Well, the Vatican hedged their bets, and ended up hanging its collective ass out. Too bad about NASA’s big announcement, though– I was hoping it would be the discovery of Planet X, or better yet, another habitable Earth-like planet… instead, they’ve discovered the most recent example of a supernova, one dating from around the time of the Civil War.

Still, it’s always fun to listen to a NASA briefing. One reporter just asked what would be my first question– in a nutshell, what’s the big deal with THIS supernova?

Uhh… did someone just ask about “moon crickets?” WTF? MOON CRICKETS!!! Now he’s asking about the Swoogy Supernova of 2007… ah, sounds like someone is goofing on NASA.

Hmm.. a quick visit to the Urban Dictionary confirms that moon crickets and swoogie are both racial epithets for African-Americans. Oh my. I’m guessing that must have been a reporter for the Pinhead Daily. Glad to see folks representing themselves so well.

Oh… and we end with someone screaming about vaginas… Yes, NASA folks, they ARE looneys.

As can be expected, I’ve been taping this conference. There’s some semi-interesting stuff going on still, despite the press conference officially being over. Sounds like someone left the mic on, maybe?

So… the Pope’s “chief astronomer” now says that aliens could exist, and that some of them might even be free from original sin. Sounds to me like the Vatican is covering its ass for the day we dig E.T. up!

In the spirit of being helpful, here’s a few more amazing facts for the pope to add to his next muttering:

1) Tom Cruise might be a complete loon.

2) It’s entirely possible that corporate radio sucks audibly.

3) The teapot’s celestial orbit is more eccentric than originally thought.

In case I hadn’t made enough mention of the fact, I’m hosting a screening for Cristopher Cichocki’s film “Elemental Shift,” and it’s THIS SATURDAY MORNING!

If you’re local, or if you’re willing to drive, I encourage you to drop in at WDBX from 4-6:30 AM May 10th. This is a great film, with great noise, and there might even be live music afterwards. Plus, I have stickers with which to reward random people of my choosing!

I’m really excited about the BBC’s new “Olinda” radio. I’ll admit that, as an American, the whole BBC thing is a bit mystifying to me– but the Olinda is surely one of the more interesting, positive aspects that come from having such a powerful public broadcaster. Let’s be real, the best thing PBS ever offered was a tote bag.

Anyways, the Olinda is a radio with a detachable portion that will allow programmers and electronics enthusiasts the ability to create third-party applications and modules for the radio. It’s a pretty far-out concept in the physical world; but well-known to anyone familiar with Facebook, GoogleEarth, or even fan-fic if we stretch the analogy a bit… the radio is a useful platform that becomes more useful as we build upon it. Check this out:

“When you get the module you configure it to connect to your home wireless network and then you set it up with your friends. You’ll notice in the pictures that there are slots for your friends - these are wipe-clean spaces for writing your friends’ names or sticking in a picture. So each slot on the wireless is customised and configured to represent one of your friends. And each slot has an associated combined light and button.

Then whenever they are listening to the radio their slot on your radio will light up. And when you push the associated button your radio will show you what they are listening to. And if you want to listen alongside them? Just push select and it tunes to the station - you’re now listening alongside your friend.

So we hope this might provide a sense of community around your radio, harking back to the times when families and friends used to gather around the radio to listen. But Olinda provides this in a glance-able, non-intrusive manner. And it will start to support conversations around radio programming and the discovery of new shows and stations. Social networking for your radio.”

It’s doubtful I’ll ever see something like this around my area, but it is a very interesting idea– maybe interesting enough that I should attempt to explore it some in one of my next radio broadcasts, who knows?

T’was a looking like a slow day for me, with nary a blog entry in sight– but Caleb Dupree put some wind in my sails with a hearty meme tagging. Here are the rules:

1) Pick up the nearest book.
2) Open to page 123.
3) Find the fifth sentence.
4) Post the next three sentences.
5) Tag three people, and acknowledge who tagged you.

Thankfully, I have recently been the glad beneficiary of an Amazon giftcard, and actually have some non-library-castoff books to read. And what happened to be nearest me? John Cage’s “Silence,” perched at the edge of my desk, just near the printer… underneath the remains of my coffeecake muffin.

Page 123 yields this portion of Cage’s “Lecture on Nothing,” from 1959:

“More and more                                       I have the feeling          that we are getting
nowhere.                   Slowly                    ,                                   as the talk goes on
,                                we are getting        nowhere                       and that is a pleasure
.                            It is not irritating    to be where one is          .”

In keeping with Rule #5, I’d like to tag “Of Sound Mind,” Kingo at his newly-resurrected “Squublog,” and (because I’ve also been reading R. Murray Schafer’s “The Tuning of the World,”) I’ll tag “Bike Mike.”

I downloaded your new Nine Inch Nails release yesterday– and I’m still seeding– but what I’m wondering is when you’ll see fit to go WAY out with your music.

