NOISE JUNKIES - Spoken Word

All right, listen up, Caves, I got your assignments riga six four three wheeler one four eight not eight oh four, and only you. You need to join host HP and fatherm Alone as they examine one of the greatest sitcoms in television history, Taxi in Knight, Mister Walters, a taxi podcast BANDA zero like your boxing record, Frank, mister Walters, weird w what do You Kiss? Front man Paul Stanley and mentalist Yuri Yeller have in common. They both wittingly or unwittingly recorded their own spoken word albums. What started out in the nineteen forties as simple performances of classics like A Christmas Carol and a Fellow later morphed into weirder and more wonderful LPs featuring the likes of Elvis Presley and David Lynch.

Tonight, the Noise Junkies discuss one of the more unique musical genres visited upon us. Before the music, there was the word spoken word. Hello and welcome to Noise Junkies. I am HPM in the Captain's seat and with me as always are my fellow noise Junkies. First, we have from Mondo Heather we have Heather drain Heather, how are you?

I'm doing good? I was about to interject that was a damn fine intro. Oh, thank you very much, Thank you very much, and joining us in our little zoom Brady Bunch quadrant. Here is the other noise junkie, Father Malone, Father Malone. How are you?

I am well? I suppose how are you? I am well too. Very excited to see you both and excited to dive into the realm of spoken word. Very excited to do this.

But first, before we get to the main event, as is our custom, we're going to talk about your little show and tell. We're going to talk about what we're listening to this week, artist album, what have you? I'm going to start with you, Father Malone, Father Malone, what are you listening to lately? Lately or always? I'm forever listening to this particular album and it's got it's hooks in me again right now.

From nineteen eighty three Island Records, Speaking of spoken Word, mister Tom Waite's Swordfish Trombones And he came home from the wall with the body and see an idea for five works display and knew that aam be read and with a dayless deal massit half a pan of Ba Navid. What an incredible album. This. I knew of Tom Waits, but hadn't really ever heard them until I got to California. I took this out of the library at USC and immediately I made a copy of it, and then wore that copy out.

It is an incredible album from how do you even describe Tom Waits? Just a modern day balladeer, honky tonkin' beat poet, sort of defies classification, and this album is all of that. It's all of his best instincts. I think it's his best album. Probably Frank's Wild Years Alons that could be any pick for any of the spoken word selections.

Later later in the program, drove home, doused everything in the house and torched it. Parked across the street, laughing watching it burn. All Halloween orange and Chimmney red and Frank put on a top forty station, got on the Hollywood Freeway and headed north. I'd like to say that I like one song over another, but it's one. It's a perfect album.

I put it on and just listen to it beginning to end, and I have been again recently. Everyone should listen Tom Waits. I'm sure you guys are familiar with this album. Oh, absolutely fantastic pick. And you're right Tom Waits really he's his own classification.

He defies any sort of easy genre. He's been all over the place. But that's a wonderful pick. I love that pick. That was actually my second Tom Waits album.

The Black Writer was my gateway, and that was love. I was immediately hooked into that and with all of its sort of like Bowie Brecdian charm, but then sort offish. Tombones was number two, and that's all she wrote. I love Tom Waits, love love, love love. I will defend him to the to my dying day.

I actually once ruined a party. Well I don't think I ruined it, but in college I actually got an argument with the guy because he was trying to be an edge lord. And it wasn't even like he was like, oh I don't like Tom Waits because of this or that. Like I know, everybody tastes different. You can intelligently just be like, yeah, it's just not my flavor.

Cool, no harm, no foul. But if you're gonna be a you know, just like a dumb ass and just try to be like that, I will, I will educate you. Well, I was more obnoxious about it than because I was. When you're eighteen, that's a good age to be the obnoxious, pretentious girl at a party. Oh that's a great age to be passionate about music anyway, Right, that's really when you're sort of becoming I mean, for me, that's when I really started to assume it as a real identity, speaking of really be pretentious when you're discussing Tom Waits.

It's just if I may double back for a second, like, I don't have a particular favorite album, favorite song on the album, but the song that made me realize that I loved this man is the last song on the first song, which is called in the Neighborhood, which is this like German umpah brass, backing to what is effectively the most mundane neighborhood activities. Okay, come yet, I scream of the market a newspaper sleeping back. Oh downly, my god, damn Flad again elevated it to like mythic status, and I thought, Jesus Christ, this guy's hilarious. All right, Heather, how about you go next? What have you been?

What's been spinning? On your turntable. Lately, well lately, I have been completely transfixed and enchanted by an EP that came out twenty twenty one by being called LeSEA and Lycia. You can call them darkwave, you can call them goth, I call them electronic acoustic whatever. I just called them good sweet.

They were formed in nineteen eighty nine and I believed by Mike Vanport Fleets and the countri of the band is him Tara van Flower, who's also done some incredible solo work, and David Galas and the EP, which is under the title of Casaluna is it's dreamy. It's a parts you feel like you're surrounded by nature right as a storm is about to hit, just like when the sky gets kind of like purple and thick. But there's kind of like a sweet beauty to it. There's just a lot of layers going on. It's a beautiful, beautiful work.

In fact, it's so beautiful that I actually have written an article about it and it's currently on my Pagereon. It may or may not show up later on at my website. But I just I adore, I adore this album and it's on Spotify. Effect I see his discography is on there and I highly encourage people check it out. And Little Trivia one of one of the biggest fans it was Peter Steele, legendary frontman of Type of Negative, and in fact, Tara does backup vocals on the song Halloween in Heaven, which was off their last album, so it's a great song.

So Dead again that was the album. But yeah, Casa Luna gorgeous, gorgeous, and one of the songs is totally there's a song called do You Bleed? And if you're a fan of artists like Jarbo, particularly like her work with Neurosis, like this will hit your sweet spot, you you will, and other songs are a little more just sort of like sad, and there's just a it's a beauty. There's such a beauty and intensity to this work and to this band, and uh yeah, I cannot recommend it enough. It sounds like a nice choice.

As we're moving from fall into winter, things are getting kind of cold. It's my favorite season of the year, but it's a good season for that kind of bruised beauty. If you will it sounds oh yeah, I'll definitely check it out on Spotify. So my pick this week, just a little bit of background before I launched into it. When I was in college, I got into a band called King of Fools.

Someone had recommended them to me because they said the vocalists sounded a lot like Bowie, and it was kind of a nice way, kind of a nice introduction to the band, like a way of easing into it is with something familiar, like David Bowie. And it's true. The guy, the vocalist, his name is Roy White, sounds a lot like Bowie. And the album was kind of almost like taking tin machine but softening some of the edges. It wasn't quite as angular and kind of intense as that.

So anyway, I knew that this guy, Roy White, had had other band before that, but I could never find any information on them. He had a band in the eighties nearly eighties called White and Torch. It was a band that he did with a guy named Steve Torch, who trivia note he was later one of the many credited writers on Shares Believe, which is weird if you've ever heard of this band. But so the band White and Torch, they just recorded a bunch of singles, but they never actually had a proper album. For a variety of reasons I'm not going to go into, but I kind of forgot about them, and then I was doing some searching for Scott Walker.

I got into Scott Walker a little bit, gotten to a Scott Walker thing for the past week, and the YouTube algorithm spit out White and Torch. I never knew they were there, but they spit out this video for this song called Parade, which was one of their big sit well, it's probably their biggest hit. People in the know. This is the one people always point to and say, Wow, this band should have been something. They should have been bigger than they were.

Oh, Jo, I'm just but the song was produced by Paul Buckmaster. He's done a lot of work with He's worked with the Stones, Leonard Cohen, Nelton John. This song was recorded and Abby Road. It's got this beautiful, lush orchestral arrangement. I would put them as sort of angsty, gothy sort of pop, but with a great sort of arrangement behind it, a lot of passion.

But the thing that knocked me out was this is the guy that I thought sounded like David Bowie in nineteen ninety one. Back then in eighty two for the song Parade, he's doing a Scott Walker thing, which is it's like it hit me all at once. It's like seeing David Bowie's evolution in microcosm, Like this guy started out as a Scott Walker kind of intense kind of vocalist and he later went into It was just it kind of blew my mind that these two great sort of influences on me, these my favorite sort of musicians were all kind of encapsulated in this guy, Roy White. But it's a fantastic song. It's kind of it's very nakedly passionate and theatrical, which I really love about it.

And I just I really got into this song. I couldn't stop listening. I still can't stop listening to it. I've chased up more of their material. White and Torch.

I think they have like fifteen or so singles that you can find on YouTube, but this is by far the best and among Like I said, this is pointed to as their best single. In fact, it was even featured on series four of the UK version of X Factor. The in fact, like I want to think the runner up performed it as his final song. So it's got legs. I mean, people know this song, and actually the guy put it on his third album, so it had a little bit of juice at least in the I guess it's like the early or the mid two thousands.

But I would recommend anyone check this out. It's really if anyone who likes Scott Walker that's sort of intense, brooding intensity, check this song out. You won't be disappointed. It's fantastic. How have you not shared this with me prior?

