FFFreakout #388 (Aired on 11/21/13)

Primitive Motion "Mortal Souls" from Worlds Floating By
Angie "Shadow Twin" from Turning
Counter Intuits " Time Was Update" from S/T
Michael Nesmith "Cruisin" from Infinite Rider on the Big Dogma
The Native Cats "I Remember Everyone" from Dallas
Peninsula "los hornillos" from "la socarrada" 7"
Tim Hecker "Radiance" from Virgins
The Jimi Hendrix Experience "May This Be Love" from Are You Experienced?
Tommy James & The Shondells "Crystal Blue Persuasions" from Crimson & Clover
"Eyes of the Tiger" from Hooked On Rock Classics
"Mobity Mosely's Months" from My Name Is Roosevelt Franklin
Camper Van Beethoven "Pictures of Matchstick Men" from Key Lime Pie
The Keystones "His Name is More Than a Swear Word" from Where It's At


Primitive Motion - Colours from BSR on Vimeo.

FFFoxy Podcast #27: Èlg and the Contemporary Franco-Belgian Vanguard

(Photo by Piotr Niepsuj)

Introduction by Èlg

Èlg "Notringo Indigo" La Chimie LP (SDZ Records) - 2013

Èlg "Armelle" b/w "Rendez-vous au fort de Queuleu" 7" (Le Vilain Chien) - 2007

Èlg "Haiku Picard" (unreleased) - 2010

Èlg "Something Big" Les Joyaux de la Couronne: Burt Bacharach CD (Le Vilain Chien) - 2010

Èlg "U.S. Girls remix" for Kraak Records - 2011

Reines d'Angleterre "Track 5" Globe et Dynaste CD/LP (Bo' Weavel) - 2012

Opéra Mort "Minuit Cerceuil" split w/ Decapitated Hed 7" (Spleen Coffin) - 2011

Naked Hug "Armless and Naked" b/w "Naked and Armless" 7" (Vauva) - 2013

(Backing track during talking segment: Èlg - Live at Cafe Oto - 2012)

Ignatz "Certainty" Can I Go Home Now? CD/LP (Fonal) – 2013

Taulard "Se sortir d'un faux pas" Taulard  CS (self-released) – 2011

Fusiller "untitled track" Les persistences paranoÏaques CS (Tanzprocesz) – 2011

Orphan Fairytale "Crybaby Needs a Hanky" Ladybird Labyrinth LP (Ultra Eczema) - 2009

Kaumwald "Stix" Hantasive EP (Opal Tapes) – 2013

Charlène Darling "My Home" Mourning Tooth CS (Les disques de l'oubli) – 2011

Tenniscoats "Mayotcha Ka" Kumo Koku Do 7" (Hôtel Rustique) – 2012

(Backing track during talking segment: Èlg - Live in Rennes at L'Atelier d'Aran - 2013)

TG Gondard "The Phalanx" Avontuur  CS (Not Not Fun) – 2011

Mim "La Mer Néant" As Far As I Compute CD (A1000p) – 2012

Miaux "Aeronaut" Aeronaut  7" (Ultra Eczema) – 2013

Bertrand Belin "Le Colosse" Bertrand Belin CD (Sterne/Sony BMG) – 2005

Plastobéton "A31" Glam Mort LP (Tanzprocesz / Eurochoc Prod) – 2004/2013

Toad "Bourrée à Solomagne" Toad CD (La Novia) – 2011

(Backing track during talking segment: Èlg - Live in Rennes at L'Atelier d'Aran - 2013)

Anne Laplantine "Jeudi" I Send You A MP3 7" (Lexidisc) – 2011

Tlön Uqbar "Elengassen" La Bola Perdida CD (Staalplaat) – 1999

Zazou & Bikaye "Signorina" VA – Ritual: Magnetic North CS (Touch) – 1985

The Dreams "Aloha Miami" Morbido LP (Kill Shaman) – 2011

Carageenan "Live at Lycaon, Bruxelles" (unreleased) – 2013

Gael Moissonnier "Aktion #1 (part 2)" (unreleased) - 2012
(Outro Music: Èlg "Blau Lunge/Sas/Pol Culte" Mil Pluton (Alter) -2012)

FFFreakout #387 (Aired on 11/14/13)

