03/29/25 - Jam_13

"There was more resistance to the fact I was using computers than to the fact that I was a woman doing music." -- Laurie Spiegel

 Listen to the show below!

Artist	Track	Album	Label	Year	Notes
Laurie Spiegel	The Unquestioned Answer	The Expanding Universe	Philo	1980 (1974-1976)	A soft and atmospheric piece of progressive electronic music. Spiegel's work at Bell Labs places her in the lineage of early electronic pioneers, though emerging during the Kraftwerk revolution.
Krok	Breath of Night Kyiv	Even the Forest Hums: Ukrainian Sonic Archies 1971-1996	Light in the Attic	2024 (early 1980s)	A jazz fusion piece from the waning years of the USSR. Smooth and polished. Carries a cosmopolitan tone similar to city pop.
T. Dyson & Company	It's All Over	N/A	Cyndee Music	1980	A rare bedroom synth-funk single from Chicago. Reissued for RSD 2021.
Ellen McIlwaine	Higher Ground	The Real Ellen McIlwaine	Kot'ai	1975	A guitar-and-voice psychedelic blues take on Stevie Wonder's "Higher Ground." McIlwaine is generally known for blending folk and blues influences.
Mr. Fingers	Mystery of Love	N/A	Alleviated	1985	Dub-influenced house track by Larry Heard, one of house music's pioneers. Bass-forward mix and experimental textures.
Res	700 Mile Situation	How I Do	MCA	2001	A neo-soul track from Res' debut album, How I Do, which mixes alt-rock, trip-hop, and post-punk revival elements.
Dwight Sykes	Where Ever You Are	Songs Vol. 1	Peoples Potential Unlimited	2013 (1980-1990)	Moody and nocturnal synth-funk track with lo-fi aesthetics. Accidentally aligns itself with vaporwave.
Wilburn Burchette	Birth of a Witch	Guitar Grimoire	Burchette Brothers	1973	Solo guitar piece from a self-taught musician who infused his sound with Tibetan mysticism.
Steve Hiett	Blue Beach - Welcome to Your Beach	Down on the Road by the Beach	Sony/CBS	1983	A dreamy ambient pop track from a photographer-turned-one-time-musician. Originally released exclusively in Japan.

12/07/24 - Jam_6

"Now, I don't really think it matters where you're based. The internet provides more self-managing platforms for promotion than you could have dreamed of ... It's how you use those opportunities that matters now." - Graham Lambkin, WFMU interview

 Listen to the show below! 

