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The CHIRP Blog
Clarence Ewing: The Million Year Trip writes@CHIRPRADIO (Week of March 20)
Special Events
- It’s the CHIRP Radio Spring Fundraiser! We want to raise $20,000 by this Friday, March 24th! We have thank-you gifts! We have a drawing for Hamilton tickets! We have an independent radio station you can help support! Make your contribution at chirpradio.org/donatenow.
New Media
- Marites Velasquez talks with Pylon Reenactment Society member Vanessa Briscoe Hay
- First Time: First Issue by songwriter, designer, and performer Ozivell Ecford
- Josh Friedberg rediscovers Alison Krauss’ Now That I’ve Found You: A Collection
- Jim Kirkhoff’s pics from the February edition of Classic Album Sunday at Saturday Audio Exhcnage
- Clarence Ewing Reviews Songs We Taught the Lord (Vol. 1 & 2) by Phil X. Milstein and Thurston Moore
- Kevin Fullam and Clarence Ewing exchange ideas about the smash movie Get Out
Clarence Ewing: The Million Year Trip writesThe Fourth Wall: Get Out and the New Old Horror
[Welcome to the Fourth Wall, CHIRP's weekly e-conversation on cinema. This week's subject is the recent smash Get Out. This edition is written by CHIRP Radio volunteers Kevin Fullam and Clarence Ewing.]
Kevin: At some point in the future, Clarence, we'll have to hold a larger discussion on the topic of horror as a whole? I'm a fan of the genre, but horror is often hamstrung by its own financial success. Studios know that there's a sizable chunk of young moviegoers (and let's be honest, they're the ones who drive box-office receipts) who will plunk down their dollars for any film inhabiting this world, and so we're often treated to lots of schlock as a result.
Get Out, however, is novel, and actually has some rather pertinent societal commentary to offer. In fact, it's a testament to the brilliant premise of the film that I walked out feeling a bit disappointed? But first, a quick, spoiler-free summary:
Clarence Ewing: The Million Year Trip writesAlbum Review: Songs We Taught the Lord (Vol. 1 & 2) by Phil X. Milstein and Thurston Moore
On December 3 and 4, 1996, tape manipulator and sound collagist Phil Milstein got together with Sonic Youth guitarist, singer, and songwriter Thurston Moore to take a musical trip. They didn’t physically travel far to record their two duets, one at the Iron Morse Music Hall in Northampton, MA and the other at The Middle East in Cambridge, MA. But what they created might help send a listener to the inner or outer limits.
Their recordings stand as the ultimate in “Anti-Pop” music: There are no 3-4 minute chart-friendly singles, no twenty-something starlets singing passages from their diary, no breaks featuring this month’s hot rap star. What you do have is two middle-aged dudes who recorded two very long tracks (Vol. 1 is 42 minutes long and Vol. 2 is 44 minutes) that set aside verses and hooks in favor of an approach similar to drone and noise music, something they’ve both been doing for decades.
Moore layers his guitar improvisations and effects over Milstein’s found-object sound structures as musical themes and ideas drift by like clouds. Their interactions are not unlike what jazz musicians do when they improvise, listening and responding to each other through the sounds they make.
Both volumes of this 2-record set are the kind of music where you can put your headphones on, press “play,” and lose track of time for a while. It’s good stuff if you need to add some active yet low-key abstraction to your life.
jimkirkhoff@mac.com writesPhotos: Classic Album Sunday at Saturday Audio Exchange (2/26/17)
[photos by Jim Kirkhoff]
Music fans had a blast at Saturday Audio Exchange listening to John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme. The gathering was part of the worldwide series Classic Album Sundays, where people gather in cities from Oslo to Miami to listen to and appreciate the same album.
Saturday Audio Exchange will be Chicago’s host for the next CAS session on Sunday, March 25th, where the spotlight album will be The Velvet Underground and Nico!
Josh Friedberg: Music Historian's Corner writesRediscovering Our Record Collections: “Now That I’ve Found You: A Collection” by Alison Krauss
By Josh Friedberg
Alison Krauss has been recording bluegrass, country, and pop since she was a teenager, and her 1995 compilation, Now That I’ve Found You: A Collection, first exposed her to a mass audience years before her appearance on the smash soundtrack to the Coen brothers’ movie O Brother, Where Art Thou?
For millions of country fans, including my mother, Now That I’ve Found You introduced them to one of the most beautiful voices of the last generation. I heard this album when I was a kid, and I was drawn to the quiet, largely acoustic sound, which reminded me of a variation on the ‘60s folk in my parents’ record collection.
Hearing it now after seeing the CD at a library, I’m amazed at how well it holds up. I’ve generally enjoyed this collection more than the O Brother, Where Art Thou? soundtrack, despite Krauss’s excellent contributions on that album. Now That I’ve Found You is gorgeous and intimate, containing moments of both older and more contemporary styles.