Despite a number of highly concerning events with Bandcamp and their new owner, Songtradr - the Bandcamp Daily continues to publish for the time being. They recently released a piece of "Space Disco" and many of the unsung records that help form it.

Part of that article cites Cosmotropics, an album by German outfit Supersempfft. The 1982 album was, apparently, intended to be accompanied by an animated film but neither came to fruition. In 2020, the record was finally released and somewhere along the line, the animation was too. It is, unsurprisingly, an absolute trip.

It's certainly unfortunate it was never released when the artists intended it to be unleashed but it's great that it has eventually made its way into the world.

go to porkbun.com. scroll to the footer. find the music note. click and enjoy.
THEN, be sure to inspect the footer for other treats.

NY Times podcast about a Tennessee County that illegally jailed hundreds of children. Fact, I went to college in that same county. Bonkers.

A wonderfully articulate response to Marc Andreessen's recent manifesto on techno-optimism. Highly recommend you read it and embrace techo-pragmatism.

Insult to injury

Having all of your pessimistic fears validated is not a great feeing! Vulture is reporting Bandcamp Hit With Layoffs Amid Sale to Songtradr and that's pretty much what everyone thought was going to happen. The article has all the necessary details but it looks like about 50% of the company was let go and only three editorial staff remain.

I've been a huge Bandcamp fan since 2008; fifteen years is a long time to be a fan of a service and not have them screw it up royally! Maybe that time has come to an end.

Doing my best to be optimistic on this one but layoffs of this size are not a good look.

Been a Deftones guy for decades.. enjoyed this interview filled with odds and ends.

Eardrummer is the collaborative project of Eve Maret and Adrienne Franke; two Nashville based electronic musicians that make some great work on their own AND managed to make something quite enjoyable together.

Dancey, Krautrocky and sometimes Ambient - an excellent blend start to finish.

I don’t have any need for this but I sure love that it exists. Pls browse for tasty examples.

javascript animation library. if that sounds boring, just click on through to the site. very very nice! via @mattlehrer

this was incredibly educational. also, big kudos to apple for walking back previous decisions and going with this approach now.

Incredibly good rundown from Ryan Broderick of Garbage Day entitled Content Moderation Is A Failed Project, wherein speaks on social medias complete lack of usefulness for real time events and the unbelievable lack of moderation - both from the angle of shocking content and misinformation. This was my favorite bit:

When Musk bought Twitter a year ago, I naively believed that users, especially irl important ones, would react to the increasing noise on their feeds by simply leaving the platform. And, if my own following tab is an indication, many have. But what has actually happened is much more dangerous. Instead of X dissolving into a digital backwater for divorced guys with NFT debt, it has, instead, continued to remain at the top of the digital funnel while also being 4chan-levels of rotten. It is still being used to process current events in “real time” even though it does not have the tools, nor the leadership necessary to handle that responsibility.

Nailed it. Lots more gold where that came from.

First new music from Charles Bissell, the singer-writer-producer of the Wrens, in 20 years. Releases mid November and I'm quite intrigued!

eight hours of ambient, drone, relaxation tones and field recordings. there's a billion youtube videos meant for sleep and relaxation but this longform composition feels far more intentional.

wonderful writeup on the power behind Talking Heads cover of Take Me to the River. Take 2 minutes, read it.

Took 54 years for this lost media to surface but here it is! I’m more fascinated by the analysis and history than the show itself and I’m willing to bet you will be too. via Davis.

TIL Apple has a way to let a trusted person have access to your account in case of death.

Some very impressive creations. Can’t wait to see full length movies coming out via Unreal.

I’ve been listening to sugar sk*-*lls for a long time. I recall a performance years ago at the, now closed, Mercy Lounge where Ben Marcantel went on stage, plugged in a Gameboy and proceeded to blast the audience with his chiptune compositions. I’ve never seen anyone do that in Nashville before or after. I loved it.

Over the years, sugar sk*-*lls has morphed and explored other sounds; Marcantel was crafting AI compositions back in 2019, way before it was cool! Looking through the back catalog of works, you’ll encounter a number of collaborations. Matt Glassmeyer of Lambchop and Lindsay Johns of Nudity appear on “tethers.” Kyle Hamlett and Ryan Norris of Coupler appear on “Right Hand Hand.” G Seth West, Tye Bellar and Tom Senter of Financier appear on “Gini Rising” back in 2016.

That Financier collaboration grew into something more concrete. G Seth West and Tye Bellar started working with Marcantel more and more; eventually forming a new Voltron version of sugar sk*-*lls.

As the story goes, they met up every weekend and crafted dozens of songs; scrapping entire compositions, merging ideas together, exploring bigger and bolder sounds. They invited Cortney Tidwell to perform on a song and realized the intended track was not good enough - West remarking “we had a diamond on a paper plate.” They kept going, pushing their work further into something they loved to hear.

All of those efforts culminated into Star Time, the album that is released today. It’s the biggest record from sugar sk-lls yet. Not only because it’s a collaboration of three minds but the production is thicker, more immersive and more inviting of repeated listens. Most importantly, and possibly most overlooked, it’s also an incredibly emotional record. Every track features vocoder leading the way, which can be easily written off as just another instrument or, worse, a gimmick. But pay attention to the lyrics, there are incredibly poignant, introspective and moving moments from start to finish.

I’m incredibly proud to be involved with the release. I’ve been a fan of sugar sk*-*lls for so long and now I get to help spread the love to more folks. It’s a record that requires your attention to fully appreciate but will still yield enjoyment even if you’re blasting it as a dance track in the background. It contains multitudes.

Pick up the 2xCassette Rave Case and digital on Bandcamp or Stream and Share wherever you like to listen.

Back in 2019, Ashley Spurgeon and I made a Chris Gaines podcast investigating that whole Garth Brooks alter ego situation that happened in 1999.

In one episode, we discuss that there were two music videos created for the ill fated project - both directed by Jon Small. Most people are familiar with the video for "Lost in You" - where a barefoot Gaines poses dramatically while ghosts whip around him as he croons an R&B song. However, the "Right Now" video seemed to be lost to time. Neither of us had ever seen it and some fairly robust searching yielded no results.

Today on Twitter, Rach Ellie Lee reached out to ask if I'd seen this Facebook video? Amazingly, the "Right Now" video had been posted 1 month after the final episode of our podcast. I'd like to believe we inspired its discovery but I think something was just in the air.

TDLR: here's a Chris Gaines music video you probably haven't seen for a song that is a very good example of how weird the project got. Hopefully it doesn't get taken offline!