original leaves so much scope for a remix to go wherever it wants. 

8S: How does technology influence your own songwriting? 

RK: Technology influences my songwriting process a lot. While I have sat with a piano or guitar to write in the past, lately, I haven’t had access to those, so I write straight into Logic Pro. I start every song by sitting in front of an empty screen and going from there. So, technology is the front and center of my creative process at the moment, though I won’t say it’s how I’ll always write in the future. And I don’t think I’ll start manipulating my lead vocal any time soon. I want to write songs that people can sing from beginning to end, so it’s important to me for my lead lines to be accessible in that way. 

8S: If technology plays a significant role in songwriting, how does that change the idea of a ‘song?’ Songs become much more than notes on a page of sheet music then, right?

RK: I think songs are much more than notes on a page of sheet music anyway! Sure, you can play other people’s songs by reading the chords and the lyrics, but songs have always felt more than that to me. It’s the record that makes the song what it is: the voice, the arrangement, the production. 

There is this purist way to look at songwriting, where you consider something a good song if it can be stripped back to just a voice and a piano or guitar and still sound amazing. I think there is some truth in this way of defining what a good song is. But then you couldn’t play “Ponyboy” by SOPHIE on a piano, could you? And that’s an amazing song. 

The computer is an instrument, and it’s much more versatile than the piano and the guitar. SOPHIE even said (I’m paraphrasing), why would you limit yourself to playing an instrument when you could make anything on a computer? Though I wouldn’t go so far as never to try and write a song that can be considered outstanding in the classical sense, stripped to its bones, and still sounding like a hit. But, really, the songs that don’t do this are and always have been as much a song as those that do. A good song is a feeling, and you definitely can’t write that on sheet music. 

8S: I’m fascinated by the experimental production techniques sneaking into pop through hyperpop and PC music. Do you like the idea of experimental music and pop music coming together? Does it create something new, and do you think a more experimental pop sound has a place on the charts?

RK: I love pop music. Hearing a great pop song is so powerful. And adding experimental elements definitely elevates the music. I think the combination makes experimental sounds more accessible and adds an interesting nuance to the pop genre. There’s an excitement in the melding of these two styles that makes me want to explore it further. Whether that has a place in the charts or not, I don’t know. 

There’s an over-the-topness about PC Music and hyperpop, which might make it ‘a bit much’ for a commercial audience. I also think there’s already proof of its lack of place in the charts. If you look at Charli XCX, she was a charts artist at the start of her career, but when she began collaborating with more underground producers and started experimenting, she pretty much disappeared from the mainstream. But I think it would be cool if this type of music were getting played in the charts. I’d love to turn on the radio and hear 100 gecs. It would also mean I’d know where to find an audience for the music I make, which is one of the hardest things to do as a new artist. They’d just be right there — I’d be making mainstream music! 

8S: A lot of hyperpop — and “ur so cute” — has a sense of humor to it. Does that help make the music accessible?

RK: When I first heard hyperpop and PC Music, I remember thinking it sounded like ’90s Euro-pop times 1000. We all used to listen to “Barbie Girl,” right? But it feels like it’s not cool anymore. I think “Barbie Girl” still sounds really cool. A lot of the glitterbomb, bubblegum, and hyperpop sound uses these older songs as influences in a tongue-in-cheek way, and that’s brilliant. But I wonder whether the world has the sense of humor to push that into the mainstream.

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Rachel Kerry‘s “ur so cute,” its remix, and her other groovy releases are available on Bandcamp.

3+1: Johan Kull

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I’m launching a new series here on 8sided.blog called 3+1. As I run across interesting people doing interesting things, I’ll get them to answer three questions, and then, as a +1, they’ll tell us about something they love. 

First up in Johan Kull, an expressive musician and vocalist based in Stockholm. He’s self-releasing a personal brand of lush, mellow music, featuring washes of ambient-influenced instrumentation accompanied by his consolatory voice. It’s a lovely combination. “Dreams,” Johan’s first single, was an auspicious debut, rewarded with national radio play on Britain’s BBC and Sweden’s P4. Now Johan has followed up with “Home,” a song about “things falling into place.” You can listen to the tune here, followed by a bit of 3+1 with Johan.

1: The new song is called “Home.” You say it’s about “finding home in a person,” and it’s especially calming and warm. Am I wrong to think this year of lockdown and isolation influenced this song?

It’s funny because many have assumed that it is about the past year. While that isn’t necessarily wrong, I think it’s nice that people can have their own interpretations. I’m glad that these feelings seem to be more present during these times and that “Home” can put those feelings into words for listeners.

2: What role does technology play in your songwriting? How about the influence of ambient music?

Digital instruments are an essential part of making my soundscapes but not a requirement. Bon Iver is probably my biggest influence, and he makes ambient textures with both acoustic and digital instruments. I have also built my sound around the contrasting relationship between the organic and the digital. 

3: What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever seen happen at a concert?

I saw Dave Grohl falling off the stage and breaking his leg in Gothenburg in 2015. He walked back on crutches to the middle of the stage and thanked everyone with a cracking voice for staying at the show. He then dedicated “My Hero” to the crowd while waving a whiskey bottle he blamed on the doctor. A memorable moment! 

+1: Something you love that people should know about.

I just discovered the show Schitt’s Creek a couple of weeks ago and binge-watched the whole thing. I believe everyone could get something out of watching this TV series … and everyone should.

Embrace the Genre

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Like end-of-the-year best-of lists, new genre names are something that music fans love to hate. There’s a mixture of disdain for perceived pigeonholing and a failure to keep up with the latest trends — nothing makes a music lover feel older than a new, incomprehensible genre. Then there’s the sub-genre and the micro-genre. Seriously, it never ends. It’s genres all the way down.

Instead of feeling intimidated, I say embrace the genre and all its fancifully named layers. Genre is an identifier, important in pointing the way and gluing together scenes. There was a time that you could walk into an indie record store, look at the clientele, and guess what genres they listened to by how they looked. It’s harder now that genres are less-defined and blur together — which I’ll argue is a good thing. But it’s also why genres are reaching beyond sonic vibes and sounds, increasingly representative of technological innovation, communities, and desired lifestyles. 

If you’re a musician, there’s nothing worse than the question, “What do you sound like?” We shuffle our postures and avoid answering, or vaguely go for something broad like “rock music.” If you look up old artist interviews with me, you’ll see I often responded with “funk,” which was unfortunate. Why can’t we just own our genre — or create our own? Consider the genre as an elevator pitch. It’s a chance to claim a plot of land and plant a flag. 

Here’s how Seth Godin thinks about genre, as explained in his recent appearance on The Moment with Brian Koppelman:

“People who are creatives bristle at the idea of genre because they think it has something to do with generic. It has nothing to do with generic. It’s the opposite of generic. Genre means that you understand your part in the chain — [and] in the process, in the market — well enough to make something magical that still rhymes with what came before. You’ve done the reading. You respect the audience enough that you can’t just show up and say, ‘This is like nothing you’ve ever seen or heard before.’ It actually is where it belongs.”

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It’s fun to look at the birth of genres. The sounds predate the descriptive monikers, often by many years. Traditionally, genres are christened through these sources:

  • An artist or band name. Bill Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys is where we get bluegrass.
  • Song or album titles. Ornette Coleman’s 1960 album Free Jazz and The Maytals’ 1968 single “Do the Reggay” popularized those terms.
  • Compilation album titles. A ‘scene’ is pre-built into the curated collection of artists, such as the now-legendary producers assembled on 1988’s Techno! The New Dance Sound of Detroit.
  • Lyrics. “I said a hip-hop, the hippie, the hippie to the hip, hip-hop and you don’t stop …”
  • Record labels. In the late ’80s, you would’ve called Skinny Puppy something else if Throbbing Gristle didn’t start Industrial Records.
  • Music Journalists. Simon Reynolds is the ninja of the genre name and is still at it. But even before, there was ‘heavy metal,’ applied to music for the first time in 1970 by Mike Saunders, future vocalist of punk band Angry Samoans. Writing for Rolling Stone, he referred to Humble Pie as “27th-rate heavy metal crap.” Ironically, Sauders did not come up with ‘punk rock,’ which was coined the same year in Creem Magazine.
  • Music Executives. Seymour Stein of Sire Records came up with ‘new wave’ to market all these bands he was signing fresh off the stage of CBGBs.
  • The technology. Dub comes from ‘dubplate,’ which is technically a music-delivery format. But dub is hardly ever heard on a dubplate these days.
  • Territory. We can call music from Guatemala Guatamalen music even though the locals undoubtedly have a more specific name. And the ‘western’ in country & western refers to the western US where many rural workers migrated and settled, especially during the Dust Bowl.
  • Radio. Famously, Alan Freed named his radio show The Moondog Rock’n’Roll House Party. Like in many of the examples above, Freed didn’t use the phrase first, but he popularized it.

