Friday, December 7th, 2007 ... 3:00 p.m. - 6:00 p.m. ... KZSU, 90.1 FM

(Return to playlists.)

dud is the latest project from Mark Briggs and Herb Heinz, who'd formed Hmmm... earlier. With dud, they've been pursuing an ambitious, improvised hybrid of experimental pop (like Hmmm or Heinz's own music) and a jam-band aesthetic, adding a dancer and light shows and creating a room-sized experience. There's some video up on YouTube posted by the account dudland.

Herb Heinz is the husband of Amy X. Neuburg and has been on the show before. I'll have to see if there's a way for us to host dud in the studio sometime; it seems like it'd be a great use for the studio cam.

Radio esoterica: To do both the Berne segment every week and a set of songs promoting upcoming local shows is carving out too much time. Luckily, the local shows part will dry up as the holidays approach, but if I arrange any interviews, for instance -- it all adds up to a bigger chunk of time that I'm willing to concede, I think. We'll see how it goes.

Of note this week:

Format:
ARTIST -- "TRACK TITLE" -- ALBUM TITLE (LABEL, YEAR)
Horizontal lines denote microphone breaks.

* Otomo Yoshihide's New Jazz Orchestra -- "Out to Lunch" -- Out to Lunch (Doubt, 2007)

Previously noted here. I'd avoided playing this one before. It's good, and a fairly straight reading of the original, but they throw in these long pauses just to mess with you. Not exactly healthy for radio airplay, although I think listeners get the joke once they hear what's up.

Previously noted here. So, the acoustic half of this 2-CD set turns out to be treated with deep echo, to keep up the towering "experimental" feel of the session. Nice.

* Charlie Hunter Trio -- "Wizard Sleeve" -- Mistico (Fantasy, 2007)

Previously noted here.

Previously noted here. I have to admit, this one's a really challenging track; it gets abrasive in ways I couldn't even take (think of that nails-on-chalkboard sound that a violin can make).

Previously noted here.

* Martin Speicher, Georg Wolf, Lou Grassi -- "Claire's Nest" -- Shapes and Shadows (Clean Feed, 2007)

Previously noted here.

Previously noted here.

From Annie Clark, the guitarist with The Polyphonic Spree. Folky pop stuff, and this one's got choral backing vocals doing chiming bells, almost like Christmastime. The title gives you an idea of what the lyrics are like: a bit humorous, a lot cynical. Other tracks get more intense and even messier. Vocals are a big highlight overall here; Clark has a clear, friendly voice that overdubs well into shimmering walls of backing vocals.

She reminds me of a younger, indie-rockish Ilene Weiss, whose music I finally discovered this summer.

Eric Glick Rieman -- "Inferno" -- The Myth Room (Water Goes Into Air, 1994?)

Strange CD. Half of it is straight folksy singing, with acoustic guitar and everything. The other half gets into melodic soundscapes, lots of synths and samples, creating a kind of cinematic feel.

* Splatter 3 + N -- "Peter Herley Part 4" -- Clear the Club (Rastascan, 2007)

Previously noted here.

? Tim Berne's Bloodcount -- "Loose Ends" -- Unwound (Screwgun, 2000)

Continuing the Tim Berne streak that I'd started with last week's show. I'm already starting to think I began this a month too early ...

"Loose Ends" is one of my favorite tracks, a hard rocking 13 minutes that opens up with a bright, jumping horn line that gets the blood flowing right away. It doesn't really let up; even when the bass/drums duet starts up, without the horns, the music keeps bustling and percolating.

! Eugene Chadbourne -- "Little Tunnel" -- Jesse Helms Busted with Pornography (Fire Ant, 1996)

One of the many artists I don't play enough. Chadbourne is a mix of guitar, banjo, improv, country, jazz, noise, and all-around fun. This song shows off most of those sides, starting off as a goofy country-sounding song, simple enough, but marches straight into a free-jazz anarchy of a solo space, we're talkin' piano and Max Roachian drums and everything, with Chadbornian steel string madness on two simultaneous guitar (dobro?) solos. Throughout that are a bunch of spoken vocals as Chadbourne's character digs some little tunnel, opens it up for business, and gets criticized for it ("Ya shoulda stayed in the camel business!")

Previously noted here. Boisen's "Past Present Future" band is opening for Chadbourne one night, so it's a nice excuse to get this one on the air again.

* Pandelis Karayorgis Trio - "Liwisies" -- Carameluia (Ayler, 2007)

Previously noted here.

Previously noted here.

Previously noted here.

Hmmm... -- "Loop" -- I Only Want Love (self-released, 2005?)

Previously noted here. As noted above, Mark Briggs and Herb Heinz are Hmmm, and their current project, with a lot of other artists, is dud.

Herb Heinz -- "Hole in the Head" -- Another (IsToo, 2002)

Mentioned a bit here.

* Amir ElSaffar -- "Hemayoun" -- Two Rivers (Pi Recordings, 2007)

Prevoiusly noted here.
UPDATE 12/9: Hey -- the awesome Avant Music News has a free "podcast" of one of the album's jazzier tracks. Good stuff -- go give it a listen.

Previously noted here.

Previously noted here. A snappy upbeat track, with a surreal repeated line: "Rocket ship to the moon has injured the Rain God... Won't somebody help us now?" Maybe it's a Sun Ra reference?

Previously noted here.

Dark and moody stuff, like the Doctor Bob CD of earlier this year. This is a solo effort, with overdubbed loops of cello, sampler, synths (possibly processed cello) and heavily treated vocals, often babbling nonsense words in tones that feel like a conversation. Nicely flowing noise for your ears.

Public Eyesore is the same record label that put out that Mighty Vitamins CD I liked so much. They do quite a bit of work with Bay Area improv folks, it turns out.

? Frank Gratkowski, Jerome Breyerton, Damon Smith -- "Three Character Attacks: The Prince" -- The Voice Imitator (Balance Point Acoustics, 2007)

Gratkowski (sax) seems to be in town a lot lately, and he's doing a couple of shows soon with a variety of folks including Smith (bass) and Breyerton (drums). This is from their recent trio album on Smith's label, and it's a very nice 12-minute track spanning a good variety of sounds. Lots of nice sax/bass interplay on here, in particular, with sheets of metallic clanging from Breyerton in the background.

* Larry Ochs Sax and Drumming Core -- "And Nothing But ..." -- Up from Under (Atavistic, 2007)

Previously noted here.

* = Item in KZSU rotation
! = Pop anomaly
? = Item not in KZSU library

-- Go back to Memory Select playlists.
-- Bay Area free/improv music calendar: http://www.bayimproviser.com.