One More Reason to Vote for Obama

Radio-Activity Update: Seven Hours, Seven Souls

I’ve done it now.
I am on board to do a seven hour radio marathon on musician Bill Laswell on the 21st of March, as part of KBOO’s spring pledge drive.
I keep thinking I’m dreaming and that I’ll wake up or that it won’t happen, but no….
…It’s in the listener’s guide now, so it’s for real.
Here’s the proposal I wrote:

Nothing is TrueEverything is permitted

A Bill Laswell Pledge-drive special

On Friday, March 21st, join The Outside World for the Seven Hours, Seven Souls pledge drive special, while we explore the vast body of work of Brooklyn musician, producer and agent of chaos, Bill Laswell.
From the downtown New York upstart Jazz Funk outfits Material and Massacre, to the extreme metal of Praxis and Painkiller, to his many dub permutations and ambient vexations, to his many World Music excursions and to too many genre-hopping collaborations to list here, we’ll barely scratch the surface of his intimidating discography, but will take you on a voyage through more musical tangent points than you thought possible.

Join us from 11PM to 6AM, for Seven Hours, Seven Souls: The Music of Bill Laswell.

Some points of interest:

* Material
* Massacre
* The Golden Palominos
* Praxis
* Buckethead
* Otomo Yoshihide
* Brian Eno and David Byrne
* John Zorn
* Divination
* Jah Wobble

and many more…

I have plenty of Material (pun intended), but am still nervous. Regular host of the show I’m hijacking - Daniel Flessas - will be out of town and across the US, so I’m flying solo, sort of. Oh, well. I also have no shortage of people willing to help out, so it’ll be swell and we’ll all have a fun time.

Be sure to listen on Friday, march 21st, from 11pm to 6am, for the Bill Laswell: Seven Hours Seven Souls pledge drive extravaganza (who’s bringing the extra vaganza, Daniel?).

KBOO is at 90.7 FM in Portland and SW Washington and is streaming on the web at kboo.fm.

Interview and mix of DJ Cheb i Sabbah

Solipsistic Nation has a great interview and retrospective mix of this Algerian-born DJ from about a year ago.

 Give it a listen.

10 Things to Do While Waiting For All Music Guide to Load

I think Allmusic Guide is possibly the slowest, most bloated and plug-in-ugly website around. ‘Tis a shame to, as it’s so damn handy for us music junkies. But its slowness makes it less and less useful as time goes on. I’m typing this blog entry while waiting for it to load in another tab.
Let’s see how far it get:

1. Read the Gulag Archipelago
2. Build a model of The Cutty Sark out of toothpicks
3. Listen to the complete works of Georg Philipp Telemann
4. Knit a sweater out of dryer lint
5. Visit long-lost relatives in Europe
6. Raise budgies for fun and profit
7. Sell Grit door-to-door and win that telescope in time for Hale-Bop’s return
8. Raise cattle on a piece of lowland
9. Migrate across the Ural Mountians in search of grasslands in winter
10. Build a time travel machine and tell the developers of Allmusic Guide that in 2008 their site was broken and retarded and no one took it seriously anymore.

I could’ve gone on and on. It still hasn’t loaded and I suspect it’s not only slow, but seems to be broken at the moment. There you have it. The nine out of ten times that I seem to really need it, it’s slow or broken, which is a shame, as I’m working on a radio research project.
Hi there, Allmusic! Your website is broken and retarded. Any interest in fixing it, or does the ad revenue still roll in despite the dysfunctional nature of the site?
Just wondering….

Busy, busy, busy

Hi all,

Way too many irons in the fire at this point, hence the radio silence.

Speaking of radios, my radioactivism has reached critical mass!

Looks like I have wandered down the left-hand path of late-night radio substitution.

So that means that I will start training and will get my feet wet in live broadcasting. I can’t really say  what yet. I don’t want to jinx it or be premature, but it looks like the last half of March will be a busy time for me. I’ll keep you all posted.

Air Modern

Reader Bryan Chandler sends me the following message:

Check out my historical Blog of Fresh Air Progressive Rock Program on WKSU BEFORE terry gross stole the name…

I strongly advise that you drop what you’re doing a go visit his amazing blog. He has compiled an amazing array of  interviews with artists from the golden age of when Prog rock collided with New Wave. Some highlights:

• Peter Hammill
• Laurie Anderson
• Bob Mothersbaugh of DEVO
• Ralf Hutter of Kraftwerk

and many, many more!

Go there now.