There’s one more traditional method of genre creation, which I hinted at in the beginning. The artist comes up with it herself. There’s a lot of power in naming your genre as, if you’re successful and others catch on, you become the forebear. Fela Kuti did this with Afrobeat. And Brian Eno did this with ambient music:

“All the signs were in the air all around with ambient music in the mid-1970s, and other people were doing a similar thing. I just gave it a name. Which is exactly what it needed. A name. Giving something a name can be just the same as inventing it. By naming something you create a difference. You say that this is now real.”

Quick side story: in the late-90s, a friend and I often DJ’ed trip-hop records and hip-hop instrumentals with the turntables pitched up near +8. Speed garage was the genre du jour at the time, so we jokingly named our genre ‘speed downtempo.’ It didn’t take off.

But, yes — sometimes a joke or off-handed comment will spawn a genre name. NYC’s DJ Olive came up with ‘illbient’ as a sarcastic response when a journalist asked if he played ambient. And Gilles Peterson famously once joked that his side room at an acid house party was the ‘acid jazz’ area, birthing a repackaged jazz revival. 

Genre is intrinsically tied to the music it denotes but spreads out to other qualities of the genre’s followers. Goth is as identifiable for its fashion as its sound, and close-knit genres like nerdcore are increasingly identified by membership in their communities. 

What’s interesting — with technological developments inseparable from how we interact with music — is the emergence of genres outside of a musical style. That is, the communities or the platforms define the genre, and the music comes later. 

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I want to look at a few recent arrivals in the pantheon of genres to see how defining our music ends up describing so much more. Be warned — many of these sub-genres contain references to other sub-genres. You might get genre whiplash.

Hyperpop

On the excellent Jaymo Technologies blog, Jay Springett writes about the daunting proliferation of genres and how streaming platforms affect genre creation: 

The world is now dominated by microgenres and subcultures, shaping perception of reality via niche hashtags and network effects. For better or worse someone at Spotify finds or makes up a genre name and then populates a playlist with content. The idea that people would be mad about an online genre having a name and coming from nowhere now seems quaint.

Jay is possibly hinting at hyperpop, a genre name popularized by Spotify via the in-house playlist of the same name. The actual sound of hyperpop is debatable and evasive, with many of its elements drawn from vaporwave, an older genre (by a few years) but somewhat more explainable. There’s a Gen Z do-it-yourself aesthetic, and many of hyperpop’s ephemeral stars are in their early teens. Lizzy Szabo, who helps curate the playlist, understands that hyperpop is “an artist and listening community” as much as it’s a musical genre. One thing to notice about that quote: the listeners are included in the definition, powering hyperpop alongside the creators. To participate, throw aside any reservations about a movement dreamed up by a big corporation. 

Glitchcore

Glitchcore shares many of the artists found on the Hyperpop playlist. Its defining sonic trait is the ‘glitch’ — quick edits, stuttering vocals and syllables, things that would have once made us check our compact discs for scratches. Some even take hyperpop songs and add these ‘defects’ for glitchcore remixes. But glitchcore’s difference is in its inspiration and intention. TikTok videos, with visual glitches matching the audio ones, along with bright colors and flashes, are the reason and original platform for most glitchcore tracks. Like how a TV signal popping in-and-out changes the quality of a show’s dialogue, it’s a visual aesthetic influencing the sound. Glitchcore is a genre given shape by a video editing technique mixed with a nostalgia for digital’s early days of jarring imperfection.  

Lo-Fi Hip-Hop

Like hyperpop, lo-fi hip-hop (or lo-fi beats, chill-hop, or, sometimes, ‘music for studying’) gets its name from a curated spot on a streaming platform. In lo-fi hip-hop’s case, these are streaming channels on YouTube playing an endless selection of music usually accompanied by a looping anime scene. A Gen Z variant of ambient music, lo-fi hip-hop is meant to accompany studying, video-gaming, or zoning out. This is another genre that’s expanded its popularity in COVID-times, with the studying girl of the ‘lofi hip hop radio – beats to relax/study to’ channel serving as a lockdown work-from-home companion. The music itself draws directly from boom-bap hip-hop and — for those in the know — the mellow side of ’90s trip-hop, but is more basic, often constructed from interchangeable sample libraries and beat kits. Lo-fi hip-hop is a diluted version of its predecessors, which is why it’s so effective as in-the-background focus music.

Bedroom Pop

Bedroom pop started as ‘what it says on the tin:’ pop music made in the bedroom. Its unexpected ancestor is the lo-fi indie movement of the ’90s, with bands like Sebadoh and Guided By Voices recording albums on four-track cassette recorders. Nothing kept those bands from visiting a studio, but the constraints inherited through four-track recording were integral to their sounds (and brands). 

The bedroom pop aesthetic predates the pandemic but has unsurprisingly grown during months of lockdown. The songs are generally sparser and have an air of intimacy not found in your usual pop. Vocals are often delivered at an ASMR volume instead of belted out. 

Billie Eilish is the patron saint of bedroom pop. She does record most of her music in a bedroom with her brother, though these raw tracks are then mixed in multi-million dollar studios. As you might have guessed, unlike the four-track to the lo-fi bands, the ‘bedroom’ part is no longer essential to this genre. As the bedroom pop artist Girl in Red says, “Pop bangers are being made in bedrooms and bedroom pop-ish songs in studios. It’s more about how it sounds than where it’s made.”

Slowed & Reverb

Slowed & reverb is one of the oddest new genres, its name a play on the seemingly ancient (a decade+ old) hip-hop sub-genre chopped & screwed. Slowed & reverb appropriates other songs, but instead of ‘glitching’ or ‘remixing’ them, the music is slowed down (‘screwed’) and then doused in reverb. Recent hip-hop tracks mostly receive the slowed & reverb treatment but, as an offshoot of vaporwave, cheesy ’80s AOR songs are frequent targets, too. This genre is all about the feelings evoked — listening is like being lost in a fog that’s hazy, nostalgic, dream-like, and druggy. It also tends to turn upbeat songs into melancholic sobfests. 

Because slowed & reverb uses pre-existing songs, you can only find its ‘hits’ on YouTube, SoundCloud, and (sometimes) Bandcamp. The other platforms have copyright barriers, though some producers have gotten away with compiling slowed & reverb mixes and servicing them to Spotify as podcasts. In a recent development, a few artists are now commissioning official slowed & reverb remixes of their singles, so perhaps there’s growth potential after all.

(Are you interested in creating your own slowed & reverb track? There’s an app for that.)

Ambient Television

This is the newest genre on the list, coined by Kyle Chayka in The New Yorker last month. I’m fudging a little as ambient television is not a music genre but a television aesthetic that draws influence from the same well as lo-fi hip-hop. This example shows how, as with glitchcore, different mediums are interacting to create new genres. 

Ambient television follows Eno’s maxim of “as ignorable as it is interesting,” or as Chayka explains, “something you don’t have to pay attention to in order to enjoy but which is still seductive enough to be compelling if you choose to do so momentarily.” These are the new breed of Netflix design shows or, as Chayka pinpoints, Emily In Paris — TV shows you can look away from to read that iPhone notification without feeling like you’re missing anything. 

There are more intriguing ramifications here when thinking about how streaming influences the ways we absorb digital media. Here’s Chayka again: 

Whereas the Internet once promised to provide on-demand access to limitless information and media to anyone willing to make use of a Google search, lately it has encouraged a more passive kind of engagement, a state of slack-jawed consumption only intensified by this past year’s quarantine ennui. Streaming companies once pitched themselves as innovators for offering the possibility to watch anything at any time, but do we really want to choose? The prevalence of ambient media suggests that we don’t.