“Ghosts” was a great start, and so far I’m enjoying “The Slip”, but how about some complete weirdness? Seems to me that you have the freedom (and the tools!) to take a few willing listeners down the path you started way back at “Fixed” and “Further Down the Spiral.”

Wouldn’t it be fun to do an album like this as a stand-alone release rather than just a series of remixes? I’m excited already. Don’t let me down!

Strange… there was nobody here when I arrived at the station today. Just the “emergency programming” spinning, which (for the 15 minutes or so I was listening to it) was a half-alright mix of delta blues and gloomy Texan ballads. A little David Bowie was playing when I came into the darkened studio… always a weird feeling to find the controls set to “phantom”…

On the upside, pledge drive is over. WDBX met its goal, so it looks like we’ll be here another season. I’m celebrating by playing the final 25-minute cut from Public Eyesore’s release of Anla Courtis, Seichi Yamamoto, and Yoshimi’s “Live at Kanadian.” I’ve been listening to this thing all week, trying to write a review of it, and I’m having a hell of a time. I’ll just say it’s rather resistant to being reviewed– every time I think I have a handle on this one, it slips away from me.

I’m afraid this isn’t going to be much of a “liveblog” this week– Aaron Jones, a local musician involved with experimental project Maggotapplewonderland, has come to hang out here in the Hi-Life Room. And let’s not neglect Karthik, now the proud owner of yet more amperage to wield in his sets. Anyhow, getting acquainted has taken precedence over liveblogging… luckily, there’s this wonderful playlist to keep you amused.

Brainiac — Hot Metal Dobermans
Brainiac — Fucking with the Altimeter
Anla Courtis, Seichi Yamamoto, Yoshimi — Live at Kanadian, pt.4
George Korein — Quiet Now
George Korein — Writhe, Sally Writhe
George Korein — God Give me Earlids
Rune Lindblad — Fragment 0
Rune Lindblad — Fragment 1
Conure — Some Vowed Abstinence
Conure — At First, We Didn’t Believe It
Rothkamm — Temporarily Unavailable OR Descent into LAX
Rothkamm — Los Angeles OR LATV
Rothkamm — Beehive OR Focal Point of Masonic Meditation
Shelf Life — tkcrdsuow
Shelf Life — cuswodkrt
Barry Chabala, Glenn Weyant — aZona
Barry Chabala, Glenn Weyant — soZona
Barry Chabala, Glenn Weyant — bZona
Warm Climate –  Forced Spring for Rising Tide
The Bastard Sons of Morton Subotnick — Nola EKG
Liteworks — Bermuda Conference
Chef Menteur — Aquavitae
King Ghidorah — Bring Me the Head of Michael Brown
Potpie — Blues for the Lower 9
Liteworks — Liteworks
Murmur — Secondary Fermentation

I’ve been super-impressed with Cristopher Cichocki’s “Elemental Shift” DVD-R release for brand-new label Table of Contents, so much so that I did what I always do when I find an interesting artist– pick his brain with a bunch of questions! Lucky for us, Cichocki was more than willing to take a bit of time for STARTLING MONIKER, and provide some nice video links and photos as well. Be sure to tune in during my upcoming May 3rd broadcast, as I will be playing a portion of this disc– as well as making an important announcement about my broadcast for the 10th of May!

STARTLING MONIKER: Creating “Elemental Shift” took you over two years to accomplish. It’s beyond doubt that the editing alone was a grueling task– what was it connecting you to “Elemental Shift” that kept you going?

CRISTOPHER CICHOCKI: Well, it was really a question of when do I stop. Walking away is the hard part for me. I’ve gone through countless incarnations experimenting with my material, and the work continues to flux and re-fragment within my sets that I project in live venues and public spaces. Just like a band plays their set and has room for improvisation on each song from night to night, I re-edit my work each time I project it at a venue. It keeps it fresh and exciting for me, and also makes it much more than just showing my video again and again. Like an organism that can extend and embody itself into morphing hybrid forms, the material from Elemental Shift continues to evolve.

SM: I’ve read that you call your work “video composition,” which seems to imply a more musical approach to directing. Can you explain why you’re using this new term to describe “Elemental Shift”?

CC: The root of the project started from making audio tracks with field recordings that I’d manipulate and layer upon. I thought of releasing these early tracks in a straightforward fashion until I began to capture video and photos in the mix of my field recording journeys. Being influenced by Earthwork artists I’ve always liked the idea of extrapolating various audio and visual content from a specific site and then reintroducing those forms building a new cohesive entity. I call my work “video composition” because there is a symbiotic relationship of visual and audio being constructed in the process. The audio informs the visual on equivocal grounds, and both are composed in a see-sawing, back-forth method of experimental fragmentation. I build it up, I tear it down, again, and again.

SM: Noise art is often a music of limits; the limit of our willingness to listen to it, the limit of performers’ ability to push forward, and even the limits of pain have all been explored. I’m curious about your limits. What limits is “Elemental Shift” testing? What limited you in its creation? If you’re pursuing this direction in the future, what limitation do you hope to overcome the most?