Artist	Track	Album	Label	Year	Notes
Graham Lambkin	The Brendan Drill	Salmon Run	Kye	2007	Independently released musique concrète from England. Graham Lambkin is generally a audio-visual artist, and as such makes experimental music that is common of such folks (e.g., Yoko Ono, Laurie Anderson, Ryoji Ikeda). Lambkin is most well-known for being in The Shadow Ring, a 90s experimental rock outfit that remains still obscure relative to similar groups from that time. I think this track, along with many others from the album, has a great mix of textures and works well as an opener to today's program.
Ünol Büyükgönenç	Japon Balıkçısı	Güzel Günler Göreceğiz	Armoni	1988	Turkish folk with some quirky elements. This song, "The Japanese Fisherman," has the sound of water splashing throughout it and an approximation of Japanese chanting. Ünol was a member of Kardaşlar, a 70s anatolian rock band, before recording this album in 1979. It was not released until nine years later due to the September 12 coup carried out by the Turkish Armed Forces in 1980.
Ernest Hood	The Secret Place	Neighborhoods	Thistlefield	1975	Ambient exploring the peaceful sounds of neighborhoods. Specifically, suburban neighborhoods in Portland, Oregon. Ernest Hood was a jazz guitarist and played with his brother in the Portland area in the 1940s. In the 50s, he contracted polio. He had limited mobility and had to use a wheelchair for the rest of his life. He could no longer hold the guitar. So he picked up the zither, which is not held but lays flat and can be picked or strummed. This record is one of two that he ever recorded.
Beverly Glenn-Copeland	Ever New	...Keyboard Fantasies...	Atlast	1986	One of the most critically acclaimed new age artists, and his most famous song "Ever New." He was on of the first black students to study at McGill University in Montreal. Prior to Keyboard Fantasties, he had released two folk albums. This album was rediscovered and promoted by Ryota Masuko in 2015. the record subsequently recieved quite a few reissues and reprints thereafter.
Lewis	Like to See You Again	L'Amour	R.A.W.	1983	Sparse ambient adult contemporary. He released two albums in the eighties that remained under the radar until they were re-released in 2014 (Light in the Attic!). During the making of these two albums, Lewis worked as a stockbroker in Calgary. It is hard to paint an accurate picture of him because there are so many rumors. One of them is that he was a scammer. This one is connected to him disappearing after not paying the photographer for this record's album cover. Another is that he didn't know how to play any instruments and somehow created a cohesive musical soundscape by himself. He plays all the instruments on this record. But in general, there is very little known about him, and he continues to retain an air of mystery about his life and his music. Even his family lost contact with him; however, he is still alive as LitA reached out to him in order to reissue the albums, and his real name is known as well.
B.W. Stevenson	On My Own	B.W. Stevenson	RCA Victor	1972	Mellow progressive country from the early seventies. B.W. Stevenson, or Buckwheat Stevenson, had a decently sized hit in 1973 titled "My Maria," landing on no. 9 on Billboard. Interestingly, it didn't chart on the country chart at all. This song, however, is from his debut album, which has received little attention in comparison to his one big hit. If you only heard his hit, you would not be prepared for how this record sounds. It is a very gentle listen throughout, this track included.
The Five Stairsteps	In The Beginning	2nd Resurrection	Dark Horse	1976	Progressive soul. The Five Stairsteps are best known for their song, "O-o-h Child" in 1970 which you have most likely heard. At that time, they were a group of six siblings. But by 1976, only four had stayed in the group. Fun fact: the sister left in 1972 and went on to graduate from and work at Emory. The group rebranded as just Stairsteps and released their last record, 2nd Resurrection. This whole album is fantastic and very consistent, which is surprising considering this would be their last. It has yet to be reissued.
Woo	The Heart Sleeps	Into the Heart of Love	Cloud Nine	1990	Somewhat experimental, sort-of new age ambient music. This is a British duo consisting of two brothers Mark and Clive Ives. This track is from their third and most well-known album. They appear to be a very ground-up sort of group musically -- they constantly experimented with new technologies as they were coming out. They are very prolific, so if you're interested you can definitely hear more.
Kaliyuga Pro	Untitled	This One	n/a	2004	Soft instrumental hip hop from Finland. Kaliyuga Pro has been making beats since 1998. This record, along with his others, was self-released which was easier to do by the 2000s (CDr). The song I chose is from an album of untitled tracks, this one being the sixth.
Lewis Taylor	Lucky	Lewis Taylor	Island	1996	Lush neo-soul with psychedelic elements. Lewis Taylor was originally a guitarist touring with the psychedelic rock band Edgar Broughton Band. In the 80s, he released two psychedelia-tinged new wave records under the name Sheriff Jack. The song I've chosen is from his debut album under his own name. it was released as a single, but the album didn't garner too much attention. He had a hard time getting his music out due to label expectations and requirements, which may have had a hand in him not being very well known.

11/15/24 - Jam_5

"When people misuse you, give Him thanks" - Otis G Johnson

 Listen to the show below! 