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Genre-chasing can seem ridiculous. But, as you see, the names we use to bond music together says everything about how we listen. New genres are a commentary on the present culture. And old ones are an archeological dig. As Seth Godin said at the top of this essay, genres help us understand our “part in the chain.” That goes for the fans as well as the musicians. Genres decode the links formed through technology, platforms, fashion, and community. Embrace the genre.

Here’s a music genre list to scroll through. And here’s an interactive genre chart provided by Every Noise at Once. The latter offers audio samples but keep in mind the music is only part of the story. Chances are both lists are seriously behind on all of the new genres, even if they were up-to-date a week or two ago.

Ralph Kinsella and the Poetics of Bedroom Listening

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Ralph Kinsella contacted me through this blog and emailed a link to his just-released Bandcamp-only Abstraction EP. The tunes blew me away — this was an ambient music I wanted to hear, melodic and optimistic, dynamic rather than constant, and featuring guitars, both processed and clear. I wrote about it in a previous #Worktones segment, giving the Abstraction EP high marks. But, behind the scenes, I emailed Ralph asking if he thought of following up with an album. And if he’d like my 8D Industries imprint to release it.

Ralph responded with the completed demo of his album Lessening. Though recorded at the same time as the Abstraction EP, Lessening felt like a step forward. Hearing Ralph’s music at a 50-minute stretch suited his sonic world-building. The music is glistening and evolving, taking on suggestive textures that convey movement from place-to-place. I’m loath to bring up ‘the lockdown,’ but these hopeful, outward-reaching tones are an antidote to seclusion.

Today Lessening is available on all the streaming platforms as well as Bandcamp. I can’t think of a better way for 8D Industries to close out this year of uncertainty — it’s an album of hesitant lightness and a resolve to keep going. 

I briefly spoke to Ralph Kinsella about this album, his music, and the beautiful part of Scotland where he resides. 

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I take it Abstraction is your debut under your own name. If so, what’s your background before that? I believe you were in a band or bands, correct? 

Ralph Kinsella: Abstraction and Lessening are the first records I recorded alone, and roughly at the same time, during the COVID-19 lockdown. They are siblings in that way, separated at birth. I wanted to do nothing more than capture something — a feeling, an emotion, maybe. Certainly, the unassailable need for extended and stretched forms of expression. Hopefully, listeners might relate to feelings of detachment and piercing melancholy, as I felt when making the records. 

I spent a long time improvising and experimenting with sounds in the lead-up to these releases. Before making these sounds, I was in various bands (mostly lo-fi bedroom rock). 

Tell me a little about your recording process. Anything surprising, either in technique, location, or even the gear you use? Do you approach the music with a ‘philosophy’? 

I record everything in a spare bedroom, and all the music starts with improvisation — usually on guitar (or synth) with a series of effects pedals. I try to use as little equipment as possible: a Stratocaster, harmonium, delay pedals, a cheapo synth, and a good synth. I use Logic Pro essentially as an eight-track. Limitations are the most important thing for me when working alone. So I avoid using any plugin instruments or too much DSP after recording. Like Keats, the philosophy is ‘truth’ – even though no such thing exists.

As a guitarist, how did you fall into this ambient style of music? Who are your inspirations/long-distance mentors for developing this sound?

The Swedish record label, Häpna, changed my life as a teenager. I’ve been obsessed with experimental music with post-rock leanings ever since. I’d go to Monorail Records in Glasgow and pick up anything new from the label (usually based on the cover art – the aesthetic curated by the label/artists was wonderful). I found the record labels and artists contributing to this creative ecosystem inspiring. It showed me a different model, one centered on creative expression.

At the moment, I enjoy listening to (and trying my best to understand) the music of Elaine Radigue, Francis Dhomont, Loren Conners, and, most recently, Cucina Povera. I think they’ve all been unknowingly collaborating with me for a while now.

When I reviewed the Abstraction EP, I pegged it as “bright, gentle, and optimistic.” Do you think that’s a fair assessment? If so, how do you arrive at that ‘vibe’ when a lot of ambient electronic music nowadays is dark and droney? And the world being dark and droney, too?

You’re right – I’m always looking for a way to make instrumental (and more left-field music) without the ‘higher access mode’ approach (by that I mean, the “my music is hard to listen to, therefore it must know more than you do” approach). I like to thread/tread fine ground between pop/experimental and abstract/structure.

Tell me a little bit about Dumfries and Galloway. I know much of The Wicker Man was filmed in the vicinity, which is wild. How does the landscape affect the music?

Liminal, fringe spaces are always interesting places for creativity. The way that land visually falls away into the sea in the imagery of The Wicker Man has a similar energy to the kind of stuff I’m interested in: where rural and (semi-rural) Scotland uncomfortably meet urban areas. The boondocks, interspersed with fragments of debris and flickering housing scheme street lights. These places (and the artistic exploration of these places) imbue my work. 

Is there an ideal listening environment or frame-of-mind for Lessening? 

The records (as with most music of this genre) require a certain amount of engagement. The pieces are musical conversations – they want to start a dialog with the listener and, I think, reject passivity. I like the poetics of the bedroom for music listening – that’s where I created the music, and that’s where it probably resonates best. 

• Ralph Kinsella’s Lessening is out now on 8D Industries.

Memory Color and Kankyō Ongaku’s New Age

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Memory Color's Blue Sun Daydream

Blue Sun Daydream‘s opening track, “Night at Sotokanda,” instantly evokes a scene. A playful melody chimes in layers of background noise before getting washed in reverb tails and floating tones. It seems we’re lost in the Sotokanda district of Tokyo. The sounds continue, echoing grinds and bells, the occasional voice. I’m imagining a railway depot — Akihabara Station, perhaps? — and by the end, we’ve walked on and into the gentle songs of birds. The bells have become meditation bells. These eight minutes are quite the journey.

Portland-based experimental producer Elijah Knutsen has crafted five expressions of Japan on Blue Sun Daydream, released through the new imprint Memory Color. Knutsen pays homage and updates the micro-genre of Kankyō Ongaku, a style of ambient recently popularized by Light In The Attic on the compilation Kankyō Ongaku: Japanese Ambient, Environmental & New Age Music 1980​-​1990. The music is known for calming atmospheres, sparse but memorable melodies, and environmental sounds. It’s music for head-traveling, a concept I’m eager to embrace in lockdown times. 

I’m fascinated by this album and the origins of Kankyō Ongaku, so I requested a Q&A with Elijah Knutsen. His generous responses detail his intentions with this project, the history of this musical aesthetic, why a compact disc release of Blue Sun Daydream is essential, and so much more. And Knutsen opens up many rabbit holes to explore. His recommendations alone are worth several deep dives. (I slightly edited this interview for clarity and concision.)

8Sided: What draws you to Japanese ambient music? What makes it different from other electronic ambient music of different eras?

Elijah Knutsen: The unique sound palette that stems from field recordings and environmental sound is unlike many things I’ve heard before. A lot of Japanese ambient albums are awash with sounds of flowing water, birds singing, rain, and thunder. It takes the music into another dimension of immersion, bringing you to a place you can feel and experience. It adds depth to the idea of music and sound as an art form. 

Second, the unique presentation of these albums is interesting to me. Two of the most well known Japanese artists, Takashi Kokubo and Hiroshi Yoshimura, made their groundbreaking records in collaboration with skincare and air conditioning companies, included free with orders and accompanying sales installations. The idea of creating an entire album based around an inanimate object is intriguing and shows how creative and talented these artists were.

Something I find notable about this genre (and ambient music as a whole) is how it completely shifts your idea of what music could be. Rather than focusing on a melody or chord progression, this music encourages a different way of listening. Things as simple as distant train horns, wind chimes, or muffled conversations are now music. You can go outside and experience that music whenever you want to. 

8S: What is ‘Kankyō Ongaku’? How would you explain it (and its history) to someone new to the genre?

EK: Kankyō Ongaku started in Japan in the 1980s as an offshoot of more contemporary ambient music and became a distinctive form of art. It focuses on ‘background noises,’ including the natural sound of life, with bits of melody blended between the long stretches of environmental sounds. Synthesizers are typical yet used carefully. The patches and sounds used are soft and simple, much like the compositions. The melodies are simple yet evolving — and sometimes not even there.

