Episode 27 - Weird + Queered

Thanks for Hitting Play and then listening to Hit Play. The New York Neo-Futurists have been celebrating Pride all week, and we’re capping it off with episodes of Hit Play featuring some queer queer plays. This week: yellow cars, sex toys, flash dance, fridge poetry!

We ask that if you find this work meaningful, you donate to a cause that is meaningful to us. Check out Trans Needles, a mail service providing free needle supplies to trans community members.

If you like what you hear and want to support the New York Neo-Futurists, subscribe to the show, consider making a donation at nynf.org, and join our Patreon. Patreon membership gives you access to bonus content like video plays! We’d really appreciate any support in these difficult times. Contributing to our Patreon helps us continue to pay our artists. 

Take care of yourself, write a letter to an imaginary friend and then send it to a random address, and share it with us on Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook.

1:54 - tall tale delirium in a big yellow car by Yael Haskal

5:12 - Everything In My Sex Drawer by Lee LeBreton

5:55 - Podcast-Flash-Dance-Interlude II by Anooj Bhandari

9:22 - Organic Voice Machine: Queering the Hit Play archive by re-crafting 111 words for the 111th audio experiment by Léah Miller featuring the Hit Play archive

Our logo was designed by Shelton Lindsay

Our sound is designed by Anthony Sertel Dean

Hit Play is produced by Anthony Sertel Dean, Julia Melfi, and Léah Miller

Take Care!

Transcript 

Episode 27: Weird + Queered

Show Intro

Bouncy chill electronic instrumental music plays underneath.

Anooj: 27. Weird and Queered. I’m Anooj—a New York Neo-Futurist. While our on-going, ever-changing, late-night show, The Infinite Wrench, is on hold for the foreseeable future, we wanted a place to keep making art for you. And thus, Hit Play was born!  

If you’re already a fan of The New York Neo-Futurists, or any of our sibling companies, hello! We can’t wait to consensually snuggle with you once again! If this is totally new to you—welcome to it!

We play by four rules: We are who we are, we’re doing what we’re doing, we are where we are, and the time is now. Simply put: we tell stories, and those stories are our own. Everything that you hear is actually happening. So if we tell you we're recording this while sitting in a bathtub, we’re actually getting pruney. Like I am right now. 

The New York Neo-Futurists have been celebrating Pride all this week, and we’re capping it off with these episodes of Hit Play featuring queer queer plays. You can head to nyneofuturists.org/prideweek to check out the rest of the art we made. 

We ask that if this work is meaningful to you, that you donate to a cause that is meaningful to us. Check out Trans Needles, a mail service providing free needle supplies to trans community members. You can learn more and donate to them at transneedles.org. And that link’s in the show notes. 

Anooj: And now, Léah will Run the Numbers!

Léah: Hey there, I’m Léah, a tech with the New York Neo-Futurists.

In this episode we’re bringing you 4 plays by Yael Haskal, Lee LeBreton, Anooj Bhandari and me--Léah Miller featuring the Hit Play archives.

That brings us to 111! audio experiments on Hit Play. Enjoy!

Music winds down.

Play 1: tall tale delirium in a big yellow car (1:54)

Yael: Tall tale delirium in a big yellow car. GO!

Yael: Dick and Jane are in the town. Dick says, “Look, look. I see a big yellow car. See the yellow car go.” Jane says, “I see it. I see the big yellow car. I want to go away in it. I want to go away, away.” 

Fractal mechanical music underscore builds slowly from silence

Dick and Jane put on their shoes. They get in the big yellow car and pay the driver $200. Jane says, “Drive until the meter hits $180 and I’ll tell you where we get out.” Dick and Jane ride in the car. They watch the signs go by. Dick and Jane say goodbye to the roadkill that is blocking the exit on Route 4. Dick and Jane go “harrumpety-bump” when the big yellow car drives over the roadkill because you can’t block Route 4, goddammit. Dick is antsy. He has to use the bathroom because he didn’t go when Jane told him to go. Jane tells Dick that this is what happens when men don’t listen to women and Dick tells her it’s fine, he can piss out the window and she can watch. Jane sits very still in her seat. Dick urinates from the backseat window. Dick and Jane have been having a rough couple weeks. It isn’t the full moon, per se, but it sure is a coincidence. 

