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Rhys Chatham
Jonathan Kane’s February
Megafaun
Paul Duncan
Collections of Colonies of Bees
Neptune
Ateleia
School of Seven Bells
+
Belong
Melissa St. Pierre (Japan)
Impala Eardrums: A Radium Sampler
2008

Radium/Table of the Elements
TOE-CD-812/TOE-LP-812
Compact disc, poster, video
Phono LP, white vinyl, 2x posters

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Astride a Sound

TO BE A SOUTHERNER — a white Southerner, at least — is to forever straddle an endless dividing line, one that separates competing contradictions and incompatible juxtapositions: past and present; city and country; us and them. Proponents of the Stars and Bars love to say of their beloved banner, "It's heritage, not hate," but even they know the truth: It's both. Synthesis and accretion. That's what it's all about. Just ask the archetypical Southern Man, Ronnie van Zandt. He'll answer you silently from beyond the grave, within any one of the dozens of photographs in which he proudly wears a Tonight's the Night shirt tight across his compact, barreled chest. It's both.

Paul Duncan hails from the edge of the Piney Woods region of East Texas, where that state begins its lazy, humid segue into Louisiana. He lives in the sub- and pan-cultural particle accelerator that is New York City. And as a singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, he is one of the most versatile and forward-thinking talents you're likely to encounter.

In the foreground of Paul's music you'll hear his lilting, intricate guitar and piano work. The songsmithing is bold and confident; often melancholic, sometimes exuberant, and occasionally—and this is the sign of true inspiration—both at the same time.  It's reminiscent of some of the great rebel songwriting of the late 1960s and 1970s. Lyrically, he observes brief moments from the woods, lakes, highways and tousled beds of a private America, opaque aural Polaroids that fade first and ask questions later. All around is the reassuring presence of slide and steel guitars, emblematic of the South for just about the entire 20th century.

Listen. Then listen closer. Enveloping Paul's work is a subtle cloak of very modern, very sophisticated experimental composition. Duncan isn't simply a brilliant singer/songwriter for the what's-analog? age; he's a brilliant singer/songwriter who is aggressively subsuming the most vital and vivid elements of today's avant-garde scene into the traditions of raw Americana, a.k.a. Southern music. Surrounding himself with an extraordinarily gifted and prominent group of musicians, improvisers and composers, Duncan incorporates elements of free improvisation, laptop sheen, and good-ol' electronica grit, and does so seamlessly. His subtlety and finesse approach that of mid-90s era Jim O'Rourke, yet he never diverts the listener's attention from the song itself.

And that voice.

It's a doleful tenor, pure like black, tannin-rich swamp water, undulating slowly in the cypress shade. It's a voice in which a man can drown his sorrows in brotherly commiseration, and a woman can—well, it's a voice in which a woman can float adrift in languid caress.

Paul Duncan's creative accomplishments are incontrovertible, but just what is his music? Is it avant-garde innovation or 70s-era rock? Is it beholden to Southern roots or a cosmopolitan milieu? Is it the sound of a dirge, or a paean?  

It's dusk. Maybe you're on a Brooklyn rooftop, Manhattan lights twinkling in the distance; maybe you're deep in the East Texas woods, fireflies pulsating in slow, spasmodic flight. Either way. Lie down, close your eyes, open your ears, and listen. Absorb. The coarse, mechanized rasp of the frogs and crickets; the gentle murmur of the cars and trucks as they float across the sky along the Williamsburg Bridge? They all know the answer.

It's both.


Milwaukee, Wisconsin
July 2007
 

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OWN THE ARCHIVE

(Posted by Within Things, May 18, 2023)

From 1993, US recording label Table of the Elements has staked its claim on a massive enterprise. It intends nothing less than to rewrite the history of American music in the second half of the 20th century. The label’s 150-plus releases are a vital contemporary chronicle, a survey of meaningful eruptions across a broad horizon of improvised, experimental, minimal and outsider sounds.