You know I like Scott Walker? You know I like David By What's wrong with You? HB? I will, And I know this is a neat follow along to the last episode, but but I will, I'll, it'll be in the playlist he did. So the version that you're going to cut into this is the original one on Spotify.

This guy, Roy White re recorded it at some point, so it's on Spotify, this particular song, but it doesn't match like the beauty of the original recording, I have to say, so there is that. But and by the way, if you check out, there's a great performance video. It's sort of like their lip syncing. I think it's an English sort of talk show that they're performing on. But check it out because there's a woman playing piano in the background who looks just like Kate Bush with a Bobby Brown microphone.

It's the weirdest thing in the world. But anyway, I digress. Nevertheless, now let's get into our main discussion. We're here to talk about spoken word tonight. For me personally, just as by way of introduction, I feel like I was a little bit pre programmed to enjoy spoken word at an early age, because I can remember as a kid, I had a little record player that I used to carry around, and one of my favorite records as a kid was Doctor Seuss's Fox and Socks and Green Eggs and Ham.

It was a double like one side was green Eggs and hand, the other side was Fox and Socks. He is an easy to say you sucks, oh sucks os socks shoes. So I loved Marvin Miller. He did He did all the voices in it, and he had this wonderful recitation of these doctors who's classic books, and it really kept me enthralled as a child, and I didn't really understand what spoken word was. I didn't have a name for it, obviously, but I think formatively I really appreciated like the idea of having a poetic performance, if you will, on record.

So that was kind of my introduction to spoken word. But I'm curious, Yeah, you two find folks, what were some of your early formative influences around spoken word, the things that got you interested in spoken word as a general concept. I'm going to start with with you, Heather. Oh no, I was afraid of that. So I have to confess the spoken word genres as one that's not really enchanted me.

Like, because even the artists that are classical spoken word artists that I love, I tend to be, I tend to would almost just rather either read their work or see like a video of them performing it. I'm not even a big fan of like like audio books. I don't know what it is about my brain. I would rather do the reading or have it in a visual and sonic context. So because even as a kid, I mean when you're kid, I remember I had like a little Grimlins forty five, but I would usually just like not play it and just find my mom's copy of Panama by Van Halen, and I would play that while reading about Kismo's Shenanigans.

But so, but that's why I'm actually I'm really curious, and I'm eager about this episode because I think the cool thing about having a good discussion, especially with like people like I'm the like cowist the world because like, not only like their your two friends, but like you guys, your knowledge. You both have like this great knowledge and great taste, and so I'm always open to be open minded these things. But I'm not a big spoken word I'm the ones that I like that you might call that. There is one of my picks, and I will mention obviously which I don't spoil it, but there's one I did pick that as a classical what you call it classical spoken word piece, like the other three is probably nebulous, but no, that's I'm excited though, I mean, that's but it's interesting because what you bring up is there's like this sort of not really a debate, but there's this notion some people believe that poetry should be heard and not read.

Some people feel the opposite. So it's I guess a lot of where you land within spoken word, and if you're looking at it specifically as poetry, I think informs that choice of whether it's something you're really into or not. I kind of I always fell into the category of I love to hear the poetry in the poet's voice. I think you gain a lot from hearing that, which is not to say, by the way, that a lot of my choices are can be put into the broad category of poetry. But I guess that's you can loosely term this as spoken word word poetry written by the poet.

But that's good. How about yourself following along? Well, I have to echo you, HP, I wasn't necessarily toting a record player. And by the way, when you described your younger self with the record player and the record like, I just imagined you on the streets of Brooklyn throwing down the thing like walking up like to a DJ set and putting down your record, putting on Fox and socks. Anyway, get Yeah, there was an LP I had as a child.

I actually tracked it down and I own it again. It's called Famous Ghost Stories, and it yeah, like four tales on each side, the pinnacle of it being a reading a recitation of the telltale Heart. When when I was in kindergarten and kids were for nap time, you would bring in a record of music you would play, and I brought in the telltale art for the other kindergarten. It as dripp off to sleep too. You would have left to see how cunningly I did it, very so that I could see him as he lay on his bed.

Would a madman of beIN as wise as this? So that sort of wet my appetite, which led almost immediately into the chilling, thrilling sounds of the Haunted House, that Disney album from the sixty four. Yes, I have that, of course we all do. I have five copies of it. I buy it every time I see it.

I can't. It's compulsive. It's awful so in that we have it like a female narrator leading us through these atmospheres and really introducing us to specific sound effects, which is perfect for me because I'm so obsessed with both. You must reach the other side, and carefully you step out onto the breach. It sways dangerously with your weight.

It seems safe enough. I think those two primed that particular pomp. I didn't really understand what I mean. I had some albums of recitations of straight up like Basil Wrath bhone reads Sherlock Holmes, and I had a Basil Wrath phone read Edgar Allan Poe too, actually, but it wasn't until college for me and the HP around the early nineties, I suppose, And it was HP who was very deep into Henry Rollins, so he could play a lot of Henry Rollins's spoken word stuff, which that facillated between the poetry and the sort of just him being a raconteur. But oh man, the poetry remains.

I can't think of Christmas but without thinking of you, HP and family man, family man, with your Christmas lights already up. You're such a man and you're putting up your Christmas lights first on the block. Family Man. I think that was my real first introduction to it. But it didn't get obsessed with spoken word as such till I heard Gil Scott heron with all that money I made last year, Well, Whitey owned the moon.

How come I ain't got no money here? White is on the moon. You know. I just about had my bill. Oh Whitey on the moon.

I think I'll send these doctor bills a male special. Once I heard him that got me hooked. And then an album I bought in nineteen ninety five, which I'm going to talk about when we get to our picks as well. That was my intro, and I dig it. I love listening to people recite things and perform things.

And yeah, I'm so glad that you brought up Henry Rowlands because that really was when I really, I will echo exactly what you said is where I really fell for spoken word as kind of an art form. It was kind of it was a great time to sort of dive into that because, as you said, Henry Rowins, his star was on the rise. Rowlands band was a monster band at the time. They were on all the palouvers of the first year, and he was just putting out spoken word and poetry books and all this material that I just I dove into, like headfirst, I loved it all, but I didn't but before all of that, like, I didn't even know that he had that side of him, because I only knew about Rollin's band up to that point in Black Flag obviously, when I wasn't much of a fan at that point.

But then somebody in my college dorm in ninety one had said, hey, he had this album family Man that you referenced, and it like kind of blew my mind. I mean, at first we would goof on it a little bit because it's also self serious. You and I would goof for years and years on it, and I how silly it was, andy At it stuck with us. I mean, even though it's kind of you know, he loved to propagate this image that he would rawlins, would go to this shed that he lived in and write and write, and he was this negative vibe, the world suck all this kind of stuff. But Family Man stuck with me.

But I that whole first side, which is it's really two sides broken up, like one side is Rollin's doing sort of spoken word and the other side is just the band doing instrumental stuff Greg Ginn and so forth. But Family Man is fantastic. He had a track called Armageddon Man, which kind of splits the difference. It's sort of him doing his version of slam poetry that you brought up earlier, Heather, and it's great. It's almost like this journey.

But that's really what kickstarted it. And I'm so happy also to hear you talk about Gill Scott Heron because he sort of I didn't get into Gill Scott Heron until much much later, I think, after I graduated college, but he was It hit me like a ton of bricks. I loved all of his stuff. He had a great flow. He really was sort of the prototypical rapper fantastic, but he was Everything he rapped about was very relatable, which I think is really important to really connect to the material.

Why don't we go ahead, let's dive into our choices. So, just to give you an idea what we're gonna do, we're gonna talk about first, we're going to talk about our favorite spoken word album, and then we're going to go into the Weirdest. We're going to have two of each. We're gonna go into favorite Weirdest, then break it up with a little quiz of my concoction, and then we'll go into other two choices. So let's start out here.

We're going to talk about our favorite spoken word LP. And this time I'm not going to put you on the spot heat I'm gonna talk. I'm going to go to father Belone first. What is your your first pick for favorite spoken word LP? I mentioned it picked up a CD in nineteen ninety five.

It came out in ninety five and I actually bought it at a little record store in Santa Monica called Moby Disc, which is long gone, but I'm also long lamented. Great great store, great staff. They were all musicians, They all knew the best shit that was coming down. They would know you and what your tastes were, and they certainly knew mine because they immediately handed me a record call from Research Magazine. Remember Research Magazine the film Oh My God.

That's going to come up later on for me. So volume two of intically Strange Music. It I oh, oh my God. If you in that year came to see a movie at the movie theater I played at no doubt you were hearing this before the movie began. This album, it it opened up a whole I thought I knew what the underground was.

I thought I knew all the cool stuff. I didn't know a goddamn thing. I was a dumb kid. This album opened up a lot of doors for me, including one I didn't even realize until tonight when I was re looking at the track list, because I have not heard this particular album in twenty years. At least in the interim, I myself have become obsessed with the sort of Hawaiian guitar music from the fifties, the forties, fifties and sixties.