8S: The Light In The Attic compilation only covers the years 1980-1990. But how did Kankyō Ongaku evolve into the ’90s and to the present?

EK: I feel that the art of Kankyō Ongaku was significantly overlooked, and only now is it becoming apparent how special it is, especially to western audiences. The artists of the ’80s continued making their music, and many went on to work in the film and video game industry (Joe Hisaishi – Studio Ghibli). However, the specific type of Kankyō Ongaku explored by Light In The Attic is mostly from ’80s artists. But Hiroshi Yoshimura’s final album before his passing in 2003, Four Post Cards, sounds directly taken from one of his earlier works.

The sound of Japanese ambient in the 1990s was defined by the artist Tetsu Inoue. Tetsu worked with Pete Namlook and his pioneering FAX label, releasing groundbreaking albums like World Receiver and Ambiant Otaku. These albums defined the genre differently. Instead of programmed synth arpeggios and babbling creeks, Tetsu’s music clouds the listener with dense textures of sound set upon ever-changing noise sheets. Tetsu, unfortunately, dropped off the radar in 2007 and hasn’t been heard from since. 

8S: Are there any notable artists missing from that compilation?

EK: Artists like Hiroshi Yoshimura and Takashi Kokubo are probably the most well known in this genre. Yet, there are other talented artists not included in the compilation. Right now, my favorites are Yutaka Hirose, Tetsu Inoue, Kensuke Mitome, Takao Naoi, and Kazuo Uehara. 

8S: Who are some current artists carrying on the Kankyō Ongaku tradition that you’d recommend?

EK: There may not be another artist exactly like Hiroshi, but there are tons who can fit the idea of Kankyō Ongaku. One of the more experimental artists I’m listening to is Tamako Katsufuji, a sound artist from Osaka, Japan. Her albums are incredibly eclectic pieces of sound art, using field recordings, cat sounds, and singing bowls, all arranged in a strangely calming fashion. Although Tamako’s music is different than Four Post Cards or Tetsu Inoue, her work is as ‘Kankyō Ongaku’ as the giants of the ’80s. The best part about this genre is how encompassing it can be.

The main reason I started Memory Color was to explore the sound of Kankyō Ongaku and experiment with it. I’m also hoping to find others doing the same thing. There are many amazing artists out there who are entirely unnoticed. 

8S: Why is it important to you that your releases are on compact disc or physical formats?

EK: It’s important because, when creating an album, everything from the song titles to the cover design should be meticulously crafted. These things are as equally important as the music. Why should the album have to be stripped down to its bare parts for a streaming website? Many people overlook how special it is to hold something in one’s hands, especially after engaging services like Spotify. Like with a book, the cover and the packaging is as essential to the experience as the content inside.

8S: Do you think there’s a difference in how fans see physical formats now — CDs, vinyl, cassettes — or are they mostly ‘totems’ to represent affinity to the music? That said, should people listen to music on physical formats? Why or why not?

EK: I do believe that many people buy physical releases for the sentimental value. But there are still arguments that formats such as tape or vinyl are the optimal way of listening. I do believe that we can grow tired of the stale sound presented by streaming platforms. One of my favorite bands, Mercury Rev, recorded their groundbreaking album Deserters Songs on physical tape. The frontman claims that the tape captured the music’s emotions in a way digital formats can not.

Going back to what I said earlier, the packaging and artwork are crucial to the album as the music itself. I’ve purchased many releases on CD after listening to them purely on digital, and the artwork and design not shown on Spotify add another dimension to the overall experience.

Elijah Knutsen

8S: You, and the label, are out of Portland. But the label’s website has a .jp address, and song titles have Japanese translations. Are you specifically targeting Japanese listeners?

EK: One of the main reasons I chose to market my label to Japan is its still-thriving physical market. A big goal is to get our releases into actual music stores, so why not try with one of the only places still buying physical releases? I also felt it was important to make the music we’re releasing accessible to Japan, especially if we’re taking such a large amount of inspiration from that country’s sound. 

8S: The press release notes that “the album explores the idea of yearning for another time and place, even if one has never been there.” Is Japan one of those places?

EK: Definitely. I often have vivid dreams about living in another country or place, and then wake up wondering what I’m missing. This feeling also ties into the music on the album. I base many of my albums on places and the feelings and memories they bring about. I like to capture the entire essence of a moment and relive it through the music.

For Blue Sun Daydream, I went on Google Earth’s street view and wandered around in small Japanese towns, noting the names of areas I thought were evocative. I wondered what it would be like to live there. The song titles you see on the album are all real places, more or less. 

8S: The album features evocative sound design. It really is transportive. I assume this is the contribution of Kato Eiji, mentioned in the press release. Can you tell me about this collaboration and how his recordings and input influenced the album?

EK: Yes, I met Kato through an ambient music forum. He posted a link to his Freesound page — that’s a site where I get many field recordings and samples for music. Most of his recordings were done in Southern Tokyo, ranging from train station ambiance to street sounds and rainfall. I used some of his recordings on Blue Sun Daydream, as well as sounds I recorded. His recordings added the extra level of atmosphere that I was looking for. They set the scene for the album. 

8S: What is a ‘memory color’? What does that mean to you, and how does the concept inspire the label’s output?

EK: A “memory color” is, scientifically, a color typically associated with an object through memory, such as a banana being yellow or a leaf being green. It’s the relationship colors have with our memories. Some colors will remind you of the specific things you’ve seen and experienced throughout your life.

However, the label name ‘Memory Color’ is inspired by the feeling of wanting to record moments and emotions somehow and revisit them whenever you want to. It’s a reference to that feeling related to the nostalgia that many people feel when listening to music.

It’s also very much inspired by the sensation of dreaming, and how that plays into memory. In a dream, you can witness an incredibly vivid place or moment. Yet as soon as you wake up, it quickly dissipates, and you can only remember a particular color, sound, or emotion. I believe that the music of Kankyō Ongaku is as close as one can get to capturing those dreams.

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Blue Sun Daydream is available now from Bandcamp and a limited edition handcrafted compact disc from the Memory Color website. 

Generous Expertise

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The terrific documentary about Other Music popped up on Prime Video last month. I’ve wanted to see this for a while — the NYC store, much mythologized, really was the ideal of an indie record shop. It had it all: a niche selection curated by the owners and staff, records filed under sometimes-baffling genre section names, cards with reviews filled to the edges with jumbled handwriting affixed to releases, store layout and organization to the point of disorganization, and so on.

The documentary made me miss New York City (I’m so happy I got to visit a few months before The Strange Times) and, of course, browsing in record stores. But, most of all, I miss the communities and interactions that revolve around great shops. This aspect of music culture was fading, along with independent retail stores, with or without COVID interference.

Other Music, New York City

Record store clerks get a bad rap for being smug jerks, judging customers’ musical tastes from behind the counter. Sure, I know a few of those —perhaps on a bad day, I’ve been one of those — but I think the cliché is overblown. As the Other Music doc shows, record store employees are often helpful experts in their chosen fields. As Caroline said as we watched the movie, “I could listen to them talk about records all day.” They know a lot about music, they listen to a lot of music, and their favorite thrill is turning someone else on to great music. People who work in record shops live for that.

There’s a moment in the documentary when a customer says to the clerk, “I’m looking for something like Lou Reed that’s not Lou Reed.” We wait for the side-glance, or a snarky response, or the indignant huff. The legends and depictions of pretentious record shops train us to believe this might be a terrible thing to ask. The customer is brave even to bring it up. 

But record store staff enjoy questions like this. The request is open-ended but has a launchpad. It’s an invitation to explore, and, most of all, it’s the customer saying, “I trust you to turn me on to something I haven’t heard yet. And I’m inclined to love it.” Maybe that’s just my own experience (I owned a record store once, remember), but I think I’m right. 

I can’t imagine the response if that person asked for “something like Lou Reed but not Lou Reed” on Facebook or Twitter. Maybe he’d get a handful of helpful replies in the spirit of a record shop clerk, but the snark would cover those over like a storm cloud. I don’t know of an internet equivalent of a space where one stranger can ask another for an open-ended recommendation without fear of trolls or insults or intimidation. 

