“DJing a Company Picnic!” by Richard F. Yates (Holy Fool)

 

 

For those who don’t know, that little piece of media in the photo above is known as a MINIDISC! It’s a mostly obsolete technology, but the dang things still work! I started working with Music & More DJs somewhere around 1998, and these little disks were the primary sources for the tunes I played at COUNTLESS weddings, school dances, birthday parties, company gatherings, and holiday events over the next couple of DECADES…

 And yesterday (Saturday, August 7^th, 2021), I sat down with a box of CDs, a tub of MiniDiscs, a Mackie board, and two dual CD/Mini players and doled out the tunes at Tam O’ Shanter Park (in Kelso, Washington) for SEVEN STRAIGHT HOURS! I love playing music for people, especially kids, who will dance to just about anything, but even I have a tough time filling seven hours with music, on the fly, picking tunes live in the moment, and trying to entertain over a thousand people with no complaints. I had ONE request yesterday (“Slow Ride” by Foghat, but there’s a good chance I was going to play that cut anyway), played one song accidentally (“Footloose” by Kenny Loggins---people generally like that one, but I don’t), and I TRIED to play a track by Samantha Fox, but the CD was ginked out and sounded horrible, so I faded out after a few seconds and moved on to the next tune. Luckily, most folks were there having a good time, eating food, playing something called “Corn Hole” (I don’t like that name), and wandering around the various booths and shit, so I don’t know if anyone noticed that the song sounded bad. Nobody said anything, anyway…. In fact, the few people who came up to the DJ booth at all during the event said positive things. That was pretty cool!

I should probably mention, the songs that I’m listing below are the tunes that I played, in order, at the picnic. These are NOT the exact tunes that I would have played if it was just ME listening, but I stand by these music selections. (FEAR NO POP MUSIC!) Without further rambling, here’s the playlist for the 7^th of August at the JH Kelly company picnic @ Tam O’ Shanter Park:

 

---Simple Minds – “Alive and Kicking”

---Joe Walsh – “Rocky Mountain Way”

---Led Zeppelin – “Misty Mountain Hop”

---Weezer – “Buddy Holly”

---Aerosmith – “Sweet Emotion”

---Eddie Money – “Baby Hold On”

---Seal – “Crazy”

---INXS – “Need You Tonight”

---Devo – “Whip It”

---Bon Jovi – “Wanted Dead or Alive”

 

[It’s sprinkling on me a bit, but that’s okay. Feels good!]

 

---Oasis – “Wonderwall”

---Joan Jett – “Dirty Deeds”

---David Bowie – “Diamond Dogs”

---Fine Young Cannibals – “She Drives Me Crazy”

---Talking Heads – “And She Was”

---Bachman-Turner Overdrive – “You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet”

---The Jimi Hendrix Experience – “The Wind Cries Mary”

---Eurythmics – “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)”

---The Breeders – “Cannonball”

---J. Geils Band – “Freeze Frame”

---Joe Jackson – “Is She Really Going Out With Him?”

---Michael Jackson – “Billie Jean”

---Dr. John – “Right Place, Wrong Time”

---Kiss – “Rock and Roll All Nite”

---Rednex – “Cotton Eye Joe”

---Scorpions – “Rock You Like a Hurricane”

---The Doors – “Peace Frog”

---The B-52’s – “Love Shack”

---Prince & The Revolution – “When Doves Cry”

---Queen – “Another One Bites the Dust”

---Stevie Wonder – “Sir Duke”

---Peter Gabriel – “In Your Eyes”

---Frankie Valli – “Grease”

---The Beatles – “Day Tripper”

---Vampire Weekend – “Harmony Hall”

---Thin Lizzy – “The Boys are Back in Town”

---The Beach Boys – “Kokomo”

---The Sweet – “Fox on the Run”

---Eddy Grant – “Electric Avenue”

---Elton John – “Tiny Dancer”

---Foghat – “Slow Ride”

---Guns N’ Roses – “Sweet Child O’ Mine”

---Van Halen – “Jump”

---Corey Hart – “Sunglasses at Night”

---Snap – “The Power”

---Grateful Dead – “Casey Jones”

---Journey – “Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)”

---Blondie – “Rapture”

---Creedence Clearwater Revival – “Down on the Corner”

---Loverboy – “Lovin’ Every Minute of It”

---Yes – “Roundabout”

---Elvis Presley – “Blue Suede Shoes”

---Steppenwolf – “Born to Be Wild”

---AC/DC – “You Shook Me All Night Long”

---Rod Stewart – “Maggie May”

---Ace of Base – “All That She Wants”

---Billy Idol – “Rebel Yell”

---Slade – “Cum on Feel the Noize”

---Kenny Loggins – “Footloose” (Oooops… Accident.)