CC: Well, I have many labor intensive ideas for video installations that are interactive with my painting, photography, and sculpture. It’s really just a matter of budget and context until I can manifest these works. As far as other ideas of limitation, I think my work has a maximal element that many noise artists are invested in, but I’m equally interested in minimalism as well. I’m interested in the narrative of emotion that a roller coaster provides. You have a slow ride up to the top in anticipation, then switch into hyper full throttle on your way down. You repeat this over and over again, still interested in the next phase.

SM: For much of “Elemental Shift,” the visual pacing could really only be described as frenetic. However in the last section, a nearly static cityscape dominates the frame, with only a few small movements. Eventually, it is replaced with darkness while the music continues. What is your intent in this final portion of the work?

CC: Most of the first half hour in Elemental Shift blazes by with a fury of fast paced over-stimuli. The minimalist ending with the LA nightscape is an opportunity for people to come out of that hypnotic overload and take a breather within a vast environment of fresh smog.

SM: What musicians and filmmakers are you excited about right now?

CC: I definitely think there’s a huge list of artists doing really exciting things right now. Some of which are listed here…

SM: What do you have coming up? Will “Elemental Shift” be showing at film festivals?

CC: I should submit to film festivals, but haven’t given it much thought to be honest. I’m currently working intensively on my side project with Ryan Seymour called State Rec (State Recreation) which is a site/ non-site noise video project that incorporates live footage of us performing at the Salton Sea and other abandoned desert areas not too far from where I live. I just finished up a music video for Foot Village, a band I toured with to SXSW.

I’m also making a handful of videos for Kevin Shields, Gerritt, Rale, Warm Climate, and others far too gruesome to mention. I’ll be certain to keep you posted.

As always, I’d like to wish everyone a very happy May Day– if the last year of struggling for basic human rights, peace, and reason have got you down; and if another year of combating poverty, ignorance, and waste looks to be too much to bear– take this small message of solidarity to heart.

For the rest of you– take your National Day of Prayer, and shove it up your ass.

It’s not even May yet; but I’m tempted to call it early– “Elemental Shift,” the opening DVD-R volley from new label Table of Contents, may very well be the best noise release of the year. Unfortunately limited to 250, I’ve begun treating my promo copy with kid gloves, thankful it had somehow arrived safely through the mail with only a thin cardboard shield to protect it.

I’m not usually anywhere near this finicky.

What’s got me so worked up is Cichocki’s seamless blending of video and sound. Although it would be a stretch to define me as a visually-oriented person, I don’t think I’m going out on a limb to suggest that “Elemental Shift” is a work that not only would be lessened greatly by the absence of picture or sound, but would be fundamentally transformed through either loss. I can also say that this is certainly not an hour-long music video– in fact, it is exceptionally difficult to determine which sounds or visuals may have preceded, as they inform and shape each other throughout.

I’m not certain I possess the visual vocabulary to describe “Elemental Shift” adequately, but I have to try! For starters, there are a lot of extremely quick cuts fashioned into loops. I don’t know if these have been constructed from individual film frames or photographs, but the results rely heavily on our persistence of vision, creating pulsing layers of eye-blinding activity. Initially, Cichocki seems to go no further than quickly revealing one image after another, but he has a real talent for selecting images that reflect the tone of the accompanying electronic scree and clearly is not operating in a random manner. In this sense, the visuals follow the music, providing a harmonious optical quality, if extraordinarily frenetic.

For me, one highlight was the use of a Wal-Mart shopping cart in a portion of the video. Viewed entirely through the hexagonal mesh of the basket, Cichocki takes us on a hyper-speed tour of the store, enhancing that tunnel vision attention-deficit state so encouraged by the bombardment of corporate messages upon store patrons.

However, where Cichocki really gets going is when the visuals encourage the sound itself. Having always found noise art to be a somewhat “rooted” music, I was thrilled to see how Cichocki’s use of successive frames (and even motive-based iconography such as traffic arrows) could impart a tactile sense of movement to the sounds. Whereas previously something I might have perceived something like “wall sound” as an immobile block, now I could imagine it as having purpose and direction. It’s interesting, to say the least, and will definitely have me re-examining many aspects of noise.

I took dozens of screen captures from the DVD, none of which come close to providing an accurate representation of “Elemental Shift” any more than a drawing of a rose might conjure its scent. If you try looking at all of them at once, you might get close. Those familiar with the accompanying videos for Merzbow performances will be surprised to find Masami Akita’s work a mere jumping-off point for “Elemental Shift,” and far less detail-oriented as well.

Finally, I should add that I don’t recommend this DVD-R to epileptics. Table of Contents seems somewhat aware of this in their press release, but I think it should be mentioned in a serious manner. If you’re prone to this sort of thing, stay far away!

For the rest of you, however, I can’t recommend “Elemental Shift” more highly.

