uns anecdotes
See back in the 70’s the issue of Persona was red-hot among younger conceptual artists.
So rather than do all the different work I was doing under one name, I associated ‘personal’ names with each of the genre’s.
So while in some senses both uns and s.weisser could be said to be working within the text/sound genre, their approaches and realizations were totally different.
So Subterranean was completely supportive of the Persona piece and released material from all three.
LIFE SENTENSE – uns/S.Weisser – cassette – Subterranean – Oct. 1986
My favorite title. It was from original recordings made on 17 March 1981 at Aldo’s on Broadway in SF, downstairs from a massage parlor, which explains some of the lyrical content.
The recordings had one track for voice, one for sound.
I took one to three second bits and over a 72 hour hack beginning 26 June 1981, I built up multiple one minute pieces and then wove them together at O.D.Studios. If it is played in mono there is a mix of elements; in stereo, depending on the panning, there is a real-time mix potential open to the listener. I broke Mark Pauline’s sledgehammers breaking the records that filled the 7″ tape boxes which held the cassette and the brass ring-bound lyric booklet together. The boxes were prepared by S.Weisser using bronze powder mixed into a clear ink base and signed S.Weisser, uns Archive, 1/100. This took a week.
BRC, Strange Girl, and BOXES These three tracks were included on One Foot in the Grave
They were produced for an LP’s worth of material intended to be an uns ‘studio album’
The title of the album was to be ‘Mother Tongue’, which would have been the first emergence of that context
Source material, recorded at Aldo’s and uns shows at the Mab on 8 and 13 March 1980
This is just another example of the support that Dirk Dirksen so magnaminously extended to me,
that is, being able to perform 3 weeks in a row at the Mab
So because of this I was able to develop the project ‘under fire’ as it were.
ALDO’S BAR
17 March 1980, Aldo’s Bar on Broadway, SF.
uns: 3 C105 cassettes, Shure mixer, Farfisa ‘professional’ organ (smoke damaged and donated by Carl Stone), fuzz box, bull-horn voice (donated by E.E. Feder), Peavey ‘musician’ amp
This recording provided material for: Life Sentence, various Magneet Bond and Music for Organ and Tape recordings, and parts of the original uns Mother Tongue sessions
SAYS
uns at the Savoy Tivoli, SF, 12 Feb. 1981.
uns: ‘Vibration’, ie. My name for the ‘band’ behind uns. 2 ‘skipping’ modified ‘VU Matic’ turntables,
2 Sanyo mono cassette portables, Realistic mixer, aluminium foil microphone, Peavey ‘musician’ amp, Cerwin Vega 3 way 15 inch speaker system
records used; Aside and Beside by ‘TO’ (we managed to have 100 copies pressed in 1976/77)
PAST 2 DAYS
June 1982, Martinson Hall, Public Theatre, NYC
uns: ‘Vibration’, records: Production and Decay of Spatial Relations (Backstreet Records), 2 Sanyo portables, Realistic mixer, aluminium toil microphone, face-mask, a long black staff
SAVE THE WHAT?
19 Sept. 1982, Het Apollohuis, Eindhoven
uns: 5 cassette decks, aluminium foil microphone, the OD studio mixer and speakers
(with a different amplifier)
Recording: TCD5M
This was the last uns performance – exactly 5 years after the Oomoonoon # 1 installation.
It also documents an electro-magnetic invocation, which I aborted; “shame” as Anne Bean would say