---Lipps, Inc. – “Funky Town (Remix)”

---Nirvana – “Lithium”

---The Cars – “Moving in Stereo”

---Styx – “Come Sail Away”

---John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John – “You’re the One That I Want”

---Lita Ford – “Kiss Me Deadly”

---Edwyn Collins – “A Girl Like You”

---Golden Earring – “Twilight Zone”

---(various) – “I Love Rock & Roll (Ultimix Megamix)”

---John Fogerty – “Centerfield”

---King Harvest – “Dancing in the Moonlight”

---Bob Marley & The Wailers – “Could You Be Loved”

---The Rolling Stones – “Start Me Up”

---Def Leppard – “Photograph”

---Jesus Jones – “Right Here, Right Now”

---Pink Floyd – “Money”

---ZZ Top – “Gimme All Your Lovin’”

---Poison – “Talk Dirty to Me”

---Oak Ridge Boys – “Elvira”

---The Fixx – “One Thing Leads to Another”

---Madonna – “Vogue”

---George Michael – “Faith”

---David Bowie – “Changes”

---Little Richard – “Tutti Frutti”

---Don McLean – “American Pie” [All EIGHT MINUTES!]

---Right Said Fred – “I’m Too Sexy”

---Eagles – “Take It to the Limit”

---The Go-Go’s – “We Got the Beat”

---Alphaville – “Forever Young (Special Extended Mix)”

---The Hollies – “Long Cool Woman (In a Black Dress)”

---The Cars – “Good Times Roll”

---The Clash – “Rock the Casbah”

---Enigma – “Return to Innocence”

---Wild Cherry – “Play That Funky Music”

---Cheap Trick – “Surrender”

---Nine Inch Nails – “Down in It”

---Autograph – “Turn Up the Radio”

---Morris Day & The Time – “The Bird”

---Parliament – “Give Up the Funk (Tear the Roof Off the Sucker)”

---The Jimi Hendrix Experience – “Purple Haze”

---Toni Basil – “Mickey”

---Donna Summer – “Last Dance”

 

That’s it! When I used to DJ every week for M&M, I would try to end with “Last Dance,” and even country-western fans could get into that cut (if they were drunk enough.) It was kinda my signature “sign off!”

 Last year, the event was cancelled (something to do with somebody being sick or something), and the year before that (2019), I was out of town so I missed the picnic, but counting this Saturday, I think I’ve played this particular event seven times. It’s always fun (for me), and I’ll happily do it again next year, if they’ll have me back! This picnic is the only real (paid) DJ gig that I do anymore---not counting all of the relatives of mine who keep getting married and having me play music for them. (I thought about selling my gear so peeps would leave me alone, but I still get the urge to set up in the backyard every once in a while and have an impromptu dance party… Oh, and I sometimes DJ kids’ dances at the Longview Public Library, which is usually a lot of fun. (I do those gigs for free of course. I try to support the local library any way that I can.)

 Okay! Enough chatting for this post! Mariah (the wife) tells me that I have to do a post with all of our vacation photos next (from San Francisco and Vegas and various stops in-between), so that will probably be what I upload tomorrow or Tuesday. (I’m planning to do it as another free PDF zine, so keep an eye out for that!) LATER!!!

 

---Richard F. Yates

(Primitive Thoughtician and Holy Fool)

 

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“Scary Goth” by Richard F. Yates

I read an article a few days ago that said some interesting and odd things about GOTH. I’m an old-school goth fan, from the 80s, and although I don’t look like a goth, I’ve been a HARDCORE fan of the music since that time. Considering my nearly 30-year love of all things dark and dreary, I thought that the article that I read had some very strange things to say: 1) Kids are no longer getting into goth, 2) a. Nine Inch Nails, b. Marilyn Manson, and c. Ministry were goth (NONE of these bands were goth, in my opinion), and 3) that EBM was born in the 90s as a result of goth fusing with industrial (thanks to the bands mentioned above) and that claim is just WRONG. (EBM, or Electronic Body Music, was a post-punk movement that started in the VERY early 80s with bands like The Neon Judgement, A Split Second, DAF, and Front 242. To suggest that EBM is a post mall-goth phenomena would be like saying that TECHNO started with Steve Aoki’s Dim Mak records in ’96. I’ve been a music guy for a LONG TIME, and I remember goth from the mid-80s, EBM from the mid to late 80s, and TECHNO from ’90 and ’91 when it started to spin out of acid-house and progressive dance culture.) Perhaps I’ve digressed…

So let’s take a look at the article’s points. The third point, I think I already covered, and the first point, that kids aren’t getting into goth any more, I think we need to come back to later. That leaves the second point as my primary focus. I think the argument from that article can be rephrased as such: Goth is heavy music by people wearing black clothes and singing about death and stuff… If this were true, then Public Enemy was a goth band. My suggestion is that an essential element of GOTH is a horror. Look at the progenitors: Christian Death, Virgin Prunes, Specimen, Bauhaus, Skinny Puppy (I’ll give the article credit---they did name drop Puppy)… The look was vampire / ghost / horror show, and the SOUNDS of these bands, though EXTREMELY different, ALSO carried that horror movie mood. Manson looked creepy, sure, but he never really sounded that goth (except when he covered a synth-pop / new wave song, “Sweet Dreams are Made of This,” originally by the Eurythmics. Most of the rest of the time he screamed over loud guitars. Atmosphere, creepiness, horror…these are the building blocks of GOTH. Goth is subtle and mysterious, suggesting something sinister creeping towards you in the fog and hidden in the shadows---no big booms or crazy special effects. It’s a mental game, played with suggestion, in which the listener creeps themselves out. And like the old, classic horror films, some people just don’t have the patience or the desire to let the scariness build.