I owned a vast Polynesian and Hawaiian collection, my favorite album of which is a guy named Billy Muir, who was this like DJ in Cleveland, who like he slings the hardest goddamn Hawaiian guitar I've ever heard, and I've been obsessed with that guy ever since. Turns out one of his tracks was on this research album. But more important, it contained a track by mister Dell Close and mister John Brent from an album called how to Speak Hip. Hey, look, you know, like if you brought this record to learn how to Speak Hip from a record, man, that is the squarest thing I ever heard of. I mean wow, But look so like you brought it, you must need it.

So that was a smart move, you know what I mean? Or something. Hello there and welcome to the exciting world of hip. Just relax. Mean this other cab we're going to strain you out.

It was released back in nineteen fifty nine on Mercury Records. It's in high fidelity. Boy, if you listen to it with headphones on, you're going to hear that it's a parody of what was at that time. Old Rage continued to be for at least twenty or so years, which is the how to album. Those proliferated in the nineteen fifties.

So these two guys noticed that, and they also noticed that there was an entire new language being spoken, an entire new culture, which is beat nick color culture, and that a lot of straight people had no fucking idea what anyone was saying. So they figured they'd do a how to record on that. So it's an album that's broken into a series of lessons by Close as the narrator, with the aid of an actual his hipster, mister Yeats Romo played by John Frinn. Now I mentioned it's high fidelity close as in your left ear, Brent, is in your right ear? Do you hipsters regard squares as the enemy?

Oh? No, man, squares are cool, you know, enemy if they attack you one way or another, but you've got to have them. They run the subways like it's not their fault. It's just the bag there in. It's disorienting.

Now, Dell Close, if you're already hip, you know who he is. But he is effectively the father of modern improvisational comedy. There were groups before him, but he belonged to most of them, including Second City, which he helped found the Compass players, but it was close as obsession with transforming what were effectively theater games into a workable narrative that changed the comedy world. Him and Charna Halpern, who was his partner or assistant whatever, they basically gave birth to the Harald, which is the blueprint for all improvisational comedy, where each of your little improvisations add up to a whole. That brand of comedy has dominated for the past fifty years, and it's really all thanks to mister Dell Close.

He's also got a perfect announcer voice, speaking of just the album here, He's got this Midwest drawl that hides behind this veneer of like aerodype but not pretentious. It's a fantastic voice on his own, and he should have had a bigger career in voiceovers if he weren't so fucking obsessed with with live theater. But Brent John Brent playing Keets Romo, Oh my goodness, he is. He's the star of the show obviously because he gets all the cool hip lingo. If you've ever seen symphony and slang, it's an old tech savery cartoon where they where it's a character spouting all this jargon and that they make it literal.

By animating it, you'll get some idea of what this album is like. But Close is the real hero here. He absolutely shines because he's got the straight man role. But he comes off as this guy like genuinely trying to understand this new cultural world as it spirals away from him, and he doesn't ever seem desperate, but he seems like he has a longing to understand this new generation. The whole thing beginning to end to this day is very, very funny.

Evidently Brian Wilson quoted this album all the time. There's a line where John Brent says, and then we'll get you no world peace. So that's my first choice, Dell Close, John Brent. You can hear the entirety of it on YouTube, you can hear it on Spotify. I'm gonna have links to a lot of it, so please check it out.

That is such a fantastic pick. I cannot believe I should have guessed that you were going to pick that because I know how much you love Dell Close, and it's a wonderful it's funny, I mean because spoken word, it's such a broad day finish, and it doesn't have to be someone delivering poetry or something like that. Some in the very staid. I mean, it really encompasses comedy, a lot of fun stuff. My favorite trivia note about Dell close by the way is I didn't he correct me if I'm wrong?

Follow didn't he will his skull to like a school for drama in Chicago after he died so they could use it for Hamlet productions. Correct? Yeah, the University of Chicago. He now plays the role of Yorick. Oh my god, I'm sorry.

That is like the radest thing I have ever heard. This might be apocryphal, but supposedly his final words were, I'm tired of being the funniest one in the room. Yeah. I choose to believe that's true. True.

I don't have any tattoos, but I get one. It's going to be a tribute to this man. That's awesome. You know, you might have seen him if you watched the remake of The Blob from nineteen eighty eight. Chuck Russell's remake of The Blob.

He's the preacher in the film. He's also in Brian de Palmer's The Untouchables. He's the one who comes to bribe them. Your fellows are untouchable? Is that the thing?

No one can get to you? And you took a phone? Pay everyone can be gotten and I'll see you in hell. Take it's a titular line. Yeah, titlar line.

Yeah, I love it. He's great, He's he's so fantastic. Wonderful choice which brings us to you, Heather, what is your first pick for favorite spoken word album? I'm very excited. I didn't even see This is perfect expanding how one views a category, because I didn't even think of Haunted House Records, which I am an immense fan of and listen to year round.

And of course, like I mean, I I purposely not picked comedy because I thought that would be too easy. But you mentioned research and one of my one of my golden goddesses is Rusty war Who's not on my list. If there were not a network in existence on TV, here are some of the programs I'm sure that we might see. First, there'd be Alive Spectacular on that television screen, featuring Lusty Laurent scenes from Confidential magazine. Then a daily drama with sparkle, sex and fizz, starring all the grades of show Biz called I Married Liz.

Everybody should have a shrine to the queen of knockers up herself, Rusty Warren. And that's also a reference from my friend Stephen, So if he ever listens to this, our queen, our saint, Rusty Warren. But Rusty's not my pick here tonight, my pick number one. And this is an album I love so much from one of my bands that I love so much. This is a band.

When I first heard them, it's like it's like when you when DNA meets DNA, Like it's like you you see a part of yourself that nobody else sees or recognizes or can identify. And that is the residence the class the San Francisco but originally from Louisiana. And I often think that few can do high weirdness quite like anybody from the South, because this is it's a weird ass region. And I can say that as a Southerner, but the residents there, we could do it, probably will at some point do a whole episode on them, because their body of work is riveting. It's vast, it's diverse, it's really formidable.

I mean, it's I prolific. I take I've taken because they were on Raco Disc. They had a whole reissue campaign when Bowie had his stuff come out on Raco Disc. And I used to see their stuff in catalogs that you get with the CD and I go and I tried to kind of cause it looked really cool. I mean, these guys and these eyeballs and these top hats and everything.

But to be honest, like I tried to get into it as a high school dude, I just it was way over my head at the time. Maybe it's time to revisit it. I was probably late and I was I don't know if I was in high school. I was like eighteen nineteen. And but the Residents definitely, I mean, it's a band not for everybody, and I can definitely see I tried to get people that was a band I tried to foolishly get people into and it was It didn't go well for me.

But one of my favorite albums of theirs, and one that I think I'm going to say is a spoken word album because it's a narrative story and that is their album got in Three Persons. Oh, I was down believe the bottom one mob. They could stare bottom daily breaking numbing down the stream a followed by some sneaking masks streaming giving gas was doing brown and nearly worn out here, and the residents before this we're we're not strangers necessarily doing storytelling. I mean they have what they had the Mole trilogy, where you've had this whole story about the prolls here, basically the living underground that are very sort of almost like an indigenous parallel, and they end up getting kind of exploited for work source by the chubbs who live above grounds.

Give up never, not as long as never souls imprisoned in the dark life, not as long as a whisper of life clinged in my body, there will be freedom in the hoods. Oh well, Hail the New Machine. They did three albums on that those are great, and of course they did a film that was I don't think it was quite finished called Whatever Happened to Violeness Fats, which they made with Graham Whiffler, who worked on a number of their music videos but got a Three Persons is basically this tale of this man named mister X, who the descriptor online compares them to sort of Colonel Parker. I just view as kind of just like a drifter almost like quasi elmer gantry kind of, you know, Southern drifter who meets these two conjoined twins and that have powers.

They have like tell up like telepathy, telepathic powers, and he becomes transfixed and kind of wants to exploit that power in a car anyway, but it's also legit kind of enthralled by them and ends up getting very mixed up because he develops lust for the female twin. But the thing is, like this album and the twins themselves are very fluid gender wise, Like there's a fluid sexuality. The whole story is it's like Flannery O'Connor meets Catherine Dunn, who wrote the incredible book Geek Love, which I can't recommend. Yeah, drawing into a situation that, with some consideration never would fulfilled and smile and smile, but there was no hesitation in my step, all right, mam, making sure the door was quiet, close the music behind it.

Because that's the thing. I'm a music girl at heart, Like I if you mix in music with something, you got me like it's like roses but better, yeah, because roses time, but music lives. And but the storytelling, the narration. I believe it. It sounds like Homer Flynn playing mister X.

Of course, the great thing about The Residence is there's always a lot of nebulousness as far as like whose identity is what? But I think it's I think it's an incredible album. It's also an interesting one in there in their point in this career because this is I want to say, eighty seven, and this was the last album they would ever record on tape, but it was the first album that they had specifically planned to release on CD first, which that's still pretty early. And the technology but the Residents were always very forward thinking, but technology like they were one of the first groups to like experiment and play aground with like computer generated imagery for their videos. And this is like early eighties, so yeah, and but it's also on kind of a more sad note.

