HR049 — Misfeasance - Harsh Thoughts — C60 — 1987
|
Side A:
Angular Attraction Pigeons Do Right Mysteral Anghear Side B: Dual Cacophono With A Slip Disk All Instruments: M. Honeycutt, C. Phinney |
REVIEW by Jerry Kranitz
Misfeasance was a collaboration between two Memphis artists, Chris Phinney (Mental Anguish) and Mike Honeycutt (Mystery Hearsay). Pulsating drone rushes and wildly whirring tones set the theme for the opening track, ‘Angular Attraction’. The drone alternates between rushing noise river and what could be an aircraft soaring over the landscape. The tones soon become more varied bubbling patterns, swarming oscillations, and dancing, rapid fire single note tones. A high intensity space-noise workout.
The tone madness continues on ‘Pigeons Do Right’, though here its underpinned by an interesting tribal percussion jam, tornadic onslaughts of rushing noise, and what sounds like bits of marching band, police siren, and crowd samples. The intensity level is higher!
Far more sedate (though only relatively) is ‘Mysteral Anghear’, which lays down an ominous yet slowly droning foundation over which aquatic noise waves rumble, synth melodies play, and other sundry electronics bounce around. But the mood does get increasingly harsh, though it’s tempered at times by a playfully humorous horde of tinkling electronics, which can just as quickly shift to dizzying high pitched tone textures.
All of Side B is taken up by ‘Dual Cocophono With A Slip Disk’. It begins with a choppy, minimal noise pattern, mildly piercing feedback waves, rolling carpets of bubbling drones, and (of course!) a steady increase in volume and high octane intensity. Things move very quickly and while the theme is consistent, there is a continual parade of effects and ongoing shifts in volume and intensity that keep things varied and interesting throughout. At one point it sounds like a noisily steady stomp of troops into battle, as a sprightly electronic melody soars about like some kind of alien Tinkerbell. It then shifts to a mind-bending drone that morphs into a hypnotic thrum, all the while accompanied by wildly shifting and fun as hell electronic patterns. Lots happening!
Overall this is one hell of a sonic roller coaster ride, with a stimulating balance of noise patterns and banquet of discernible effects throughout. A good time space-noise workout.
INTERVIEW with Chris Phinney and Mike Honeycutt by Jerry Kranitz
JK: What led to you and Mike recording as Misfeasance?
Chris Phinney (CP): We were just hanging out and recording, made up a name for it and made up a name for the tape. Honeycutt borrowed some Korg digital synthesizer from someone, and neither one of us had ever used one before. He brought it over here and we did a jam. We had a different instrument to use. So it was all pretty much improv shit. We did two tracks and then did two more.
Mike Honeycutt (MH): Oh MAN! Like Chris mentioned, if I had to guess? Korg M1 - I do remember borrowing one from Mike Childress. It had some really nice pads and other chonky sounds. I know Childress had an early Mac SE? I think. It had MOTU (Mark Of The Unicorn) interface and sequencing software. Chris and I just used the board straight no chaser... or Manual.
JK: So you just started jamming and were playing with this instrument that was new to both of you.
CP: And using our old gear as well. We didn’t know how to work the fucker (laughs). We’d never played nothing but analog shit man! And here he brings over this digital keyboard and it’s like, that’s cool, let’s use the son of a bitch.
MH: Yeah! Airborne No Parachute kind of approach.
JK: So was this some early digital instrument?
CP: Yeah. I think it belonged to Alan Hayes. He used to be in Calculated X, a local synth-pop band. Mike might remember.
MH: I must add that Alan Hayes was a big influence on my gear access, production ropes for many other musical activities. We met through my radio show. I can't remember, perhaps at the Antenna. Alan always had the latest gear and the first Emulator. The Emulator helped with a lot of my more concrete work. The E1 had those huge 5" floppy disc for recording the samples to. To be able to spread the sounds over the keys was heaven.
JK: Misfeasance appears one more time much later in the catalog. HR316 - Mental Anguish & M. Finnkrieg/Misfeasance.
CP: We did some more recording. We did one side, M. Finnkrieg, me and Honeycutt, then me and Finnkrieg did a collaboration. It’s too bad Finnkrieg disappeared. And too bad Deaf Eye disappeared. That was a damn good label. Over in Berlin.
MH: Damn! Wait a minute I don't remember the Finnkrieg connection at all. I sorely missed label indeed.
JK: You’ve got some fun track titles on this tape. I love ‘Dual Cocophono With A Slip Disk’.
CP: It’s just a joke (laughs). Me and Honeycutt threw it together.
MH: I think inspiration on that came from "Slipped my Disco" by The Tubes.
JK: The cover art looks like a… is that a gun rack?
CP: No, it’s an electric chair. I did have gun racks hanging in the hall, but once my kids got old enough I had to hide them all. Because you never know with kids.
JK: And then on the bottom part of the cover where the credits are, it looks like some kind of cartoon?
CP: That’s a bullfrog.
JK: That’s a great combo, an electric chair and a bullfrog! Did you do all the editing and mixing or did you guys collaborate on that?
CP: I did it all. Honeycutt also released the same tape.