And the big yellow car drives down the highway at 66 miles per hour, because the cops aren’t usually out at this time in the afternoon, and the driver would really like to get back to where he came from, but this isn’t about him, really. It’s about Dick and Jane. You’re Dick and I’m Jane, no, I’m Dick and you’re Jane, dammit, you’re Dick and you’re Jane and I’m a fucking fast car. Burning through the gas and you don’t even realize I’ve only kept you here so I could speed in the high-occupancy lane. Vroom vroom motherfucker. As if we really talk like that. Drop my heart in the mailbox when you’re done with it, won’t you? Jane was a different kind of girl. She kept her money where her mouth was and shut up, right? It’s hot and heavy summertime, I’ll speed in any way I can as long as there’s something to drive about. 

Jane looks up at everything overhead. She asks the sky, “How do I know you’re not painted shut?” The clouds say come here and find out. So Jane jumps the partition and takes the windshield route. (glass breaking sound) Glass is everywhere and the driver’s screaming, “My car, my car,” and Dick wasn’t fully finished urinating but it’s too late, it’s too late!, Jane’s on top of the big yellow car, and she’s rising like a blue balloon, higher and higher until I can’t see anything anymore, my gut’s in the gutter but my eyes are in the sky, and she can hear the little voices from the highway, “Goodbye, Jane, goodbye!”, the way they love you more when you leave a room, and now she’s me, she’s me, that balloon and its heartstring piercing through the atmosphere into the space beyond space, and we’re flying, we’re flying, and we know, we finally know, that the sky opens up forever.

Music gets louder and then fades out

Play 2: Everything In My Sex Drawer (5:12)

Lee: Everything In My Sex Drawer. GO!

The sound of each item in Lee’s sex drawer being set on a hard surface, one item at a time:

Sound of hard plastic object.

Sound of rope.

Sound of squishy plastic object.

Sound of chain.

Sound of small hard plastic object.

Sound of smaller hard plastic object.

Sound of even squishier plastic object.

Sound of belt buckle.

Sound of more buckles.

Sound of even more buckles.

Sound of wrappers.

Sound of latex glove snapping.

Loud squirts of lube.

Play 3: Podcast-Flash-Dance-Interlude II (5:55)

Anooj: Podcast-Flash-Dance-Interlude II. GO!

Dance beat begins 

Anooj: Hey everybody, you feel that in the air? That’s your spirit calling you onwards and upwards to move that beautiful body of yours. Get somewhere you can move and groove because it's time for our Hit. Play. Flash. Dance! Number Two. There’s no right way to do it, but to listen and move to that little beat inside of you, especially if that beat sounds like this, Come on, music! 

Music beat crescendos with a warped "yeah". Peppy dance beat! Think aerobics class. The music picks up themes in the instructions: boingy spring when you spin, Arthur theme motif, etc!

Starting off easy folks, with the basics, let’s get you doing some heel touches… heel touch right, heel touch left, heel touch right, heel touch left, now as you’re continuing those heel touches, close your eyes and just start wiggling your body around as you move, and on 8, we are going to start and spin and clap... 5, 6, 7, 8, spin 2 3 clap, heel touch and heel touch, spin 2 3 clap, and heel touch and heel touch, spin 2 3 clap, heel touch heel touch, one more time, spin 2 3, and heel touch and heel touch, now put your hands in the air and jump, and freeeeeeze, now march, and march, and march, and march, put a bounce in that march, now pretend the ground is moving beneath you like you’re in the intro of Arthur. And on the count of three yell what a wonderful kind of day, and 1 2 3!  Now bust a move, freestyle! 