But I think that’s what’s stopped the 90’s version of goth, that heavy metal / industrial / goth, in its tracks (get it, as in “tracks” on a record…) It was too overt, too heavy, and relied on jump scares and gore. It lacked the subtly and atmosphere that a truly creepy, truly horrific goth experience can provide. There needs to be SUGGESTION, like Hitchcock used in his noir films. It shouldn’t need to BASH the listener over the head, it should slowly creep them out, make them feel uneasy and unsettled in their skin. And that’s what a truly great song by the likes of Laibach or Bauhaus or Current 93 or Reptilicus can do, just give you the all over heebie-jeebies…

Think of it this way: What was the scariest song by Nine Inch Nails? Which songs by Ministry really creeped you out? (Don’t get me wrong, I love both Ministry and Nine Inch Nails, but if they are what most people think GOTHIC MUSIC is supposed to SOUND like, then we’re all in trouble.) I’m not trying to be a heavy GENRE NAZI here, either, I’m just suggesting that MOOD is more important than POWER (or black clothing and pancake makeup) when it comes to music.


Now let’s go back to that first point that the article made, that young kids aren’t getting into goth anymore. I’d argue that this is because of a misunderstanding about what goth is. If you grew up in the nineties or oughts, then you heard this aggressive, thrashy, Manson / Rob Zombie style “spooky” metal music in every horror movie or action sequence that happened for the last 20 years, and you probably thought, “God… All that GOTH music sounds the same.” And, you’d be right. That shit’s boring---but it’s also not GOTH! I think the mall-goths and the metal-goths have all gotten bored and moved on, but that doesn’t mean that DARK MUSIC is dead. Goth, as a MOOD, can be found in about a hundred different genres: punk (45 Grave, Vice Squad, Misfits, Crass and others), old school techno (Physical Motion, Smashing Atoms, Ethan Fawkes, Boogie Times Tribe, Earth Leakage Trip, and even The Prodigy---and Drum & Bass is FILLED with horror), industrial (Skinny Puppy, Click Click, My Life with the Thrill Kill Kult, Lords of Acid, Project Pitchfork, Front Line Assembly), dubstep and modern electronic dance (Grimes, Fake Blood, Drop the Lime, Excision, Zomby, Feed Me, deadmau5, TR/ST…), classic rock (Alice Cooper, Crazy World of Arthur Brown, Black Sabbath), dub and reggae (Scientist, Lee “Scratch” Perry), and even hip hop (Deathgrips, Die Antwoord, djedjotronic and Spoek Mathambo, Gravediggaz) all create gothic moods in their music. There are lots of bands that have scary atmospheres in their tunes, and I don’t see any reason to exclude these songs from the GOTH kingdom, just because they come from a strange source. Kids today may also be LISTENING to gothic songs, but not dressing like Rozz Williams or Bela Lugosi.

It should also be noted that even the original goth bands were often mixtures of various genres. Bauhaus: glam / punk / jazz / psychedelic. Skinny Puppy: industrial / dub-reggae / punk / noise. Virgin Prunes: punk / post-punk / cabaret. 45 Grave: punk / thrash / glam / new wave. Controlled Bleeding: industrial / classical / opera / noise. Alien Sex Fiend: punk / glam / rockabilly / electro-synth experimentation… And ALL of these bands also made goth music! (Most of the REALLY INTERESTING bands in the world don’t fit comfortably into ANY category.) Maybe what people need is a WIDER UNDERSTANDING what GOTH can mean---and I think I can help in this respect.

So for those who are interested in exploring the DARKER REGIONS of the human psyche and in hearing some seriously SCARY music from a wide variety of music styles, come and give my SCARY GOTH program a listen. Maybe you’ll hear something that you enjoy… You might even have a heart attack! (You’ll never know for sure until you give it a try!) (People who have a previously diagnosed heart condition should probably skip right on by…)

Here’s what you’ll hear:

SCARY GOTH (approx. 1 hour and 55 mins)

