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b/art's Playlist for Friday, 19 November 1999 (22.59 - 00.05)
Paul Bowles RIP "Come, let us lapse into freedom ... Let me not think ever ... Let everything be slow and soft ... Let anything except what is coming come; that is the way I have always felt." - Paul Bowles | |
| Cut | Artist |
|---|---|
| The Wreck This Mess Story #031299 | |
| Six Preludes for Piano | Paul Bowles [1] |
| Sonata for Oboes & Clarinet | Paul Bowles |
| The Empty Amulet | Paul Bowles [1] |
| + Liallah Ou Gnouai | Gnoua Brotherhood of Marrakesh [2] |
| Nights | Paul Bowles [3] |
| Music in the Village of the Amara, High Atlas Mountains (recorded by PB, | |
| 1960 | Paul Bowles [1] |
| Sheltering Sky (exc.) | Paul Bowles [3] |
| Sounds from the Jemaa El Fana, Marrakech | Paul Bowles [1] |
| Pendulum Mesmer Wreck ID #0123mm.96 (see the outside edge of the record) | |
| Here I Am [poem] | Paul Bowles [1] |
| Up Above the World | Paul Bowles [3] |
| Love Song | Paul Bowles [3] |
| Tribute to Hasni | Rootsman [4] |
| Beyond the Hills (Ras Boras remix) | Rootsman [5] |
| Peace & Freedom | Ras Boras Dub Tribe [6] |
| Panorama | Treponem Pal [7] |
| Radio X | Rootsman [8] |
| Assimilation | Bit Tonic [9] |
| Nights (2x) | Paul Bowles [1] |
| Al Andalus (Dub #1) | Rootsman [5] |
| Pendulum Mesmer Wreck ID #0123mm.96 (see the outside edge of the record) | |
| [1] "Black Star at the Point of Darkness" on Sub Rosa www.subrosa.net, Title comes from a line in "Sheltering Sky" the Bertolucci movie version of which, Bowles stars as a kind of mendicant ghost narrator. This cd is an odd (there are all sorts of intrusive ghostly sounds that permeate the recording studio) but effective rendering of aspects of Paul Bowles 50 years of life in Morocco. He just died this past week at age 88 and is perhaps one of the giants of 20th Century literature if only in the way that he sharpened his calm rational eye for the irrational and sinister in the human soul. In the way that he chose solitude over media hype. Avoiding the public eye and despite that choice (and also becausse of it) becoming renowned for his work. Born in 1910 on Long Island, dropping out of college, he began to wander to look for where he belonged. He studied music with Aaron Copland but remained restless. He took the advice of Gertrude Stein, and went to Morocco. He became over time totally absorbed by the existential and simple brutal beauty of the place. This affected his writing no doubt as all his fiction has this brutal view of human nature. People faced with life and death decisions. He roamed Morocco after making it his home making field rcordings for his own reference and fascination but also traditional music for the Library of Congress. On short and infrequent trips back to the states he wrote scores for such works as Tennessee Williams' Glass Menagerie and Suddenly, Last Summer, Watch on the Rhine. Bowles always remained the other, outside the hub bub that accompanied the rise, redux and retailing of the Beats all of whom made their pilgrimages there. He remained on the outskirts, maintaining the status as a guru, someone that people sought out. He developed friendships with Burroughs and Gysin who were also greatly influenced by Arabic culture. In fact, it is this region, Tangier, as an international port, a free city, that served as geographical reference and inspiration for the Interzone imaginal geography in Naked Lunch. At his death he had lived some 50 years in Tangier at the Imeuble Itesa. Listening to him read or reading his works yourself you partake of that baptism of solitude that he took. Solitude and the stark landscape, the few people who inhabit this land left their marks on him and all of us. One of the century's greats is gone but cannot be forgotten. His writing is always the perfect antidote to all the poseurs, the hyper-active muddled behemoths of sophisticated urban writing. Manners, gestures, word play, the rarefied notions of urbanity all get carved away by the sharp blades that affixed to every edge and side of every word. There is no way to avoid getting cut when you read Bowles. He marks you. I highly recommend his collection of very short tales called Points in Time. | |
| [2]"Mind the Gap vol #8" gonzo@planetinternet.be: an excellent Belgian magazine with an intrepid series of compilations that enterprisingly searches out the most adventurous musical/noise ensembles. | |
| [3] "Baptism of Solitude" is a cd produced by Bill Laswell & Nicky Skopelitis which features some rarities and some very familiar work by Bowles. It is all framed by a heavy does of Laswell mood ambience. Sometimes to good effect but also often to annoying effect as if he is trying too hard to instruct the listener just how to paint the moodscape and setting that bowles creates himself quite well with his words. | |
| [4] "Beyond Planet Dub" on Planet Dog www.ultimate-records.co.uk is a good series of CDs which fuses the logical sonic connections between Dub, ambience, and "ethnnic" musics that transport listeners to other states of mind. A mixed bag here including such stellar stalwarts as Silicon Drum, Zion Train, the Woodshed, the Mad Professor and, of course, the Rootsman, a former Leeds dj who somehow manages to creative a sensitive music that does not go soggy into the night. He utilizes world ambiences without letting them sound derivitative or plunderous. | |
| [5] "Versions of the Unseen" on BSI info@bsi-records.com is remixes of Rootsman's "Realms of the Unseen" by BSI sound jockey Landau, Didier B or Ras Boras of the excellent French post-punk-gone-dub-band, Treponem Pal, and the Rootsman himself. The Rootsman's work lilts and thunders, beautiful yet dynamic. | |
| [6] "French Dub Connection" on the German label Echo Beach echo.beach@on-line.de a great compilation of FRENCH dub - rough and beautiful. Here we play the excellent dub offshoot of Treponem Pal, Ras boras Tribe. Includes 7 Dub, Ethnician, LXR, Laurent Garnier, Housatonic. Highly recommended. | |
| [7] "Future Dub" on Radio Nova out of Paris, compiled by dj Black Sifichi blkdix@easynet.fr is an excellent French (and other nation) dub collection with among others Gregory Isaacs remixed by Kruder & Dorfmeister, Dub Syndicate, the excellent French dubsters, Zenzile and a great piece by Renegade Sound Wave remixed by Leftfield and here the very trance-hypnotic kinetic Treponem Pal as remixed by British dubsters Dreadzone. | |
| [8] Wreck This Mess: Remission 1, Ambient-Industrial vs Electronic-Dub vs Hypnotic-Grooves" on Noise Museum www.zone51.com/noisemuseum compiled by Wreck This Mess (Paris HQ) dj Laurent "Panou" with some brilliant prosthetic fusions of electronic and ritualistic trance. Dub in the abandoned factory with the excellent Rapoon, Cosmic connection, Muslimgauze, LA Sunkist Triade, digidub and others. Excellent. | |
| [9] This piece by Bit Tonic or Iris Garrelfs co-organizer of Sprawl, the London label which insists on exploration via electronics. Resident DJ at the Sprawl Club and various other great places in London. This is one of the beautiful pieces that i find myself putting on cd repeatrepeatrepeat... Will be performing as part of the Triple X Festival here in Amsterdam on the evening of 26.11 at the Westergasfabriek. MORE INFO: www.triplex.nl | |