MH: Yup. I could not tell you where the master is. I know I have a copy on cassette that might be the master. I used to record my masters to VHS Hi Fi and that's another format it might reside on.
Misfeasance was a collaboration between two Memphis artists, Chris Phinney (Mental Anguish) and Mike Honeycutt (Mystery Hearsay). Pulsating drone rushes and wildly whirring tones set the theme for the opening track, ‘Angular Attraction’. The drone alternates between rushing noise river and what could be an aircraft soaring over the landscape. The tones soon become more varied bubbling patterns, swarming oscillations, and dancing, rapid fire single note tones. A high intensity space-noise workout.
The tone madness continues on ‘Pigeons Do Right’, though here its underpinned by an interesting tribal percussion jam, tornadic onslaughts of rushing noise, and what sounds like bits of marching band, police siren, and crowd samples. The intensity level is higher!
Far more sedate (though only relatively) is ‘Mysteral Anghear’, which lays down an ominous yet slowly droning foundation over which aquatic noise waves rumble, synth melodies play, and other sundry electronics bounce around. But the mood does get increasingly harsh, though it’s tempered at times by a playfully humorous horde of tinkling electronics, which can just as quickly shift to dizzying high pitched tone textures.
All of Side B is taken up by ‘Dual Cocophono With A Slip Disk’. It begins with a choppy, minimal noise pattern, mildly piercing feedback waves, rolling carpets of bubbling drones, and (of course!) a steady increase in volume and high octane intensity. Things move very quickly and while the theme is consistent, there is a continual parade of effects and ongoing shifts in volume and intensity that keep things varied and interesting throughout. At one point it sounds like a noisily steady stomp of troops into battle, as a sprightly electronic melody soars about like some kind of alien Tinkerbell. It then shifts to a mind-bending drone that morphs into a hypnotic thrum, all the while accompanied by wildly shifting and fun as hell electronic patterns. Lots happening!
Overall this is one hell of a sonic roller coaster ride, with a stimulating balance of noise patterns and banquet of discernible effects throughout. A good time space-noise workout.
INTERVIEW with Chris Phinney and Mike Honeycutt by Jerry Kranitz
JK: What led to you and Mike recording as Misfeasance?
Chris Phinney (CP): We were just hanging out and recording, made up a name for it and made up a name for the tape. Honeycutt borrowed some Korg digital synthesizer from someone, and neither one of us had ever used one before. He brought it over here and we did a jam. We had a different instrument to use. So it was all pretty much improv shit. We did two tracks and then did two more.
Mike Honeycutt (MH): Oh MAN! Like Chris mentioned, if I had to guess? Korg M1 - I do remember borrowing one from Mike Childress. It had some really nice pads and other chonky sounds. I know Childress had an early Mac SE? I think. It had MOTU (Mark Of The Unicorn) interface and sequencing software. Chris and I just used the board straight no chaser... or Manual.
JK: So you just started jamming and were playing with this instrument that was new to both of you.
CP: And using our old gear as well. We didn’t know how to work the fucker (laughs). We’d never played nothing but analog shit man! And here he brings over this digital keyboard and it’s like, that’s cool, let’s use the son of a bitch.
MH: Yeah! Airborne No Parachute kind of approach.
JK: So was this some early digital instrument?
CP: Yeah. I think it belonged to Alan Hayes. He used to be in Calculated X, a local synth-pop band. Mike might remember.
MH: I must add that Alan Hayes was a big influence on my gear access, production ropes for many other musical activities. We met through my radio show. I can't remember, perhaps at the Antenna. Alan always had the latest gear and the first Emulator. The Emulator helped with a lot of my more concrete work. The E1 had those huge 5" floppy disc for recording the samples to. To be able to spread the sounds over the keys was heaven.
JK: Misfeasance appears one more time much later in the catalog. HR316 - Mental Anguish & M. Finnkrieg/Misfeasance.
CP: We did some more recording. We did one side, M. Finnkrieg, me and Honeycutt, then me and Finnkrieg did a collaboration. It’s too bad Finnkrieg disappeared. And too bad Deaf Eye disappeared. That was a damn good label. Over in Berlin.
MH: Damn! Wait a minute I don't remember the Finnkrieg connection at all. I sorely missed label indeed.
JK: You’ve got some fun track titles on this tape. I love ‘Dual Cocophono With A Slip Disk’.
CP: It’s just a joke (laughs). Me and Honeycutt threw it together.
MH: I think inspiration on that came from "Slipped my Disco" by The Tubes.
JK: The cover art looks like a… is that a gun rack?
CP: No, it’s an electric chair. I did have gun racks hanging in the hall, but once my kids got old enough I had to hide them all. Because you never know with kids.
JK: And then on the bottom part of the cover where the credits are, it looks like some kind of cartoon?
CP: That’s a bullfrog.
JK: That’s a great combo, an electric chair and a bullfrog! Did you do all the editing and mixing or did you guys collaborate on that?
CP: I did it all. Honeycutt also released the same tape.
MH: Yup. I could not tell you where the master is. I know I have a copy on cassette that might be the master. I used to record my masters to VHS Hi Fi and that's another format it might reside on.