They originally were gonna have Snake Finger who Philip snake Finger Litman was an ambidexterous guitarist, a guitar legend for me, Snake Fingers amazing brilliant, brilliant fucking guitarist, and I do recommend a solo work, and he he was going to add guitar parts to it, and he died and so that was never to be. And I always feel like this point onwards, their career changes without Snake Finger a little bit like sonically, because he was like such a pivotal contributor and he was one of the few member, like few kind of associated members of the Ralph Records Residence Corps that wasn't like under a pseudonym or anonymous. So but yeah, I just got in three persons. I think it's in a incredible story.

It's an incredible album. I know they've done a few sort of like stage productions of it in more recent years, but you don't even this is what I don't think you you know, still leave any of the visuals because it's it's so evocative. This would be as much as I said earlier, I don't like audio books. I guess that's a lie. It depends on how you do it, right, because this is a story that it's it's fucking great and yeah, listen to it, you know.

I think that might have been the CD that I took a stab at listening to the Residents with. I think probably because it was described as a concept album in some way or a story. But I just I'm guessing my sixteen seventeen year old brain just wasn't prepared for all of the craziness of that. But I'll definitely check it out. I'll revisit it for sure.

That sounds awesome. As for myself, my favorite my choice for a favorite spoken word LP. My first choice is an American Prayer by Jim Morrison and the Doors. Shoes they crew in the ancient ones. The time has come again.

Shoes Now they crew begneath the moon and he's tied on ancient lake. Enter again the sweet forest, Enter the hot dream, You come with us, Everything is broken up and dances. Father Malone and I were big Doors fans in high school, and I remember one time going to the Record Exchange and Salem this used record place, and I had just bought up everything I could find on the Doors, every tape. It was all on cassette at that time, and then I found one day I found this cassette called an American Prayer with this picture of Morrison in a beard, and it was it looked different than all the other Doors albums. And this was pre internet, so I couldn't really find out what was this all about.

It didn't it wasn't one of the big ones like Morrison Hotel or Strange Days. I knew it wasn't one of the main ones, and I knew it wasn't even one of the two that came out after he died. They put out two records after he died, and they both stiffed. So I bought it, just signed up, basically just taking it on faith that this wasn't some kind of weird bootleg. Given if it had been, it would have been kind of cool to check it out.

But I bought it in no way of knowing that this is probably this may end up being my favorite Doors album of all time, which I know is a lot to say. But so way before Free as a Bird, when the Beatles resurrected, I deceased John Lennon and put him alongside modern day Paul McCartney and George Harre, even before Hank Williams Junior saying there's a tear in my beer with his father that had died when he was four years old. Deer beer, pull the right on you. The Doors there were the surviving Doors, I should say, did this, and they had already called it quits by nineteen seventy three after. Like I said, there are two post Marson albums that had gone belly up and hadn't done a thing.

But they reconvened in nineteen seventy eight to do this sort of project using Morrison's He had recorded some spoken word by himself at odd times during when we were still alive, obviously, and they set about taking those tapes and creating an album, not just an album with them backing him up, but really took great care into making it an audio experience, a little bit like an audio movie, if you will. And the interesting thing is the album really kind of takes you through poetically, not literally, but it basically starts out with Morrison as a child and we resolved the past, lurking jaws, joints of time, the bass to come of age in a dry place, holes and caves. My friend drove an hour each day from the mountains.

The bus gives you a heart on with books in your lap. The progression of the album goes through his early childhood into him sort of striking out on his own living in California, taking him through those years and USC as a pot on the rise, through his ascent with the doors tight lit Losers and less folk fuck sales with my Militant Dandies, all strange order of monsters, hot on the trail of the woodvine. We welcome you to our procession. And then finally it ends with a dog. It's his death.

But they're using all of this great poetry that he'd recorded. He recorded an American Prayer, which was one of his books. Basically they used they recorded all new music behind him. They were smart enough not to and the technology didn't exist for them to actually take his vocals and kind of beat match them. So a lot of it was really kind of him reciting poetry and reciting these sort of stories just behind a free form backing by the surviving doors.

They but they also use pre existing music. They used Peace Frog, they did Texas Radio and the Big Beat, they used Unknown Soldier. The remaining members of the band still had great musical chemistry. It's clear, like I said, that a lot of care went into the crafting of this album. I mean, even now, this kind of thing happens where you take this just happened.

John Lennon just came back on the Now and Then song with the Beatles, the so called last Beatles song, and people are still kind of looking at that as a little unseemly, like is that what John Lennon really would like? And there's no getting around the fact that Morrison didn't intend these spoken word pieces to be part of a Doors album. He very specifically was going to do this outside of the Doors. In fact, he had approached Leilo Schiffrin, the composer, to contribute backing for what he had hoped would be a solo record of sorts, which I thought was an interesting bit of trivia. Despite that, like I said, for me, this album has really had legs because it really is an experience.

It's not a record that you can just listen to this song or that song out of context. It really kind of demands that you sit down and listen to it from beginning to end, and it takes you through this sort of journey, which I really like. It's something very unique. I think it's a fascinating record. It's even really poignant at times.

And as a side note, not that this is any measure of quality, but it was nominated for the nineteen eighty Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album, so take that for what it's worth. It was finally it was only available on cassette and record for years and years, and in ninety five they finally put it out on CD with a couple of bonus tracks, which I was delighted by. But you can check this out on Spotify. I'm sure it'll be in the playlist. And yeah, if you're a fan of the Doors, if you like interesting poetry, if you like something that's a little more of a movie and audio, a movie for your ears, yes, I like that out very much as well.

Am I Going to Die? Hb Father Malone and I had a period where we were making music and it's doing a lot of sampling, and that was one of the things that I sampled. Was Jim Morrison saying, am I going to die? Over and over as we talked about our first favorite, Now I want to talk about the weirdest we're looking for. Now.

This doesn't mean that this is your another favorite. This may even be something that you don't even like very much, but it's just the weirdest off the wall, kookiest idea, kookiest execution. What have you know? You said? Kooky and I all I can think about?

Ed Byrne Well. We went at to talk about like that song was an Elosi, and that was there was a parody called Spooky Skirt Spooky than for me. Of course, the weird is going to be also my favorite, because that's just how I roll. And Father Malone, when you mentioned Research, my heart jumped up, sang did a parauete and just grew five times its original size. Research.

I never had access to the magazine, but the books particularly, they're Incredibly Strange film book and the two volumes of Incredibly Strange Music Books were tann them out to bibles for me as a teenager, absolutely pivotal reading for me, and I was lucky enough to find it. Took me a lot longer to find volume two. But the companion CDs for these two volumes are fantastic. And so when you mentioned Billy Mure, immediately was like, ooh, I know what that is because my number two pick is an artist that is also on Volume two of Incredibly Strange Musics, and that is a man named Eden who was known as Abby to his friends and Eden and in fact, there looks like there is a documentary being made about him.

There's a really good looking trailer for it on YouTube. Eden is a fascinating cat. This guy born in nineteen oh eight. Was some would call him a proto hippie. He was very much into naturalism, like living off the land, had long hair and a beard, and probably arguably one of the most conformist eras of well, I mean, I guess said he's always been conformist, but you know, particularly in the forties and fifties, vegetarian.

But however, in nineteen forty eight he kind of got known to like the masses because he pinned a song called nature Boy, which would be covered by Nat king Cole. Fact Na King Cole's version was number one for eight weeks. A little shy, I'm sad of but very why he was. Yeah, he was a yogi and just it's surreal when you see pictures of Eden, particularly from this period, because he looks like a hippie, but this is the forties, so it's like, it's so fascinating. But it would take a few years for Eden to release his solo album, which is nineteen sixties Eden's Island, The Music of the Enchanted Isle.

There's a line that is great and it's grand. There's no fear and no pain. We will all live again, and everyone well fine, the ones they love this is a beautiful piece of exotica. First of all, if you like me, I love exotica. I live for it.

This is my just some of the music that puts me in the most happy place is going to be exotica. And not all of this is spoken words. I'm cheating a little bit, but some of it is, and there's a lot. There's a number of tracks that have Eden reciting is poetry with this music. And the track that I would highlight from this is full Moon, which is also the one on the cop But it's just it's a simple tale about seaside living and just valuing nature over sort of the bigger ill gotten gains of a capitalist lifestyle, being poor but happy, and the full moon, the tide, the wind to serve and calm the beach and gather seashells and drift wood and know the thrill of loneliness and lose all sense of time and be free to high cover the island credit.

It's a lot easier to be porn happy when you live in a warmer climate. Yeah. Yeah, if you have a paradise, walk down to the lagoon because I got nothing, Okay, how horrible. Yeah, that's a life style that would later on also be praised by a band called Mungo Cherry in the Summer Time. I'm totally gonna get haunted by Eden Opice's ghost now for evoking Mango Jerry.