1. Coil – “Heartworms”
2. Reptilicus – “Anal Duke”
3. Einsturzende Neubauten – “Halber Mensch”
4. Crass – “Birth Control ‘n’ Rock ‘n’ Roll”
5. Psychic TV – “Twisted”
6. Bauhaus – “Departure”
7. Skinny Puppy – “Antagonism”
8. Cabaret Voltaire – “Seconds Too Late”
9. Christian Death – “This is Heresy”
10. Liquid Sex Decay – “Everything Dies”
11. My Life with the Thrill Kill Kult – “Resisting the Spirit”
12. Laibach – “Sympathy for the Devil (Time for a Change)”
13. Attrition – “The Redoubt of Light”
14. Chrome – “Armageddon”
15. Lustmord – “The Boning of Men”
16. Controlled Bleeding – “Crack the Body”
17. Butthole Surfers – “Cherub”
18. Hitting Birth – “Happy Just To Be Again”
19. Kode IV – “Possessed”
20. Virgin Prunes – “New Form of Beauty”
21. Current 93 – “Extra Ecclesiam Nulla Salus”
22. Ethan Fawkes – “Go Away”
23. 45 Grave – “Black Cross”

Scary Goth from Carpet Dweller on 8tracks Radio.

---Richard F. Yates
(Commander in Cheap of The Primitive Entertainment Workshop)

https://primitiveentertainment.wordpress.com
https://www.patreon.com/primitiveentertainment
http://readadamnbookwithrfy.blogspot.com
http://primitivesoundsystem.playtheradio.com/

“Primitive Sound System - Update 002: Verifiably Awesome!” by Richard F. Yates

After some finagling, I discovered that I was incorrect about Radionomy not being able to recognize a number of the songs that I’ve uploaded. (It turns out that I’m just REALLY impatient.) I tried uploading a song by The Shamen (“Destination Eschaton,” which is full of Illuminati references…) and the upload process stalled, giving me a little, yellow exclamation point---which I took to mean that the host site couldn’t recognize or verify my song, so I gave up and went to bed. The next morning when I got up and checked the site, the exclamation point was GONE and the song was “verified.” I was happy, because I really like that song and wanted to play it. Next, I thought to myself, “Maybe I was just too impatient, and some of those other songs that I tried to upload might have just needed more time to be recognized.” (I’m paraphrasing, of course, because I don’t really remember what I thought to myself…) And so I re-uploaded a bunch of the songs that I thought failed before, and almost all of them were quickly recognized the 2nd time I tried!!! Excellent. The Specials, Vicious Pink, Misfits, D-Mob, etc., etc., etc…. All up and running now!

At this point, only one cut has failed to be verifiable, the song, “Shock Treatment” by Richard O’Brien and Patricia Quinn, from the soundtrack to the sequel to THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW. I’ve had a couple of songs upload and be verified, but with the wrong artist or title info, which is frustrating. In most cases, I’m just deleting the song if it’s not the proper info, but in a couple of cases, I’ve just left it and written a note in the song’s file that the title or artist information was incorrect.

Overall, though, I’m very happy with the host, and the station has been up and running for about a week! If you haven’t yet, click on by and give it a listen!!!

http://primitivesoundsystem.playtheradio.com/

---Richard F. Yates
(Commander in Cheap of The Primitive Entertainment Workshop)

https://primitiveentertainment.wordpress.com
https://www.patreon.com/primitiveentertainment
http://readadamnbookwithrfy.blogspot.com
http://primitivesoundsystem.playtheradio.com/

“Primitive Sound System – Update 001: Roll Call!”

Here’s a list of the bands that have been uploaded to the station since last weekend (along with the genres that they seem closest to falling in…) Should you choose to listen to the STATION, this is the type of stuff you are likely to hear!!! Also, if you like long lists of bands, you might think this post is fun!