Oneohtrix Point Never "Problem Areas" from R Plus Seven
Sparkling Wide Pressure "Fall Back Into a Sea of Love" from FFFour KMSU
Ornette Coleman "Street Woman" from Science Fiction
Alice Coltrane "Blue Nile" from Ptah The El Daoud
Throbbing Gristle "Distant Dreams, Part Two" from Mission of Dead Souls
Trampled by Turtles "Drinkin' in the Morning" from Live At First Avenue
Talking Heads "Road to Nowhere" (early version) from Little Creatures (deluxe edition)
Faces "Ooh La La" from Ooh La La
Arcade Fire "Flash Bulb Eyes" from Reflektor
Tom Petty "Feel a Whole Lot Better" from Full Moon Fever
Alejandro Escovedo "Always a Friend" from Real Animal

Jandek, "Athens Saturday" review by Bill Shute of Kendra Steiner Editions

Bill Shute of Kendra Steiner Editions, who appeared on a few of our 

Jandek Study Group Overnight shows and whose work was featured on 

our podcast, has been one of the few writers out there to continue to provide 

thoughtful coverage of Jandek's recent output. We've said it time and time 

again, Jandek is producing some of the most ambitious and groundbreaking 

music of his long and storied career, yet there is a surprising lack of commentary 

that goes beyond the tired "outsider-with-a-detuned-guitar" insight. Bill is able 

to contextualize these works in a meaningful and engaging fashion, so we are thrilled 

that, as with The Songs of Morgan, he has kindly allowed us to re-publish his review of 

Jandek's latest live set, Athens Saturday. Like all Corwood Industries releases,

this 2-CD set can be purchased at a reasonable price ($12 U.S./$13 overseas)

from the most reliable mail order service around:

Corwood Industries

P.O. Box 15375

Houston, TX 77220

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Jandek’s appearance at the Orange Twin Conservation Community in Athens, Georgia was of great interest to me, primarily for two reasons: 1) it was the next show after the Austin, TX Jandek concert that I organized/curated in June 2012, so I was excited to see how Corwood would follow-up that stunning performance in Austin; and 2) Orange Twin seemed like a fascinating and unique venue. Here is a brief description (not a recent one, alas) of the concept of OT, quoted from a Google Sites article: 

The Athens, GA based Orange Twin is currently working on an “eco-village” on the northside of the town. The ultimate goal of the eco-village is to create a “pedestrian-based eco-village while preserving 100 acres of woodland five miles from downtown Athens.” Orange Twin’s vision statement is to live with one another and all forms of life, flora and fauna, in a way that respects all life, is considerate, and open to growth. The village would encourage diversity of all types. They hope to be understanding and open-minded to other’s ideas, they hope to learn and grow hand-in-hand, and to offer what they learn to others. They will also support each other, to encourage creativity, and to share their discoveries. They hope to create an integrated community that supports all aspects of life in a way that will not harm, but heal the planet. 

One uncommon aspect of the show’s organization was that ticket prices were lower if you DID NOT bring a car and carpooling was actively encouraged. AND if you bicycled there, you got a voucher for free food! Also, the amphitheater was an old Girl Scout Pavilion. Thus, this was going to be a fascinating venue for the show.

Corwood has now released the recording of the concert on a two-cd set called ATHENS SATURDAY, which has made waves in the Jandek community because for the first time, Corwood has released a show out of recording sequence. Many of us used to joke about Corwood having gotten to the end of 2006 in its schedule of Jandek live albums and how a particular show we enjoyed from 2008 or 2009 or whatever might get released by 2019 if we were lucky. Well, all that is over now…evidently, Corwood will be releasing live albums out of recording sequence…yet another wild card in the full-of-surprises Corwood/Jandek CD catalogue. After all, who was expecting a nine-cd set of solo piano earlier this year?

Of course, any performance titled WAITING TO DIE is probably going to be of a weighty and deep nature. I have previously made analogies to the process of a method actor in my descriptions of Jandek’s lyrics being given life in performance—-an actor finding hidden aspects of his/her psyche and then exploring character within the parameters of those areas. Much like the way in which the sparse but dense and rich dramatic texts of Harold Pinter or Samuel Beckett or late-period Tennessee Williams, which may seem skeletal and minimal on the page, become fully sketched out when inhabited by an actor, it seems to me that Jandek gets into a deep “performance zone” prior to recording or live performance and brings to life, “in character,” the existential monologues and dialogues of his texts. Many early critics of Jandek’s work did not seem to get that. Shakespeare is not “mad” because he wrote King Lear; Jim Thompson was not a murderer because he wrote “The Killer Inside Me.” Jandek explores deep places inside the psyche and explores profound existential questions—-questions about ultimate meaning and about identity and about the meaning of EVERY MOMENT of everyday life, not just the ones we designate as “important.” For many reasons, Jandek is one of my favorite contemporary poets–he just happens to bring his works to life through live performance, as part of a unique music-and-voice collage, whether we are talking about one of his own solo albums with guitar and voice or a live performance, as we have here with an ensemble, where the Rep is one voice, one thread woven through the quilt.

