Asphalt Eden

http://blog.wfmu.org/freeform/2008/07/metropolis-can.html

Footage missing from Fritz Lang's 1927 classic Metropolis have been discovered in Buenos Aires.

Upon its initial release, according to Zeitmagazin, "the film flopped with critics and audiences alike. Representatives of the American firm Paramount considerably shortened and re-edited the film. They oversimplified the plot, even cutting key scenes. The original version could only be seen in Berlin until May 1927 – from then on it was considered to have been lost forever."

Now, will someone please find the missing reels of Greed?

HT: Don Brockway

http://stevekilbey.blogspot.com/2008/07/quick-and-dead-lucky.html

http://blog.wfmu.org/freeform/2008/07/achwgha-ney-wod.html

It must be strange for older record collectors ever since the internet massacred obscurity.  How many envelopes full of money have been sent to Corwood Industries since NPR featured Jandek (who has yet another concert coming up later this month in Colorado, by the way)?  The infamous Nurse With Wound list has become valuable primarily as a taste maker since most of the list is now available for free on various mp3 blogs.  Maybe I sound like I'm bemoaning this?  Definitely not.  I’m actually excited to announce the unearthing of another mega-obscurity.

Stalker Blog recently posted Achwgha Ney Wodei’s incredible and incredibly out of print Triptyque record, which you can download in full here, only a few days after posting this very informative article.  I first heard ANW on the Out Of Nowhere comp and was totally weirded out by their futuristic/primitive schizoid tribal chant Boule.

Achwgha Ney Wodei - Boule

Even before hearing ANW’s central work, Triptyque, I had already been blown away a second time by the band when Tony Coulter played half of 1984’s Autocassable, a cassette tape molded in plaster into a model sports car.  Both sides of the tape have now been played on WFMU – you can stream realaudio of side A here and side B (the tape begins about 20 minutes into the show) here.

Figures that ANW also has a video on the ceaselessly entertaining and mind-expanding RVP Transfert video comp, most of which is on youtube - ANW’s video for ‘Petit Paul’ is here.  There are still a few comp tracks out there I haven’t heard, but thanks to the internet and loose enforcement of copyright laws, I’m now pretty much versed in one of the more obscure corners of…well what corner does Achwgha Ney Wodei belong in anyway?  Now that the authoritative no-wave book is out, can someone more qualified than me get started on the authoritative dark-wave book?

http://www.avclub.com/content/blog/box_of_paperbacks_space_opera?utm_source=from_tag

http://www.avclub.com/content/node/82322

http://blog.wfmu.org/freeform/2008/07/video-truffles.html

Remember Divine's cheesy dance floor songs recorded in the 80s? When I used to work at Wax Trax records back in Denver, I would spend hours by meyself manning the counter in the all vinyl store (ah, bygone days) and invariably I would find myself listening to one of our huge collection of Divine singles. They were irresistible, not just because they were mostly picture discs, but because I used to love dancing around the store shelving records to Divine's impressively hostile delivery. Never has the dance floor felt so fun and so frightening at the same time.

Speaking of Baltimore legends, here's a vintage local news clip about the Go-Go's drummer Gina Schock. Not only is she a Charm City native, but she got her start in music thanks another John Waters' favorite, Edith Massey. I never knew that Gina had such a beautiful Baltimore accent, nor that her parents were so lovably dorky. (via YouTube, where it was posted by the segment's original producer)

More musical video finds including Boney M, Rachel Sweet, Jean Claude Van Damme, and the International House of Pancakes after the jump.

Die Doraus und Die Marinas was the brainchild of 16 year old Andreas Dorau, who cranked out the truly lovable and loopy single "Fred Vom Jupiter", one of Mute records founder Daniel Miller's favorite records.

Speaking of New Wave, here's a big hit from the era whose official video wasn't that great, so this YouTube user made his own.

Talented teen singing star Rachel Sweet went on to host her own TV series "The Sweet Life" on the Comedy Channel in 1989. Here's a couple of samples from the show, and watch for a cameo from a now Comedy Central superstar whose humble beginings included being a writer on Rachel's show. I leave it up to you if Rachel is acutally funny, or if she just really cute and amicable.

Two nights in Bangkok: one by the original vocalist and Chess star Murray Head (brother of Anthony Stewart Head, aka Giles from Buffy the Vampire Slayer), the other by Canadian pop singer Robey (who gained more cult fame as co-star of the TV series Friday the 13th).

In the middle of 70s bikersploitation flick The Black Angels comes a lovely moment of folky widsdom, "Cigarettes", as sung by character actor Smokey Roberds (also a member of sunshine pop pioneers, The Parade).

Jean-Claude Van DANCE! Only a Kickboxer has these kind of smooth moves.

Musicians beware - you are about to be replaced by robots. Meet The Trons.

Euro-Disco legends Boney M's string of nonsense hits pettered out around the mid 80s, but not before they cranked out one classic music video, "Happy Song", featuring Bobby Farrel and The School Rebels.

