masteller

Dechirico – Please Don’t Let the Universe End Just Yet
1.7.19 by Ryan Masteller

This is the exact body of the email I wrote to my congressman just a couple of months ago:

Dear Congressman:

Please don’t let the universe end just yet.

Sincerely,
Ryan

How in the world did Dechirico know? How could there possibly have been overlap? Did Dechirico have access to my emails? Did I forget to properly password-protect my server? This could be a big deal – there’s been a lot of talk lately about the importance of emails and server safety. I don’t want to go to prison or anything.

Also in my email:

Dear Congressman:

Do you like krautrock? If you listened to some krautrock, maybe you’d mellow out a little bit.

Sincerely,
Ryan

… You’re seeing this too, right? I’m not going crazy? Look, we live in some strange times, but this is a little too close to the mark for my liking. How does Dechirico know I dig krautrock to such a degree that I’d risk making a fool of myself in front of my own congressman? And it’s true: I listen to Neu! an awful lot. Tangerine Dream. The old Vangelis stuff. Kraftwerk, duh. And Dechirico loves all these bands too, you can totally tell. Gleaming metallic rhythms, futuristic synthesizers, beauty in repetition. But there’s something about “Universe” that’s different, something fundamental that sets it apart …

It’s humanness.

That’s right, Dechirico has blood pumping in actual veins that lead to an actual heart; lungs inhale oxygen and exhale carbon monoxide. There’s a brain in which synapses fire instructions to various body parts. Chances are that Dechirico is either eating, sleeping, or taking a dump right at this very moment. Now THAT’S human. So instead of passionless robots, we’ve got a pulse, an emotive center in a being that cares just enough that it requests of someone, something to allow the universe to exist for just a little while longer. Maybe there’s something Dechirico has to do, or something Dechirico has to tell someone. At any rate, we can thank Dechirico for addressing this important question, putting it in writing, in song, right out there for anyone to heed.

Now, if someone could only reach the cold steel mechanism my congressman calls a heart, that would be great.

Grippity grip this tippity tip [tape] from Bonding Tapes!

The Last Ambient Hero – Under the Same Sky
1.4.19 by Ryan Masteller

Armed with superior skill, our hero returns – The Last Ambient Hero, a superbeing gifted with the ability to create the densest and most intricate ambient soundscapes humanity has ever heard. Deploying “Under the Same Sky” from a hidden base in Manchester, England, the LAH seeks to defeat the crushing evil of indifference, the vast villainy of boredom, the insidious machinations of only-half-paying-attention. How, you say, can only one person fight the good fight against the wickedness of subpar ambient music? How can a single entity pry the attention of world’s masses from EDM and Mariah Carey? The Last Ambient Hero has a secret weapon in his toolbelt: tape loops.

Employing this newfound technique over the length of an EP, the LAH blankets the earth with magnetic rain, coating the planet with a calming atmosphere of soft drones and gently shifting synthesizer patches. Thus the population falls under a benevolent trance, drifting through existence encased pleasantly in a vaporous cocoon of tone. We are all “Under the Same Sky,” as it were, no longer influenced by gritty or agitating music, no longer staring blankly into the depths of Muzak hell. I think we’ll have to call this newfound utility of the LAH’s a success – I’m certainly having a better day because of the great work of the Last Ambient Hero.

“Under the Same Sky” is available in an edition of 20 from the Hero’s own Bandcamp page.

SqrtSigil – Lost In
1.4.19 by Ryan Masteller

I wrote a story where small synthetic animals scurried across the floor of a digital jungle, foraging, rummaging, hiding from predators, generally doing things normal small animals do on a jungle floor except these ones weren’t real. SqrtSigil helped me out, helped me to visualize whatever the heck was nagging me about these creatures, providing the audio to my imagination and the universe these things lived in. I barely had to break a sweat with the text of the thing – the sounds did all the heavy lifting for me. In fact, I finished what I was writing just as “Lost In” came to a close, and as I looked at my computer screen, I was surprised to see the open Word document in front of me was as blank as a Tabs Out Podcast script! I had imagined the whole thing, even writing the whole thing. I was pretty embarrassed about it. Still am.

I’m definitely NOT embarrassed about allowing SqrtSigil the opportunity to take over my waking life for approximately forty minutes. The Polish artist’s synthesizer work burrows into your brain, like tiny critters burrowing into the fresh, moist loam of the jungle floor. There they work, sleep, play, eat, shit, procreate, and survive, just like SqrtSigil’s bustling, forever-active sound experiments. Like a demented NatGeo documentary score, “Lost In” fills in the sonic accoutrements of the action, ever-shifting as digital nature takes its course, its inhabitants’ codes executing and rewriting themselves as life unfolds. Tactile and fully present, “Lost In” is as fascinating to listen to as it is to participate in – that is, if you’re watching what I’m watching in my head, and you can’t help yourself but to start exploring that jungle too.

You better act fast if you want one of the 33 copies from Szara Reneta – there are only four left!

Linden Pomeroy & Nicholas Langley – Are We Not Drawn Onward to New Era
1.3.19 by Ryan Masteller

The answer is, no. But then again, if we really, truly consider the trajectory of society, if we squint very, very hard, it becomes clearer that we may, indeed, be inching toward that “new era.” A heretofore unrealized new era, an evolution toward utopian existence. A rejection of the damaging arc on which we’re spinning out of control. A glad embrace of reason and kindness and forgiveness that will truly push us forward as a species. A golden age of health and prosperity for all humankind.