Miss Information picked up a lovely set of vintage Tomorrowland photos last month, while browsing at one of my favorite junk stores. The set first appeared to be postcards, but that didn’t make a lot of sense to me upon closer inspection, as they are printed front and back. I’m guessing the postmark area means the purchaser might choose to send the whole set as a single piece of mail?

Anyways, I had some fun trying to figure out when the photos date from, since Miss Information happily pointed out the absence of everyone’s Tomorrowland fave. You guessed it, there’s no Space Mountain! Back in the old days, folks were happy with the People Mover and the motorboats.

Back to what I was saying about the photo dating– it’s been a bit problematic, as the photos seem to have been taken at somewhat different times, given some important details shown. Before I continue, I’d like to add that the folks behind Yesterland provide a wealth of information, without which I would have been hopelessly lost. Thanks, Yesterland!

The main discrepancy seems to be between the Skyway and the CircleVision Theatre. In the photos of the Skyway, the first-generation round buckets are shown, which were replaced in 1965 with a differently-shaped bucket. That would initially suggest the photos date from no later than 1965. However, the CircleVision Theatre did not begin playing “America the Beautiful” until 1967, when it was re-opened. Clearly, there’s no way these photos could have been taken at the same time.

There are also a few other interesting details! See the Alweg Monorail? When it first opened, the red and blue trains only had three cars each– but the ones pictured have four. The additional cars were added in mid-1961; shortly before the addition of a third, yellow, monorail later that year. With the monorails featured so prominently in the photoset, I suspect the yellow monorail didn’t yet exist, placing these photos very near the mid-year of 1961. The text, which touts “extended” 2.4 mile monorail, also support this date.

Enough Disney-geekery for now– here are the photos! (click to view full size, please)

For those of you who missed the live set by Karthik Kakarala on my last “It’s Too Damn Early” broadcast, I’m happy to say that it was extensively documented. Along with my short embedded video below, you can watch a large portion of the set at YouTube, thanks to Tom Vasilj. Apparently, this guy never puts the camera down– so don’t make his work for naught– check out both parts here and here.

There’s been a bit of fuss amongst WordPress bloggers about a surprise new feature added recently– the “possibly related blog posts” thing that is now dangling at the end of some of my entries. So far, it seems to be a goofy extra that mostly tries to direct readers to my own pages, which may be a sign that I’m the only person who writes about this sort of stuff!

I decided to scroll back through my entries to see if there were any useful links I would have made myself, and really didn’t find anything too mind-blowing. If anything, the whole process got me thinking about how fun it would be to have a random link generator for my own site…

Luckily, one already exists. As I gather, it was released as something of a secret, and probably as more of a curiosity than anything. Clicking on it will take you to a random Startling Moniker entry, and you’ll find it in the sidebar, titled “John Cage Demands It!”

Feel free to click the above link, or its sidebar doppelganger.

There’s a nice little audience here to see Karthik tonight– and it looks like he’s brought everything but the kitchen sink in for some noise-making. Seems like 5am is going to be the magic hour, so stay tuned!

Zbigniew Karkaowski, Damion Romero — 9 Before 9, part 1
Zbigniew Karkaowski, Damion Romero — 9 Before 9, part 2
Rune Lindblad — Death of the Moon
Rune Lindblad — Fragment 0
Rune Lindblad — Fragment 1
Dr. Mint — Summon the Shadow Sun
KARTHIK KAKARALA, LIVE GUEST, IT’S TOO DAMN EARLY WDBX-FM
George Korein — Liftoff
George Korein — Peak Altitude
George Korein — Evasive Measures
George Korein — Acceleration
George Korein — Crash Landing
George Korein — Flying Corpse Flies Again
George Korein — Gleaming Corpse I
George Korein — Singsong Corpse I
George Korein — Gleaming Corpse II
George Korein — Singsong Corpse II
George Korein — Gleaming Corpse III
George Korein — Pulsing Corpse

Back in August of 2007, I sent Yann Hagimont some interview questions. At the time, I had just learned that ‘O’, (a duo featuring Hagimont and Sylvain Ducasse) had just split up. ‘O’ had been one of my favorite groups since I heard their split with Tin.RP, so I wanted to see if ‘O’ might move on in some fashion. Hagimont was a good sport about the interview, and insisted on translating his original French answers for STARTLING MONIKER readers. It’s taken a while, but I think this interview was well worth the wait.

STARTLING MONIKER: First off, what’s happened to Sylvain? Will ‘O’ continue as a solo project?

YANN HAGIMONT/’O': Well, just what often happens when two people play together for a long time. After some disagreements, we’ve decided to stop our collaboration and to follow different directions. I only know that he focuses on his scientific research (sounds like he’s a really respected archaeologist), but we didn’t talk together for a while… about two or three years ago. So “O” continues as a solo project– or more exactly, as an “orchestra non orchestra”… But as interactions are really important in the “O” creation process, I’ve also prepared some collaborations with artists I really respect. Some years ago, I’ve said that “O” will die after “Numero 0”… Of course, it was metaphoric. It was the death of a concept.

