Deathranch ‎– "A Prisoner" ( Sound Of Pig ‎– SOP 239) 1989

Former Big City Orchestra collaborators  on the "Massacre of the Innocents" album, also on Sound Of Pig; Deathranch (whoever they were?) had a life of their own.
Bordering on the Avant Garde at time, with hints of abstract composition, this release suggests that those hanging out at the deathranch were no ordinary noise cowboys.A constantly shifting melange of found sounds,porn movies, drones, strangled noise and some unexpected musicianship. A fascinatingly good addition to the vast SOP canon of weirdness.

DOWNLOAD and be a prisoner of the deathranch HERE!

Big City Orchestra ‎– "Bretagne" (Nihilistic Recordings ‎– NhR066) 1989

Bretagne is the Celtic part of France, which was once attached to south west England during the ice-age by land;  and they extended their reach into Wales, Scotland and Ireland .
This C-60 sounds like a malfunctioning radio in a freezer centre(again!), and it wouldn't surprise me if this is what it sounds like in the Celtic mind, for Bretagne is full of weirdo's. Cornwall used to be full of weirdo's, now its even worse; packed with trust fund hippies,even richer adrenaline junkie surfers;and even worse still, Lawyers and stockbrokers with holiday homes. In fact whilst  thinking of those three population groups my mind is producing a similar noise to this recording......hmmmmmm,.now I understand.

Tracklist:

1. Albin-Haler (31.40)
2. Xzintrailles (31.35)

DOWNLOAD the warped mind of a celt HERE!

Big City Orchestra - "Childhood Rememberences" (Seiten Sprung Aufnahmen) 1989

As this is firmly in Drone territory, I have very little left to say about this genre; But this tape is crammed full of dark ambient drones littered with nostalgic melodies from your lost childhood. A soundtrack to do some Rebirth Therapy to. 

Tracklist

A1	Tibre
A2	Genie
A3	Solitaire
A4	Cardinet
B1	Marie Stuart
B2	Odeon
B3	Amsterdam
B4	Louis Labe
B5	Ermitage

DOWNLOAD a virtual childhood HERE!

Big City Orchestra ‎– "Myth Makers" (Nihilistic Recordings ‎– NhR033) 1987

This is BCO as if mixed by Adrian Sherwood and Willem de Kooning. Set Flanger feedback knobs to max and echo box's to variable, this is music in the style of a Jackson Pollock action painting.
More painting references,as this is as much non-music as Pollock's "No.5" is non-painting. Its formlessness is its form, as random sounds and effects bounce from all directions like spilt paint. Chaos Theory in action,and one of the best BCO tapes It avoids boredom like a Christian avoids the Theory of Evolution.

Tracklist:

A1	Warriors Of The Deep
A2	Colony In Space
A3	Wheel In Space
B1	Kinda
B2	Visitation
B3	War Games

DOWNLOAD and make your own myth HERE!

Big City Orchestra ‎– "Substance Abuse" (The Subelectrick Institute) 1988

This one is more or less a Haters/BCO anti-supergroup,or poopergroup if you'd rather.Featuring noise cyclops G.X. Jupitter Larsen(the Haters),and occasional buddy AMX (Sometimes Hater).
They take us on a journey from that same old Freezer Centre again on track one, full of  humming and whirring refrigeration systems. Sending you sleeping to track two,to spend a night inside  the storage compartment of a vast empty oil tanker.
The third track finds the repairs team shoring up the tanker walls after it's ran aground,ironically leaking in the polluted dead waters of the Gulf of Mexico.
We end with the foundering tanker sinking slowly beneath the scummy ocean surface to rest on a barren sea bed covered with human detritus.
Its definitely BCO in subtle doom mode,and,in my opinion, one of their better C-60's.

Tracklist:

A1	Wait Til Autumn
A2	Work A Little Harder
B1	A Soft Answer
B2	Work Harder Reprise

DOWNLOAD some blatant copyright abuse HERE!

