I’ve written extensively about Everyday Samething on the site, so there’s little I could say here that I haven’t already said… other than that 2024 is almost over and they’re still killing it. In love with this new batch.
Unknown Artist – James Blunt Documentary
Have you seen the new James Blunt documentary? Yes, it’s a documentary about English singer-songwriter James Blunt. Yes, the guy who did “You’re Beautiful.” Yes, I could think of a few things your hour and a half might be better spent on. For example, you could play this single-sided cassette called James Blunt Documentary four times (with room for rewinds). No, it’s not just remixes of “You’re Beautiful” (as far as I know). Yes, it’s an ambiguous glitch-strewn nightmare, structured around warped digital noise that twists and shivers with all the anxiety of a 21st-century pop culture enthusiast. Yes, the man himself makes an appearance in the form of a muffled, awkward interview, likely an excerpt from the documentary itself—if you weren’t aware, Blunt is classically trained in the obscure ancient tradition known as “self-deprecating humor.” Yes, it is yet another superb anonymous entry in the Everyday Samething catalog that blends analog obscurity with internet-era despair. No, you won’t regret listening to it. Yes, you will regret being born.
Belisimo – The Release Is Printed on an Edition of One Custom Thimble
Going off precedent, the title of this new work from Belisimo could very well be an actual fact, but what’s more subversive than subverting subversion? Ironically, an unhearable anti-music object version (à la Seth Cooke’s Selected Works concrete cube, perhaps) would be less of an affront than whatever this is. Buried somewhere at the center of this loathsome web of half-formed textures is the human voice, but that knowledge alone isn’t enough to affirm it as reality. Beneath communication breakdown lies communication death. “The sensation of suddenly realising you have wet hair in a public place.” Singing is no more artful, no less useless than sighing. The synth-soaked kitsch of Tears for Fears’ “Mad World” lands somewhere between embarrassing faux pas and repulsive taboo in the context of abject nonsense. Scrabble and scrape, mutter and melt… it feels both too long and too short. The Release Is Printed on an Edition of One Custom Thimble.
Noise Not Music 