Record stores are places of generous expertise. It’s sad that the concept almost seems quaint in this volatile age. And that’s what I miss the most about stores like Other Music. Hopefully, these stores — Other Music not included, unfortunately — will be around once we get out of this mess. In the meantime, watch the documentary. If you ever had — or have! — a favorite record store, this movie will move you.

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A couple of weekends ago, 1200 record stores participated in Record Store Day. I don’t need to tell you that this was a weird edition of the annual tradition. Record store day occurs typically in April but, this time was pushed to June, as there was a thing called “wishful thinking” back then. As that plan fizzled out, we’re now celebrating RSD 2020 through three ‘RSD drops’ on the last Saturdays of August, September, and October.1One wonders if this monthly schedule was inspired by ‘Bandcamp Days.’ In part, the idea is that spreading it out will thin the crowds showing up at actual record stores. This schedule, in theory, will also help space out the releases, so they’re not all hitting on a single day. I’m not so sure.

The decision exists in our current retail paradox of ‘less physical customers, more physical sales.’ The dramatic lines in front of record stores (which you can see in photos from a year-old blog post of mine) are no longer welcome. Elbow-to-elbow bin browsing is not allowed. That’s a shame as peeking at the person’s selections next to you is how vinyl junkies make friends. 

Most record stores won’t open their doors to the record-collecting masses. The RSD organizers frowned on online orders of exclusive releases, but this year it’s acceptable. Stores are trying to restrict orders of these limited items to local addresses, which sounds like a losing battle. Some stores are using a lottery to determine which customer snags a rare vinyl release or who gets to step in the store for an allotted time. Others are using platforms like Instagram, posting a photo of the record. Then it’s ‘first come first serve’ among the commenters. And, appropriate for this year of live-streaming, Zoom-led RSD tours from stores are happening.

In Variety, Mick Pratt of the Northeastern US indie chain Bull Moose says of the challenges, “I choose to be optimistic about it and hope that it will be great and it will not result in too much stress, either for staff or for customers who are like, ‘Damn, what I really needed to get through 2020 was this record.'”

How did it go? It seems like it went okay, but shifting vinyl fans from crowding the stores to crowding the internet had foreseeable problems. Here’s a tweet from Damon Krukowski, whose old band Galaxie 500 released the live album Copenhagen for RSD:

Regardless, the point is to support these stores (among all the other independent businesses you’re supporting) during this difficult time. You don’t need to wait for the next Record Store Day to do so. We can’t lose these places of generous expertise: the record stores, the bookshops, the locally-owned restaurants, the farmer’s markets, etc. I have the feeling once we get out of this, we’ll need these places more than ever. I don’t know how we’ll manage if they’re gone.

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John Shepherd has a generous expertise. You’ve probably heard about the short documentary John Was Trying To Contact Aliens by now. So you know Shepherd’s expertise wasn’t only his musical selections. Though I’m not convinced all those knobs and wires and screens and machinery actually did anything, you know, scientific. You might also know that his generosity extended to alien life forms. He DJ’ed to the great unknown, an audience that may or may not be out there. I know the feeling — I used to have an overnight slot on college radio.

As evidence of my embarrassing music-nerdom, the most crucial part of the documentary, to me, is when, in vintage footage, Shepherd pulls Musik Von Harmonia out of his vinyl collection for a local TV crew. As obscure as that album is now, it was but a rare fossil when that television ‘human interest’ piece aired — sometime in the ’80s is my guess. Shepherd’s geek move was strategic. He knew this would go out on television, potentially to an audience in the hundreds of thousands. So what album does he choose to show? And then he plays some of the music, announcing “now here’s a song from Harmonia” into the microphone. Shepherd’s audience is now more than extraterrestrial, and he knows it. 

Like making friends with the person browsing next to you at the record store, John Shepherd aims for connection. He’s satisfied if that connection is with aliens or a TV viewer left dumbfounded at a Harmonia album on the evening news. The film’s director, Matthew Killip, speaks about these connections in The Guardian: 

Killip was interested in extraterrestrial life less as scientific inquiry than cultural phenomenon – “if you make a film about someone trying to contact aliens, there’s an in-built narrative problem, which is that they don’t contact aliens,” he said. But he found Shepherd’s lifelong interest in contacting someone, or something, in outer space to be “deeply romantic”, and more universal than a guy rigging thousands of dollars of radio and electrical equipment in his grandparents’ living room might seem. “We’re all sort of sending out a message hoping that someone else will pick it up and understand us and understand who we are,” Killip said. “We’re all trying to make contact.”

The compact but poignant documentary John Was Trying To Contact Aliens is streaming now on Netflix. And, John is right — Musik Von Harmonia is an album worth hearing.

This post was adapted from Ringo Dreams of Lawn Care, a weekly newsletter loosely about music-making, music-listening, and how technology changes the culture around those things. Click here to check out the latest issue and subscribe.

Talking Backward

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I encountered Kramer through his band Bongwater, and his production work with Galaxie 500, Low, Daniel Johnston, and many others, all recorded at his Noise New York and Noise New Jersey studios. Kramer’s label Shimmy Disc was a trove of curiosities and, yes, treasures — a label as distinctive as Factory and early 4AD but perhaps even more surprising. The identifiable sound of Kramer’s production (those drums, that reverb) balanced an unpredictable and eccentric A&R taste. Shimmy Disc was a paradox because, when buying one of the releases blind, you sorta knew what it would sound like without having any idea what you were getting into. The genre or style of each record was a mystery until the needle touched the vinyl.

I’ve been fascinated by Kramer’s activities for a long time. Perhaps even more now that he’s living Florida and has established his Noise Miami studio. If I had a band, I would totally take advantage of the fact that Kramer is a four-hour drive away.

I was excited to discover an interview with Kramer, conducted by the writer Rick Moody, on the Believer Magazine site. Then I was disappointed to find out the interview is only three questions long. But that disappointment was short-lived once I realized Kramer answered those three questions with over 10,000 words covering his music story’s early years. And what a story it is — Kramer is an excellent writer, and almost every paragraph is gripping. I’m in for one of the top pledge tiers on Kickstarter if he ever decides to self-publish a memoir.

Kramer’s long answers to the first two questions are terrific and filled with entertaining stories. He talks about his early touring band experience with psychedelic trooper Daevid Allen and the band Gong, and then his entrance into the avant-garde, rubbing shoulders with the likes of John Zorn, Karl Berger, Tom Cora, and (hilariously) Ornette Coleman. In an episode of my newsletter, I discussed a long-form interview with Jim O’Rourke. This second part of Kramer’s interview is like that — it’s ridiculously rich in recommendations and rabbit holes. There’s also lots of folksy wisdom, such as this nugget: 

Never expect your heroes to be fine people. It’s far better to expect the exact opposite. Then you can be thrilled to death when you meet someone who treats you just as you would treat them. Hang on. Hang on just a little bit longer. You’ll meet good people. Eventually.

Kramer is such a great storyteller. Reading this piece had that feeling of a novel you can’t put down. Mesmerized under Kramer’s spell by the first two sections, the third question shook me back to consciousness. Rick Moody asks, “How did you meet Butthole Surfers, and what was it like touring with them?” No doubt, this ride was about to become a roller coaster. 

I find it challenging to explain the Butthole Surfers to anyone who didn’t see them in the ’80s. I saw them twice in 1988, and the effect — especially that first show, with Flaming Lips opening no less — was life-changing. They weren’t the same band for me once they went from two drummers to one, which is a hipster-y “before they were cool” thing to say, but that really did change their sound. During the time I saw the Butthole Surfers, there wasn’t any comparable band. Maybe that video of Throbbing Gristle doing their last concert at Kezar Stadium comes close, at least in intensity. But it’s still a different animal.

The first time I saw the Butthole Surfers was the second ‘real’ concert I ever attended. Someday I’ll tell you my first but now’s not the time. I grew up in Central Louisiana, remember, and we didn’t have many concerts. Well, there were a few — Elvis played our town a few months before he died. But I didn’t go to any live shows throughout my pre-college years. Then I got talked into a road trip to see the Surfers in Houston. That’s a five-hour drive, folks — I just double-checked as I find it hard to believe that we used to drive five hours each way for a concert. It was the first of many of these drives.

