Sarcastic Bastards Anonymous

 

Track list:

Jason Nazary - An Easy Slide On
Petter Eldh - Slakten Makten Takten
On-Ly - Bureaucratic Collectivism
Nettle - The Ballad of Jimmy Hollin is More Awkward Than That (Leafcutter John Remix)
Collocutor - The Angry One
Antipop Consortium - Rinseflow
J. Givens - Ignorantro
Diego Cortez - Delta
London Jazz IV - Death Is Near
Steven Jesse Bernstein - No No Man (Part One)
William S. Fischer - Green Forever
Galapagoose - Weight
Comfort Fit - Worlds Falling Apart
TJ - Time Is Wasting
Intellexual - Over The Hill

In March of 2019, I presented my first Fading Into Obscurity mix to the world entitled As On Your Way You Go, which was a combination of words and music in tribute to my father, Gerald Allen Smith.  Ever since his death in 2018, I've been making my way towards a place of understanding regarding what I perceived to be his risk-taking nature and my perpetual need to play it safe.  A recent conversation with my mother revealed to me that he had a methodical and analytical side, that I did in fact get it from him.  That's the best news I've heard in weeks.

Sarcastic Bastards Anonymous was recorded on the fourth anniversary of my father's death.  As much as this mix is for him, it's also for Frank Zappa, whose comments on stupidity in the universe serve as an introduction.  After the Zappa documentary was released, I revisited Frank's music, concert footage and interviews in a big way and really haven't stopped since.  In addition, this mix takes its cues from the movie God Bless America, which was written and directed by Bobcat Goldthwait.  A question posed by the film's protagonist, Frank Murdoch, is one that I ask myself often:  "Why have a civilization anymore if we are no longer interested in being civilized?"  Mixes like these tend to serve as confirmation that I don't really have a desire to be a DJ in the traditional sense anymore.  I like the "off-road" moments of mixing too much, those times where blends veer away from the beaten path of the locked groove, those segments where what a selector has to say doesn't necessarily require a rhythm or for beats to be in sync.  

Fading Into Obscurity grew out of the fear of dying before I have a chance to walk in my purpose and the nagging sense that time is running out.  These mixes are part of my way of coming to grips with my own mortality.  This one's filled with little moments that speak to me, from the insistent, punctuated brass stabs of Petter Eldh's "Slakten Makten Takten" to the sonic consensus between acoustic guitar and laptop-generated noise on Nettle's "The Ballad of Jimmy Hollin is More Awkward Than That."  High Priest's opening verse on "Rinseflow" by Antipop Consortium punched me square in the chest earlier this year.  This song is part of their Tragic Epilogue album released in 2000.  Over two decades later, this album still serves as a musical and lyrical reminder of what is possible in hip-hop.  Something about High Priest's verse speaks directly to where I am in life right now.  This song is one of the key selections in this mix alongside TJ's "Time Is Wasting," so tender and homespun.  It's a weathered recording, which lends to its charm.

"Ignorantro" by J. Givens follows the Antipop cut and I love how it sounds like the rapper's ego overheats right before it explodes.  "Delta" by Diego Cortez is a piece that I am absolutely fascinated by because the duet between piano and cornet never actually happened in real time.  Butch Morris listens to Cortez's piano solo a few times and then records his cornet solo not while he's listening to Cortez's recording, but based off of his memory of the recording.  That just wrinkles my brain.  It sounds like they're reacting to each other in the same studio session, but that's not what we're hearing at all.  The end result is still achingly beautiful, though.

I was completely obsessed with poet Steven Jesse Bernstein's Prison album in my college radio days.  Produced by Steve Fisk, Bernstein's voice is the epitome of a sarcastic, sardonic outlook on everything.  It's the voice of a man who has seen and been through WAY too much.  Including "No No Man (Part One)" was a no brainer and the same can be said for "Death Is Near" by London Jazz IV.  I love the 5/4 time signature and the backing vocals that really accentuate the bounce and swing of this piece.  William S. Fischer's "Green Forever" comes from his Circles album, a fascinating fusion of jazz and rock textures.  Galapagoose's "Weight" feels drunken and disoriented placed alongside the dystopian downtempo of Comfort Fit's "Worlds Falling Apart," but both songs still manage for beams of light to shine through the darkness.  

By the time "Over The Hill" by Intellexual fades out, there are no neat conclusions.  It sounds like I'm still trying to figure things out, and I like that.  As for that nagging sense that time is running out, every now and then I repeat the song title of a K15 instrumental to myself, the same song that closes out my first Fading Into Obscurity mix:  "You're Alive (There's Still Time)."  There's comfort in that practice.

On The Corner Of 73rd & 45th

I've been wanting to make this mix since November of last year when I turned 45.  Sometimes I have an idea of what songs I want to include in a mix, but gaps will linger for a while in my head.  The songs that build a bridge from one artist or style to another may not present themselves until weeks or sometimes months later.  I just wanted to get back to letting some of my constant inspirations sit alongside current favorites.  These days when I'm not thinking about music, I'm thinking about my own mortality (a side effect of getting older, I suppose), so there are some songs that deal with that in both serious and more sardonic ways.

