Welcome to Volume 5 of our ongoing 'Multiple Exposure' series where we ask musicians that we admire to tell us about their favourite pieces of repetitive music.
This volume we are honoured to have our favourite drummer, the mighty 'Kid Millions' from the legendary Oneida and solo project Man Forever to share his favourite repetitive pieces of music:
Bruce McClure - Vouchsafe Me More Soundpicture (Fain Make Glories)
I picked up this record at the April 16, 2009 Brooklyn Throbbing Gristle show. I know that because it says it on the record! It was only available during those shows. There were no announcements about an opener, so when these incredibly minimal synth blorps popped along to an accompanying crossed bar light projection I wondered if THIS was the Throbbing Gristle show. I was really excited that it was. I thought, yes , this is so fucked up and anti-music, and none of them are on stage and it's just this really annoying endless synth hit which sounded like pieces of metal banging together I felt like TG was still relevant and amazing. But it wasn't TG, which is fine really, and I picked up this LP.
Bruce McClure
Steve Reich - So Percussion
Steve Reich's Drumming, there are so many versions of classical compositions out there. You might not know which one to pick, and then whichever one you buy, maybe you fall in love with those quirks and you dismiss all the other recordings. Anyway, I think this is the best version of Drumming on record. The reason is because So approached it like a pop record. They overdubbed each section and used the studio as another instrument. You get a sublimely well-recorded and energised version of this killer piece.
So Percussion
Frankie Knuckles featuring Jamie Principal - Your LoveI was reminded of this jam b/c of Knuckles' recent passing. When I was first introduced to early Chicago House I was definitely unprepared for the actual music. It doesn't have the insistent bumping rhythm that became emblematic of House music (see Move Your Body by Marshall Jefferson), it's really a kind of minimal collision of Kraftwerk and African American dance culture. The music is warm, alienating and trance-inducing at the same time and just. There are also endless versions of this song out there. I have a compilation called "Move Your Body: The Evolution of Chicago House", and the version on that is the best one I've heard. It's the perfect tempo...I have other versions that are a bit too fast or have shitty vocals, bad mixes.
Frankie Knuckles
Lisa M - Rock to the Beat (Short Circuit Mix) Along the same lines as the above is the incredible track Rock to the Beat, produced by Juan Atkins. It's a bit harder edged...this is not a chill track.
Lisa M
Connie - Rock MeAnd while we're at it...'Rock Me' the version that's on Street Jams, Electric Funk Vol 4... these are all the 12" mixes of these classic tracks. This is more of a "freestyle" track. . . but on headphones there are so many deep and trippy delay effects. I realise that these songs perhaps have had their original day, and their revivals...and now their current passe status. No matter, these tracks are heavily repetitive and trance inducing.
Connie
Sleep - DopesmokerI played this track at work once...I used to work in IT and we used to trade off playing music. For about 3 years the music I played actually saved my sanity. That passed...I didn't have to play music anymore and I just pushed through somehow. I quit that job about two years ago, but Dopesmoker is still there!
Sleep
Free - Fire and Water (album) When I bought this cassette at Caldor (a defunct chain of department stores) back in the 80s or early 90s I was kind of initially disappointed...because every song was played at the same sluggish tempo (except their one hit "All Right Now")...what was the deal with this band? They never mixed it up. But I quickly grew to love the perversity and single-mindedness of that. What seemed like a glaring flaw became a virtue. Then I read "Rip It Up and Start Again" by Simon Reynolds and realised that a large number of Post-Punk bands talked about Free, and that golden mean tempo, Gang of Four among them. The album works as a whole, much in the same way of Dopesmoker, but it's blues rock and Paul Rodgers is a genius.
Free
Rhys Chatham - Two Gongs (1971)That's what it is. Two gongs being played for over an hour.
Rhys Chatham
La Monte Young and Marian Zazeela - Dream HouseThis isn't an album thank God...can we seriously just FUCK album lists? So sick of doing these (love you Rocket!)...anyway...Dreamhouse is a place in Tribeca NYC. It's a "sound and light environment", there are tons of specific sound waves generated by a synthesizer and everything is in a fuchsia tone. Just go there before it disappears with everything else weird in NYC.
La Monte Young
Metal Machine MusicAs played by Fireworks Ensemble from an orchestration by Ulrich Krieger (of course originally written by Lou Reed RIP), this shit changed my life. This is a video of part IV from a Miller Theatre performance that I attended. So SIIIIICK.
Metal Machine Music
Kid Millions has a new Man Forever album out on the 8th April and hopefully there will be a new Oneida album soon!!
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