Big City Orchestra ‎– "Mile After Mile" (Sound Of Pig ‎– SOP 118) 1987

How to categorise this?......mmmmm?......okay okay, i'll used the vague epithet otherwise know as "Experimental". A broad bracket that could include anyone from John cage to Beyoncé, but Big City Orchestra are in there...... somewhere. I suppose on first listen one would drift towards the Little Johnny Cage end of the swimming pool, i.e. 'the deep end',rather than the Shallow end occupied by those bizarre 'R&B' pop acts of the day. But personally, I find this tape in particular, rather listenable, a kind of avant-easy;the lounge musik for the casual  abstract hobbyist. The peculiar sounds that come at you from all directions could even be called 'Novelty music'.Not unlike those weird tape cut-up records from the fifties, that one used to impress the ladies with your state of the art hi-fi equipment in your space-age bachelor pad. Are they the Esquivel or BBC Radiophonic Workshop of (US)cassette culture? Probably not.....they're not as WEIRD as Esquivel or as innovative as the BBC backroom staff,and I don't think this will impress any ladies,at least not the ones you want to get in the sack.
Better get that Beyoncé CD out?

DOWNLOAD file after file HERE!

Big City Orchestra ‎– "In The Near Future" (Freedom In A Vacuum) 1988

Mmmm,what shall i do today? I think i'll make a dozen 30 minute  drone epics in real time. Thats an easy way to make a 'Weird' back catalogue with the minimum possible effort.
These two sides are rather like spending a night in a freezer centre,with the freezer units humming a monotonous lullaby,and the local dysfunctional Buddhist group are meeting next door.
Everyone and their granny has got a drone project festering away inside them,and  hearing more than one can,amazingly enough, lead to boredom. I'm sure its fine for a spot of transcendental sport in your flotation chamber, in fact its a great soundtrack for any self-indulgent hobby.....including making drone music.
This tape's strengths lie in its subtlety and space, something other drone epics struggle to hold on to.They have a danger akin to a painter mixing all his/her paints together.......you end up with a brown mess.Although, this one is somewhere between a light Ochre and a dark Sienna.

Tracklist:

1. Cooperate With Integrity
2. Handle Either Or Both

DOWNLOAD in the very near future HERE!

Big City Orchestra ‎– "Planet Of Giants" (Self-Released C-60) 1988

Prolific abstract non-music collective, BCO, are more often than not stuck in the Drone rut. Thankfully this doesn't happen on "Planet Of Giants".....well not much anyway.
Two live sides from 1986-88, side one being a cut up monologue based on the theme of water,complete with recordings of  various water scenario's,and some american chap droning on about 'warder',which is american for water.
Side two starts off with a repetitive hammering sound not unlike House music and its derivatives, stripped down to its most basic brainwashing form, overlaid with twisting electronics and mangled porno soundtracks.
The last track is a kind of fairground organ drone track. A haunting calliope mocking the listener from a lost childhood. Guaranteed to make you feel old and depressed.....what fun.
To sum up a rather excellent C-60 that deserves a wider audience.

Tracklist:

A1	Water Rituals
B1	Victor And Victim
B2	An Unearthly Child

BEAM IT DOWN from the planet of giants HERE!

