radio free midwich

stress of speech: joe murray sings along to emblems of cosmic disorder, pascal nichols

Karl M V Waugh – 5 Alarm Systems / Songs About Choir Boys (CD-r and text prosody poems in document file, Emblems of Cosmic Disorder)

dogeeseseegod / The Zero Map – Split (tape, Emblems of Cosmic Disorder, unspecified limited edition)

Kosmos 954 – IX V IV (CD-r in hand made cover, Emblems of Cosmic Disorder)

Binnsclagg – 23 (CD-r, no label)

Pascal – Nihilist Chakai House (LP, Discombobulate, BOB003, edition of 250, ‘on frozen puddle coloured vinyl’ as Joe would have it)

Karl M V Waugh – Songs About Choir Boys / 5 Alarm Systems

Like many folk I’m slightly aroused by office stationery [Editor’s note: too right – I’m still banned from Rymans].  There’s something about the clear usefulness of envelopes, pens, polyvinyl packets that’s so darn satisfying.  So it was with trembling hands I slice open the latest package from our esteemed editor; a selection of goods from new ‘boutique’ label Emblems of Cosmic Disorder.

A slim document file, the kind of thing you’d find in any dusty HR department, houses a neat CD-R in a clam case and several pages of closely typed text.

I check out the disc (‘songs about choir boys’) first.  This 20 minute piece has three distinct sections:

• Cluttered junk noise collage – echoed pings, guitar scratch knitting itself tighter and tighter.  Balloon squeak adds a slivery ripple.
• Domestic vocal psychedelic – “What valley?” Bus-travel-noise, digital avalanche, granular fractals etc. “I’m gonna go out now.”
• Electric Balalaika heard through the fog of war, Austrian glitch and heavy pastries.

The editing is sharp, each distinctive piece flows nicely like egg yolk through new copper pipes.  Not a leak in sight!

I take out the poems (‘5 alarm systems’) and give them a bash.  On a first reading these short pieces come across like some fractured stream-of-consciousness narrative…

“Diamond scratching on the inside of my scalp.”

Or

“Duncan Harrison refuses to fight Johnny Liron and everyone’s oxygen supply is depleted.”

Pretty heady stuff, ya dig?  Like reading old Bananafish magazines through a gin hangover or something.  But closer inspection of the handy press release states these are prosody poems; a term I have never come across before.  A quick google search tells me…

Prosody is the rhythm, stress, and intonation of speech. Prosody may reflect various features of the speaker or the utterance: the emotional state of the speaker; the form of the utterance (statement, question, or command); the presence of irony or sarcasm; emphasis, contrast, and focus; or other elements of language that may not be encoded by grammar or by choice of vocabulary.

OK…I get it.  It’s all about how the poem is read.  So I heave myself from the comfortable armchair and gracelessly unfold to my full (and rarely realised) six foot three and read these darn things loud and proud.

The neighbours curtains twitch, the kids giggle, Mrs Posset asks if I am feeling well.  The answer is a boisterous ‘YES’.  In fact I feel better than ever.  The act of reading is a tonic, a shot in the arm, just the very thing.  And I read on; in trembling baritone.  The intensity and vigour leaves me glowing like a Victorian lady.

I wonder if these excellent poems are to be read along with the music?  There are no instructions in the envelope to the contrary so I take matters into my own hands and rig up the gramophone to record and play and hawk out money scam intake collection [Editor’s note: click to hear a one minute rendition – self-embedding journalism, that] for kicks.

Even if this was never K.M.V. Waugh’s intention the interactive nature of abstract sound and spoken word is a great one: ham & eggs, strawberries & cream.

I urge you to check this one out and popularise as a parlour game for all the family.

dogeeseseegod / The Zero Map – Split Tape

There’s some real right brain/left brain stuff going on here on this pocket guide to cosmic disorder.

dogeeseseegod take the knotted tangled path with raw ganglions swaying.  Junked up domestic field recordings get clotted and rubbed up rough with the sound of water (a unifying fixture with dripping tapes, gushing pipes and the steady trickle of piss) running through this whole piece, ‘Tappin ‘Ard O Phiernahe On Rye’.  As I settle in my listening chair I’m picturing some Futurist Opera, the men of dogeeseseegod wrapped in itchy suits as they arrange scrap metal structures to a newspaper score.  Occasionally there’s the rare fizz of melody.  A guitar or keyboard makes a dash out the door with a tune stashed up a tight cuff.  But mainly the sounds are free to roam within the strict structure of the edit.  You’ve seen One Man and his Dog right?  Sort of like that but with sheep being replaced with rude tape blarts and hawking tremors.   Thankfully the electronic effects are kept to a minimum so the pure mung rises to the top of the beaker, ready to be scooped off and fermented; brewed into zingy espresso.