808 State – techno
A3 – techno
Adam & The Ants – new wave, post-punk, pop
Alien Sex Fiend – goth, industrial, experimental rock, electro (they’re all over the place)
And One – industrial, ebm
Bad Manners – ska
The Bad Plus – jazz
Bassnectar – dubstep, techno, experimental electro
Beat Pulse Mecca – techno
Big Face – nu-rave, dance rock
Bjork – new wave, alternative, experimental, techno, electro, lounge, weird
Blondie – new wave, synth-pop, pop, disco
Blue Oyster Cult – classic rock
Bob Dylan – classic rock
Book of Love – new wave, synth-pop, electro
Bratmobile – punk, indie rock
The Breeders – grunge, alternative
The Buggles – new wave
Cab Calloway – jazz, swing
Captain Sensible – new wave, post-punk
The Chemical Brothers – techno
Cosmo & Dibbs – techno
Cotton Mather – indie rock, alternative
Crystal Castles – electro, dance rock, experimental, witch-house
The Cult – goth, post-punk, new wave, rock
The Cure – punk, post-punk, goth, new wave, alternative, electro… a little bit of everything
The Damned – punk, new wave, goth, post-punk
David Bowie – David Bowie did it all…
The Death Set – punk, synth-pop, electro-rock
Depeche Mode – new wave, synth-pop, alternative
Devo – punk, new wave, synth-punk, electro, synth-pop, experimental
Die Antwoord – hip hop, electro, techno, freak
Dr. Calculus – new wave, synth-pop, electro
Dr. Hook & The Medicine Show – classic rock
Duran Duran – new wave, synth-pop, pop, new romantic
Echo & The Bunnymen – new wave, post-punk
Erasure – new wave, synth-pop, electro
The Farm – electro-rock, dance-rock, alternative
Fatboy Slim – techno
Fishbone – ska, post-punk, funk, funk-rock
Frank Zappa & The Mothers of Invention – classic rock, psychedelic
Frankie Knuckles – house
Fulflej – alternative, grunge
Funkadelic – funk, funk-rock
Furnace – goth, alternative
Gang of Four – punk, post-punk, new wave
Gary Numan – new wave, synth-pop, post-punk, electro, experimental
The Germs – punk
Groovie Ghoulies – punk, indie rock, monster rock
Happy Mondays – britpop, alternative, house, dance rock
Hithouse – house
The Housemartins – new wave, alternative
Human Resource – techno
The Idle Race – classic rock
Information Society – new wave, synth-pop, electro, techno
Instant Funk – funk, disco
INXS – new wave, alternative
Jape – alternative, indie rock, techno (when remixed)
Joey Scarbury – pop, easy listening
The Kinks – classic rock, gods among men
Kiss – glam rock, classic rock, hard rock
Kon Kan – new wave, synth-pop, electro, dance rock
The Legendary Pink Dots – goth, new wave, electro, experimental, psychedelic, uber-freak
Les Rita Mitsouko – new wave, synth-pop, electro, alternative
Lionrock – techno, alternative, dub
Madness – ska, new wave, pop
Martin Denny – jazz, lounge, exotica
Meco – disco
M.E.S.H. – house, acid house
mind.in.a.box – industrial, ebm, electro, future-pop
Minutemen – punk, post-punk
Mochipet – techno, dubstep, electro
Modern English – new wave
Mr. Oizo – electro, techno, experimental
Neneh Cherry – synth-pop, pop
Newcleus – hip hop, electro
Nuclear Family – electro, dance noise
Obscure FM – techno
The Orb – techno, electro, ambient, experimental
Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark – new wave, synth-pop, post-punk, experimental
Our Daughter’s Wedding – new wave, synth-pop
Pink Floyd – classic rock, psychedelic
The Postal Service – alternative, synth-pop, indie rock, dance rock
Prince – funk, funk-rock, electro, r&b, synth-pop
The Prodigy – techno, EVERY kind of techno
Public Image Ltd. – punk, post-punk, new wave, alternative, experimental
PUD – punk
Quando Quango – new wave, synth-pop, dance rock
Re-Flex – new wave, synth-pop
Revenge – new wave, synth-pop, post-punk, electro
Saint Etienne – trip hop, electro, future-house, acid-jazz
Schoolhouse Rock – rock, pop, educational, novelty
Scratch Acid – punk, post-punk, alternative
Sex Gang Children – goth, post-punk
The Shins – indie rock, alternative
Siouxsie and The Banshees – punk, post-punk, goth, electro, experimental, alternative
Skinny Puppy – industrial, goth, electro, dub, experimental
Sly & Robbie – dub, reggae, dancehall, electro, techno
Smart E’s – techno
Soft Cell – new wave, synth-pop, electro, sleaze
Special AKA – ska
Subway Sect – punk, post-punk
Suicidal Tendencies – punk
Swanky Tunes & Far East Movement – techno, hip hop, electro
The The – new wave, alternative, post-punk
Throbbing Gristle – industrial, experimental
Trevor Simpson & The Cataracs – techno, hip hop, electro
TR/ST – electro, goth, synth-pop
Underworld – techno
Vampire Rodents – industrial, goth, experimental
Violent Femmes – new wave, alternative
Virgin Prunes – goth, post-punk, experimental
“Weird Al” Yankovic – novelty, comedy
Whodini – hip hop
The Wombats – electro-rock, nu-rave, indie rock
Yes – classic rock, prog rock


---Richard F. Yates
(Commander in Cheap of The Primitive Entertainment Workshop)

https://primitiveentertainment.wordpress.com
https://www.patreon.com/primitiveentertainment
http://readadamnbookwithrfy.blogspot.com
http://primitivesoundsystem.playtheradio.com/

“RADIO: Primitive Sound System” by Richard F. Yates

Greetings Sports Fans and All the Ships at Sea!

FLASH!

This just in: The Primitive Entertainment Workshop has entered the online streaming radio station business! The PRIMITIVE SOUND SYSTEM is now up and running, 24 hours per day, 7 days per week, for your listening pleasure!

The Primitive Sound System is hosted on Radionomy, and you can listen online in the flash player (after a short ad), which you can “pop out” of the page and hide in the background while you’re doing other stuff. I had the show playing all day on Sunday while I was working online, and the program only stopped to buffer once in an 8 or 9 hour period. There is also a “Radionomy” app available for Android, for those who like to listen on the go. I downloaded and tested the app, and it seemed to work fine. I was able to find my station in a matter of seconds with the search bar (just typed in “Primitive Sound System” and it was the first station on the list), and after another quick “advert,” it ran without any problems. So there are a few different ways to listen, depending on your needs and desires!