Various Artists ‎– "A Very Large Array" (Sound Of Pig ‎– SOP 152) 1987

Well, I have seen larger array's than this,but its a jolly good array of the usual abstract electronica and left field avant-industria that lurks in the shadowy world of pig (sound of...).
Again it features my favourite minimal composition student and word collage-ist ,Roberta Eklund,she good,she very good. The excellent,and prolific Big City Orchestra contribute the ironic 'making a Living as a Musician', and Europe is represented by the fine Dutch industrial act Zombies Under Stress.
Its hard to understand why a band called The Swimming Behaviour Of The Human Infant were never snapped up by CBS or any of these other awful, clueless ,culturally bankrupt record companies,who are the very definition of Zombies Under Stress. Thankfully there are a diminishing Array of these hideous capitalist leeches due to the power of the internet; its usually people like me who get the blame for 'Musicians' not making a living,when its the corporate nazi's  who have been stealing from musicians and music fans for decades.Internet sites are nothing more than digitized versions of the John Peel Show, magnified.Providing the biggest shop window that has ever existed for underground music of the past and future. DIY/underground/alternative musicians have never made a living as a musician,but there exists an opportunity by playing live......ie Work. 
Another way is repackaging the 'free' music of the past as limited editions and selling them to the middle classes at an exorbitant rate. As a certain  German based re-issue label does,and seems to feel free to slag me off,and others,  using my pseudonym in certain public communication forums,setting himself up as some kind of Tape collecting Jesus. We're doing the same thing except we don't do it for money,and put ourselves on a pedestal for doing it.
How talking about a band called 'the Swimming Behaviour Of the Human Infant' led to this rant I have no idea, so apologies to all.....except Herr Maier who seems to share the same traits as thee most famous German/ Austrian ever......altogether now, "FEGELEIN!" (if you've seen Downfall that is.)Or in this case......ZCHIVAGOOOOOO!

DOWNLOAD from a small array of download host choices HERE!

Big City Orchestra & Deathranch ‎– "Massacre Of The Innocents" (Sound Of Pig ‎– SOP 39) 1985

Is this BCO's first appearance? And one might have guessed it would be on the home of "Other" music, Al Margolis's Sound of Pig label. More noisier old skool industrial version of otherness on this tape,but just as 'out there' as 'normal',with lots of unexpected non linear invention from outside the shoebox.
These guys must have been rich, or in some well paid jobs or something, 'cus they seem to own at least one Emulator, which in 1984/5 cost a packet! This marks them down one point as i'm a from the 'Politics of Envy' side of the spectrum, as the 'Daily Mail' would label it; but they get a bonus point as money usually destroys creativity,and I see no lack of creativity here.Maybe they were honest and poor after all,and lived in squats to invest their begging money in Emu Systems latest tech? Who cares, its a great tape.

Tracklist:

A1	Blue Note, Blue Noise
A2	Tu Pa Pa Au
A3	Cannibals
A4	Iron Works
A5	Cerebral Edema
A6	Blind Bat
A7	Warsaw
B1	Burial
B2	Norwahl
B3	Whatever You Want
B4	Relax
B5	YAMC (Yet Another Madonna Clone)
B6	For We Love No One
B7	Womyns Muzik
B8	Education
B9	Biting Through

DOWNLOAD of the innocents HERE!

Big City Orchestra ‎– "Arph, Arph, Arph" (A.R.P.H. Tapes ‎– AT # 012) 1985

Usually I have some kind of loose theme for my posts, but recent events have fucked up my mind-track. So i'm just gonna do random selections from the category known on iTunes as “Other”.

Its a prestige pigeon-hole to be sorted into, one the straights have invented to put artists that cannot be pigeon-holed.

Such an act is the prolific Big City Orchestra,who have a back catalogue the size of the Welwyn Garden City phone book. Another category this combo usually gets lumbered with, is “Experimental”. Which is an adequate adjective for this highly inventive uncategorisable otherness.

It contains a virtual anthem for our times in “Child Abuse”, with found dialogue that both exposes the attitudes to under age exploitation and the accusing finger of peado-paranoia of the 21^st century. Almost a foot tapper.

Tracklist:

A1	White Sale	3:16
A2	Child Abuse	4:36
A3	Sex Dance	4:04
A4	Chimes Video	3:56
A5	Wolf Boy Eyes	2:36
B1	I Turned It Off	2:06
B2	Tax Talk	4:29
B3	Commercial	4:20
B4	Spidey Ub's Out	4:26
B5	Fuzzy Wuzzy	5:30

DOWNLOAD, oooh, not'arph,HERE!