Episode 43 Getting Under Your Skin
Episode 43 Getting Under Your Skin
Thanks for Hitting Play and then listening to Hit Play. This episode: mosquito songs, lions & cows, whistling pals, broadway words!
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, walk backwards all week as a durational performance piece, and share it with us on Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook.
1:22 - a tiny lullabye for my midnight mosquito enemies by Colin Summers
2:37 - I got eyes on the back of my butt! by Anooj Bhandari
5:20 - Put your lips together by Anthony Sertel Dean featuring the whistlers
7:20 - A Broadway of the Mind (with apologies to Mr. Larson) by Cecil Baldwin
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 43 Getting Under Your Skin
Show Intro
Swoopy space age electronic instrumental music plays underneath.
Julia: 43. Getting Under Your Skin. I’m Julia Melfi—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. So we made this podcast!
If you’re already a fan of The New York Neo-Futurists, or any of our sibling companies, hello there! We can’t wait to play spin the bottle with you. 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.
Julia sounds far away, dishes clink
So if we tell you we're recording this part while putting away our dishes, we're really recording this part while putting away our dishes!
Julia: And now, Colin will Run the Numbers!
Colin: Hi, I’m Colin, a New York Neo-Futurist alum.
In this episode we’re bringing you 4 plays. The first is by me, Colin Summers. The second is by Anooj Bhandari. The third is by Anthony Sertel Dean featuring the whistlers. And the last one's by Cecil Baldwin.
That brings us to 165 audio experiments on Hit Play. Enjoy!
Music winds down.
Play 1: a tiny lullabye for my midnight mosquito enemies (1:22)
Colin: a tiny lullabye for my midnight mosquito enemies. GO!
Buzzing sound/stylized music. Colin sings into a microphone which has it’s pitch altered by octave generator pedal.
Colin: goodnight my dear though i can’t see you
I know you are near to me as I sleep
soon you’ll feast upon my body
and I’ll wake up in a rage as you eat
I’ll know you’ve been visiting because
I’ll find your little bites on my face and neck
and one time, on both of my eyelids
and then i will come and kill you
smash your body on the wall and I’ll laugh
as my blood pours out your body
Music cuts out
like all those before you
Goodnight!
Play 2: I got eyes on the back of my butt! (2:37)
Anooj: I got eyes on the back of my butt! GO!
Subtle underscore, sound effects amplify words
Anooj: Quote. “Lions help maintain balance in their ecosystems, but they also kill cattle.” End quote.
Lion growls
When I was in my first year of high school, I had gym class with the juniors and seniors, and this one guy used to sack and zip tie my bookbag every week after I changed out of my clothes to start the laps at the top of class. For those of you unfamiliar with the classic sack and zip tie, sacking a bag is when you empty it, turn it inside out, and then repack it, while zip ties, are well, just your typical zip ties that you need to find scissors to cut off, but in this prank, all the zippers get tied together so that the only way for a first year high schooler who had to use a hand me down gym uniform to get them off post gym class would be to walk through the halls in tiny green shorts that were a little too tight with a sacked backpack until finding a teacher whose scissors could be used to cut open the zip ties.
Quote. “The big cats are ambush predators who depend on the element of surprise.” End Quote.
Lion roars
I was a good enough kid in high school, good enough that I could get away with most things with a little explaining, and so one thing I frequently did, or increasingly did, was skip classes I didn’t want to go to. One day, after being sacked, yet again, and I did my own work over night… got a hold of a pack of zip ties. I skipped gym class that next day, but hid in the locker room, and while the senior boys were out hitting each other with balls, I one-by-one sacked a handful of their bags before sneaking out of the locker room and back out into the hallway.
Quote: “In an experiment, eyes painted on cow backsides appear to deter lions from attacking.” End Quote.
Cow noise
That’s it. My roommate said she couldn’t believe this act in the same ethos of looney tunes comedy was the simple solution they were looking for. They tried to remove the element of surprise from the experience of the lions and that was good enough to make it seem like their prey was not worth attacking anymore.
Now, this article is certainly fodder for larger metaphors on prey and predator in society and changing dynamics of these relationships, but today, I use this as a chance to revisit a prank that I’m pretty proud of. After that day I sacked the senior boys’ backpacks, none of us freshmen were ever sacked again. Those who prey can stick around. You play out in our ecosystem, thrive off the element of shock. But don’t forget… We got eyes on the back of our butts… and we are watching you.
Music plays out. Cow moos.
Play 3: Put your lips together (5:20)
Anthony: Put your lips together. GO!
Anthony: A-1, 2, 3, 4!
Collection of whistlers (attempt to) whistle Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies
Eventually, some of the original music builds underneath whistlers and crescendos and the fades back out.
We hear a collage of "oh my god that was so high at the end" and "well there ya go" "thank you" "my cheeks are sore" and other reactions to the whistling
Play 4: A Broadway of the Mind (7:20)
Cecil: A Broadway of the Mind (with apologies to Mr. Larson). GO!
A layering experiment including the following:
Actor humming La Vie Boheme from the musical Rent
Read text, Notes on Camp by Susan Sontag
Read text, lyrics to Mr Goldstone from Gypsy
Read text, definition of cannibalism
Read text, Kaddish by Alan Ginsberg
Read text, In my craft or sullen art by Dylan Thomas *CB: Larson probably meant Bob Dylan, but fuck it, I like Dylan Thomas more*
Read text, Merce Cummingham on creating dance with Cage and the I Ching
Read text, Lenny Bruce obscenity charges by City of New York
Read text, Good Morning by Langston Hughes
The layering text fades out
Cecil: To. The. Stage. Curtain.
Show Outro
Wooshy electronic instrumental music plays underneath.
Julia: 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, walk backwards all week as a durational performance piece, and share it with us on Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook.
This episode featured work by: Colin Summers, Anooj Bhandari, Anthony Sertel Dean featuring the whistlers, and Cecil Baldwin.
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 me, Julia Melfi. Take Care!
Music fades out!