I remember not being that excited to see the Butthole Surfers. I thought they were some comedy punk rock act (years earlier I wouldn’t have been that off base). But I read about the first Flaming Lips album in The Bob, bought it, and loved it. I got in the car to see them. 

The Flaming Lips were terrific. Their now-infamous visual show was pretty low-tech back then. They turned on multiple fog machines, creating a thick white cloud on the stage. And then the band played with a bright light behind them, dark shadows within that cloud. We never actually saw the group. When they finished, I remember thinking, “That was the weirdest thing I ever saw.” I had no idea that it would move a notch down to the second weirdest thing in about 20 minutes.

Remember how I said it was difficult to explain the Butthole Surfers? I’m not going to try. There’s a bootleg recording of the concert here, but that’s only half the story. The sounds they were making were unreal — Gibby’s vocal manipulations alone, via the SPX1000 and a digital delay unit, blew my mind. Add the visual overload happening on that stage with the backward projected movies, the cymbals on fire, the eye-patched topless dancer (it’s true) — I wasn’t the same after all of that.

The audience added to the surreal scene, repeatedly climbing tall speaker stacks and jumping tens of feet into the crowd. I never saw mayhem like this before. After the band finished their encore, Gibby came back on the stage and yelled at someone in the audience to approach him. Gibby bent down and exchanged harsh words with this individual. He suddenly pulled a bottle out from behind his back, smashed it over the guy’s head, and walked away.

I’ve thought about that moment a lot. What was it about? Was that guy okay? How could the band get away with that? And then this Kramer interview revealed the secret to me over three decades later:

Gibby clamors back onstage and runs behind Paul’s guitar amp, only to emerge a few seconds later with a large plastic box which I immediately recognize as a case of breakaway bottles we’d been lugging around Europe for weeks … breakaway bottles look like real bottles, but they are actually props made of sugar to be used in theater, film, the circus, etc… you can smash them against someone’s face and no one gets hurt.

There you go. 

I saw the Butthole Surfers again in Houston less than eight months later. My friend David joined me and shot this gorgeous 8mm footage, recently digitized and uploaded to YouTube: 

David writes about this footage and his experience filming it here. And I’m with the YouTube commenter on the show — I’m pretty sure it’s December ’88 at Ensemble Hall, not Numbers (which is where I saw them the first time). But I digress.

When you drive five hours to see a concert you want to make the most of the experience. That’s partly the reason why we used to smuggle tape recorders and 8mm cameras into the shows. We also always tried to blag our way backstage after the concerts. My friends and I all volunteered at the college radio station, so we often used the trusty “we’re here to interview the band” ruse. It worked more often than you’d think.

And we made our way backstage at this second Butthole Surfers show. I remember Gibby towering over a flock of adoring punkers, grinning maniacally as they shouted his name: “Sign this for me, Gibby!” I wandered into a side room, and King Coffey, one half of the drumming duo, was sitting alone. I sat down and struck up a conversation. The Ensoniq EPS sampler was released that year, and we talked about that. King had purchased one, and I wanted to know all about it.

After a few minutes, I decided to do some actual radio business. I pulled out my recorder and asked King if he’d do a ‘radio ID’ for my show. That entailed King saying who he was and then ‘you’re listening to …’ followed by the station’s call letters. He asked me for the station info. “KLPI in Ruston, Louisiana” I replied. King told me to hold on for a minute, and he sat back, deep in thought.

I couldn’t figure out what King was doing as he was visibly making some sort of calculation in his head. Then he quickly leaned forward and said, “I’m ready — start the tape!” I held my recorder to his mouth, and he says, “This is King Coffey of the Butthole Surfers, and you’re listening to KLPI in Ruston, Louisiana, which backward is …” And then he spouted a couple of seconds of nonsensical gibberish.

We laugh, I thank him, and then my friends and I get in a car and drive five hours back to Ruston. 

A couple of days later, I go to the radio station to transfer my recording to ‘cart.’ If you’ve seen WKRP In Cinncinatti, then you’ve seen Johnny Fever take what looks like an eight-track tape, stick it in a slot, and a commercial or radio ID plays. Pre-digital, that’s what radio DJs used. The cart was always cued to the beginning, playing the audio at the push of a button. And, for some reason, to get my recording on the cart, I first had to transfer it to reel-to-reel tape.

I successfully transferred King Coffey’s routine to reel-to-reel, and I readied it for the cart. His fake ‘backward’ talk got me wondering … nah, there’s no way. But the thing about reel-to-reel tape is you can flip a switch, and the tape plays backward. So I listened to the tape in reverse and — you guessed it — King actually did say the station call letters, city, and state backward. Perfectly. It sounded like I was playing it forward. That band made my mind reel even days after the show.

It was about fifteen years later that I picked up Michael Azerrad’s essential history of the US ’80s independent music scene Our Band Could Be Your Life. There’s a chapter on the Butthole Surfers, and, casually, Azerrad throws out the trivia nugget that King Coffey has the unusual ability to translate any sentence backward accurately. 

There you go.

But this is about the Kramer interview, which you should now go read. It’s kind of a love story — a love for music, adventure, and adventures in music — and Kramer closes the piece with these words about the Surfers:

I will love these people long after I am dead. And of that death, thanks in great part to my months alongside them in 1985, I will not be afraid.

This post was adapted from Ringo Dreams of Lawn Care, a weekly newsletter loosely about music-making, music-listening, and how technology changes the culture around those things. Click here to check out the latest issue and subscribe.

The Soundabout

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I’m thinking a lot about how listening creates spaces, both shared and solitary. In the Strange Times, with no concerts and shuttered venues, you might think isolated listening is the only game in town. But, unexpectedly, live-streaming is opening up new opportunities for a shared listening experience, and I’m not talking about the facsimile of hanging out with distant Zoom-mates. 

If there’s one thing live-streaming is bringing back, it’s shared listening in our homes. I thought about this last Thursday when I caught Rishi from Elephant Stone live-streaming from his basement. As I listened, I scrolled through the top bar in Zoom, checking out the other attendees. Many had their kids, family, and friends enjoying the stream with them. Eventually, Caroline joined me in our video square, snow-white cat in tow, and we listened together as Rishi rocked out on sitar.

I know we still (sometimes) watch television shows together, but we’re focused on the music in this case. The video might draw us in, but upon our arrival, the image is an afterthought. We’re silently listening, paying attention to sound, occasionally breaking the spell to comment in the ‘chat’ stream on what we’re hearing. In a way, it’s a replication of meeting at a nightclub (though a coffeehouse is more apt) but only with our family and closest friends.

We’ve all seen those vintage photos of the family crowded around the radio, presumably listening to audio theater — but sometimes it’s music that’s holding their attention. And in pictures from the ’50s and ’60s, we see a gathering of teenagers, one placing the record on the turntable while the others gaze at the album cover or dance around the bedroom. Listening was only private if no one else was around. One could wear headphones (now appearing comically oversized), but there was no mobility. Headphone listening could pass for teenage rebellion if the family were also in the room, but mostly it was awkward.

The transistor radio — and, to a degree, the car radio — allowed the music to travel as the immediate surroundings changed. This movement created the first personal soundtrack, though other people could pop in and out of our movie (in the licensing world, the phrase ‘interstitial music’ refers to music that all the characters in a scene can hear). Then, of course, the cassette and the Walkman added a new way to listen — a genuinely private listening experience. We choose the music, and we choose where we want to go with it. The combination puts us inside the movie, shifting the soundtrack to our inner lives.

The Walkman (briefly called the Soundabout) debuted in most places outside of Japan in 1980. The early versions were bulky and — in a misunderstanding of how the device would change listening — came with an extra headphone port for a friend. A button paused the music and activated a microphone so the paired listeners could talk to each other. Sony jettisoned these features once it was clear users preferred to listen on their own in sonic isolation. 

In a way, the Walkman and its successors aren’t too different from a psychedelic device, like an audio Dream Machine, altering a state of awareness and heightening perceptions of the moment. Music production had already gotten trippy thanks to a chemically-enhanced counter-culture and studio-as-instrument innovations. Once the music appeared in the middle of one’s head with a wider-than-wide stereo field, things got extra-groovy. As we wander about, the brain’s penchant for connecting images with sound adds meaning and color to the more expansive music. 

