Sunday, October 15, 2006

October 15, RIAA

October 15, RIAA

This week's feature is on a mashup outfit by the name of RIAA. Even more tongue in cheek than Big City Orchestra, this group wins the prize for being the first to respond as Beavis and Butt-head... Stay tuned for episode 116, featuring a track by RIAA and a dozen other sound collage artists!

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RIAA

As their website says, RIAA raids "the sonic junkyards of the world to create highly danceable collages." This is a solo project pertaining to not only mashups, but also some straight-up sound collage and even another project in the same vein as a band called Culturcide, who were the first project I was aware of anyway, to accompany recordings... and for all I know RIAA did it first - it's not really my area of expertise. Not always a good idea to compare artists anyway...

To clarify what I mean by "accompany recordings:" What I remember of Culturcide is that they would sing new lyrics to popular songs, over effected recordings of those songs. So they weren't mashups, nor were they really parodies, as the lyrics were often more political than send-ups of the original songs. RIAA refers to this manifestation of their project as "grafitti music," as they are "spraying" their own output over the top of previously recorded work - and this is different from the more "pure" sound collage which gets played around here, in that their output in this case is more "traditional" music (in some sense, anyway), which they are recording themselves and then layering over the existing recordings.

Does any of this make sense? The track we play by RIAA in this week's podcast is not an example of this anyway; It's a mashup - quite a good one, in fact, titled The Joy of Noise, recorded in 2004. It mashes up Public Enemy's Bring The Noise with an instrumental track by Apollo 100 called Joy. (Personally, I'd have titled it Bring the Joy, but that's just me). Anyway, without further ado, here's the SAR Q&A with RIAA...


*Name: RIAA

*Are there any additional names used to describe this project: (Recording Industries Are Archaic, Really Interesting Audio Adventures, Rendevous Internationale Action Album, Rockin' Internet Art Alternatives, probably more...) Mr Fab, Mr Fab & his Bag of Heads, Mr Fab & His Bargain Slacks

*Do you use a pseudonym? No

*Members: Huh huh, you said "member."

*Founding Member: Heh heh! Yeah! He said "member!" My death-metal band Mandatory Bowel Evacuation broke up, and some of us became a noise band called Projectile Diarrhea, named after our favorite tropical disease symptom. I got thrown out because I refused to play banjo, and went solo.

*Tape manipulations, digital deconstructions or turntable creations: digital de/constructions

*Another genre descriptor: Some of my stuff is "graffiti" music - like a graffiti artist spray-paints his own art over someone else's property, I play original music over instrumental mixes, karaoke tapes, etc.

*Location: North Hollywood, CA

*Original Location: My mommy's tummy.

*What is your creative/artistic background: Er...I don't think I have one...just been making music at home for my own amusement since - oh, I see that's the next question.

*History: Right, as I was saying, been making music at home since, well, since I was a kid - still have a tape from the '80s I made placing an acapella version of Nico singing "All Tomorrow's Parties" over an instrumental passage from one of my little brothers' Iron Maiden records. No, I won't post it. But I do have a track on my website called "Everybody Breakdance With Me!!" that I recorded around '92.

*Born: Hollywood! Or, should I say H!O!L!L!Y!W!O!O!D!

*Motivations: Someone told me this would be a good way to meet Pam Dawber.

*Philosophy: Gee, I dunno...I do it 'cause I enjoy it...it's kinda like asking me what's the philosophy behind my masturbating.

*Web address: www.m-1.us

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Thanks to RIAA for being the focus of this week's Q&A! Be sure to visit their website to learn even more about the project. Stay tuned for this week's podcast (episode 116) to hear 13 sound collages, including a mashup by RIAA.

Stay tuned, because in just about ten days, here in Minneapolis, we'll be welcoming Negativland back to town. The last time I saw them perform was in 2000, at The First Avenue Mainroom. Minneapolis was one of their stops on the True False tour, which was excellent of course. This time out, they're doing a live performance variation on their weekly radio program, Over The Edge. I've been listening to the CD of the material they've been performing, and I have to say I'm really looking forward to seeing them perform "It's All In Your Head" at First Avenue, again in the mainroom, on Thursday, October 26 (7PM). Some Assembly Required is a proud sponsor, and if you're anywhere near the Twin Cities, I hope you'll make it out to see this show!

Tune in next week for our update on DJ Food's Raiding the 2oth Century. We'll be podcasting the episode featuring our phone interview with Strictly Kev, and since we've already run the SAR Q&A with him, I'll have to do an update on his project instead of another Q&A. Stay tuned!

Until next week - thanks for listening,
Jon Nelson

www.some-assembly-required.net

3 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

I doubt RIAA were long out of their "mommy's tummy" when Culturcide released "Tacky Souvenirs of Pre-revolutionary America" in 1987.

David

12:03 PM  
Blogger Jon Nelson said...

Thanks for the response! Like I said, its not my particular area of expertise - I really should have done a little more research though. Thanks for the info, David!
Jon Nelson

2:05 PM  
Blogger Mr Fab said...

Culturcide certainly beat me to the punch. I'd like to hear more of their stuff. I just know a couple of their tracks, which I only first heard a few years ago.

Thanks for hyping me, Jon, you're a brave man!

4:01 PM  

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