Do I believe any of that? The answer is also, no.

Then why do Linden Pomeroy and Third Kind Records label head Nicholas Langley insist upon it? Perhaps it’s because the “new era” is simply different than the old, not necessarily better. It would explain the somewhat hesitant, distant tone they strike on “Are We Not Drawn Onward to New Era,” a collection of ten experimental ambient meditations that marks Third Kind Records’s final foray into releasing music until some-bloody-time in the (hopefully) near-future. Not to mention that side B plays side A in reverse, as if it’s a philosophical study in perspective and perception. And time manipulation. Time manipulation is certainly a part of it.

Through processed field recordings and hazy sonic constructions and downright poignant moments of clarity and cynicism and beauty (depending on where you’re standing), Pomeroy and Langley wipe the memory of 2018 with an emotive bang, a wire scrub to the brainpan that has us all pointing in a new direction, toward that “new era.” Could that “new era” be a more positive 2019, which leers at us provocatively from the other side of December 31? My guess: not remotely – I expect more of the goddamned same.

Oh well! We still have this awesome tape, “a red and white C74 with red shell print and cover art by Karen Constance” in an edition of forty. Nine left from the label!

New Batch – Personal Archives
12.27.18 by Ryan Masteller

A hundred and frickin twenty-seven releases in, Personal Archives should be the name on the tip of everyone’s tongue when you start talking about longevity in the tape scene. (Already Dead notwithstanding – we’ll get to them in a minute.) So why is it that I have to keep reminding you with these posts, huh? Shouldn’t you have this down by now? Bob Bucko Jr. curates a strong stable of interesting and inventive artists, cajoling them to record and collaborate and mix it up a little, have some fun, hitch a ride on the back of a garbage truck when no one’s looking. Live a little, why don’tcha. Read these first, though.

 

Cop Funeral – lo quality self-value
This is who I was talking about: Joshua Tabbia runs Already Dead, and Already Dead runs circles around the competition for sheer release volume. But that’s not why we’re here – Joshua also records as Cop Funeral, a melancholy drone project that gives heartache its ambient soundtrack. Just look at the two song titles here, one lengthy piece for each side of the tape: “she challenged everything I knew about being a miserable person” and “buyer’s remorse,” each one playing spoiler for Cop Funeral’s mood with words like “miserable” and “remorse.” Sure, there’s introspective qualities there, glimmers of hope even, maybe, but if you’re stuck in a rut, look no further than Cop Funeral’s work. Actually, “lo quality self-value” itself is pretty descriptive, and if I’m being honest, you really have to squint to see that hope glimmer. But still, we’re here for the challenge, and as usual, Cop Funeral makes the passage worthwhile.

 

James McKain – The Detectives
I’m WATCHING them, get it? No, sorry, no more Elvis Costello dad jokes today, I’m too tired. I’ve been on the beat, see, staking out joints and following up leads. Shaking down suspects. Getting to the bottom of mysteries. Peering menacingly out from under the brim of my fedora. That’s what I feel like I’ve been doing all day when listening to James McKain’s “The Detectives,” a cycle of mournful solo sax that will make you turn your collar up against the wind and rain as you walk under streetlamps at night. No good reviewer will avoid the word “noir” in their writeup, because the film noir street vibe pouring from McKain is unmistakable. Take this smattering of track titles, for instance: “Even Angels Burn Out,” “Mott Street Breakdown,” “Aces,” “Some Real Soprano Shit, Buddy,” and “Alley Cats.” You’re there, right? In the story? In your imagination? If you’re not, “The Detectives” will help you get there.

 

Michael Foster and Dane Rousay – Mail & Tool & Turmoil
“YOU manipulate this object!” “No, YOU do it!” I can only imagine the arguments between these two, neither of them wanting to use the wood block or the junky old shaker they found in their parents’ basement. Nothing remotely like this probably happened, but you never know – what we DO know is that objects were manipulated, and drums and saxophones were played. I’m gonna venture that friendships were, in fact, maintained. Foster and Rousay’s recordings here exhibit the utmost restraint as they explore the space between their playing and the instruments themselves, focusing solely on the mood of the room – which sometimes necessitates bursting into dank bebop, of course. I love it when that happens.

 

One More Final I Need You – A Plea
“You who build these altars now, to sacrifice these children, you must not do it anymore.” Thank you! I was waiting for someone to say that, because it’s getting pretty ridiculous, people dying for ridiculous reasons (everybody’s somebody’s child). “A Plea” pleads (because that’s what pleas do) for sanity, all while illustrating the insanity we need the sanity to replace. Taylor Campbell (guitar), Landon Deaton (drums), PA label head Bob Bucko Jr. (tenor sax), and Eli Smith (laptop, electronics) pool their resources for their release as One More Final I Need You, colliding their combined expertise to explode out two live improv sessions. Their manic energy is infectious, and invigorating, even as they plow through tunes titled “Wrong Longings” and “A Child’s Body.” Obviously, OMFINY retains some dead-centered and rigid seriousness as they flail without abandon, playing off each other with intense glee. THAT’S the way you deliver a message.