In the academic paper Make a Sound Garden Grow: Exploring the New Media Potential of Social Soundscaping, the authors cite a 1993 quote from writer William Gibson: “The Sony Walkman has done more to change human perception than any virtual reality gadget. I can’t remember any technological experience since that was quite so wonderful at being able to take music and move it through landscapes and architecture.” The paper continues:

As William Gibson suggests, the Walkman was a revolutionary technology when it was released in 1979 that allowed people to impart a personalized soundtrack over shared public spaces. The Walkman was a significant departure from another popular mobile technology of the time: the boom box. The boom box made private tastes public by merging the music one listened to with the shared sounds of a public space. The Walkman, on the other hand, made possible a more private form of listening.

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I remember a time in New York City in the mid-90s. I was walking the avenues with a friend who made especially jarring sheets-of-layered-noise slow techno. He handed me the headphones to his Walkman so I could check out a new track. The music began filling my head with all these textures and brutal sound blasts. Then we turned a corner, and suddenly we were at the edge of a crime scene — yellow tape everywhere, smoke hugging the pavement, men in dark uniforms excitedly talking on radios. I wasn’t sure if we were supposed to be there — it seemed dangerous. And the music instantly became a part of everything around. It was the glue combining the whole of my perception at that moment. We passed the scene right as the track ended. I took the headphones off, looked at my friend, and said something like, “whoa.” Twenty-five years later, that’s still one of my most potent and memorable music moments.

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Walkman-adjacent means of listening — today’s earbud activities — seem ideally suited for social distancing. Amanda Petrusich, writing about the approaching ubiquity of headphones four years ago, predicted:

It seems possible, though, that we are slowly reconfiguring music as a private pleasure—that, in fact, all pleasures, soon, may be private. We are all the lone stars of secret films, narrated by and in our own minds, and we seek out music that validates that position: separate, but forever plugged in.

That may have been our trajectory. And beyond facilitating an intentionally isolated experience, earbuds acted as a stay-six-feet-away signal. In co-working spaces, I used headphones to imply, ‘I’m hard at work.’ The seat next to me often remained empty. Headphones on walkers, joggers, and public-transported commuters keep the inquisitive, bothersome, or flirtatious at bay. Headphones became an extension of ‘the bubble,’ a signifier of our personal space.

I know that we’re often not walking around with headphones in our homes — though I occasionally do, don’t judge — but one might think social distancing signals the apex of private listening. But we could have easily anticipated the need to experience things together once again. Staying home for months accentuates the lack of concerts or nightclubs or even a chance encounter with a great song in a retail shop or through the window of a passing car. I don’t know about you, but I’ve found myself listening to — and commenting on — music with family, partners, and friends in my ‘social pod’ more than before. I’m not talking about interacting with music through things like Tim’s Twitter Listening Party. That’s fun and fabulous and, yes, another form of shared listening that feels kinda radical. Besides Twitter parties, I feel like we’re starting to listen together again, live, and in person. I admit the concept is subtle, and you might not notice that it’s happening. And it’s not just through enjoying live-streams together. Our lockdown-inspired shared listening feels new, distant from that family engrossed in radio theater, but operating in a similar momentary environment. 

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The music critic Amanda Petrusich, who I mentioned above, also thinks a lot about the spaces we create by how we listen. Back in 2010, she was interviewed for NPR under the Get To Know A Critic banner. The correspondent asked, “What’s your ideal way to listen to a record?”

… it’s true — some music is easier to type to, and some music rewards repeat listens in different ways. My knee-jerk tendency is to want to listen to music on vinyl, through headphones (no earbuds, never earbuds), all alone, with the lights turned off (in other words, the way I listened to music when I was fifteen), but I fight that whenever possible, because it’s really not fair. Music doesn’t function that way; it needs to breathe.

If I’m stuck on a record review, I’ll put something on my iPod and ride around on the subway for an hour, listening on my headphones. I think almost all music sounds better on the subway or in a moving car with the windows rolled down. Or I’ll go for a run with it — there’s no better way to get inside the rhythm section of a song than by running to it. It’s not always practical to implement, but I do at least try to think about where and when something was meant to be heard.

I like the idea of thinking not only about why we listen, but also where and how. We’ve all got favorite songs for specific environments and situations — playlists we make for driving or studying reflect this. But it’s also useful to think about how listening technologies affect one’s perception of songs, whether its headphones or shared speakers or a platform like Spotify. Inevitably these combinations color music and invite context. Deep listening (which I’ve talked about before) requires intentionally tuning these variants, increasing opportunities for meaning and connection. However, surprises that fuse with an unintended soundtrack — like my NYC crime scene episode — can offer the most powerful associations.

This post was adapted from Ringo Dreams of Lawn Care, a weekly newsletter loosely about music-making, music-listening, and how technology changes the culture around those things. Click here to check out the latest issue and subscribe.

Brightening the Forest

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I’m testing out the platform micro.blog. At first glance, this looks like a Twitter alternative, as Twitter falls under the same ‘micro-blogging’ genre. The user types in a short update — 280 characters on micro.blog, links and Markdown code not included — and followers will see it. But on micro.blog you can go over the character limit. Then your full post moves over to a personal blog while a truncated version — linking to your post — appears in the feed. So, it’s like a combination of Twitter and a blogging platform.

The differences are more substantial than that. There are no targeted ads, or any advertising, on micro.blog. Instead, users pay $5 a month for an account. This fee not only means the platform doesn’t need ads but also keeps out the bots and most of the trouble-makers. This factor gives micro.blog a different feel than other social media places we’re used to. And as you may have guessed, the downside (?) is that there are also a lot fewer people there.

I haven’t touched on the most remarkable thing about micro.blog yet. When you post, there’s not a lot of opportunity for adrenaline-rush feedback. There are no ‘likes’ or hearts to click — you won’t receive the warm fuzzies of a tweet that’s hearted dozens of times. And, even more alien, you don’t know who follows you. You don’t even know how many people follow you. No one could be following you. Or hundreds. No way to know. You can see who other people are following — this helps with discovering who is on micro.blog. But if they follow you? That’s a mystery.

The only tap on the wall you’ll get from the cell next door is when someone responds to your post. And, being the only option, this seems to encourage people to interact. So far, in my limited experience, the users on this platform are friendly as can be. I’ve peeped in on a couple of disagreements, which were some of the nicest, most civil disputes I’ve seen. That’s jarring when you’re used to the discourse on Facebook or Twitter.

I signed up to experience a subscription-supported social media platform. That is, one that doesn’t do things like suck up personal data, use algorithms to hide posts, tolerate bots and unsavories to strengthen user numbers, or amplify contentious posts to increase angered engagement. I intended to give it a go for a couple of weeks solely for research and then move on. It’s educational, and I’m enjoying myself. It’s like I’ve stepped into an alternate timeline (no pun intended). I might stay.

Sometimes I wonder why I even need social media or an outlet like micro.blog. There is the ‘social’ in social media — keeping touch with friends. I would hope we could stay in touch with each other regardless. Then there’s the town-crier aspect. We want to tell others about the cool things we’ve found, like that hilarious video or the article that totally captures how we feel. I also like using social platforms as a notepad to keep track of things I might want to remember later (like those hilarious videos and spot-on articles).

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The cry to ‘delete Facebook’ is particularly loud at the moment. It’s always been in the background — remember six years ago when everyone was going to ditch Facebook for Ello? But with all the recent infuriating activities of Zuckcorp, many have reached a tipping point. And rather than a threat of ‘we’re leaving for someone else,’ the voices are simply saying, “We’re leaving.”

Here are one blogger’s reasons for leaving. And here’s a zeitgeist-y piece in Wired with instructions for deleting social media accounts. Writer and investor Om Malik is vocal about this, too, writing, “If you believe that Facebook is causing long-term damage to our society, and you don’t agree with their values or their approach to doing business, you can choose to leave.” But it’s author Alan Jacobs who really speaks to the punk rock kid living inside my brain:

When you use the big social media platforms you contribute to their power and influence, and you deplete the energy and value of the open web. You make things worse for everyone. I truly believe that. Which is why I’m so obnoxiously repetitive on this point.