WEWS TV had perhaps the swingingest promos of all, even in the news anchors didn't quite have same hip vibe. Via the incredible TV Ark on-line television museum, which will send you down a daylong black hole of vitange TV awesomeness. 

Lawrence Welk reefers to "One Toke Over the Line" as a modern spiritual. "Reefers"! Get it?

If you haven't seen comic genius Reggie Watts in action, get thee to his next show because his freestyle comedy beatbox skillz are a sight to behold. For instance, here he is performing "Fuck Shit Stack". Yeah, this dirty language is NSWF:

And finally, there's nothing like having a friend get naked and play with your organ.

http://blog.wfmu.org/freeform/2008/07/waste-creeps.html

Obviously, when not busy trying to take back the night, "Charles Bronson" sat around at home making some primitive, phased, cheapo punk, writing songs about all the creeps on the street ("Streets Without Creeps", "What Do You Do When Your Son Is a Creep"), all the greedheads that interfere with his work plans ("Paul Kersey Architect"), and how to blow all the said creeps off the street (yes, "Rocket Launcher"). Aquarius Records, carrying the disc, says on their site: "Definitely something you hear on WFMU at 3AM."
Bronson: "Punk Rock Creeps" (MP3)

http://blog.wfmu.org/freeform/2008/07/public-collecto.html

Public Collectors, an archive project led by Chicago artist Marc Fischer, consists of informal agreements where collectors allow the contents of their collection to be published and permit those who are curious to directly experience the objects in person.

In addition to hosting collection inventories, Public Collectors also includes digital archives of out-of-print publications, relics of the pre-internet music underground and random ephemera such as a collection of "do not disturb" signs.

Some highlights of the digital archive include:

A self-published collection of stories and illustrations by Michael Gira that was only available on the Swans' 1997 tour.

A collection of children's graffiti from antique sources

Transcripts and audio documentation of conversations with a developmentally disabled man about music, split LPs and Super Nanny.

Issue #19 of French artist Bruno Richard's Elles Sont De Sortie- an insane, beautiful and obscene art magazine published in the early 80s with Pascal Doury. In addition to Richard's early work, Public Collectors also includes a show catalog from an exhibit curated by Marc Fischer that documented nine years of mail correspondence between Richard and Fischer.

All publications are provided as high quality PDFs suitable for printing. I did not provide the direct links because I want you to pretend like its old times and dig around a bit.

http://12kblog.wordpress.com/2008/07/03/northern-album-of-the-month-tokafi/

http://12kblog.wordpress.com/?p=401

TOKAFI.COM has called the re-issue of “Northern” the Album of the Month and are featuring a very positive review on their home page for the next four weeks.

you can read it here.

“…There is also a degree of “realness” to this music which is striking. While there is a popular trend to disgress into mythical dimensions with albums mindtravelling as far as the poles and diverting into imaginary iceages, Deupree’s Winter vision is quite tangible. It is a music which describes its most immediate surroundings, tells of the stories the forrest mumbles in its sleep, unafraid of the mysteries of the night and fully aware of human fragility. It is music which doesn’t deny that there may be a fast-paced world out there somewhere, but instead chooses to stay on its mountain top, taking in the view, in awe of nature’s beauty. Others may be moving in step with the trends, but Taylor Deupree knows what he is doing. This may be the closest electronic music will ever get to folk music.”

http://disquiet.com/2008/07/03/tom-lawrences-irish-forest-field-recordings/

The latest podcast from the Touch label is a brilliantly detailed documentary recording by Tom Lawrence, who’s in the Humanities and Social Sciences department at Dublin City University. Titled “Donadea Forest,” after the Irish location where the sounds were recorded, it captures, in a languorous half hour, bird calls, breezes, and the rain amid the trees.

One especially appealing segment introduces more traditional musical elements into what is otherwise a collection of field recordings. This is accomplished by working in chimes at play in the forest. Also complicating that portion of the overall piece is the presence of traffic noise — it’s a smart moment, as humankind makes its presence heard simultaneously as tone and noise, as organized musical sound and unintended aural presence.

To assist in the listening process, Lawrence has helpfully provided a time-code guide to the work’s five constituent parts:

00:00-04:27 Castle Crow’s Cacophony (31st December 2007, 7.20am)
04:28-10:23 January Gales 9th January 2008 10.45pm (contains references to 9/11 forest monument and the avenue of trees, captured with contact mics)
10:24-14:48 Forest Rain 12th January 2008 1.15am (extensive flooding)
14:49-20:36 Forest Harmonics 8th March 2008 6.20-11.50am (sampled forest chimes, forestry felling, and the ‘carbon chorus’ [surrounding motorways]).
20:37-30:47 The Dawn Chorus (recorded on National Dawn Chorus Day 20th May 2008, 4.35am)

The set of recordings was made between December 2007 and May 2008, and was just released on Touch’s Touch Radio series. The entire piece is available for download: M4A. More information at touchradio.org.uk. And more on Lawrence at his website, tom-lawrence.net.

http://www.achewood.com/index.php?date=07022008

http://www.merriam-webster.com/cgi-bin/mwwodarch.pl?Jul.03.2008