The text here (just google “Jandek, Athens, lyrics” and you can find an excellent transcription of the lyrics by “Greg F” if you want to read along) is a kind of interior monologue that splits into an interior dialogue. Someone once commented that the setting of most of Edgar Allan Poe’s works is the mind, and one could make a similar observation here, although as often happens with a Jandek lyric, it’s full of poetic phenomenological particulars….the matter-of-fact pieces of experience that tend to make up our days and nights: sitting in chairs, debating whether or not to do some mundane activity, wondering about ice chests and naps and baseball games and shoes and peaches. The central section of the piece features either a bickering couple, finding themselves taking the opposite sides out of habit and out of spite, or perhaps more likely an internal dialogue, as we question every move we make and undercut ourselves. Remember the old Warner Brothers cartoons where Elmer Fudd or some similar character has a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other, both whispering into his ear, both trying to influence his behavior? Just imagine both of them INSIDE the narrator’s head, aspects of his own psyche.

The moods of the narrator’s flow of ideas and images is brilliantly mirrored by the musicians–in particular, the cellist and the bass clarinet player set the beyond-time pace early on and create a languid sound-canvas that the other musicians and the Representative himself swim in, sometimes diving to the bottom, sometimes coming to the surface, sometimes treading water, sometimes in pursuit of something in the water, always moving in relation to the other swimmers in a kind of underwater dance. While the tone is in many places solemn, it varies and is in some passages witty, mirroring the nature of the lyric. Jandek himself plays keyboards, set both to “acoustic” and “electric” and moves seamlessly between them. As part of an ensemble, his playing tends to be pointillistic, and he on occasion provides pianistic shading while delivering the lyrics…and often provides a keyboard “commentary” on the text between or right after particular lines. The subtle playing of guitarist Bradford Cox and percussionist Eric Harris should also be praised—though some referred to this as an “all-star” ensemble, there were no star turns at this performance, no showing off…just organic ensemble playing (by musicians who are listeners first), strands in the weave. Overall, this is undulating yet understated music that breathes. Those who liked Jandek’s MAZE OF THE PHANTOM should like the music here, though this lacks the exotica element of PHANTOM.

Except for getting up to change CD’s in the middle of the performance, I lost any sense of time while listening to ATHENS SATURDAY. It took me into its world, almost in a cinematic way, and in a place beyond time, a place beyond time-keeping beats and traditional theme-variation-theme development of ideas, the next thing I knew, the album was over…and I had the sense of walking back into daily reality from some kind of wooded area within the mind…richer for having taken this journey.

WAITING TO DIE? We’re all waiting to die…and those of us who realize that find an incredible freedom once we stare into that void. We also realize that time’s-a-wasting….these dialogues are, in the end, time-killing….it’s best to do, to achieve. I have the feeling that an artist who has released 70+ albums has come to that realization long ago…but we all must keep making the commitment, keep silencing the doubting questions and the dissonant dialogues…

As this piece closes, the final three lines are:

TIME, THE END OF ALL HIS DAYS 
WAS STARING HIM IN HIS FACE 
AND HE SIMPLY COULD NOT LOOK AWAY

The performance WAITING TO DIE is no less than a musical and lyrical deep venturing into the psyche, airing some painful truths and putting the spotlight on aspects of the psyche that are not usually discussed—-not because they are evil or because they are incomprehensible , but because they are taken for granted. Jandek takes nothing for granted.