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Kickstarter founder Yancey Strickler has written about what he calls The Dark Forest Theory of the Internet. He bases his thesis on the metaphor of wandering through a forest at night, which seems quiet and empty. But the forest is teeming with life — everything’s just hiding.

Strickler believes this is what the internet will become as people go off into their private groups and corners of the ‘indie web.’ Then Facebook, Twitter, and corporate social media will get left with the users who are screaming, antagonizing, and spreading untruths. Strickler fears that rather than isolating ugly voices, the ‘dark forest’ might increase their influence:

It’s possible, I suppose, that a shift away from the mainstream internet and into the dark forests could permanently limit the mainstream’s influence. It could delegitimize it. In some ways that’s the story of the internet’s effect on broadcast television. But we forget how powerful television still is. And those of us building dark forests risk underestimating how powerful the mainstream channels will continue to be, and how minor our havens are compared to their immensity.

I’m doubtful. I think there’s a difference between what Strickler calls ‘the mainstream internet’ and the manipulative, corporate, and closed internet we’re escaping. The screamers and the antagonizers are already doing a great job influencing powerful media, and they do it partly by influencing us. We talk about this ugliness on social media, we argue and engage with it, we even ‘retweet’ or share its messages with or without commentary. Then our reactions are amplified by an algorithm that feeds on conflict and anger. Often we spread the awfulness by merely being alongside it.

I don’t think it’s their forest we’re hiding in. If any part of the internet is ‘mainstream’, then it’s the part that’s not closed-off, disagreeable to our values, and sucking our personal data like mosquitos in a rank swamp. Inverting Strickler’s analogy, we should aspire for a forest where we can walk freely in the daylight. Let’s push the screamers to hide in the darkness.

This post was adapted from Ringo Dreams of Lawn Care, a weekly newsletter loosely about music-making, music-listening, and how technology changes the culture around those things. Click here to check out the latest issue and subscribe.

A Lot of Honking: The Age of Social Distanced Concerts

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I expect a lot of honking. Ray, a longtime friend, alerted me to The Road Rave, an event billed as “North America’s first-ever drive-in festival of the COVID era.” The festival is led by EDM sensation and Ultra Music Festival veteran Carnage, performing alongside at least four other acts. A maximum of 500 cars will line up in formation, facing the stage, each with two to six inhabitants encouraged to stay seated during the event. “Roaming golf carts” will take concession orders.

The Road Rave takes place Saturday, June 20 (postponed from the original date of June 6), about six miles from my house. It’s sold out. No, I’m not going, but thanks for the invite. That said, I’m close enough that I’m sure the not-too-distant sound of 500 cars honking will echo over Lake Holden and into my eardrums throughout the evening. Every bass drop — honk honk honk. Every on-stage glitter explosion —- honk honk honk. Every DJ raising his hands in the air — honk honk honk. There will be a lot of honking.

We’re now in the phase of The Strange Times where watching a concert from the seat of a car seems attractive. I get it — we’re making our way through this any way we can. And even a glimmer of normality that’s not normal at all can provide reassurance. But, man — all those cars.

In the last several months, there was a push to explore the idea of environmentally-conscious, carbon-neutral touring. Massive Attack and Coldplay were high-profile advocates of the concept. So it’s ironic concert-goers are now encouraged to lean into the fossil-fuels, idling their automobiles as a festival broadcasts over an FM signal, and a guy in a golf cart takes another nacho order.

It’s not only The Road Rave. The concert promoting Borg, known as Live Nation, is planning nationwide ‘drive-in concert’ tours this summer, taking place in the various parking lots of its 40 amphitheaters. And for promoters who don’t own stadiums, drive-in theaters are a no-brainer for events. However, most existing drive-ins are far outside of bigger cities, and the owners would rather show movies. Says one proprietor, “We don’t mind doing one-off special events, but most of us feel we’re here to show movies.” Less hassle, less honking.

In an article about the absence of live music, the drive-in theater aspect inspired Rolling Stone contributing editor Rob Sheffield to remember a scene from ’70s movie dystopia:

There’s a scene I keep re-watching from the Seventies sci-fi zombie trash classic, The Omega Man. Charlton Heston is the last human left alive in LA after the plague. He drives out to the empty theater that’s still showing the “Woodstock” documentary. He sits alone in the dark, a ritual he’s done many times before, watching the hippie tribes onscreen boogie to Country Joe and the Fish. “This is really beautiful, man,” a dazed flower child tells the camera. Heston recites every word along with him. “The fact is if we can’t all live together and be happy, if you have to be afraid to walk out in the street, if you have to be afraid to smile at somebody, right—what kind of a way is that to go through this life?”

Charlton Heston gives a sardonic smirk. “Yup—they sure don’t make pictures like that anymore.”

On the other hand, there are approaches to social distanced gatherings that border on performance art. For example, the restaurant outfitted with mannequins and the TV show with an audience of balloon people. A precursor to social distanced performance art might be 2018’s Mile-Long Opera, where listeners walked along NYC’s High Line. Singers were encountered along the path, each singing in tandem, and, as an ‘audience member,’ you are encouraged to keep moving. It’s a compelling idea, but nowadays, even a performance in motion has its COVID-19 dangers. Jane Moss of The Lincoln Center, considering the option, worries about transfixed groups stopping to watch in a virus-spreading bottleneck: “The more ingenious and intriguing you get, the more people want to come together to see what you’ve done.”

Performance art directly inspired one daring concert experience. Marina Abramovic’s exhibition (and terrific documentary film) The Artist Is Present featured the artist sitting across from a stranger in silence. The simple act of this face-to-face meeting — at about a socially distanced six feet — caused intense feelings of intimacy in many participants. Some of the seated museum-goers broke into tears during their sittings. From this idea came performances at the dormant airport in Stuttgart, Germany. A musician from the local orchestra gave a series of ten-minute ‘concerts’ to solitary audience members. They faced each other at a short length, with no conversation and no applause. In a NY Times piece covering the event, listeners spoke about the same sort of intimacy that Abramovic’s temporary partners felt.

This intimacy is unexpected, but innovative answers to the live-music-under-COVID problem will produce unexpected results. That’s the subtext of all performance art — experiment with people’s expectations and things will happen. And the further away we get from a traditional live performance, the less it looks and feels like a concert. Understandably, that worries a lot of people.

Others have attempted to zero-in on the center of the Venn diagram linking live music and COVID-19 safety. There was this small event in Münster that featured famed DJ Gerd Jansen, social distanced dancing (in theory), a 100-person limit, and €70 tickets to break even. And in Arkansas, blues-rock singer Travis McCready played to a sold-out — but still smattering — crowd who were temperature-checked before entering:

On the surface, the concert had all the makings of a typical rock & roll show. Stage lights set the mood. The audience clapped along, with some even dancing in their “fan pod” seats (tickets were sold in blocks to keep groups six feet apart). But when the bank of floodlights at the front of the stage illuminated a nearly empty 1,100-seat theater during Travis McCready’s set, the reality of the situation was clear. The first socially distanced concert in the US felt more like a dress rehearsal than a typical concert experience.

It’s something, but is it helping? And by that, I mean, helping us cope or return to something like our ordinary lives? Since reading the Vulture piece I linked to above I think a lot about this paragraph:

The first fallback options—play to an empty house (as a small sub-ensemble of the Berlin Philharmonic has done) or distribute a few hundred listeners around a hall that could seat 2,000—would only emphasize the melancholy weirdness. That kind of event can have an impact as a ritual of mourning, a dramatization of all we’ve lost. But it’s no way to lose ourselves in some alternate, virus-free world of the imagination.

The music is only one reason we go to concerts, festivals, nightclubs, or raves. We also go for the community, to connect with (as Seth Godin says), “People like us who do things like this.” We’ve all forged at least one friendship with someone we saw at ‘all the same shows.’ Many of us even met our future life partners at a club or concert. These solutions I pointed out — attending in cars, listening alone to a flute player, or boogying at a distance in a near-empty club — only solve the ‘music’ part of the equation. It’s true that we miss and crave the rush of volume, performance, and the live music experience. But until we regain the electricity of community that accompanies it, we’ve, so far, only captured the facsimile.

This post was adapted from Ringo Dreams of Lawn Care, a weekly newsletter loosely about music-making, music-listening, and how technology changes the culture around those things. Click here to check out the latest issue and subscribe.