But but it's serious as Eden's Island. I think it's I think it's a very cool album history. He lived until nineteen ninety five and he was killed by a like he was in a car wreck, like, so this guy obviously was living living right like very like and just kind of a fascinating cult figure. And he always always maintain this lifestyle like this wasn't a fad. Nobody could accuse Eden of sell it out like this man was the real deal.

And I'm looking forward to that documentary definitely. And if you love exotica, if you love pseudo spiritual nature based poetry, which I have a little crunchy granola, I guess in me more spacey really because I love Hawkwind. But but yeah, definitely check it out. It's a cool album. By the way.

Another cover of nature Boy very underrated Leonard Nemoy a little shy and sad but very wide was her boy in space music from Outer Space. I love, Yeah, I didn't know the album was called that. Yeah, I love checking that out as you should. I love that we're all talking about are you guys are talking about incredibly strange music in research and all that, because I remember it's one of those things. I remember going there was a cool bookstore on campus in college, Vaughn's, and they had all kinds of crazy cool books and records and everything, and that's where I came across incredibly strange music and research the books.

But it was one of those things where I kind of felt like I was the only one who had ever come across this stuff because it was just so like it wasn't prominently featured. You had to go down and find it in this crazy you know. It was just it really felt like something that spoke to me uniquely, But I think we all had a similar experience finding this exotica and all this kind of interesting sort of totrit us over the years. So very cool. I'm gonna go ahead, I'm going to jump in and I'm going to take the second spot on this talk about my the weirdest spoken word that I've come across, and this one, I know is going to speak to you, particularly Heather, because mort Garson is prominently in Yes, yeah, so this I did not go with, was it of that would be too easy?

But what Garson's going to maybe get his own show. Eventually, He's going to be featured elsewhere Asca. Apparently we're going to have an exotica program. Yeah apparently, but no, but this particular and I'm cheating a little bit because it's not one album or one song one album, it is twelve. I'm talking about the signs of the Stodiac series from nineteen sixty nine.

Capricorn's moon in Taurus is the case of the goat and the bull coming up with a horseshoe. This combination appears to be a lucky one, and when good luck produces success, you are impatient to share the fruits with others. Dude, that was my runner up, no joke, because like, particularly the voluptuary track Taurus, which is also my sign. I'm listening to that. Oh my god, the twink is I'm listening to that track a lot, like, oh that's a great pick.

Wow. Yeah. So I obviously there's no getting around the fact I'm a huge More Garson fan and I came across this a few years ago. It's it was music by Morc Garson and script written and directed by Jacques Wilson, who also did what was it of viz? What I Love about this?

And where it gets the weirdest pick is. It was a series of twelve albums, one for every sign of the zodiac, from Aquarius to Virgo. There was each one was made just for you, and each one came with a moon chart specific to that sign in question. I mean they really, they didn't do this halfway. I mean it was in the inside slip cover and I wrote this down, it said quote.

With the release of this series, A and M Records acknowledges the birth of a new renaissance among people everywhere, especially among people who have opened their minds to see beyond the ordinary and recognize the true relationship between man and the universe. That's poetry right there. Just let's forget about the album that was off Eden's Album's so like I said, each well, each album basically featured the same eight tracks, and each one that there was one about how to deal with love from and as that particular sign for this moment is nothing to take lightly. Love must be a meaningful thing and one does not scatter their roses. You move into it carefully, with an eye to where it's going, and a desire to make it last.

For in love, as in all things, Taurus must feel he's building something, or whether you should work for or hire someone who had that sign. The mature lion is ready to assume command. His belief in his worth rises until he gains recognition for the person he truly is and for the values he most deeply possesses, and how even how the various moves affected that That signs essential qualities. But also this is great. I didn't know this until I did the research.

So there were three narrators that basically traded off speaking duties in these albums. Each one it's just fascinating. The first one is an actress named Nancy Pritty, who also happened to be the mother of Christina Applegate. I've seen you Cancer, making your daily journey between heaven and Hell, running the emotional scale, making a symphony of every note, ringing it roun bizarre. The second one is an actor named John Irwin.

He's better known later in life as the voice of he Man in the popular TV series The Librin Has theories on everything, and you'll hear them all. Nevertheless, his powers of concentration are legendary, and when the scales tipped toward the work side, his output is tremendous. The third narrator is an actor name Michael Bell. In one job, you serve the cause of work. In one cause, you serve all causes.

In one love, you know all love for the aquarian has the greatest contribution to make. It is the talent for seeing beyond notion the truth. He is a loving other jobs. Do you know who Michael Bell is? Horslo I'm seeing He was in an episode of Night Gallery recently.

He's in the Star Trek pilot encounter at our point. He's the villain at the end who's holding those aliens hostage. Yeah. He's the voice of every cartoon character you've ever heard. From Saturday Morning he was also the voice He did the dubbing for Peter Chris with Kids meets the fanom of the Park when oh, my god, you need to be careful cat man, I mean buck oh with his scurvy crew steaming close behind, and I do meet steaming.

We are serious. Yeah, he because Peter Chris refused to come back and do the looping so they have Michael Bell come in and do all of his lines. That alone was worth the price of admission. But when you listen to this, I'm very heavy obviously, as I talked about American prayer on experience and feeling like what you're getting taken on a journey, and there's no better way to feel like You're sort of sitting in a darkened room, maybe lit by a black light and the finest velvet paintings on the wall, maybe one of those, maybe a lava lamp shining in the corner, and it just really gives you that vibe. I mean, I don't know who actually bought this record.

I suspect if they probably missed the mark. Probably any self respecting hippie probably avoided this because it was a little square, even for nineteen sixty nine. But beyond that, the music itself is typically wonderful work from mort Garson. There's some really great melodies and great stuff on there, and overall it's just a great time capsule of the sixties. The reason why this hit my list of the Weirdest is just them.

I just admire the immense scale of this. To take one album for every sign of the zodiac and how comprehensive the whole thing is. I just thought it was, you know, really really wonderfully crazy, ambitious project to take on fatherm alone. What is your choice, your first choice for the weirdest spoken word around, Well, mine dovetails nicely into yours. Not necessarily the album of the content or anything, but in the segue of late nineteen sixties new age spiritualism that would take a bit more hold in the coming decade, and everyone with new aging.

You know what goes with New agism. Plants. You got to have plants in your house, right, You got to have green plants. And this is an album I picked up about fifteen years ago, and I could not believe I found it when I did. This is It's an album from nineteen seventy six.

It's called Plant Talk Sound Advice for House Plants by Molly Roth. The first no, I'll say the second side first. The second side is straight instructional telling you how to care for your plants in repotting. Never use a pot more than one or two inches bigger than the present size. The plant is in repot in something too big and the plant can sit for months growing roots like crazy and putting out exactly zero above the top of the pot.

Her side is the important sign. This is the plant Talk side of the album where Mollie Roth, who has a very smoky voice, let's say she speaks to your plant. The album is broken up into plants. There are dozens of them, like the Iron Cross, Bogonia, the African violets, and she speaks to each of them, assuming she knows their personality. So you get a bit of I knew a jade tree once that was five feet tall.

He was fifty years old, and he costs six hundred dollars. See what can happen to you jade? Oh, mister Schuffala, you're going to have to have a bath. You're covered in red Spider Man. This is probably the weirdest album I own, and I will throw it on occasionally just because of the sheer, batshit insanity of it.

I don't have any plants, but it works on humans too. I see. And I thought you were gonna go Plantasia on us, which was more Garson's record that's supposed to be played for houseplants. Your choice is much weirder and much better than that, So bravo. That's the thing.

I knew that there were tons of albums out there for plants as musically, like you mentioned the more Garson, there are others. There were classical music for house plants and things like that. So when I found this, I'm like, oh, you're kidding, because this is something you'd always heard about. You should talk to your plants, you know, they get used to your voice, treat them nicely. And so that somebody actually went ahead and did the recording of the album, It's just fantastic.

What a world we live in. How lucky are we? I'm serious, Like that's the thing. Anybody listening to us you're having a bad week, just like, oh my god, Like listen to us and US three alone, You're welcome. But I mean, like, oh my god, this suxist.

Also, like I'm the knowing that there's individual I don't know how I missed it being a huge Mark Garrison fan. There's individual vinyl albums for each sign Criminy, Like, I don't that's gonna Bedskog's here, I come. I guess, Yeah, it's crazy because he put out there were a couple of He actually put out a single record about the zodiac. What is it called? It was just I think it was actually just called the Zodiac.

It was credited to the Zodiac and the album was called Cosmic Sounds. But it's it's a little I mean, it's similar. It's a little more kind of what's the word I'm looking for. It's a little more kind of chaotic and all over the place, whereas the Zodiac series is a little more like you kind of know what you're getting regardless of which sign you go for. But they're all really, really good, and that could have made my list.

But this was just crazy. Twelve twelve albums no that I can't wait to hear that Father alone. That's exactly something that I would have probably bought it a used record shop. That's the kind of record you pray that you find when you're like at a thrust store or a goodwill, because a lot of times you're just having to go through a lot of copies of like some old monte Vanni records, some Christian music, Herb Albert on a brass. If you're lucky, Oh my god, if you're lucky, you get Herb Albert.

