Tabs Out

Energy ☆ – S/T
11.28.18 by Ryan Masteller

This one was tricky, because words are symbols, and the meaning is abstract. Not only is Energy ☆ basically a walking concept, it’s also a source of renewable power. One listen to this self-titled cassette on Galtta and you’ll be driving that hot new Prius with the tape deck plugged into the battery. That’s how Energy ☆ intends you to roll.

Each of the five lengthy tracks (well, two are shorter) is a succession of tilde symbols, “~” to “~~~~~,” representing the flow, the current, of Energy ☆’s, ahem, energy. To call the music of duo Camilla Padgitt-Coles and Bryce Hackford effortless would be an utter understatement. Each tilde-y wave undulates frictionlessly out toward infinity, and would continue toward it if time constraints and the shortage of Chrome tape stock didn’t put a damper on the party. These delightfully laid-back electronic tunes skip like stones across space and time where gravity and physics don’t exactly conform to what we’re used to here on Earth. It is why the Toyota Prius is powered by an endlessly looping tape deck in this scenario. Also because my imagination put it there.

The utter joy bubbling out from my speakers lifts my spirits like an effervescent cloud, ever expanding, ever advancing. The soft-focus ambience lifts the pulsing rhythms as if they were landscapes in a utopian science-fiction fantasy. Maybe we’ll figure out how manipulate time in that reality; maybe infinity music can occur; maybe we won’t even be driving Priuses anymore.

Grab a tape from Galtta, edition of 100!

Dere Moans – Brain Mountain Disciples
11.27.18 by Ryan Masteller

There’s a lot of great stuff to plunder out there, from jewels to gold to gold-encrusted jewels, but a lot of people don’t realize that there are more plunder-related activities than embarking upon a swashbuckling adventure to pirate’s booty. That’s right, did you know you can plunder SOUND as well? Well, you can. This so-called “plunderphonics,” a practice coined by some joker named John Oswald in a rum-fueled (probably) essay titled “Plunderphonics, or Audio Piracy as a Compositional Prerogative,” is, and allow me to “plunder” some words here from Wikipedia, “any music made by taking one or more existing audio recordings and altering them in some way to make a new composition.” Sounds highly illegal, and probably dangerous. But when it’s done right, the result can hit you right in the sweet spot and leave you feeling refreshed and fulfilled in ways you may be unfamiliar with.

Minnesota-based swashbuckler Dere Moans’ “Brain Mountain Disciples” just so happens to be one of those works of plunderphonic enjoyment. And since we’re off to such a great start with the description above, let’s allow Orb Tapes, Pennsylvania-HQ’d releaser of “Brain Mountain Disciples,” to continue from here: “[‘Brain Mountain Disciples’ is a] plunderphonics soup of old video game soundtracks, movie trailers, forgotten jazz obscurities, field recordings and jumbled midi drum sounds.” Oh, I thought so! Not only could I figure that out (I, too, thought of soup at some point), but I could also enjoy myself while doing so. See, I’ve watched a fair amount of movies and played a bunch of video games and listened to a heckuva lot of jazz, so hearing this stuff all jumbled together in a coherent and engaging way was a treat I didn’t see coming, and I’m over the moon about its actualization. Dere Moans whips together a crackling slurry of disparate source material into two sidelong slabs of constantly shifting sonic collage, at times smearing the atmosphere with gross digital brushstrokes while at others pinging breakneck impulses through the ionosphere. If that’s not a ringing endorsement of the Dere Moans way, then I should probably start looking for a new writing gig.

Seriously, that was OK, wasn’t it? Pirate gifs aside, of course.

Anyway, grab one of fifty copies from Orb Tapes – or you’ll be sorry!