FFFreakout #386 (Live on 11/7/13)

Palais Schaumburg "Morgen wird der Wald gefegt" from S/T
Sean McCann "Slowly Drinking Shade" from FFFour KMSU
My Bloody Valentine "If I Am" from MBV
Hobo Cubes "Spectral Eyes" from FFFour KMSU
Low "Blowin' in the Wind" from A Lifetime of Temporary Relief
Bob Dylan "If Not For You" [alternate version] from Another Self Portrait (1969-1971): The Bootleg Series, Vol. 10
Arcade Fire "Here Comes the Night Time, Pt. 2" from Reflektor
The Cramps "Bikini Girls with Machine Guns" from Stay Sick!
Gary Numan "Cars" from The Pleasure Principle
Jason E. Anderson "Utilization of a Quartz Crystal (For Dramatic Effect)" from FFFour KMSU
Johnny Cash "A Boy Named Sue" from At Folsom Prison

Thanks to those that took part in our auction on today's show and congrats to Tom for coming out with the top bid at $125. As of this writing, KMSU is about half way to meeting its $20,000 goal for their Fall Pledge Drive. We have been able to raise close to $1,000 for the station through the sales of the FFFour KMSU lathes and digital compilation. All of the lathes are now gone, but we still have a bunch of the Graham Lambkin FFFour KMSU cover art prints available that come with an immediate download of the compilation (plus an extra download card, too). We have marked these down to $10 in an effort to get them into more hands and ears. Please consider picking one up at the FFF Bandcamp site. You can also continue to pledge your support to KMSU by calling the station direct at 507-389-5678 or 1-800-456-7810 or by visiting the KMSU website.
  

Feeling New Feelings - from Hobo Cubes '' A Singular Dream '' - Video by Guillaume Vallée from Groop Index on Vimeo.

KMSU pledge drive auction: FFFour KMSU lathe + original artwork signed by Graham Lambkin

As we already posted on this site a few weeks back, we put together a special 10" lathe cut record and 20-artist digital compilation called FFFour KMSU with original artwork created by the one-and-only, Graham Lambkin. We've made the various options for this release available for purchase through our FFF Bandcamp site, with the proceeds going to help support our station KMSU in their Fall Pledge Drive fundraiser. This Wednesday, November 6th, the Fall Pledge Drive officially gets underway. We, of course, will still be offering this release through Bandcamp and we will also have a limited number of the lathes and art prints (w/ download cards) available at the station for those that call-in to pledge. 

For our regularly scheduled Free Form Freakout Thursday show at 2 pm, though, we will also be offering an exclusive and very special premium. We will be auctioning off what will likely be the last available copy of the FFFour KMSU 10" lathe paired with the original artwork drawn by Graham Lambkin, including the cover and center label images. All three of the drawings are signed by Graham himself.

To give people ample time to respond and take part in this, we are going to start this auction today with a minimum starting bid of $75.00. Here is how you can take part and what you need to know:

*E-mail us your desired bid amount and your contact information at fffreakout[at]hotmail[dot]com

*On Thursday, November 7th, from 2-3 pm (CST), you can also call us at the station with your desired bid amount and contact information at 507-389-5678 or 1-800-456-7810.

*The highest bidder at the end of our show on Thursday, November 7th, will win the auction.

*The winner MUST be able to pay by credit card or Paypal within 3 days of the auction's end; otherwise, the next highest bidder will claim the premium.

*International bidders would have to pay an additional $20 to cover shipping costs.

*We will be updating this post regularly with where the current auction bid stands throughout the week and we will also be posting updates on Facebook and Twitter if you'd like to follow along there.

*Feel free to get in touch if you have any questions.

Winning Bid:

$125.00

FFFreakout #385 (Aired on 10/31/13)

Lou Reed "I'm So Free" from Transformer
The Velvet Underground "Pale Blue Eyes" from S/T
Lou Reed & Metallica "Mistress Dread" from Lulu
The Velvet Underground "Femme Fatale" from The Velvet Underground & Nico
Lou Reed "Satellite of Love" from Transformer
Luna "Season of the Witch" from I Shot Andy Warhol O.S.T.
Fred Schneider "Monster" from S/T
Frankie Stein & His Ghouls "Be Careful It's My Throat" from Monster Sounds and Dance Music
Roky Erikson and The Aliens "Creature With the Atom Brain" from The Evil One
"Theme to Dr. Who" from Television's Greatest Hits
Talking Heads "Psycho Killer" (live) from The Name of the Band is Talking Heads
The Misfits "Halloween" from Collection II
Los Straitjackets "The Muenster's Theme" from Halloween Hootenanny
The Fleshtones "Return to the Haunted House" from It's Super Rock Time!: The I.R.S. Years 1980-85
Danny Elfman "The Clown Dream" from Pee-Wee's Big Adventure soundtrack