▀
▀
▄▄
███ ███
███ ▀▀▀
▄▄▄▄███ ▄▄ ▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄ ▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄ ▄▄ ▄
████ ███ ███ ████ ████ ███ ████ ▄ ▄▄ ▄ ▄
██▓█ ██▓ ███ ████ ██▓█ █▓█ ██▓█▄ ▄▄▄ ▄
█▓▒█ █▓▓ ██▒ ██▓█ ██▒█ █▓█ █▓▒█
█▒░█ █▒▒ █░▒ █░▒█ █▒░█ ░▒█ █▒▒█
█░ █ █░ █ ░ █░░█ █▒░█ ░█ █▒░█ ▄▄▄ ▄▄▄ ▄▄▄
█ █ █ █ █ █ █░ █ █ █░ █ ████ ████ ████
▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀█ █ ▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄ ████▄▄▄ ▄▄▄▄▄▄▄ ████▄▄▄▄ ▄▄▄ ▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄
█ ░█ ████ ███ ████ ███ ████ ███ ████ ███ ████ ███ ████
███ █ █ ████ ██▓ █▓██ ███ ████ ███ ████ ██▓ ████ █▓█ ██▓█
█ █ █ █ ██▓█ ██▓ █▓▒█ ██▓ ██▓█ ██▓ ██▓█ ██▓ ██▒█ █▓█ █▓▒█
█ ▓█ █ █ █▓▒█ █▓▒ █▒░█ █░▒ █▒░█ █▓▒ █▓▒█ █▓▒ █░▒█ ░▒█ █▒▒█
▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ █▒░█ █▒░ █░░█ █░ █░ █ █░░ █▒░█ █▒░ █ ░█ ░█ █▒░█
█░ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █░ █ █ █ █ █ █░ █
▀ ▀▀ ▀▀▀ █ █▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
█░ █
█ █ P U B L I C . S O U N D
█ █
█ █ presenting our latest release
▀▀▀▀
r e l e a s e . i n f o
Artist.....: Tony Conrad
Title......: Bryant Park Moratorium Rally (1969)
Rip Date...: Aug-25-2006 Cat.No.....: TOE-CD-83
Style......: Other Label......: Table of the Elements
Quality....: VBRkbps Type.......: Album
Size.......: 67,4 MB Source.....: CDDA
r e l e a s e . n o t e s
An October afternoon in 1969. Midtown Manhattan. A rally in Bryant
Park against the Vietnam War. Down 42nd Street towards Times
Square, Tony Conrad is adjusting microphones in his 5th floor
loft, one directed at the TV set - where it will pick up live
local news coverage -- the other pointing out the window, where
the echo of speeches and crowd noise mingles with the oceanic rush
of crosstown traffic. As the event is about to begin, he rolls
tape. Thirty-four years later, we hear what he heard. And the
juncture, for so many reasons, could not be more critical. As the
Bush Administration pursues a risky military agenda in the Middle
East - one with unsettling long-term implications both at home and
abroad - we see a nation not divided, as in the Vietnam Era, but
strangely complacent. Our media-saturated reality functions like a
drug, instantly televised warfare a new entertainment, and
organized public dissent a novelty at home and a roaring chorus
everywhere else. Conrad's recording of the Oct. 15 Vietnam
Moratorium Rally is an eerie flashback that offers urgent new
insights into our own lives and times, post-9/11 and full on into
a new millennium.
"This was one event that I didn't have to leave the house to
attend," says Conrad, whose recording coincidentally chronicles
not only the rally - an archival moment - but doubles as a kind of
sonic residue of a New York City that doesn't quite exist anymore,
a place as swept away by the tilt of time and the circumstance of
history as the twin towers. The Times Square area, now a
Disneyfied circus of commerce suitable for morning show wallpaper,
once was something far scarier and more radically chaotic. And it
was from this perch that Conrad spent the afternoon. He remembers:
"The street was awash with humanity, but no one lived there. It
was like being in a desert in some ways. The number of voters were
very small. There were people of every stripe and pandering to
every kind of base and debased desire. There was a huge crossover,
because millions of people came to work there every day, but it
was also skin deep. People lived at the edge of the gutter."
The perfect place to make your life as an artist, amid the
democratic bustle. That ruckus is key to this recording, which
indulges the composer's interest in issues of documentation, the
nature of public spectacles, and the deep biological impulses that
govern the individual's response in the face of a mass. "What
quickens your pulse in the wake of thousands and thousands of
people?" he asks, while holding up this construct to a dual one.
"That phenomenon of somehow the abstract voice of the media that
comes down to us, can shape individual reality."
With that in mind, listen to how the two channels of this tape
define the gap between media (the instantaneous leap of audio from
a microphone in the park, transformed into a signal, and broadcast
through his television's speaker) and reality (the delayed and
muffled arrival of the same information at his window). It was
funny, Conrad notes: "Because being there is later than TV. This
brings up the phenomenological notion of the present, whether we
live in it or after it. So you have this situation of TV vs. live,
or TV vs. the street, all these issues of presence. The tape
invokes that time really accurately and thoroughly. It's a big
chunk, and that makes things so much more different than a sound
byte."
The rally, part of that date's full slate of public demonstrations
against the war, proves to be at once poignant and a bit comical.
Powerful oratory from the Rev. William Sloan Coffin (who cites the
gospel according to Pogo: "We have met the enemy, and he is us.")
shares time with quips from Rod McEuen. A stageful of Broadway
stars enjoy cameos ("Dick Benjamin!"), while Dick Cavett and Woody
Allen chime in with quick comments. Leading anti-war politicos -
such as Eugene McCarthy and Shirley Chisholm - take the
microphone. It's a remarkable day in the life of a city.
"People really owe it to themselves to go to these things," Conrad
says. "Because these occasions are such important markers of the
events of our time. The moratorium rally put the media and the
people side-by-side, and presents a very important idea that comes
into the picture in today's protests as well. The media and
reality: It's hard to attend both."
Steve Dollar
New York City, 2003
p l a y l i s t
01 bryant park moratorium rally (1969) 50:52
50:52 min
g r e e t i n g s
1real - 1way - aes - amok - bcc - bex - boss - cmg - cmc - cms
def - dh - disc0 - emp - drum - ftd - fwyh - gxe - hit2k - jfk
jrp - just - kinky - kw - om - rac - radial - sb - sfe - soup
sour - tr - trt - ube - uki // respect to music lovers worldwide
never forget : go to the show. buy the t-shirt. order the vinyl
.__________________________.-..__.-...-..___.-..________________________///.
|.:.MisterX & MisterY.:.:.. \/ // | ||/| ||::.::.:::.Site Scripts V2.0:|
`--_______________/---------___//--|_||//|_||---------_________________/'