For anyone that ever wondered why I feel so strongly about music, perhaps the quick story I share at the beginning will shed some light on that.  I still say that my party rocking days as a DJ are over and mixes like these are just proof of that, but really...I'm okay with that.  I was the side room DJ most of the time for a reason.  That's where I truly belonged.  I don't think that my heart and my selection are built for peak hour time slots, but I'm sure that my wife would strongly disagree, given her love for the house music sets I used to spin. Granted, there are times that I feel like dancing, but then I start making mixes like this and I'm reminded that it's good to break away from a locked groove sometimes.  Everything in moderation, right?  Even the need to stick to a 4/4 rhythm structure isn't exempt from that practice.

I should probably let the music do the talking from here.  We can always pick up the conversation again on the other side of this.  Hope you get something good out of this one.


Track list:

Alice Coltrane - Wisdom Eye [Antarctica Starts Here]
Bullion - I Just Wasn't Made For These Times [self-released]
jitwam - Temptations [Tartelet]
Don Leisure - Only Built 4 Turkish Linx [First Word]
Intellexual - Boca [Fantasy / Concord]
Nautic - Navy Blue [DEEK Recordings]
Andrew Wasylyk - Through the Field Beyond the Trees Lies the Ocean [Athens Of The North]
Sun Ra - State Street [Evidence Music]
Frank Zappa - Down In De Dew [Rykodisc]
Champagne Dub - Schmooze Fest part 2 [Faith And Industry]
Dabrye - Lil Mufukuz (feat. Doom) [Ghostly International]
Dr. Who Dat? - Kelly Drive [Lex Recordings]
Eric Lau - Val In Time [First Word]
Denaun Porter - gOd LaUgHs [self-released]
10cc - The Hospital Song [UK]
Phonte - Expensive Genes [+FE Music]
Dorian Concept - You Give And Give [Brainfeeder Recordings]
Alphabets Heaven - Kieron [WotNot]
Machinedrum - Rise N Fall [Ninja Tune]
Plug - Delicious [Nothing/Interscope]
The Range - Life Like This [Donky Pitch]
Antipop Consortium - Smores [75 Ark]
4Hero - Play With The Changes [Milan]
Alessandro Alessandroni - Underground Disco [Four Flies]
Run Child Run - Untitled [self-released]
Cocteau Twins - Three-Swept [Capitol]
Louis Cole - Trying Not To Die [Brainfeeder Recordings]
Lonnie Holley - There Was Always Water [Jagjagwuar]
Geeez 'n' Gosh - Nobody Knows... / We Call On Him [Mille Plateaux]
Vula Viel - Do Not Be Afraid [self-released]
Eugene McDaniels - Sagittarius Red [Water]

Me And Him Moments

Track list:
Andrew Wasylyk - Unsurfacing [Athens Of The North]
Jon Hopkins - Abandon Window [Domino]
Otis Sandsjö - YUNG [We Jazz]
Peter Bark - sega genesis [Drift Label]
Jef Gilson - 1973 [Jazzman]
Kompozyt - Homesick [Trees Will Remain Recordings]
Late Era - Bakersfield [Drift Label]
Ross McHenry Trio - I Can Be Better (For Myuran Sukumaran) [First Word]
Gil Scott-Heron - Running [XL Recordings]
Isaiah Owens - I'll Fly Away [CaseQuarter]
Rest You Sleeping Giant - Absent Minded [self-released]
Otis Redding - Pain In My Heart [Rhino]
K15 - You’re Alive (There’s Still Time) [WotNot]
ELWD - etherealend [Bad Taste]

I've been wanting to put together a mix of words and music in tribute to my father since around this time last year, but I knew it wouldn't happen then.  The feelings were too raw and not enough time has passed.  The "new normal" never feels normal enough, but as long as GOD keeps waking me up in the morning, I'll work through it.

The previous blog post was used as a springboard to formulate my thoughts and finally sit down in front of the microphone and hit record.  The music is primarily selected works from releases that got me through that first year of his physical absence.  Pieces like "Abandon Window" by Jon Hopkins have been with me for a few years.  That one has served as a sonic antiseptic for me many times, a selection that washes away the mental detritus of everyday living and online distractions.  It's also a piece that I associate with extreme sadness, one that the jukebox in my head recalls whenever depression sets in.  It's the song that first came to mind in those painfully silent moments after my father's spirit had left his body.  The Andrew Wasylyk composition closes out an album that was released just last month, but "Unsurfacing" puts me right back in that room at the nursing home during Dad's final moments.  Every note of that piece conveys exactly what I was feeling at that time.  "YUNG" by Otis Sandsjö may be the piece that introduced me to the We Jazz label and the fertile jazz scene in Helsinki, Finland.  It's swirling, experimental, and has this off-kilter bop to it due to slivers of hip-hop's swagger woven into the fibers of this work, but years of struggle have eaten away at its confidence, so the strut is more of a stumble.  It's become more hypnotic the more I listen to it and certainly captures my ever changing emotional state and questions about my own identity that I had for those first six months after Dad's death.  The same can be said for "I Can Be Better" by the Ross McHenry Trio, which builds from tender to fierce and cools down again towards its conclusion.  I find it heartbreaking at times, but mainly it's a song for my more contemplative moments, particularly as it pertains to the similarities and differences between my father and I.

