The Roving Musicologist

Drunkaholism (Budapest)

Some people have a drinking problem, but I seem to be addicted to drunks.  They cry out to be recorded, because all their gestures seem so grand to them at the time.  Religion provides the other pole, presenting itself as grand even when completely sober, and most things posted here reflect the practiced channels it facilitates or the undirected and novel energy of someone that has forgotten what they were so worried about before they started drinking.  If it’s a good day maybe they mix.

Weyes Bluhd Part 2 (Baltimore and other places)

That’s how it goes.

This is a song from a set recorded in October 2009.  The other song can be found in an earlier post. 

This was the first song from the set, and it has a way of wrapping itself around you like a mist.  The mixture of tapes, live instruments, and singing in this song is done very well and shows some good instincts.

I’m not sure what exactly Weyes Bluhd is up to right now, but she seems to stay busy wherever she goes.

Fred Meyer (Portland, Oregon)

Although they lost the battle of the bands, Fred Meyer knows it’s more important to be good sports.

The sun was hot when I recorded this show at the pancake house in north Portland.  It seemed like things were going wrong.  At some point there was an apology from the performer.  I was having my own problems with recording…notice the conversation about dogshit halfway through.

But then when something is recorded it changes. This is the last song of a three song set.

A very rare photo of Lala, the other half of Fred Meyer.

Travel Post #6: Gjirokaster Folk Festival with Three Women

High in the Mountains

Gjirokaster is a small town in the south of Albania.  All of the old houses are made of stone.  Even the roofs of the houses are made of a black slate that is found on the hillsides.  Because of a lack on investment in the town, there isn’t money to keep them up and there are wrecks of the houses scattered around town.  But many of them are still up and there is an Ottoman castle on the top of the mountain.  That’s where this festival was, overlooking the valley far below.

These singers were about the first thing I heard when I came in, and one of the two best things I recorded over the course of two days there.

While it sounds like it has been looped, it hasn’t.

Grandfather Claws (Portland, Oregon)

This Band performs sitting on the ground without back support, hence stretching is necessary to maintain proper posture.

Grandfather Claws is a band, two men and two women, that I happened to catch shortly before I left Oregon.  I found them in the few recordings that I took with me when I left the country and they seem to be an appropriate thing to post after Michael Hurley, as they both represent, for me, a sort of rambling approach to folk music.  What people call noise music, while it is approached from many angles, is at its core more folk than anything else.  While it is influenced by esoteric ideas from all over the spectrum of music (well, hopefully), when you go to a noise show you are seeing these ideas being refracted in a way that will almost necessarily reflect a homespun approach.

http://www.myspace.com/grandfatherclaws

What I have posted here is only about a quarter of the show; to post more I would have had to reduce the quality to the point that many of the quieter tones would have been lost.

Smegma of Portland, Oregon (Part 1)

There are very few people who have been continuously active in experimental music for as long as Smegma.  They have been making music, in various combinations, since they formed in Pasadena in the early 70’s.

This recording is a collaboration with Nour Mobarak and Parker Lemus.  It was performed as a live soundtrack for a movie Nour had previously made.

The next part of this series will feature an interview by Smegma where they talk about their beginnings, what it was like playing shows during the early punk years, and the recent interest in their music by younger fans.

http://www.myspace.com/smegmatheoriginal

Weyes Bluhd of Bucks County

In this song, taped noises that sound like lost artifacts are balanced against the slow river of a girl’s voice.  Weyes Bluhd continues the singer/songwriter tradition with an awareness of its past and possibilities.

Weyes Bluhd performing in Baltimore, in a room darkened at her request.

Weyes Bluhd’s page:

http://www.myspace.com/nataliewiseblood