The station plays, primarily, music of the alternative and/or electronic persuasions. As the sole programmer, I come from the NEW WAVE generation, so the show is heavily 80’s weighted, particularly by synth-pop, post-punk, and “college” rock songs, but there is also a major TECHNO element to the mix. I actually like a variety of different music styles, so don’t be too surprised if you hear jazz or classic rock or reggae or novelty tunes or…who knows…

I’ve been collecting music since the early 1980s, and I’ve been a DJ for decades. My first gig was playing music at a friend’s house party on a dual cassette-deck back in 1988. I “went pro” in 1996 when I was hired to play techno music at a bar in Kelso, WA, and about a year later I started working for a local DJ company doing weddings, school dances, company picnics, and all that junk---and I still work the odd job for those folks every now and then. I’ve also done podcasts and live online radio shows in the past, but I’ve never RUN THE WHOLE SHOW, until now!

The part that I've found MOST fun so far has been making the personal promos. We’re pretty LOW-TECH here at the Workshop, so I’ve been recording audio with my phone, then using a freeware audio program (Audacity) to edit and enhance the files. I’ve done my best Tiny Tim impression and sung a promo, I’ve tried (very VERY badly) to do a Cagney impression, I’ve recorded my wife saying the name of the station and then enhanced her track with some echoes and effects, and I’ve even recorded the stupid cat meowing and mixed it with my younger daughter laughing… I’m hoping in the next week or two to start getting some interviews and maybe some rants recorded to slip in-between the tunes and make the station more “personal.” At this point, however, it’s mostly music.

Here’s some technical stuff / minor complaints that I have with the Radionomy site: (1) – Because of licensing (I’m guessing), the host sight has to “verify” the songs that I upload before they will let me play them. I have a love for old, weird, obscure tunes, though, so a LOT of the songs I’ve uploaded have been unverifiable, so I’m not able to spin some of my favorite songs (like “Nocturnal Me” by Echo and the Bunnymen, or “Take Me Now” by Vicious Pink, or “We Call It Acieed” by D-Mob…) (2) – Every once in a while, say once every 40 minutes or so, the station adds one of a handful of songs to my playlist by some lounge/jazz/new age band, which I’m guessing payed some fee or something to promote their act. I get it---I’m using the host site for free, so they get to take some liberties. I just wish the music was a little more “MY STYLE.” It’s not TOO far off from some of the older ambient or world beat albums that I own, but it’s still a bit unpleasant. (3) – This one’s a minor point, but as I'm a stickler for detail, it’s a bit frustrating. When I upload songs to Radionomy, they have to “find” the tracks, and the artist and title details are “locked” and not editable. Once they verify the track, they call it what they have in their database, and the artist and title data remain uneditable. Sometimes, however, the titles or artist info that they come up with don’t match what I meticulously typed into the computer when I loaded the CD in the first place. For instance, they called the band M.E.S.H. (an acid-house band) “S*M*A*S*H” and that’s just stupid. The band’s only song is “Meet Every Situation Head-On” or "M.E.S.H." It’s printed on my CD cover and everything. In another case, they dropped the remix information from a song I posted by Jape. It was supposed to be “Floating (D.I.M. ReWork)” but they just called it “Floating.” The original, non-remixed version of the song is pretty boring, but when D.I.M. remixed it, the cut came alive, and my whole family likes that version. The audio that plays on the station is still the version that I uploaded, but listeners just won’t know that the track is a remix. Another particularly annoying mess-up happened when I uploaded an obscure old techno track, and Radionomy tried to say it was by Lil Wayne. I just deleted the song…

Those complaints notwithstanding, (none of them are deal breakers) I’m pretty happy with the station and the host, and I hope that listeners find the station entertaining! As I said, we’re hoping to have more ORIGINAL spoken word stuff to play soon, but for now there are a few home-made bits and a bunch of awesome tunes. Give it a listen, and let us know what you think!

---Richard F. Yates
(Commander in Cheap of The Primitive Entertainment Workshop)

https://primitiveentertainment.wordpress.com
https://www.patreon.com/primitiveentertainment
http://readadamnbookwithrfy.blogspot.com
http://primitivesoundsystem.playtheradio.com/

P.S. – This is a list of the first 17 songs played on the P.S.S. It’ll give you some idea of what the station is up to!