Jef Gilson's "1973" was a last minute choice that made sense to include.  It's another one of those jazz cuts that I always reach for and in the context of this presentation, it brings to mind my younger years with my Dad, going to all the places I shouldn't have gone with him and creating some unforgettable memories along the way.  I credit Kompozyt for creating an album that got me through those first few months after losing Dad.  I listened to it constantly.  A brother duo originally from Poland and based in London, their album Synchronicity is a blend of floating ambient soundscapes, earth-shaking dub, and jazz improvisations.  "Homesick" represents for this album as an aural example of the fog I was in most days.  My dad wasn't a religious man by any stretch of the imagination, but the idiosyncratic gospel stylings of Isaiah Owens feels like this halfway point between my spirit and his spirit.  What Brother Isaiah does with "I'll Fly Away" is altogether captivating and unconventional, a fitting eulogy for an irreverent man.  Gil Scott-Heron and Otis Redding had to be included.  When Father Gil speaks, I hear my father sometimes.  He had a similar matter-of-fact outlook on the world and was definitely one of those "I said what I said" types.  Otis Redding was my dad's favorite singer, so that one was a no brainer.

The songs that appear as background music are important as well.  I've found that I need ambient works around me all the time now and I've been getting into releases from the Drift Label, a sister imprint of Inner Ocean Records.  Peter Bark and Late Era are both on Drift and I've been playing their releases almost every morning before walking into work.  Ditto for Rest You Sleeping Giant, an artist that I came across on the Free Music Archive.  His drones are arranged in such a way that I'm always taken somewhere else whenever I listen.  K15 and ELWD serve as important closing cuts for me and hopefully their messages resonate with you in some way.

Whoever you are, thank you for taking the time to read this and to listen.  It truly means a lot.

As On Your Way You Go...

This was once a place where I shared thoughts about music, life, and my own mortality.  Over the past month or so, I've felt the need to reclaim this space, even if for no one else's interest but my own. 

I've never thought about my own mortality more than after my father's passing, two days after Valentine's Day and Ash Wednesday decided to share the same 24-hour period on the calendar earlier this year.  After he died, I had so many questions about my own identity, why he seemed to roam through this world so freely while I was so methodical, so conservative, so unwilling to take risks and break free of the rituals and tasks that were killing me slowly.  A brief conversation with a career reinvention coach not too long ago helped me realize that I had more of his risk-taking spirit than I thought I did.  We look alike, we have the same mannerisms, and we both speak fluent sarcasm, but the way in which risk taking plays out in my life is not meant to mirror his life.  I have my own path to travel and the next year needs to be spent in constant communication with GOD concerning placing my short-sighted plans aside in order to get on board with the divine purpose that was intended for me.  At the very least, whenever GOD says "Trust me," my response needs to be "Okay.  You've got this."  The last time GOD told me that was in regards to making things right with my dad.  "You need to do this.  I'll explain later."

That was almost two and a half years ago.  GOD set it up so that I would be the one to spend the last moments with my father before his spirit took flight.  It was without question one of the saddest and strangely beautiful moments I had ever experienced.  And I remain extremely thankful that I listened to the messengers that GOD placed in my life (my mother, my wife, and two of my cousins) that served as flesh, blood, and bone confirmation of the spiritual text alert that caught me off guard during the Fourth of July in 2016.  I feel my dad running all through me now.  I often saw him when I looked in the mirror in recent years, but now it's on a whole other level.  My mom recently told me that he left behind everything that he no longer needed when he died and just deposited those sides of himself into me.  I have no reason to doubt that, especially when I was walking around yesterday in one of his two-piece athletic outfits while wearing a silver eagle head that he gave me when I was younger around my neck.  I never saw more of him in me than when I looked in the mirror yesterday.  And it made me smile.

When I was growing up, I read a lot.  I made time for play, but reading and listening to music in solitude were probably my two favorite things to do as a little kid.  That hasn't changed much at the age of 45.  A lot of what I read was regurgitated in conversation with my dad in the guise of "advice," much of which had little to nothing to do with what we were talking about at the time.  However, there was this one time when I shared something with him and it was exactly what he needed to hear.  He found it so profound at the time that he had me repeat it to a number of his running buddies.  A few of them would even repeat it back to me as I got older.  It was something that I read in this book that was full of silly jokes and rhyming games.  I can't remember the name of the book, but it was something that seemed to hold my interest when I wasn't reading street signs in passing or The New York Times (yes, really).

I still remember the quote.  I just thought about it again today and realized that it could also serve as social media protocol in these days of online half-truth wildfires and Internet trolling on both a general public and Presidential level.

"Keep this in mind and will all go right
as on your way you go:
be sure to know about all you tell,
but don't tell all you know."