We Help by W2F

“Mr McKenzie said GO… so they WENT”

Moving residence, down-sizing, hoovering the thick black roof residue off boxes languishing for 23 years in an inaccessible attic, several of said boxes having clung to my person since the mid eighties.
It seems some things of importance weren’t thrown away after all. Again archive artwork can be married to cassette masters long considered abandoned at some roadside but as it turns out merely a victim of ‘misleading & insufficient labelling’.
A memory is a wonderful thing , even better when faded into grey room, silver nitrate floating away from acetate film base like sugar stealers in an unexpected August gust. How was that sound conjured? Damned if I know after 3.8 decades , full Tascam speed drum machine slowing to a crawl whilst a W.S.B. Drawl gets whiplash from elastic belt drive spasms. Finally a chance to enjoy one’s own strange fruit subjectively, a Tod Dockstader Alzheimers consolation prize from a raffle ticket you have no memory of purchasing.
The fourth & final ‘official’ missive from W2F recorded during the same 2 year beach bum sojourn as The Southern Vegetable Mystery - refer to that release for more background info (https://smallrocks.bandcamp.com/album/the-southern-vegetable-mystery). Final, and it has to be said in retrospect, most ambitious of all those 80’s oxide assemblages. Those of you listeners in it for the long game may be able to detect the fledgling attitude & tape gene splicing that points an angry accusing finger at the beginnings of Wand’s Stock, Hausen & Walkman project.

Zoviet ( or Soviet ) France’s influence also can not be overstated and apologies to them for perhaps revelling a little too much in techniques ‘accidentally’ borrowed wholesale once figured out. It is almost certain that the ‘Popular Soviet Songs & Youth Music’ double cassette in abstract ceramic notched vase/instrument seeded the long-form ambitions on display here, but not only those wiley NorschMen, one can hear also the ferric ghosts of Graeme Miller, Nurse With Wound - spiral insana era in this case, H3o , Lewis & Gilbert in the background, The first few years of Touch Tapes compilation releases meridians/land’s end etc and perhaps a placard or two from General Strike?
Giving a hefty bunk up to all that are Burroughs’ tape cut-up experiments via Gysin, but why state the obvious? Who didn’t have an IOU lodged with those codgers back then?
Enough with the list of anticipatory plagiarists - there’s a lot to sit through here - get yr ENO-esque triangular speaker system set up ,, or a suitably worn out sony walkman and press firmly on the satisfyingly spring actioned play button of Once Upon a Tascam.

W2F: WE HELP….
But you have to admit you have the problem first.

Matt runs the Independent Record Label HOT AIR. He formed the seminal electronic sampling & improvising group Stock, Hausen & Walkman in 1989 and also works under various other pseudonyms, Small Rocks being one.
He has remixed many people ie: Ground Zero, PULP, Frankie Goes To Hollywood, Hawkwind, Peter Thomas, Steve Reich, Buffalo Daughter, Lady Miss Kier, Thurston Moore.

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