It was not for nothing that Evil Dick used to call his label Polemic Music. This delusion that “good music” hovers above us sordid social animals like some unearthly pristine unctual anointment is a running sore which hurts us daily.
In a false world, Truth becomes Polemic, not out of perverse itch of aggrandisement but simply by being true to itself. The proselytisers for “quality” are running stupid petty marketstalls whilst pretending they’re in a holy temple. Overturn the tables! Wreck the sales racks! In order to foreground the fact that all art is social (or anti-social!) statement, I wrote biographies of Zappa and Bailey – inspiral rubbishers of quality norms – but this “intellectual” approach got me the wrong audience. So I sent them over-educated suckers off to peruse Wire magazine, and tried something else: radio. After seventeen years, I’m glad to say I’ve gathered various Mitglieder (aka AMM All-Stars) and become a mite louder. Here is my most condensed and organised polemic yet, where I challenge you to tell the difference between: Blues, Freak Rock, Punk Rock, Free Improvisation, Politics, Entertainment and Poetry (with a little ugly something – probably called “Graham” – on the side …).
- Evil Dick “The OTL Show Theme” 1:49
- Evil Dick feat. Dave Jackson on tenor sax “Wolf Harbor” Mappa Zappa (Cordelia, 2018) 4:22
- AMM All-Stars feat. Dave Black on bottleneck guitar “Glottal Bottleneck Folk Remedy” Combined and Uneven with Dipping Sauce 20-iii-2019 46:07>>52:08 6:01
- The Blues Boys feat. Lonnie Johnson on violin “Memphis Stomp” 15-ii-1928 (Okeh 12″, 1928) 3:02
- Mothers of Invention feat. Frank Zappa on sped-up guitar and Art Tripp on percussion “Nine Types of Industrial Pollution” Uncle Meat (Bizarre, 1969) 6:00
- Derek Bailey and Min Xiao- Fen “Da Qing Ye (Woad)” 16-xii-1997 Viper (Avant/Disk Union, 1998) 4:38
- Captain Beefheart and Frank Zappa “Orange Claw Hammer” (KWST, 1975) 4:50
- I Digress Indeed/Out To Lunch “Selection from Homo Fludens” (SoundCloud, 20-iii-2019) 18:26>>23:08 4:38
- Gabba Zappa Hey! “Dead Girls of London” Mappa Zappa (Cordelia, 2018) 2:25
- AMM All-Stars “Still You Can Say Blacker and Blacker” Combined and Uneven with Dipping Sauce 20-iii-2019 31:20>>36:06 4:47
- AMM All-Stars “Composite of Multiple Developments” Combined and Uneven with Dipping Sauce 20-iii-2019 38:55>>41:26 2:31Music With
- My Insane Friend and Loopy C “The BOOOOOOMMMM Connector” iii-2019 Old Dot Find (forthcoming) 13:02