Thursday, March 22, 2012

Exotic Pylon

Johnny Mugwump, head of Exotic Pylon Records and long-time DJ on resonance fm, responsible for 2 seasons of the excellent Weird Tales For Winter series - which took classic tales of weirdness from the likes of William Hope Hodgson, Nigel Kneale, and Thomas Ligotti - and set them to music and soundscapes by fellow esoterrorists Advisory Circle, Moon Wiring Club, Vindicatrix, etc.

He's been hosting a monthly event at The Vortex
, but he's decided to hang it up, in order to focus on the record label, which is good news and bad: good news if you want more and better records, bad news if you live in the UK. But he's decided to go out with a bang and a whimper, throwing a 4 day blow out at the vortex, one last hurrah. Last night was the first night, but there's still three left! If you happen to be on that side of the pond, sell yr watch and go! I'd give a gallon of my neighbor's blood to be there; i like to imagine drinking espresso with k-punk and johnny trunk, watching Cut Hands freak out the squares, but i'll just have to settle for the Oregon rain.

The Exotic Pylon posse - Johnny and Dolly Dolly and the head technician of Pye Corner Audio - run in the same shadowy circles as some of the more well-known hauntologists - Leyland James Kirby, aka The Caretaker, and Jim Jupp, evil genius behind Ghost Box and The Belbury Poly. They frequent sites like the Found Objects and argue about fonts. They collect mouldering scraps and scratchy vinyl. They have turned me on to more good weird horror movies than you can imagine.

To commemorate the Pylon's last hurrah at The Vortex, i have cobbled together a mix of my favorite cuts from all 6 Exotic Pylon releases so far, including a special treat - a surreal sound edit featuring some sounds from the upcoming Gentleforce
ep, out on 3.26, stitched together with some sounds from Ronny Juzzle's sounds from the Spaz-tec National Diploma in Horseriding 3" cd. I've titled it why are you so far away?
, i tried to stay true to the concrète punk of Ronny Juzzle's track, with Gentleforce's cosmic optimism. The end result sounds like some bad happenings on the Solaris spaceship. The mix really illustrates Exotic Pylon's eccentricity - garage psychedelia from Misty Roses, mournful Wicker Man folk from legendary weirdos Band of Holy Joy, radiophonic hip-hop from The Lord, and the missing link between grime and dubstep, from Infinite Livez.

I've also written a small essay, in a PDF, extolling the virtues of Mugwump, and of all the smoldering British weirdos.

You may have already missed Black To Comm, but you can still see Andy Stott, Cut Hands (William Bennett from Whitehouse with musicians from Haiti, the Congo, and Ghana!!!), Cindy Talk, Infinite Livez, and others.

1 comment:

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