Artist	Track	Album	Label	Year	Notes
Otis G Johnson	Walk With Jesus	Everything: God Is Love 78	Holy Spirit	1978	Lo-fi gospel minimal synth from Detroit. What a combination of words. This is the first outsider artist I have played on the program. He sings a little bit, got a drum machine playing in the back, and plays a bit on a Hammond Organ. There are probably many records just like this -- it's much easier to record by yourself even for genres that somewhat demand the participation of many -- they just haven't been found. Everything: God Is Love 78 was released on O.G. Johnson's own record label, Holy Spirit, where he mostly released his own records, including singles. But he did also operate two other labels that had other similarly obscure gospel artists... though not many. He's also been a DJ and host of gospel programs. This record was rereleased by the great Numero, one of many rerelease labels operating today.
Omar Khorshid	Ah Ya Zain	Rhythms From the Orient	Voice of Lebanon	1974	70s Egyptian bellydance music. This is particularly synthesizer-focused, which steers away from how this music would traditionally sound. Omer Khorshid was a guitarist from Cairo. After a lot of political turmoil in Egypt including shift from Soviet to USA support during the Cold War, the bread riots, and political repression of citizens, Khorshid moved to Lebanon to continue his music career which had just started getting along. That's where he produced much of his recorded output, including this record.
Francis Bebey	Agatha	Fleur tropicale	Ozileka	1976	Cameroon singer-songwriter-tinged bikutsi. Bikutsi is a traditional folk music of the Ewondo people in Cameroon. Generally, Francis Bebey's discography (which is quite large) is more in line with a traditional bikutsi, most notably with 6/8 time signature. However, on Fleur tropicale, he used an instrument associated more with modern bikutsi style: the synthesizer. This record is heavy on the spoken word, as you can hear in this track, which in my mind partly earns it the singer-songwriter label. The rest is due to much of the lyrics on the record being written by Francis.
Eddie Palmieri	Cobarde	Unfinished Masterpiece	Coco	1975	Descarga/salsa with jazz components from the ever-flourishing NYC salsa scene. The 70s were a big time for salsa; you had the rise of the Fania label, which had pretty much all of the big-time names from this era -- including Palmieri. This record, however, was put out by Coco, a label created by a former employee of Fania. This record is considered the peak of experimentalism in salsa, with this song being perhaps the most out-there showing of it. It really ramps up and gets crazier as the song goes on. The record itself is unfinished according to Palmieri, but Coco put it out regardless and used this 'unfinished' label as a way to market the album.
Henri Guedon	Sainte-Marie	Cosmozouk Percussion	Epic	1975	Kreyol djaz (creole jazz) from Martinque. Kreyol djaz combines influences from various styles of French Caribbean music with jazz. This particular style of it though reflects the spread of salsa and other latin american music styles throughout the world. Guedon was a pioneer in exporting different types of latin music to France (Martinique has not left French ownership since the Napoleonic Wars). This record in particular fuses guaguanco, descarga, and guajira along with zouk, a sort of vocalist-focused dance/party pop music. This track is moreso a jazz fusion heater though.
Jon Appleton	Chef D'Ouvre	Appleton Syntonic Menagerie	Flying Dutchman	1969	Musique concrete/sound collage from Hollywood. A collection of electronic soundscapes in a time where the concept of electronic music was mainly novelty, even when it did not carry any satirical edge like this does. I enjoy stuff like this because it really does break up the monotony of expected melodies and rhythms and such things like that. I don't mean to be pretentious, but... how about this: it's fun! Frozen lil' pizzas from Chef Boyardee!
Cody Chesnutt	Can't Get No Betta'	The Headphone Masterpiece	One Little Indian	2002	The most well-known weirdo neo soul record, The Headphone Masterpiece, featuring German, Japan, Rastafarian, and UK flags on the cover without a semblance of connection to anything going on in the music. I'd recommend listening to the album yourself to truly experience it because a more accessible cut like this does not represent that weirdness very well. Same record label that put out most of Bjork's records for some reason also put out Cody Chesnutt's The Headphone Masterpiece as well. This was before The Roots covered his song "The Seed" a year later, which is what he's most known for. The record is sometimes a little goofy, mostly overtly sexual in the most absurd way -- but it is extremely stylistically experimental and adventurous in a way I have honestly never heard before in any soul music, even in recent stuff. It's really out there.
William Onyeabor	Good Name	Good Name	Wilfilms	1983	Continuing on with the lo-fi elements here, here's some lo-fi synth funk from from Nigeria. Got electro elements in there as well: Roland TR-808 drum machine syncopation. Onyeabor was actually quite the success in Nigeria, enough for there to have recently been a Vice doc about him and his career titled Fantastic Man -- plus the millions of streams of his tunes on Spotify. Sort of as a side effect of afrobeat, the song is quite long, many of his songs are this way as others as well from this period. Despite the low fidelity being pretty strong here, the grooves are just as strong if not stronger.