This kinda porridge pot can be hit or miss but I am delighted to say this is breakfast gets a Goldilocks ‘just right’ from me.

The Zero Map set their dune buggy down a smoother, less hectic, route.  The modestly titled ‘Z’ is a meditation.  Pale blue tones float out my cheap-o hi-fi clearly.  They arrange themselves in regular symmetrical patterns that turn in on themselves, forever folding and unfolding across a hidden axis to reveal a thousand-leaved Chrysanthemum glowing with an inner light.  The sound warms up to a pinky-red hue and the slight ‘tap, tok, tap’ of a recurring theme (the decaying ring of a bell with all the attack digitally snipped off perhaps?) rubs my shoulders as I settle deeper into the Chesterfield.   My eyelids droop and I find my 14 year old self perched in front of the TV trying to keep up with Horizon or something.  I’m scrunching my brow over some really complex but beautifully original maths, the slight chemical tang of lemon squash leaving a bright yellow smile on my lips.  The almost spiritual neatness of a Venn diagram, intersecting arcs creating enclosed spaces calms my teenage self into a Zen stillness that rockets through the years anointing my old-guy bristles with Nag Champa.

Kosmos 954 –IX V IV

What’s this?  A live in the studio jam all cut up with a monkey claw?  Yeah man yeah.  It starts with odd honks and the sort of space echo Joe Meek would have pawned his Ouija board for.  And then a scissor cuts and Kosmos 954 draw us into the gloom for some heeds down pub-kraut-rock.  Zoinks!  The edits keep on coming: a rhythmically blocky soundtrack to 80’s handheld game ‘Scramble’ (Kink, kink, kink!) slides into slurring crabs leaving tracks in the sand of mystic Hebrew script ending the ritual with a heaviness worthy of Haikai No Ku. I love to be confused by a record and Kosmos 954 are cheeky mystic monks Ra-Ra-ing like a funky Rasputin.

Binnsclagg – 23

More poetry and ‘natural malfunction’ from the South coast.  I’ve been told this is not an emblems release but it bears all the hallmarks; handmade sleeve, ambitious scope and grievous cluttered sound etc.   The lazy blogger would drop names like Graham Lambkin but this is a far more robust beast.  Sure enough, there are browned-off words that melt like dripping but some of the accompanying sound is sharp and glitchy enough to share self space with those Editions Mego jokers.

Things get pretty dark about 14 mins in.  The crystal plumage noise is replaced with matter-of-fact reportage and amplified gibber/gong workshop.  The natural energy of a live improvisation takes over and an end of the pier sample wraps things up nicely in under 25 minutes.

Pascal – Nihilist Chakai House

Whooosh.  I’m on my way to mighty Manchester with an earbud full of Mancunian musicians making the Megabus the most happening bus on the M62.

Rob has beat me to it, covering the excellent, Getting Nothing to Appear on the Developed Film by The Piss Superstition already.  So, all that I can add to the no-audience dialogue is a breathless “CHECK OUT THE SUICIDEFUZZOUTLIVEATTHEBUDOKANMIGRANE ON THIS SHIT MAN!” to the poor bloke sitting next to me.  He snores on…

The next record in my brace of Manc offerings comes from Pascal Nichols, one half of the wonderful Part Wild Horses Mane On Both Sides (often abbreviated to tongue-straining acronym PWHMOBS) who are stealthily playing their way into the hearts of the underground.

Here Pascal wallops hollow gourds until they clank and click like a Moondog army marching menacingly through a dark Mardi Gras.

And then…a bagatelle?  Rubber marbles?  The sound of impact folded inward.

In my cloth ears a theme reveals itself.  Cacophony is introduced then tamed…the gradual removal of syncopation reveals the human heartbeat within.  ACTION POINT: A Grandfather Clock is taken apart piece-by-piece – a military ‘tick / tok’ resolutely strict and stiff-upper-lipped morphs seamlessly into an allotment shuffle; muddy tools being hung in racks by knotted hands.

A dry ‘thwock’ repeats.  Micro spaces click sticks.  Did I just hear a sneaky ‘Moonlight on Vermont’ snare ripple?  The stick clicks continue and seem to say ‘hatchback’ in the language of the trees.  Bees are waxed for sure…you can smell the yellow howl of varnish all over the ba-da-boom, ba-da-bing.

Soon a knitting machine of Patrick Woodroffe proportions rattles pennies in a jar.  Each bronze disc placed with a trajectory planned by a master’s hands.

This is a glorious and life-affirming record.  The joy of playing is evident in every snare swish and cymbal brush.  Share the spirit of adventure…let the love in!

—ooOoo—

Emblems of Cosmic Disorder

Discombobulate