All right, this is the moment we've been waiting for. It's quiz time, and we're gonna do this. I'm gonna I'm gonna switch off. I'm gonna start with you, Heather. I'm gonna ask you the first question I get and we'll just switch off.

So we'll go that way this time. Okay, So the first question is true or false? Okay? Okay. The celebrated mime Marcel Marso produced an album of his most famous routines called The Best of Marcel Marceau.

True or false? That is true, and in fact, the bulk of the album is completely silent except for the very last moment where you hear applause. Technically false. There is an album that exists, but it was not recorded by Marcel Marceau. If you look, his name is actually spelled differently.

It's actually spelled Marcel Marceau with an oh at the end. It was a parody record released in nineteen seventy by a man named Michael Weiner. But you're right. Each side consisted of nineteen minutes of silence followed by a minute of applause. So technically false, but the album does exist.

Well, see I was testing you and you pass follow blone Yo are you ready? Sir? I am okay, which actor narrated the spoken word LP The Begatting of the President, which was a satirical summary of lbj's presidency and Nixon's election in nineteen sixty eight, done in the style of Biblical verse, which actor narrated this LP. Is this a comedic actor or just like a straight up Steve McClean. This is a straight up actor.

They don't get more straighter up than this guy. Then, But it's LBJ and Nixon, Ronald Reagan, no Orson Wells, oh Orson Wells. I have it. It's a terrible album. It didn't.

It's weird, but not good enough to make any of my lists. And LBJ said, let us make war on poverty and lo there were welfare checks fallen upon the land, and upon them it was writ fold not neither should you spindle nor mutilate. Heather who was the antagonist of Muhammad Ali's nineteen seventy six spoken word album, which featured contributions by Frank Sinatra, Howard Cosell, and Richie Havens, who is the antagonist of this record Tooth to k You are right, you absolutely right. It was mister chicky, I think, and he's got a bad too. Boks like tooth has Sadden.

All oh, he said in already read to get your dinner floss and your tooth brushes, and let's start right now. The full title was The Adventures of Ali and his Gang Versus Mister Tooth Decay. It was recorded to raise awareness of tooth decay among children, and it was even officially endorsed by the American Dental Association. Very good, Hey, that album cover alone is fucking balkers. Of course I would know this.

Wow, that is I'm bravo fantastic. All right, it's one to zero fo them alone. I think she's tex first one too. She's two to zero here, two to zero. We'll give it to you.

A truth of true false. Timothy Leary recorded a spoken word album with Pete Townsend during Townsend's tax exile in nineteen seventy true or false false correct. Although he did record an album called You Can Be Anyone This Time Around, it was not recorded with Townsend. It was recorded to raise funds for Leary's gubernatorial candidacy for the governor of California, and it had Hendrix, It had Buddy Miles, Stephen Stills, and it contained the earliest known examples of sampling on a commercial record. I'm on the Board, You're on the board two to one.

Back to Heather, which famous DJ was sampled for Negative Lands infamous song The Letter You and the New World Too. Yeah. About that, I was like, somebody, what does he say? Like, god, damn dead dog dog dyet Yeah, dog named Snuggles And he says it was it was all American top forty out takes that they cut in to like a Muzaki version of I still haven't found what I'm looking for? But even yeah, and they got sued.

They did. They they got sued very aggressively by U two and it really led to a larger discussion over the use of fair use in entertainment. So it was a very important song, really, But you went around and hired Emergency Broadcast Network to do all of their stuff for their Zoo TV tour. How do you like them apples? That's true, Well, depending on who you talk to.

The edge like he pleads like innocence, Like I didn't tell him to sue anybody. It was our lawyers. They got over as Zellas. I don't really believe that. But nevertheless, very good.

So it's three to one. You can't win. But maybe you can make a better showing of it alone. The last last question. Steely Dan co founder Walter Becker collaborated with William S.

Burrows on a track from his nineteen ninety spoken word album Dead City Radio. True or false? True? That would be false too, it was again, maybe I'm taking liberties with the questions are a little tricky. It was Donald Fagan who recorded a song with William Burrows on that LP.

The song was called a new standard by which to measure infamy is not yet no, no, it will in good time, so foul, and actors that will out like murder. This man still lives. Surely he was born and saved, set for men a news standard by which do measure inter me and shame sadly, well, not sadly for Heather, because Heather, you won three grade. My god, Ali one alone should have gotten you. In the title, I am the only I knew that because if you watched the movie when we were Kings right befo, where Ali goes to Zaieir he's having an interview and he goes we mos whoop tooth decay.

I got a cavity here and a cavity here, but I didn't know that he recorded an album to combat mister tooth decay. I think that's fantastic. Now we're going to talk about our second choice for favorite spoken word LP. Because you're the Winter Heather, We're going to go to you. What's your second choice for favorite spoken word album?

Wow? My second choice is a key member to a band I alluded to earlier. But this is also a choice that is a probably the most classical like spoken word of my choices for the evening And I'm a going with Robert Calvert. This house is washed up on a mountain of rain. The night has made us famous all around.

Huge microphones are being tested and flashbulbs blind out windows. And his album grade at two thirty two. This was a him reciting a book of poetry that he had released earlier. The album came out in eighty six. And Robert Calvert, for those who don't know, he is probably best known.

He wrote Silver Machine. He was a member of hawk Wind for several years. So fantastic frontman, fantastic writer like he was a poet and a prose writer before he was ever a musician, but just absolutely captivating frontman. He's one of my favorite artists period I love Robert Calvert. I think he's really unsung.

I mean, I think one could argue that hawk Win or still kind of underrated, but Calvert, especially and this particular group of poetry is just it's beautiful. I mean Calvert his voice alone, he has such an interesting voice because it's in parts, it's imparts. It is very rich and has a strength to it and a quirkiness. But there's always like a little tinge where you could tell he's either gonna maybe make a little sly comment like he's like a little witty aside, or even kind of revealed, like a really kind of heartbreaking too truthless I say tooth the Alie decay thing and still in my brain, but just like a heartbreaking yeah, heartbreaking truth. And he does that both with his voice and his lines like and that takes a special I think a special writer and speaker to be able to do that.

The cool thing, too, is that a number of these poems you can kind of because they're a lot older than eighty six, there are seeds that would become songs like some of them. There are alliance that would be in Hawkwind's spirit of the age being alone, laws to identify even this dog Room that paurs from my pen has just been written by another twenty telepathic men. Word for word, Oh, for the wings of any bird other than a battery head a cloud, I have those laws to identic by of this dog roll that flaws on my ben has done by twenty tavy pathic mend Oh Blood says a battery Ahead, which is one of the best songs for My Money, as well as Robert's first solo effort a Captain Lockheed and the Starfighters, which is a great, great album if anybody is a fan of our just like kind of weird prog.

There's actually spoken word bits in that album. Definitely check that out. And the second one, like as was produced by Brian Eno. Was it Lafe, the one I'm gonna Lucky Lafe, Lucky Life. It's something it's got like a crazy long name, but it's okay.

Arthur Brown's on Captain Lockheed as well as a lot of members of Hawkwin like Nick Turner's on This Day Rock. But to go back to Cintigrade, it's just I think it's just a great It's a great collection of poetry. What more do you need? It's compelling. Whether he's reciting pieces that are talking about other worlds or something that could be right in the home.

His way of telling a story and looking at life is eternally compelling, and there's always a nestle of truth and just sheer, clean insight to Robert Calbert's work. That's fantastic. And I'm familiar with Captain Lockheed and the Starfighters, so and I'm a huge Hawkwind fan. I was just the other day listening to Warrior on the Edge of Time, which is an amazing album. Oh, such a great that's actually one of my favorites.

Yeah, Space for Chill too. They just re released Space Rituals, like this huge set. But to know that's I'll have to what was the name of that album? Again? For the Robert Calvern album since you grade two thirty two, I'm definitely gonna check that out father alone.

Second pick favorite spoken word. Okay, this is actually my favorite spoken word. The Dell Close one was up there, but this is the actual favorite. And let me peel back the curtain here for our listeners. As soon as HP announced what this subject was, my brain screamed, don't get scooped by these two.

Speak up. And thus I present to you Ken Norden's colors. Now this was I mentioned how to speak him? I had first heard on that research Incredibly Strange Music Volume two. That same album features three tracks from this album.

Ken Nordeen. Who is he? He's a gift, That's who he is. He did voiceover work for commercials and trailers. No, I must go to other towns, he said, and he left left us with our new levis.

He was to Blair's vocal coach for The Exorcist. He worked with The Grateful Dead and Billy Vaughn. He appeared on The Tonight Show and Sesame Street. In nineteen sixty seven, he was hired by the Fuller Paint Company to write and perform and produce ten radio ads about colors, nine actually nine colors, and one was about the Spectrum King Purple feels. There's a right that is his, that goes way way back to beginning, to the place where Pomp began, that is Purple Pomp.