SM: So much of ‘O’ seems to do with duality– the personnel of ‘O’, the split-releases with other artists, and now a split-release in two parts across two labels, even the cooperation ‘O’ expects from listeners to “finish” creating the music. Why this emphasis on duality?

YH: Basically, you’re right… But behind all these dual elements, there’s always a third value– not limited to the fusion of the two others. In reality, there’s no emphasis on duality. To be honest, duality is probably what I hate the most… and that we hated the most. At the beginning, we had created “O” as a way to escape to duality, Manicheism, SYMMETRY, perfect repetition (“L’Imperfection est la cîme” ). Duality is sterile: it only permits to create lifeless structures. This aesthetic position could be summed up like this: a + b = c, or possibly, c = a + b + x (consider that “c” is “O” music and “x” all accidents, aleatory events. I’m not sure that’s a good image.

Have you ever seen Henri Meschonnic’s works? He develops a really specific conception of rhythm, based on a re-definition of rhythm; rhythm in language, rhythm in poetry, etc. According to him, rhythm isn’t a binary shifting… it’s movement, and it doesn’t require regularity. A consequence of this re-definition is that all art productions are unique. And it’s not only an aesthetic approach: it is also applicable to politics. Now I must give another reason: duality goes against my political ideals. Duality is an enemy of freedom, of individuality, of specificities.

If splits with other artists have many positive aspects (as all collaborations, it has positive economic aspects, creates communities and it determines creation), they’re also really stereotypical in underground scenes (which are ruled by many codes) and in many “pop” music scenes. As stereotypical objects, they must be disfigured. That’s the reason of our first split (with Tin RP): it wasn’t a “horizontal” split but a “vertical” split– a stereophonic split. The “O” vs Je split was a split between me and myself. The split with Moon was another variation of disfigured split (a split in two parts on Lona Records and Burning Emptiness). And the next split (with Joe Post, an ex-Monitors member) will be our first conventional split release.

About the cooperation of listeners, I don’t see it as a figure of duality. Oh! A little remark about this. I’ve said in the past that “O” needs active listeners, but all sound productions need active listeners to become music; there are just different degrees to this . Perhaps I was a bit clumsy or naive to focus on this point. At the same time, it was a good way to contest the cliché of “feeling.” Many people consider that music “speaks to their heart” (sorry for my English) but it’s just a romantic vision. They find feelings in music because they have learned how to find them in what they listen to.

SM: I have always been interested in works that fall between the world of “useful” crafts, and art. Obviously, you put a lot of work into ‘O’ recordings, but you also deny that they are communicating something concrete– and even that they are completed! How is it that you came to work in this middle ground?

YH: Of course, there’s months and months of work upstream from “O” music, especially in recent pieces. But this work is not an end. Of course, I must be sure that I can bear “O” approximations (“O” is not exactly music) and in the past we’ve said that “O” wasn’t music. One of the first steps of creation is to listen many times to the raw version. Then, a great part of the work consists in “sculpting” of this raw material: to “organize” it, create different spaces… and arrange this with all non-musical things I can find in the studio. Sometimes, the “non-musical” (more exactly the “concrete” elements) can be used first… I’m not sure that I’ve really answered this question!

SM: Your use of the ‘O’ symbol seems deliberately confusing– it can be seen as a whole, as a nil sign, a closed loop, a vessel to be filled, or a process without end. I have always thought that ‘O’ begins at one of these interpretations when starting to create. Is this true?

YH: Well… When we found this name - “O” -, we were looking at the full moon. We were speaking about more than a polysemic name, but at the same time minimalist and complex. Perhaps you’ll find it ridiculous, but when we found this name, it delighted us. It was like our first aesthetic production. The stupid sound of the letter “O” in French, the mathematical values (not positive, not negative) and the circle had totally charmed us.

But I keep in mind that the interpretation of a sign like “O” totally depends on the context. A text? An equation? A geometric exercise? A diagram? A child’s drawing? That means “O” is nothing. Or all.

To be honest I don’t really like symbolist explanations, which assume a preexisting sense to the form. A symbol doesn’t have any existence outside of a culture anymore. All these interpretations of “O” can be subsumed under the category of subjectivity. Consequently, the only real sense of “O” is the affirmation of the subjectivity. And our main musical objective (ah, ah!…).

SM: Does your recording process assume a listener? Who do you imagine? What are the qualities of this listener?

YH: Of course! And the recording process includes a listener twice. As I’ve said before, an important part of my preparation’s work consists in listening to the raw material. Oh! Even when I play guitar, I play as a listener– I try to introduce “errors;” things I don’t expect, things which can break listening codes. It can take me several months (I need to “multiply” me…). But it also assume other listeners at each step of the creation. How could we really imagine music without any listener?

