Freak of the week - 9 - Classroom Projects

It's records like this that I live for. A compilation of 'incredible music made by children in schools', the record features only a handful of the saccharine choral works you might expect, opting instead for some rather wonderful juxtapositions. Children singing about children dying? Check. Children interpreting John Cage? Check. Children fronting Bradford's 'Don't drink and drive' campaign? You betcha. Almost all the tracks are excellent, and all are performed by or written by primary school children, brought to life by a series music teachers with surprisingly avant-garde/dark tastes. We get bits of choral stuff, a cover of 'bright Eyes', some tape-manipulation and some solo-cymbal pieces that might have been penned by Alvin Lucier. The CD annoyingly has a whole bunch of extra tracks not found on the record, but even so, this compilation stands out as a truly odd, and oddly experimental album.

Buy it here - https://trunkrecords.greedbag.com/buy/classroom-projects/

Week 8 - Yellow Magic Orchestra - Firecracker / Technopolis

Some glitchy, ahead-of-its-time computer game synth pop for this installment of Freak of the Week... all the way from Japan.

Yellow Magic Orchestra (AKA YMO) were (are?) a pioneering group of musicians credited with influencing the early days of synthpop, electro and electronica. Using samples and drum machines before most people considered them 'proper' instruments, they forged sounds that seem less wild today than they would have in 1979, when this particular 12" came out. To be fair, this could have been a Charity Shop Gem of the Week as it was picked up in a bargain bin for 99p many years ago, but I feel its combination of glitchy 8-bit sounds, peculiar synthesis and the ridiculously long build-up to Firecracker make it a glorious candidate for Freak of the Week instead.
Also worth noting there are some serious samples to be pilfered if you're that way inclined!

Each of the 3 tracks is deliciously wonky and has that Japanese sense of wonder - I love it.

And of course you can pick up a copy for peanuts at Discogs

Week 7 - The In Sound From Way Out (Perrey - Kingsley)

Beastie Boys fans will recognise this record title, and indeed cover art, font and graphic style - the Beasties released a 1995 album of the same name that looks remarkably similar to Perrey-Kingsley's 1966 escapade into experimental synth-pop psychedlia. In turn, that record owes a lot to the influence of another 'delia' - not psyche-delia, but Delia Derbyshire, the pioneering sound designer famous for her work with the BBC during the 60s. See what i did there? That's journalism, baby.

The In Sound From Way Out is a remarkable collection of standards and hits a la mode, reimagined using the trusty Moog synthesizer, plus field recordings, found sounds, tape splicing and many other experimental techniques... from children laughing and splashing about in the bath to what sounds like someone snoring, sped up. The results are some quite remarkable sounds, with some choice loops appearing throughout that will delight many a producer.

Also worth mentioning is some superior recording and mixing - many similar records suffered from muddy, dull mixes, but this record has splendid depth of sound and is beautifully mixed. Well worth searching out... but let us dio the work for you... here's its Discogs entry 

And you want to hear it as well? Bloody hell... alright, fine!

Week 6 - Jungle Exotica 2

I'm almost certain that all the bands on this record are white-American, which probably makes it all a bit racist. At the very least, it's almost offensive in its caricaturing of 'tribal' music, like blacking up and shouting 'Um Bongo, Um Bongo, they drink it in the Congo' while your band plays polyrhythyms and make gorilla noises.

But, having said all that, there is something interestingly playful about this collection of madcap 50's/60's 'exotic' rock n' rollers. Occasionally catchy riffs, and a genuine sense of fun pervade. It's probably akin to the Black and White Minstrel Show in its cultural sensitivity. Only the music is actually pretty wild and you kind of can't help but be charmed by the whole thing. Songs called things like 'Arabian Jerk' maybe a touch on the offensive side, but there are a few stand out moments such as The Tides' Midnight Limbo. Annoyingly, a few of the tracks from the CD didn't make the vinyl release, but overall it's a pretty interesting compilation from Crypt Records, and a worthy winner of our Freak of The Week!

Incidentally, I've featured Volume 2 purely because that's the copy I picked up - no idea what Volume 1 is like but I'm interested to find out!

Have a listen here

And buy it direct from Crypt here (US) or Discogs here 

Week 5 (ish) Wong Ching Yuan – A-Go-Go & Off Beat Cha Cha

This week, we welcome our esteemed guest contributor Dan Wall from Funky Navigation, to provide our features...

Following on coincidentally from the Betty Chung / Jun Mayuzumi 45 featured here back in August, the Orient coughs up another curiosity for us this week in the form of this four- track EP of Singaporean Popcorn/Beat coolness. Now this is all a matter of perspective because our friend Wong Ching Yuan here - responsible for this slice of Mandarin Suave, also happens to be incredibly popular with grannies all across Asia and has recorded around 800 songs in a career spanning 40+ years! That being said, here he manages to craft a sound that is haunting and other worldly. Twanging guitars drenched in echo and a hypnotising vocal style float through the air like wisps of opium smoke. This is a great example of the 'a-go-go' sound he helped proliferate throughout Singapore, Malaysia, and beyond. Check it out on this month's Curious Music For Curious People podcast.

Week 4: Afro Rock Festival

Lions roar in the distance, hyenas wail and a cacophony of savannah sounds burble away as Assagai's Kondo begins, soon launching into a driving afro-percussion riff replete with monkey-calls and chirping birds, that loops for a few minutes before abruptly ending. 

With more safari soundscapes than you can shake a stick (or spear) at, and some pretty wild afro/rock n roll crossovers that err on the side of the afro, this compilation is pretty bonkers and a shoe-in for Freak of the Week. 

I can't find any of the tracks on the record available to stream on the internets, so perhaps you should wrap your ears around my latest mix, where Osibisa's Black Ant features...

Dead Wax Social Mix by Ewan Hoozami on Mixcloud

Week3: La Monte Young & Mariam Zazeela - The Black Album

It's like Christmas, but early.
This record has been at the top of my wish-list forever, but the £100+ price tag for old battered copies of the impossible grail always prevented me from buying it. La Monte young is incredibly prolific, and records everything he ever does, but, somewhat against the grain of internet culture, never actually releases anything. Having a grand total of two commercially released albums (plus a few shoddy bootlegs), it is possible to pick up the 100 hours or so of the rest of his output on torrent sites, but you rarely find anything in the flesh... until now. A limited re-release that seems to be already bordering on going out of print, this album consists of two long-form 'drone' tracks - the first for two singers (Young and his wife Zazeela) and sine tone, with the second for two gongs. Like all Young's music, it's not for the faint-hearted, and you'd be forgiven for assuming a lack of progression throughout the 20 or so minutes of each piece. However, the careful use of specific frequencies creates all kind of odd psycho-neurological affects in the brain, creating a space that is beyond conscious attention - the mind tunes in to a new way of being, freed from the constraints of taste or opinion.
I can't sell this record enough - it is one of the greatest things to every grace wax - designed to be played loudly and in a single, uninterrupted sitting, I defy anyone to not get caught up in its trance-like effect under the right conditions. If your in New York, Young and Zazeela have an ongoing installation where you can go and sit in on these continuous drones and chants - there house is an open performance space that has been running a perpetual version of this work for nigh on 30 years.

You can pick this up at Piccadilly records for at least another ten minutes - Buy it