The ads ran, and then the strangest thing happened. People started calling in requesting to hear them again, which is an impossibility given that they were paid advertisements. You can't give free advertising after they paid. But the popularity was not lost on Ken Nordine, who then expanded the idea of ten up to thirty four forty four actually originally before or they put it so what we yet are jazz number tracks. Each track is about a minute and a half to two minutes tops, each expounding the joys and sorrows and wonders of colors, sometimes speaking to the color, sometimes speaking about the color.

Seems that green, you know how green can be. Didn't want yellow in some silly primal envy, I suppose, but for whatever cause, the effect was bad on yellow and caused yellow to weep yellow tears for several eternals before there were years. It is a hypnotic in ways you can't believe. Ken Norden has one of the greatest voices of all time. The fact that he's not as well known as my next weird album choice is shocking to me.

He look, he was on the radio for many, many years. He first got sort of notari an when he released an album called word Jazz, which is the sort of proto version of colors that was back in the fifties, I think, and but that's more spoken word like. He was telling stories and he continued to do that for the majority of his career and the albums he put out. But Colors is a little more specific. It's a little more just straight poetry, even if it sounds like pros at times.

I put my girlfriend had never heard of Ken Nordine, didn't know what the hell I was talking about. And I said, Oh, it's this album this guy doing. He's talking about Colors and they put like some bbop jazz behind him. She's like, that's ridiculous, and I said, yeah, here, listen to one. She's like, oh, that was good.

Play play another one, Like oh really, so yeah, yeah, play another one. Her name is Amber, and there's a track named Amber, and it's not the best track on the album. I felt so about it's just okay, it's you know, it's like it's comparing Amber to like the amber of a of a stop light. Amber, from its vantage, winks among the many millions, stops and goes because Amber knows from the bottom of its amber that even made in God's image, even something as smart and as special and as serious as that, has to be told when to stop. You know, it's no yellow, it's no green, it's no olive.

Olive, which are featured on the album It makes you feel groovy even if you're not. And those of us who are maybe a little bit older will also remember that Ken Nordeen was the voice of Taster's choice the coffee commercials. This rich, sort of bassy, reassuring voice that was Ken Nordean, Taster's choice, looks and smells like ground roast and tastes fresh. Curt I cannot love this choice anymore, Father Malone. Obviously, I was vexed by the fact that you swooped in and took him from me.

But but it's such a worthy choice. They a few years ago they put out a collection of all the word jazz albums onto a double disc set, and I cherish it. Flippity Jib is a fantastic track. The videot, Like you say, it's more storytelling, and some of them are funny, some of them are a bit shocking, some are even a little bit sad in places. But he's so magnetic.

His delivery is so unique. But colors is It's peak Ken Nordine. It's fantastic. He's so comforting, even at his most chilling, because he's got some chillers in the early albums. But it still always feels like it's all right, I've got you.

Yeah, he's got his voice is what kind of grabs you and pulls you in. But his mind and his storytelling and the stories that he comes up with. It's completely offbeat and off kilter and off center and just wonderful. Actually, interestingly, my second choice for favorite spoken word album in a funny way, it kind of to use your same turn for phrase. It dovetails into what you just went through fought them alone.

My second choice is a record called Journeys Inside the Mind Potier meets Plops from nineteen sixty four. It's Sydney Poitier reading the dialogues of Plato over a jazz backing led by Fred Katz. Until political greatness and wisdom meet in one ruler, and those commoner natures will pursue either attribute to the exclusion of the other. Art compelled to stand aside. Cities will never have rest from evils, No, no, the human race.

Then, only then will our state have a possibility of light and behold the light of day. This was a record I first came across. A lot of these records, and a lot of the stuff I came across in late night crate digging sessions. I was the music director at my dorms radio station in college, and we had a massive record collection this closet. It would just go on forever, and some nights, if I didn't want to go to bed or couldn't sleep, I would go up there, just go through the stacks, and this was one of those records that I came across.

It was Obviously people should know who Sydney Poitier is or was. He was the groundbreaking Academy Award winning actor and civil rights activist. Everyone should know who this man is. Frank Katz, on the other hand, was an American cellist and composer who was once described as the first real jazz cellist. He composed the music, among other things, he composed the music for Roger Corman's Bucket of Blood movie, which oddly enough also appeared in seven other Corman movies, so I guess his music got reused a lot there.

He was the professor of Ethnic music at California State University, and one of his students was John Densmore of the Doors A little bit of Trivia there. The record consists of Poitier reading these dialogues of Plato over the sort of hipster backing jazz backing music composed by cats, and Poitier simply has one of the smoothest, most beautiful voices that you could ever want to hear. He was obviously a wonderful actor, but his sort of reciting of these dialogues is transfixing, and despite the incongruity of the subject, it's really well matched by the lively jazz compositions on display, and I can honestly I could hear Poitier read the phone Book and I would be just as transfixed. This knowledge was lost at birth but may be recovered by the use of the senses, so learning is really an act of recovering by recollection.

And our souls existed without bodies before they were in the form of man, and must have had intelligence. It's such a weird combination of confluence of ingredients, but it really works. Jazz and Poitier with Plato mixed in you can't go wrong. I believe archive dot org has a digital copy that you can listen to, and of course it's on YouTube. Let's go into our final choice for weirdest spoken word album.

Let's start with you Follow Them Alone, what's your pick for the weirdest? Solomon Freeze all to his pals. Guy had a four octave vocal range. Started in vaudeville in the thirties as Buddy Green doing impressions. In the forties he was a voiceover man par Excellence and show Us Like Crime, Classics and gun Smoke.

He provided the adr for Humphrey Bogart and his final film, The Heart of They Fall, when he was unable to complete the dialogue due to ill health. Wow. He worked for every animation company, Walt Disney, Warner Brothers, Walter Lance, Hannah Barbara, on and on and on. He was Boris Badanoff On, Rocky and Bullwinkle. I Like It, I Like It.

He was John Lennon and George Harrison and the Beatles Cartoon. Look at this lovely picnic casket they packed for us. He was Meister Meisterberger and Santa Claus is coming to Town. I hate toys and toys hate me. He passed away in nineteen eighty six, and yet he's still performing day in day out Disney World in Disneyland on the Pirates of the Caribbean Man Tale.

Now that's Paul Freeze, but He'll always be the ghost host of the Haunted Mansion. Take two from Welcome Foolish Mortals. I may as well give you another one, right you want it? Very good? Welcome Foolish Models, Find the Way Out.

Paul Freeze is who we're talking about. In nineteen seventy one, somebody thought it was a really good idea to release an album of mister Freeze, and I couldn't agree more. He's fantastic. Why wouldn't we memorialize him? The result is Paul Freeze and the Poster People.

It is an album of then contemporary songs, each interpreted by Paul Freese. Now that description is ten lining enough to hear him singing those songs. Oh but you have no idea. See, each of the songs is done in the speak singing style, spoken word if you will, in the manner of mister Freeze. Many impressions.

So yes, you get Bella Lugosi performing games. People play and they while away the hour. De dere aybody, how de oya. My personal favorite on the album is Sugar Sugar, as essayed by Sydney Greenstreet. Sugar Sugar, you are my candy gun and you've got to be wondering what it's crazy.

I can't, but everyone will want to hear him. Hey, Jude, by Peter Lauree, you have no idea how wonderful this is. Hey Jude, don't be afraid. You were me to go out in dinner a minute your letter under your scheme, then you begin to make it better. The final track on the album is Everything Is Beautiful, where Paul free cycles through all of his impressions.

Look, I have to warn everybody if you're going to go pick up this album, the let It be cover, which should be a fantastic cover. I saw the title of the track, I went, oh my god, this is going to be great. He's doing it as Warner Orlan. Oh my god, it's Charlie Chance. So it's it hasn't aged well.

You might want to just skip that one. Don't skip. Mama told me not to come by w C. Field pumping up the wind though, what's somewhere into this room? I love it crazy.

I had no idea this because I love Paul Freese. I didn't know this existed. That's amazing. Seriously, I had no idea either. I love Paul Freeze too, Like, holy shit, it was quite a revelation when I found this out.

Yeah, I think Paul Freese was Actually he was also an undercover narcotics agent back then. I think he was the one who inspired Elvis to want to be Remember that famous Elvis sets Nixon. He's the one who inspired Elvis to want to become an undercovered narc himself, but not a lot of people knew that about him. Paul Freese directed one movie called The beat Nicks. It's like the some and like slightly right wing screed, but who cares.

Paul is the haunted mansion guy. It was an album. It's it could have. I was tempted to add to this list, but it's more comedy than spoken word. Stan Freeberg had an album called Stan Freiberg Presents the United States of America, Volume one, and Paul Freese is the narrator of that.

It's basically like a song in dance history of the US up to that point. But Paul Freese is just unmistakable. We have a lot of great voices represented in this particular. I didn't expect that, but that's awesome, Sonna. I'm gonna take the next spot.