---The Breeders – “Safari”
---The Idle Race – “Sitting in My Tree”
---Newcleus – “Jam on It”
---Gary Numan – “Stormtrooper in Drag”
---Jape – “Floating (D.I.M. ReWork)”
---The Bad Plus – “Heart of Glass”
---Alien Sex Fiend – “Radiant City”
---The Cure – “Fire in Cairo”
---Information Society – “I Like the Way You Werk It (Jr. Kain & Ary Mix)”
---Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark – “Radio Waves”
---Captain Sensible – “Plastic Arcade”
---Les Rita Mitsouko – “Andy”
---Dr. Hook – “Freakin’ at the Freakers’ Ball”
---PUD – “Mamma (Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Satan)”
---Hithouse – “Jack to the Sound of the Underground”
---Saint Etienne – “Filthy”

I Lost the Plot a Few Miles Back – Richard F. Yates

7 Dec. 2016

There’s really no reason for me to be writing this…

And yet, I’m still writing. Weird, isn’t it. Doing something for no reason (or no apparent reason) seems irrational. A few “DEEP THINKERS” have suggested (or exclaimed) that the world we live in is inherently irrational. I buy that. Especially today.

“So what are these words for?” I hear you asking (in my head.) These words are a bit for me and a bit for my friends and loved ones, and they are also (possibly) for all the other Irrationalists and Fools and Reality Rebels out there (who I don’t know) that are trying to survive in this crazy, mixed-up, media saturated, vision destroying, big business dominated, dollar worshiping, art and humanities ignoring (unless they’re worth $$$), crap-shoot of an existence. I’m a fan of words. I’ve always written, for as long as I can remember. I’ve also drawn pictures and listened to songs and eaten cereal and rooted for monsters and hunted for ghosts (never found any), and I’ve always felt like I was about three steps outside of whatever reality everyone else seems to be living in. Out of phase, I suppose, but I get by.

Here's ME:

Now, as in RIGHT NOW, I’m a 44-year-old, Irish/English descendant, living in a former logging town (which, at the start of the 20th century, in the 19-teens and 20s, boasted one of the largest docks on the Columbia River, which was used to ship out all the “OLD GROWTH” timber that once lived in the region, but now doesn’t live anywhere because it’s all dead). At the moment, I’m trying my hand at screen-printing as career. (I’ve had other careers: writing tutor, editor, teaching assistant, disk jockey, floor manager of a music store, pizza delivery guy, cashier and clerk at a bunch of places from video game shops to department stores, and I’ve been a full time student a few different times… I’ve DREAMED of being an artist / writer / poet / curator / publisher / et-set-tur-ah, and I’ve made a couple of bucks here and there doing those things, but never enough to feed my kids.)

I’m heterosexual (please don’t hold that against me---I’ve pro-LGBTQ rights), and I’m married to a very understanding and patient woman who works as a “Licensed Dispensing Optician and Contact Lens Specialist” at an eye clinic. In other words, she makes the money and I “goof around.” Together, the optician and I have raised two daughters: one is now 23, lives with her fiancé and works at a vet clinic as a tech; the other is 19, lives at home still, works at a local department store, is taking classes at the community college (undecided, as far as major), and bowls (extremely well. Yes, she has thrown a 300---several, in fact.) These humans are the most important people in the world to me, and as long as they are happy, I’m can be (mostly) happy.

Part of the reason that I’m writing this is because of our current political climate in the country where I live. Our recent President-Elect, in my opinion, is an irrational, dangerous, corrupt, and hostile time-bomb, and I fear for what he may do, both in our homeland and in the world. His racism, anti-intellectualism, ignorance of science (or callous indifference to the damage he could do), and his apparent attempt to return the country to its “Good Christian Values,” worry the shit out of me. Unlike a majority of the people in the U.S., I’m an atheist, not a Christian, but I wasn’t born this way. My father may or may not have had any religion beliefs (he never really said), but my mom was definitely a believer. As a child, I remember her being a Jehovah’s Witness for a while, attending a Baptist church for a bit, and spending a lot of time at different Nazarene churches in various cities in Southwest Washington---and for most of my young life, I was a full-fledged believer, too. I had one of those “student Bibles” where you mark off the chapters as you read through different sections, and my book was pretty marked up by the time I graduated from high school. However, I also started taking “world literature” classes, first in high school and then later in college, as well as comparative religion courses, psychology classes, philosophy / logic / critical reasoning… I studied and read and learned. I read books on the origins of the Christian religion, on the Essenes and the Gnostics, and the creation of the current, canonical Bible. At the same time, I was studying Eastern philosophy and religion, anthropology, poetry, folklore, storytelling, and the human need to feel special. I eventually got my B.A. in Humanities with a formal minor in Anthropology, focusing on literature, cultural studies, and linguistics. Later, I went on to grad school and studied literature, poetry, and writing---although I ran out of money (and student loans) before I could complete my M.A. (I have 69 graduate level credits, and the program required 48 to complete the degree---but I couldn’t pass my foreign language exam, and I was too stupid to just take some Spanish classes, until it was too late...) Somewhere in all that studying and reading and thinking, my belief in the factuality of Christianity, in the possibility that it could be true, drifted away.