I can’t believe people who release records and say that they do their music only for themselves, or for none. I don’t know if you ever read Umberto Eco’s “Lector in Fabula”. I think the reading processes described can work as well in music. Even if you say that you don’t (or can’t, which is probably my case) imagine your listener (and by this, I mean someone in particular), an entity determines many of your choices. Unfortunately, it’s probably connected with your environment– cultural, social.

I can’t say– or more probably don’t want to say who I imagine. A listener probably composed with a part of you? The qualities of a listener? Mainly confidence. And doubt.

SM: You have a release on Antenna Records, “Numero 0″… There’s something else I’d love to hear– any chance of a collaboration with The Telescopes?

YH: Ah, ah!… I’d like to work on something like that, but our problem is always time. Never have time enough. I have a deep respect for The Telescopes and Stephen; they produced so many awesome things since their start. They’ve never done the same music, and they’re more and more non-commercial. They follow their way and don’t care about any trend. Their journey into music and sound must be considered as an example.

SM: What music are you excited about right now?

YH: So much! I’m into a lot of contemporary music (my favorite remains Claude Debussy, one of my first discoveries)… and I do love all Messiaen works. Of course I love what some people call “abstract”, but I’m also a great fan of No-Wave, experimental rock, and I even listen to “arty” grindcore. I’m really interested in traditional music too. The only thing I really hate is pretentious popular music. Sometimes, people making popular music are dumb enough to imagine that they’re as great as “real” composers… but we’re not.) Never forget that popular music; from indie to techno, from harsh noise to grindcore, from folk to idm (I’d like to know how dance music can be intelligent. Just another stupid fashion.) are clichéd combinations. Don’t imagine that I’m a snob– I love clichés, and I love playing with them too!.

SM: What is coming up for ‘O’? Is the Monitors split still going to happen? Any touring, other albums in progress?

YH: Unfortunately, The Monitors no longer exist… I really miss them; it was a promising band, a really interesting prog no-wave. Even though they no longer exist, a split EP (the first “O” vinyl ever!) with Joseph Post (ex-member of the Monitors) will be released this August on Golgonooza Records (who also release music from Sberms, G.I. Joe, Gay Beast and many others). Another split (with S/T, ex-bassist of the Japanese band Green Milk from Planet Orange) should be out on Skyr Records really soon as well. The “O” part is totally different from what I usually do– it’s mainly a minimalist electronical work, and was composed between 2001 and 2007). There’s no full album planned for the moment; I’m just thinking about a new approach of “O”… I can’t use a same concept twice.

For those few readers who give a damn, my birthday was great. I had a surprise party, which was made more interesting by the fact that I was already AT my house. So everyone actually had to contrive a reason to show up, and then arrive simultaneously. Miss Information had taken her recent Sweeney Todd obsession into the realm of vegetarian-friendly “meat pies” and some yummy hazelnut cookies as well.

She also found me some REAL COKE. For the uninitiated, real Coke is made with actual sugar, and comes in a tall glass bottle. None of that high-fructose corn syrup nonsense to spoil things!

A well-timed bit of spending money (a rarity around these parts) enabled me to pick up a new memory card for my camera, so I upgraded from 64 megabytes to 1 gig! Now I can take high-quality video for nearly 30 minutes… my brain is enjoying tossing this possibility around for future projects. I also got some punch balloons, and three tiny basil plants.

On a somewhat surreal note, the girl checking out our purchases was very excited to tell us about a hotel “somewhere in the midwest” that does not have beds, but is “all murder rooms.” Not sure what that meant exactly, but I think she may have been describing some sort of home-grown history museum. Or just getting too much of the home-grown herself…

Taking our leave from Homicide Ho-Jo, Mister and I had our photostrip made, with props! For the record, bubbles are finicky partners in a photo setting.

Upon returning home, DJ Mo presented me with the keys to Dave City, a sim of which I am not only the man-about-town and concurrent five-time homeowner, but also the mayor. My approval rating is pretty high, but apparently, I need to get a fire station built before this highly-desirable real estate goes up in flames.

New Nashville homeowner Tony capped off my birthday with a much-appreciated gift card for Amazon. Winging their way to my door are John Cage’s “Silence,” David Toop’s “Haunted Weather,” “The Soundscape” by R. Murray Schaeffer, and a Dover Thrift Edition of the “Tao Te Ching.”

All in all, a great birthday. Thank you, everyone!

In a little over 8 hours, I’ll be thirty years old. Although I always have a good time making a tremendous fuss about my birthday– mostly for present-gathering purposes– the truth is my birthday doesn’t usually mean a whole lot to me. And while I haven’t gotten weepy or anything, I have to admit that thirty seems like a bigger deal somehow.

I’ve grown up quite a bit since 20, and a heck of a lot has changed. This time ten years ago, there was no Google. Seriously– reflect on that for a minute. I probably hit Google 300 times a day. What the hell was I using back then? Excite? iMacs were just coming out… now I have one my eight-year-old will barely bother with.