I'm gonna go with my second choice for weirdest LP. This one. I can almost guarantee neither of you have heard of it. I'm pretty certain of that. It's an album called Basic Black Parentheses, a poetical odyssey through inhumanity by a fellow named Jason Black.

That's ja y Son Black. This was another record that I came across in my late night creat digging in the record stack of my radio station in college. And what drew me to it was the cover is, and I said, I have to see what this is all about. The cover is a rather blank faced man who kind of looks a little like mister Spock. He's wearing a robe and he's sitting Lotus style in front of what looks like two sort of Greek arches, but he's gied the weirdest expression on his face.

And I said, well, this is weird. But then I turned it over and this really sealed the deal for me to want to listen to it. An excerpt of what's printed on the back. It says, Jason Black should be arrested for exposing himself in public. What he exposed is not pretty to look at, it's not pleasant to hear, and the aroma is definitely offensive to lofty nostrils ok, and then further down it says Jason Black has been an alcoholic since he was eleven years old.

He has been in twelve mental institutions. He was a patient at Chicago State Hospital. As recently as February nineteen sixty nine, wcfl's all night disc jockey Standale found Jason Black at Chicago State and was appalled at the conditions and which humans were condemned. He placed Jason in a veterans administration hospital, where he is now an outpatient. I'm reading this, going, what is this?

This is insane? Like this is usually that the back of an album is about lyrics or groovy text about whatever. This is all about how awful this guy's life is and how miserable everything is around him. So I said, of course I have to hear this. This is insane.

I am cheese strange ladies in my red cellophane wrapper. It is cool here on the shelf, unmolested, but the smell inside is bad. Can't be me. So evidently, from what I could gather, Jason Black would go on this DJ Standale's all night program and he would read his poetry, where I would assume he then was able to make the lead to laying it down on Wax if you Will. Song titles include Social Workers and Other Fools, A Garrett for Failure, Showdown with Nighttime, and my personal favorite title, Inquisitorial Exorcism, which would actually make a good band name if you think about it.

A Yeah. So there's no music backing per se. It's mostly just his voice reciting these poems. But there's sounds that appear to come from actually, I'm pretty certain like they come from a generic sound effects record of the day, because like one of them begins with the sound of a woman screaming, and I know I've heard the same scream in one of my Superman read along storybook records, like a record of sound effects that they just threw on to make to dress up this guy's poetry recitations. But his voice is pretty amazing.

He sort of seems like he's seething with anger, but he's also rather clear and lucid, which I wasn't expecting given that he sounds like a mental patient, a literal mental patient. But all these years I've puzzled over this record. Who was this guy? Really? Was he really as damaged as it seems?

From the copy on the record and his poems, and how did it end up This record end up in the archives of a college radio station. It baffles me because it's not a major label. It's some label out of Chicago, and I went to school in Indiana, so probably the close proximity maybe that's how it ended up there. But it's a very odd ball. They don't get more oddball than this.

Although I think You're reading to the Plants probably takes the cake there. But I think this guy had some pretty severe issues going on, and a lot of that's reflected in the poetry. And yeah, like I said, it doesn't get weirder than this, Jason Black, you will not find it on Spotify in case you were wondering. I don't know where this ended up or where this guy ended up. So that's my second choice.

Finally, Heather, Wow, it's all been leading up to this moment. What is your final choice for weirdest spoken word album? I had to pick. This is not only a weird one, this is a huge favorite of mine. This is an artist I have written about for a pioneer who I think has largely gone on sung, which is part of the reason why I did an article because more people need to know about her.

And I'm going with Ruth White and her album Flowers of Evil, that swimming side by side, that strange to the use, and this, as one may guess in the title, this is an adaptation of the poetry of Charles Baudelaire done in a absolutely groundbreaking manner, the seeds of what you would later on hear, because this is nineteen sixty nine. Ruth is doing techniques and sounds here that you would go on to hear bands like Throbbing Gristle Integrate, and the way that she's modulating her voice, it sounds at times like she's a literal specter trying to communicate to you from another realm, like through a mirror or something like. It's absolutely I've seen this one pop up a lot on people's like creepy list.

I of course, a lot of things that I find soothing and fascinating I think tend to make it on people's creepy list, but I think it stunning work. Ruth is one of the original innovators with the mode, which she doesn't get mentioned a lot, and she should. She did a lot of compositional work for children's records, which I think all so that it's probably one of the reasons why she tends not to get mentioned. It's kind of weird when we think of things that are creative and expressive that society kind of throws away and doesn't take seriously, and like educational stuff, which I would say in some ways, some of the educational stuff that was creating the sixties and seventies is fascinating and very much creative and artistic.

But stuff for kids isn't valued. But just maybe you should value it because it's literally what you're having your children like watch and listen to and read. But Ruth's backstory is also fasting. She studied as a college student under another composer named Georgianathiel and George He If she's fascinating, George his backstory. He's another groundbreaker, but an auvant garde composer, was considered the bad boy of auvent Garden in the nineteen twenties.

His Paris' debut in nineteen twenty five literally incited a riot, and at one point he pulled a revolver out of his pocket and just put it on top of the piano like he would do. This is a after my heart, like this is my we're painting with my colors. Now, this is so just perfection. It's a thinking about like Ruth is studying under this guy and just she's I adore this woman so much, and I think now we're finally starting to getting there where people kind of know who Wendy Carlos is and Delia Derbyshire. Of course, what helps is Delia's got the doctor who connection and Wendy's got the shining and so that's not to damn play.

They're both fucking brilliant and they're both great and everybody she listened to everything those women have done as well, but also listen to some Ruth White and especially especially this album that should be We Didn't Want Precious because before Ruth there were like a few adaptations of Bottelaire to record, but they're more sort of standard just you know, Whre's nothing wrong with that. What's fascinating is one of them was Robert Goulay. I'm sorry, Robert Goulay. Reading Bottelaire's it tickles me. I can't help it.

But I like to think there's like some version of Story of the Eye out there by George Batiel that that has a Gulay vocal intonation on. But yeah, Ruth White, absolute legend, groundbreaker, genius. This is one of the most sonically brilliant albums I've ever heard, and it cannot ever be priced enough. I'm unfamiliar with it. I feel ashamed.

Oh dumb, No shame, Oh my god, you can you after your picks, They're shame, No shame for any of us. I am so smitten with all of our picks. I usually am. That's yeah, I love my noise juggies. But holy shit, this episode.

What a powerhouse and the fact that we can all like not only turn our humble, wonderful listeners hello, thank you for still listening, and but also each other like, oh my gosh, this is so cool. And Ruth's stuff is on Spotify, so it is accessible and of course, if you like it do I believe the Cities are still in print through her company, which I believe was called They're still around, so you can support physical media if you like what you're hearing on Spotify. So that's been And now I have Robert Gulay stuck in my head. I'm gonna have to fetally start looking for Baudelaire by Holy Canelli. Right, that's the Robert Gulay, just with that stash and that that sort of slightly sleazy but lovable essence.

He seems kind of perfect for Battlelaire. Are you sure this is the casino? I think I should call my man. Your manager says for you to shut up. Vera said that fantastic, So that will do it for this episode.

For the spoken word episode, let's go around a little bit, Heather. When you're not listening to music with your fellow noise junkies, where can people find your material? Well, I have a link tree and it'slinktree dot com for a slash Modo Heather, and there you'll find links to my website Mondoheather dot com, my Patreon Fond of Heather, my social media, other podcasts I'm on which are also on the weirding Way Media which we are also on, including the Culture Cast and Bollywood Cinema Club, which I appear on. I also recently reviewed for my website a shot on video horror movie called splatter Farm for nineteen eighty seven that's really very cool, very sort of like Aready but also art gore film made by Literal Teenager and it has so much heart and charm and great composition and it's intriguing and so do check that article out.

And you can also just find all my stuff there linktree dot com or a slashmando Heather and you follow them alone. Where can people give us some information on where people can find you when you're not hanging out with the noise junkies. You want to see my visual nonsense, go to followm alone dot com. If you want to hear me, go to weirding Way Media where I host a show called Midnight Viewing, the horror anthology podcast where we're wrapping up our look at Night Gallery Rod Serlings series in preparation for Tales from the Dark Side start recording very soon, so check out Midnight Viewing. Also, I have a show called Dark Destinations.

It's a half hour radio drama, not necessarily spoken word, but it is a lot of people talking and a lot of sound effects and music by HB. I would echo as I often do. I love Dark Destinations. If you love good audio drama, good storytelling, you can't go wrong there. As for myself, I am also among the galaxy of personalities on the Weirdingway Media network.

I do a podcast with Father Malone called Night Mister Walters, a taxi podcast. I'm also an occasional guest on the Culture Cast. Yes, and also I have a band camp site hpmusicplace dot bandcamp dot com if you want to hear some of my some of the audio nonsense I've cooked up. There's not a lot there now, but hoping to add more and more good stuff as time allows. But anyway, thank you both for everything.

Thank you for this wonderful treat of audio spoken word audio choices here p for Heather and for Father Malone. Thank you so much for listening, and we'll see you again next time.