Quick music interlude

Keep it moving friends, now imagine you’re at a party with all your favorite friends, and one brings out a big ol’ cake and on the count of three a hundred puppies pop out, 1 2 3, and chase the puppies round your house, and chase ‘em and chase ‘em and catch one, apologize for the human construction of puppy mills, then toss ‘em in the air. Your puppy now turned into a pinata folks, watch it glitter!... and kaboom! catch the candy! It’s falling all over your room. Now lay that booty on the ground and make a candy angel, yeah wave your arms and legs you heavenly celestial ray of light, and freeze!!! Now freestyle from the floor! 

Quick music interlude

Keep up the good work folks, now jump jump jump jump jump jump, and take your middle fingers and shove them in the air. Throw your own one-person party, let those middle fingers flare. Now touch those fingers to your nips and imagine your body glowing, any color your want… and glow… become the color… now flash flash flash flash and strobe around your room, and on the count of 3 you’re gonna yell “destandardize this place!” 1, 2, 3, go!... I can’t hear you, 1 2 3 go!... now hug yourself and love yourself and touch your hips and do a dip, give yourself a raspberry use some spit somewhere on your body… name yourself the magnificent beauty wonder that you are, and stop. Now bust a move. Freestyle!

 Quick music interlude

Alright, everybody! Thanks for jammin, happy pride, and remember, your body is a home so be oh so loving to it today, and if you want to take a video of you trying this dance again, feel free to send it to as @nyneofuturists. Peace! 

Music plays out

Play 4: Organic Voice Machine (9:22)

Léah: Organic Voice Machine: Queering the Hit Play archive by re-crafting 111 words for the 111th audio experiment. GO!

A version of the Hit Play theme plays and then cuts out like a radio turning off. Each word in this play is audio pulled from past plays, with a multitude of voices! 

organic voice machine

Quick interlude: Hit Play theme variation 

briefly yourself smiling

joyously sexy

constantly juicy yellow

Quick interlude: Hit Play theme variation 

heavier daffodils

arbitrary umbrella

satisfying broccoli

panic dessert

random teeth soup

cumin moon skillet

Quick interlude: Hit Play theme variation 

ready? okay

wonderful whimsy

intimate princess people

Iridescent deities remember 

Quick interlude: Hit Play theme variation 

glitter adventure earthworms

pink parsley clementines

celebrate lavender window music

hot icicles, pepper-hot dinosaurs

absolutely pantsless together

mammal symphony, laugh? yes

language body theory

excess hearts translation

wonder brain connections

enthusiastic buddy blanket

Quick interlude: Hit Play theme variation 

color space lungs

upstairs astronauts

river submarine

before singing, chuckle

Quick interlude: Hit Play theme variation 

windy Manhattan fossil

gurgling spaces, bluegreen tomorrow

easy happiness skeptical

mosaic rituals, understand ancestors

trustworthy neighborhoods possible

Dance music from Podcast Flash Dance Interlude I plays 

freestyle!

sometimes eagerly awakening examining bursting reflecting thematically

love theatre sneakily, now nothing

tattooed memory

Quick interlude: Hit Play theme variation 

GO! 

Hit Play theme tambourine play off, ends with a snap! 

Show Outro

Chill bouncy electronic instrumental music plays underneath.

Anooj: Thanks for Hitting Play and then listening to Hit Play. If you liked what you heard, subscribe to the show and tell a friend! If you want to support the New York Neo-Futurists in other ways, consider making a donation at nynf.org, or joining our Patreon–Patreon.com/NYNF. Patreon membership gives you access to bonus content like video plays and livestreams. And if this episode gets over 1,000 downloads, we'll order one of our Patreon supporters a pizza on us. We’d really appreciate any support in these difficult times. Contributing to our Patreon helps us continue to pay our artists. 

Take care of yourself, write a letter to an imaginary friend and then send it to a random address, and share it with us on Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook.

This episode featured work by: Yael Haskal, Lee LeBreton, me--Anooj Bhandari, and Léah Miller. Our logo was designed by Shelton Lindsay. And our sound is designed by Anthony Sertel Dean. Hit Play is produced by Anthony Sertel Dean, Léah Miller, and Julia Melfi. Take Care!

Music fades out!