I’ve been through more crappy vehicles than you’d believe if I numbered them, buried three people and two dogs, crossed the country a few times, watched two kids take their first breath, lost half as many friends as I did cars, held about a half-dozen jobs, and personally spent at least a week in the hospital.

I don’t remember a lot of it. I’m not even sure I’d want to.

Mostly, I’ve learned to let go. I figured out that control was a big elusive carrot, and that I was a lot happier letting things come as they may. I found the mental flexibility to come to terms with the world’s absurdity, and started trying to live more in the moment– not just the lip service most folks pay it, either– but accepting the loveliness that comes with knowing that tomorrow simply does not exist.

“The crack of Doom / is coming soon / Let it come / it doesn’t matter”

I still haven’t quite made it to 30 proper yet. Ended up in the woods last night, in a deep culvert somewhere around the center of my block… dashing a flashlight about, whose failing battery cast a dim yellowness on my surroundings. I couldn’t see a thing, but I sure could hear my puppy, the aptly-named Squeaky. He was trapped in a neighbors garage somehow. So there I was, well past midnight, introducing myself to a guy named Randy– “I’m sorry to be on your porch so late, and I know this sounds crazy, but I think my puppy is in your garage.”

So it begins.

PS: Forgot to get me something for my big day? Make it up to me by recommending Startling Moniker to someone who wouldn’t ordinarily read such a thing, and leave me a comment. Thanks!

Karthik Kakarala, currently a Carbondale-based student and musician, will be this week’s live guest on “It’s Too Damn Early.” Naturally, I’m encouraging everyone to tune in. In the meantime, here’s a short e-mail interview in which Kakarala spills the beans about the habits of underground artists, the relationship of noise to Peking opera, and future recordings.

STARTLING MONIKER: How do you approach explaining noise to an interested (but otherwise uninvolved) party?

KARTHIK KAKARALA: This is the ongoing trick, isn’t it? Well, I’m not going to trivialize it by suggesting I’ve solved how to do so, nor insist that it’s impossible due to how many different ways there need to be in order to fit with the types of listeners that exist. Of course, these explanations depend entirely upon the listening experiences of the individual(s) in the conversation, and that must be determined first.

Rock ‘n roll: I’d say this is perhaps easiest, in terms of an inherent thirst for excitement that is obviously there, even in the oldest fossil who’s still into rock music. Old-school rock music (the popular edge of which is actually far less controlled in sheer percentages due to the advent of sophisticated compressors that can, with a couple of clicks, successfully steal all heart out of a track now) flagrantly is reachable via blues, and in any case blatantly points to Hendrix. Anyone worth their salt knows that it’s more than the basic “note” sounds that make him so damned interesting in his time, and focusing the person’s attention on the compositional possibilities of those non-note sounds for expressing fuzzier, more abstract concepts. I go back that far because not everyone gets into Radiohead (as a band that has almost always required multiple listens to form an opinion of, whether or not the particular album was up to snuff), not everyone ends up listening to the ambitious steps of The Who or Pink Floyd, and most people don’t hear Sonic Youth’s “Confusion is Sex” when they’re eleven years old, even though the latter’s not the end-all reason as to why I’m here typing this.

Blues/folk: These recordings are often crackly and fuzzy as hell, and at the very least, a certain respectful understanding can be derived from explaining how the nature o f those can be appealing.

Classical: Beethoven, Stravinsky, etc., etc.. There’s plenty of dissonance that gets thrown in when a classical composer starts stretching the wings, and that implementation of tension is shown to obviously not need electricity to derive.

Various Eastern music types: Drone. Also, Peking opera has some of the best traditions of abrasive sounds to draw attention at the right times and wake up the tryptophan-addled viewer that decided to have Peking duck before the hours-long performance.

Electronic(s): I suppose this really depends on how long a line of reasoning one wants to draw. Synthesizer music nuts will eventually see why making insane sounds on a Moog requires intention and skill. Analog electronics goons will easily see why Peter J. Woods is losing his mind during Anthony Ptak’s NoiseFeSTL ‘06 theremin performance:

And so on? Basically, I posit that, the more time there is to make a proper explanation, and the more sonic history you have splashing about in your noggin’, the easier noise is to explain to someone. It’s best to not even USE “noise” in any manner within the first 3-4 sentences, and if you can pull off using the word “experimental” without sounding wishy-washy, all the better.

SM: You’re all over the place, and I’ve heard it said that there might be more than one Karthik to handle the load. I’m betting you have a good bird’s-eye view of the Midwestern noise and experimental scene. Are there any cohesive qualities to our region that you’ve noticed?

KK: I laughed so hard that I might have woken someone up when reading this. If I have a bird’s-eye view, it’s probably because of my impressive height.

Chicago and St. Louis are more prone to having instrumentalists (read: jazz and classical musicians) employing skillfully combinations of “wrong” tones. While other Midwest cities have good instrumentalists doing so, the former two are mentioned for stronger jazz traditions that extend before any of these post-industrial attacks became treated like a new kind of Punk Rock.

