HR076 - Teen Lesbians & Animals - Blast From Me - C46 — 1988
Side 1:
Horses Who iz this? Last Sunday Goose Pimply Verse 23 Ectomorph LSD by Travis B. |
Side 2:
Blast From Me SDI Hallucinogenic Nitemare Predictable |
REVIEW by Jerry Kranitz
I was introduced to Oklahoma based Teen Lesbians & Animals when I reviewed the recent HR069 Woundz Never Heal and HR075 The Wound Deepens compilations. Members listed in the credits for their Blast From Me tape are the mysterious trio of EEL O., Jesus Christ, and Mortuary Attendant. These folks have a real flair for creating interesting and often oddly musical experimental tape collages.
Side 1 kicks off with ‘Horses’ and its tape manipulated gymnastic fun that sounds like a mash-up of wind tunnel, horror movie soundtrack, and carnival music. It can be noisily grating but there are lots of discernible sounds and musical bits, which create a dizzying yet steady rhythmic flow. ‘Who iz this?’ is like a twisted, brain-on-drugs children’s tune. I love the somber, streaming synth melody, oddball toy instrument and kooky voices that come together to create a song. ‘Last Sunday’ consists of a repetitive voice sample and clunky metal percussion. ‘Goose Pimply’ is similar to ‘Who iz this?’ but with a playful sci-fi edge. This is one of my favorites of the set. I love the pulsating alien melody that anchors the track and rolls along with a steady current of voice and old-time big band jazz samples, plus a mild glom of windswept noise. ‘Verse 23’ is another example of a minimal yet pleasant musical bit that carries the tune and creates a mesmerizing vibe, combined with voices samples and ambience. ‘Ectomorph’ is an off-kilter, dissonantly drugged children’s music theme with cracked voices and spooky atmosphere. ‘LSD by Travis B.’ is more purely voice sample dominated than the other tracks, yet the piece still craftily interweaves the voices with a strange brand of musical noise-ambience.
The fun continues on Side 2 with ‘Blast From Me’, with its intensely flowing blend of weather-beaten noise, spoken word, and fierce fluttering that later cranks up to variably sped oscillations. There is a method to the madness as this musical-noise excursion comes to a gradually descending finale. ‘SDI’ features a collage of Reagan era Strategic Defense Initiative news reports and super nifty tape mish-mashed, lo-fi psychedelic electro hip-hoppy grooves. The basis for the nearly 10-minute ‘Hallucinogenic Nitemare’ is an old LSD cautionary broadcast, with lines like “We are about take you into the world of the LSD user”, and a frightened voice yelling, “It’s a hallucinogenic nightmare!!”. The spoken samples are spliced up, juxtaposed and repeated against a spacey, swirly, creepy backdrop to create a good fun Reefer Madness collage for the experimental audio-art acid crowd. Finally, ‘Predictable’ is very different, being a straightforward yet very cool synth-pop tune with a simple but enticing melody.
I was introduced to Oklahoma based Teen Lesbians & Animals when I reviewed the recent HR069 Woundz Never Heal and HR075 The Wound Deepens compilations. Members listed in the credits for their Blast From Me tape are the mysterious trio of EEL O., Jesus Christ, and Mortuary Attendant. These folks have a real flair for creating interesting and often oddly musical experimental tape collages.
Side 1 kicks off with ‘Horses’ and its tape manipulated gymnastic fun that sounds like a mash-up of wind tunnel, horror movie soundtrack, and carnival music. It can be noisily grating but there are lots of discernible sounds and musical bits, which create a dizzying yet steady rhythmic flow. ‘Who iz this?’ is like a twisted, brain-on-drugs children’s tune. I love the somber, streaming synth melody, oddball toy instrument and kooky voices that come together to create a song. ‘Last Sunday’ consists of a repetitive voice sample and clunky metal percussion. ‘Goose Pimply’ is similar to ‘Who iz this?’ but with a playful sci-fi edge. This is one of my favorites of the set. I love the pulsating alien melody that anchors the track and rolls along with a steady current of voice and old-time big band jazz samples, plus a mild glom of windswept noise. ‘Verse 23’ is another example of a minimal yet pleasant musical bit that carries the tune and creates a mesmerizing vibe, combined with voices samples and ambience. ‘Ectomorph’ is an off-kilter, dissonantly drugged children’s music theme with cracked voices and spooky atmosphere. ‘LSD by Travis B.’ is more purely voice sample dominated than the other tracks, yet the piece still craftily interweaves the voices with a strange brand of musical noise-ambience.
The fun continues on Side 2 with ‘Blast From Me’, with its intensely flowing blend of weather-beaten noise, spoken word, and fierce fluttering that later cranks up to variably sped oscillations. There is a method to the madness as this musical-noise excursion comes to a gradually descending finale. ‘SDI’ features a collage of Reagan era Strategic Defense Initiative news reports and super nifty tape mish-mashed, lo-fi psychedelic electro hip-hoppy grooves. The basis for the nearly 10-minute ‘Hallucinogenic Nitemare’ is an old LSD cautionary broadcast, with lines like “We are about take you into the world of the LSD user”, and a frightened voice yelling, “It’s a hallucinogenic nightmare!!”. The spoken samples are spliced up, juxtaposed and repeated against a spacey, swirly, creepy backdrop to create a good fun Reefer Madness collage for the experimental audio-art acid crowd. Finally, ‘Predictable’ is very different, being a straightforward yet very cool synth-pop tune with a simple but enticing melody.