Why does any of that matter? It matters to me because the culture in this country is based on a twisted version of Christianity that has been warped by hatred, greed, segregation, exploitation, and violence. The new guy heading for the White House is making political decisions based on Christian traditions (or a misguided understanding of those traditions) that I don’t think have any place in the political decision-making process. Yes, I understand that I am a minority when it comes to religious belief, and for the most part I eschew politics in all their forms (the modern political parties seem to me like warring squirrels in different trees chattering threats at each other while the fight over the chestnuts on the ground between them), but this new era we are entering may cause me to be more politically active.

For instance, and this is a HORRIBLE THING for me, I am now making a massive sacrifice in my life for political reasons: I’m giving up Nestle’s Quik Chocolate Milk. For the last four decades, I have consumed an unfathomable quantity of chocolate milk, and I consider it one of my greatest pleasures, but the Nestle company is run by MASSIVE SHITHEADS who are attempting to steal all the drinking water in the world and sell it back to us common folks at a ridiculously high price. The WORST PART of my decision, which will have a terrible impact on my morale and mental wellbeing, is that the bastards at Nestle won’t even notice that I’m denying myself one of LIFE’s greatest pleasures. It’s a conscience move on my part, and I hate that. I hate that those jerks are making me do it…. Stupid shitheads…

So let’s see: hetero, married, kids, atheist, fledgling political activist… Oh yeah, while we’re on the political front, let’s get this stuff out in the open, too: I am pro-gay marriage (as long as the weddings are fabulous), I am pro-science, I HATE racism and think we need to make a serious effort to eradicate it (but understand how ingrained it is in most cultures, and how difficult it is to combat.) I am NOT in believer of any religions (but if you want to believe, more power to you, just don’t get any on ME or MINE), although as a former anthropologist in training I am a fan of the STORIES of most religions, and I SERIOUSLY wish more people would actively create art, writing, clothing, environments, and unique personal experiences for themselves instead of passively consuming whatever pops up in their electronic feeds or menus. I consider myself an artist, a philosopher, a writer, a cultural theorist, and a mystic (in the psychological sense, instead of the supernatural), and I like to DIG through cultural artifacts looking for forgotten and oddball THINGS, which I then work into my art and stories in an effort to help my “subscribers” (for lack of a better term) experience the WEIRDNESS of our world. (I’ll talk more about my ART in the next post…)

Another fundamental element of my personality: I love music, and I hate when people say they listen to “ALL KINDS” of music, when I know that’s not true. I listen to and enjoy all of the following: techno, electro, new wave, disco, old school punk, post-punk, industrial, goth, ska, reggae, dub, dancehall, ambient, trance, breakbeat, big beat, jungle, drum & bass, dub-step, psychedelic, experimental, classical, opera, contemporary classical, synth, funk, jazz, Dixie-Land, fusion, be-bop, big band, rockabilly, some old school country, old school blues, old school rhythm and blues, funk-rock, electro-funk, breakdance music, some hip hop, a bit of old country / bluegrass / folk, singer-song writers, yacht rock, soft rock, classic rock, hard rock, some old school metal, some grunge, some alternative rock, lounge (particularly “space lounge”), world beat, novelty songs, parodies, synth-pop, acid-jazz, trip-hop, no wave, spoken word junk, some field recordings of found sounds, and even some other weird shit, like contemporary pop and dance. (Just off the top of my head…)

Music is important to me (sound in general, but as John Cage said, anything can be considered music---except rock and roll, in his opinion). I’ve always connected with music, even as a little kid. I used to listen to my mom’s and my dad’s and my aunts’ and my uncles’ records, and radio fascinated me as a kid. I made hundreds of mix tapes throughout my teens and twenties, then CD mixes, then podcasts, then online playlists… I’ve worked at a couple of music stores, even worked my way up to “Floor Manager” at one of them. I’ve been a DJ and music collector since the 1980s. I’ve DJ for weddings, funerals, school dances, company picnics, house parties, rave parties, and at dance clubs and bars, playing everything from techno and electronic dance music to goth and industrial to rock and blues. I currently have 26,478 songs cataloged on my computer, and I still have a bunch of CDs left in my garage that I haven’t “computed,” yet…and that’s not counting any of my RECORDS, which I haven’t even started on!!!! (I’m a particularly big fan of 7” singles, which are great time-capsules.) I’ve written for and edited music zines, I’ve booked bands for nightclubs, I’ve done interviews with bands for zines and for radio shows, I’ve ordered product for the store I worked at, and I even had a special room of my own that I was allowed to curate, painted a mural on the ceiling for, and had my own clientele, and everything. I’ve been to hundreds of concerts, I’ve had friends in hundreds of bands----and I can’t play a SINGLE NOTE myself or carry a tune in a bucket. It’s a type of magic I enjoy when produced by others, but I have to enjoy it without make it myself…

Where was I going with this??? Perhaps I’ve lost the plot again.

That’s about enough for now, anyway. I’ll write more as soon as I’m up for it.

---Richard F. Yates