The label’s carefully cultivated archive now contains over 15,000 CDs and LPs, an impossible quantity to logistically or financially maintain. Rather than “recycle” the majority of these modern sound and design artifacts, Table of the Elements is making them available to the public via Within Things.

From rich bundles of obscure recordings, exclusive printed material, and limited quantity “holy grails,” Within Things is excited to help connect this important archive to the public. We’re very honored to collaborate with a label that helped define a path and inspire what we do, long before our store even existed.

Click the image above to be taken directly to the Table of the Elements section on our site, and stay posted for the announcement of limited offerings via our newsletter.

~~o0o~~

"The supremacy of Table of the Elements as an unwavering outpost of ultra-experimental strains can be attributed to its concomitant adherence to valiance. Most of the Table of the Elements catalog has no broad commercial appeal, and many of its projects are risky ventures, even with respect to the experimental marketplace. Yet, this philosophy of risk works because everybody associated with the label feels like they're doing important work releasing important records, and they're willing to go for broke to make it happen.”

—Pitchfork

"The music made and cultivated by such artists as Tony Conrad, Captain Beefheart, John Fahey, Cecil Taylor, Rhys Chatham, Charlie Feathers, Dock Boggs, Jim O’Rourke, Faust, Derek Bailey, Thurston Moore and Lee Ranaldo of Sonic Youth, Keiji Haino, Arnold Dreyblatt, Charley Patton, Harry Smith, and scores more, is at once among the most radical and deeply rooted of the 20th century, transcending time and place through the agency of the vibrating string, the resonance of the drone, the terrifying beauty of electric amplification, the hypnotic power of repetition, and the revelatory genius of cranky individualism. 

"How does someone begin to represent that in a visual manner? The trick involves some old-fashioned alchemy. Everyday commodity has to be constructed as both miniature museum and theater. No longer a mere object, it now becomes a site in which one can endlessly indulge a sense of wonder, love and, yes, obsession. It’s not often that someone can cast an influence on a broader design aesthetic — think Blue Note in the 1960s, with its hip Reid Miles album covers — but as this sizable body of work took shape, that’s exactly what happened.”

—Steve Dollar

“The hallmarks of this New Archivism [are] beautiful and innovative packaging, elaborate and idiosyncratic liner notes, rare and obscure recordings ... Working with graphic designers such as the Grammy-winning Susan Archie, [the label] produced a collection that combines varied textures, lavish finishes, and period details with art from the era of the original source recordings. Their treatment of Robert Longo’s late 1970s photographs for Rhys Chatham’s releases could, for instance, measure up to what’s on view at most contemporary art centers. In addition to its archival endeavor, TotE also releases the new work of its avant-garde heroes and their devotees. TotE’s active support of the work of sonic pioneers ensures that theirs are living traditions – not ossified museum objects.”

—Art Papers

Tony Conrad: Completely In the Present
A Film by Tyler Hubby

"Hubby's film captures Conrad in all his facets ... broadly as a man determined to make 'abstract art funny, happy, energetic, joyful.' Conrad lived long enough to see his early recordings, barely or never released, get the reissue and the attention they deserve. ... [Completely In the Present] is a sharp, sweet, eloquent documentary about the merriest, most artistically expansive minimalist on record. His work and his life asserted the importance of listening for the sounds nobody else has heard."

—Chicago Tribune

“Joyous, exhilarating, and transformative, Tyler Hubby’s documentary is essential viewing for anyone involved in the history of music and visual art.”

—Artforum

"Conrad was 100 percent badass. Without Tyler Hubby’s documentary and Table of the Elements ... one of the great stories of American music and art might have gone underappreciated.”

—Henry Rollins

All contents ©2024 Table of the Elements ®2024 Table of the Elements Archive. All Rights Reserved. Related media from the Table of the Elements Archive published courtesy the estate of Tony Conrad.

Since 1993, Table of the Elements has staked its claim on a massive enterprise. It intends nothing less than to rewrite the history of American music in the second half of the 20th century -- and beyond. The label’s 150-plus releases are a vital contemporary chronicle, a survey of meaningful eruptions across a broad horizon of improvised, experimental, minimal and outsider sounds.

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