Back in those music salt mines, bringing you more sparkling treats!
(NB: the last track is only on Bandcamp - I didn't upload it to Youtube, because that seemed kind of dodgy.)
Conlon Nancarrow, "Study No. 2a"
Nancarrow is one of the most avant-garde artists in my entire collection. An American who fled the US fearing persecution as a result of his activities in the Spanish Civil War, he lived in isolation in Mexico. While there, he took to composing for the player piano, which enabled him to create incredibly complex compositions that a human player wouldn't be able to perform. Many of his compositions strike you as alien when you listen to them, because he was able to create so many layers and strange patterns within his work. A bunch of his works were collected into a single volume, Studies For Player Piano, Vols. 1-5, which is what I have. I used to play his stuff on the air at WRCT occasionally, when I felt like my audience needed to be weirded out a little bit.
(NB: this song begins at 2:32 in the video.)
Cavity, "Marginal Man"
Underground rock band playing what got lumped into "sludgecore", which was apparently an entire scene that I was mostly unaware of until now. I got this as part of Hydra Head's going-out-of-business sale, a big pile of random music they were clearing out. To my ears, it sounds pretty close to the types of noise rock that was being put out by assorted underground labels in the early and mid 90's. Which isn't such a bad thing!
Critical Mass, "An International Incident"
Another Moon Ska album from the third wave, which I remember getting, and honestly can't remember listening to in ages. I've sort of forgotten entirely what this sounds like, and this track is just some strange interstitial thing, so not a great track to judge against. However, when I pulled this up on Youtube, the next song it rolled into was actually pretty interesting, so I'm going to haul this album up and give it another spin.
Superchunk, "From The Curve"
A song from their indisputably(1) greatest album, On The Mouth. I have nothing to add to how brilliant this album is.
(1) frequently disputed.
Erasers, "It Was So Funny (The Song That They Sung)"
Another track from that great Ork Records compilation documenting the very early punk scene.