Every single college town has at least two noise musicians. There is a high possibility that they, even in this information age, might not even have the slightest idea that they are tapping into any of it. Their beer-drinking, pot smoking friends will be “open” to their amp-loops, pedal-generated fuzz explosions, and occasionally will be quiet long enough to hear the scratchy attacks on an unsuspecting instrument. At least once in every 5 of these, no matter how many, one will stumble upon the idea of circuit bending (whether due to a strange relationship with electronics or perusing the Internet). If there are only two, it is most likely that they will never be friends, by the very propensity toward reclusiveness that some of this confers. If they become friends, there’s an even lower chance that they’re collaborate beyond the occasional experimental jam during a kegger. If there are performances, they will occur in art galleries or basements most of the time, and it should be assured that they will usually be in the background, rather than foreground. Only by being in the background of something will such audio experimentalists ever play a bar more than once, and even that may never happen.

Ex-pats of slightly rough-edged bands end up making good converts in this situation: Finally, ¡they get to do what they want! While there are individuals striving towards an intentionality in their work, they are few and far between (a.k.a. people who have even SOME idea of what they’re doing, so that it’s not a complete improv). There are very few conservatives in the ranks, an even lower percentage than in overall rock music. Noise is the new punk, for now and having been increasing to this point for 35+ years, with even less specific action all too often, although there are many that seek such employ to shatter the few restrictions left in their original focus. There are almost (I cannot cite any, personally) noise/experimental artists/musicians who did not try to learn a conventional instrument at least once before in life.

It’s a good thing you didn’t ask whether I was a noise artist (as opposed to experimental) specifically, because I wouldn’t really know what to tell you, there.

SM: Musically speaking, what do you hope to accomplish in the next year?

KK: At present, an overdue scale-down has occurred in order to sharpen and attempt to more frequently realize my visions. It’s the limits that make a piece, and having “endless freedom” to “jam” does not result in anything new, as nearly every jam band will demonstrate. I am writing down (as in, typing AND writing to paper) work to be played with other individuals (long overdue as well), adjusting the 4-movement piece that I first debuted in full when opening for Rhys Chatham, and finishing a quartet piece. I actually have other projects which are serving as pressure release valves:

My “noise” project is different than the material under my own name mostly due to its near-total rejection of the guitar, and currently is obsessed with a typewriter. This may also be where I incorporate the violin that I’ve been building. I intend on having two pieces out in the fall for that. My singer-songwriter identity allows for short bursts of hooks and, occasionally, catchy rhythms.

All of this comprises my solo work.

By the end of this calendar year, I will have a recording of my 4-movement work of pride, and will be working closely with Benelli. I will also hopefully have finished writing my 51-guitar piece as well, and as those matters are wrapping up, I will be consistently playing shows with ensembles and bandmates again.

Don’t miss Karthik Kakarala this Saturday, April 26th on “It’s Too Damn Early!”

Seven-piece outift Sad Sailor turn out three competent drone-rock tracks in this 28-minute EP, mostly focused on the progression familiar to all– the slow plunge from layered noodling into sweaty chaos. Unfortunately, Sad Sailor’s focus is too intent on this outcome, with little other emotional range apparent excepting a lovely section opening the EP.

And it’s too bad. For the first three minutes or so, Sad Sailor surround the listener with subtly-mingled guitar lines, watery cello, and floating peaks of occasional noise. It’s nothing astoundingly new, just rather well-done, with effortless shoring up of one another’s phrases that shows a real bond between players. The trumpet kicks in, and the whole thing lifts off… if a bit predictably. Even the false end to first track “Juice the Room” fails to surprise, like watching James Brown do the cape routine for the fifteenth time.

That’s why it’s odd when “Juice the Room” is suddenly cut off, and “Radiant Evil” begins– especially given how it almost immediately launches into the same trip the first track took us on at about the five-minute mark. Another lift-off into 4/4 time, but this one seems stuck somewhere in the middle stage throughout. Sad Sailor seem to think it a dud, so why not reset and try again?

At this point, you’re really wondering what the purpose is. “Down at Weirdo Park” rolls back the tape, gets a bit of momentum, and aims squarely at the “let’s blend some guitars together over drum and bass while the trumpet solos” territory so thoroughly juiced in the first track. Listeners shouldn’t be surprised to find only pulp and rind here.

I guess this is the modern day equivalent of one of those generic 60’s surf records; it is serviceable, but too predicable and staid to elicit much serious reaction. For such competent players, and the Eh? label who generally have such fantastic releases, this all seems like setting the bar a bit low. Even for the relatively short duration of this disc, Sad Sailor hold the ecstatic playing too long, ultimately depriving “Link to the Outside World” of necessary emotional contrast that would have sharpened the whole.

For kicks, here’s Ampersand Etcetera’s review of the same. Never say I’m not a giving person!