Transcript

electronic instrumental music plays underneath.

Greg: 71. Quality</>Quantity.

Hi, I’m Greg-- a New York Neo-Futurist. Our live show is back, but we just can’t stop making art for your ears so Hit Play continues! If you’re already a fan of The New York Neo-Futurists, or any of our sibling companies, hello! We can’t wait to scream things at you.

If this is totally new to you— welcome to it! We make art 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 that we’re watching planes, or running water, or stressing we’re really doing that thing, like I am right now.

If there is a content warning, add the following line. If there isn’t a content warning, skip it: Some of the work in this episode may contain sensitive topics. For more specific content warnings, check the timecodes in the show notes.

All of the plays in this episode play around with some ideas that convey the Quality/Quantity of voices, sounds, effects (sound design/audio tracks), life, seconds, etc..

And now, Meg will run the numbers!

Meg: Hi, I’m Meg-- a NY Neo-Futurist Alum. In this episode we’re bringing you 6 new plays.

This week’s cast is me, Meg Bashwiner, Greg Lakhan, Rob Neil, Shelton Lindsay, and Yael Haskal.

That brings us to 318 audio experiments on Hit Play. Enjoy!

Music winds down.

Play 1a: Quality/Quantity (1:45)

Meg: Quality/Quantity. GO!

Meg: I take five hundred milligrams of search ruling every day. Sertraline is the generic version of the antidepressant Zoloft. It's a tiny blue pill smaller than a Tic TAC. It stops me from driving off very big bridges. It costs me two dollars and ninety seven cents for 30 pills, less than a penny a pill. It saves my priceless life every day.

Play 2: Deep Cuts Of Varying Quality (2:14)

Greg: Deep Cuts Of Varying Quality. GO!

Greg: As neo futurists, we work tirelessly to bring our supporters all the best work because that's what they deserve from us. Obviously, we write a lot and spend a lot of time coming up with ideas to pitch week after week. So I'm curious, you guys, are there any plays that anyone has been holding on to out of fear that they aren't ready to be pitched? I guess it would only be fair if I went first. I really wanted to do a live action. Yu gi oh play in the crane theater. We would come up with a neo version of dual monsters and use the neo futurist as monsters in the game, and each new futures would have their own trading card and special effects when they got played. I wanted both the duelist NEOs to have dual discs, but there were a couple issues that I had pitching. One, I feel like a lot of our audience really wouldn't get the reference. And another issue was that dual discs actually run for a thousand dollars now on Amazon, and I can't fucking afford that.

Shelton: OK, like two weeks ago at a bar, we came up with this a play for the Neo-Futurists present: She Wolf The Musical, and I would be like a dramatic retelling of something through the music of Shakira, probably centered around the absolutely incredible song She Wolf, which I don't think gets enough credit. But I haven't figured out how to make this A Neo-Futurist yet, or B how to not make it like a two and a half hour rock opera. So I haven't pitched that yet, but like, stay tuned because I obviously will.

Meg: OK, so I have an idea for a play, but I haven't pitched. It's called the Infinite Ranch and it's technically a wrench. And the idea is that we get a bottle of ranch dressing and we sort of play hot potato with it throughout the show. So if someone hands you the bottle of ranch, you have to take it. And whoever is holding the bottle of ranch, someone always has to be holding the bottle at the ranch. And then whoever is holding it when the buzzer goes off at the end of the show has to drink the whole thing. So I think it's pretty obvious why I haven't pitched that. I guess it's because I- uh- I don't think I hate anyone enough to make them do that play.

Yael: I have this rewrite of we didn't start the fire, and it's just events that are from the early 2000s until now, which is really a whole place worth of deep cuts. And I think the rhythm works and I think the rhymes work, but I don't know. I worry that I picked the wrong events or that it's the wrong key for my voice or is not funny enough, and I get shy about singing in public so that play is hiding under the bed.

Rob: Yeah. So I wrote this play a while back called Animal Collective Faux Motivational Meetings, one through six that went pretty well. And I have tried to write animal collective motivational meetings seven through 11, but I just haven't gotten it fully there enough to pitch it. It's, you know, continuing the journey. Actually, you don't know because you probably haven't seen the play, but it's about a guy who meets these soft, small animals, and he's very encouraging to go on because he feels like he's failing. And they kind of encourage him to go on at the end of the play. You stand up to go on and sure, there's more to the story, but I've never quite gotten it right or gotten the nerve to pitch the next part of the story of Animal Collective of motivational meetings seven to 11, maybe one day. It's been a while. Maybe I could actually make it happen.

Greg: Well, thank you all for sharing these deep cuts with me, you guys. I hope these plays are able to get to where they need in order to be seen at some point in time. Peace.

Play 1b: Quality/Quantity (6:00)

Shelton: Quality quantity. I eat protein rich meals, whenever I feel the need, I mean, I know that sounds super basic, but as someone who gets hangry really fast learning that I can be in control of my emotional state by doing something as simple as eating has changed my life.

Play 3: Synthesizing harmony…(6:28)

Rob: Synthesizing harmony though all the winter olympic events. GO!

Opening Ceremony

Luge

Doubles

Men’s Singles

Women’s Singles

Team Relay

Ski Jumping

Men’s Individual Normal Hill

Large Hill

Team

Mixed Team*

Women’s Individual Normal Hill

Snowboarding

Men’s Big Air

Halfpipe

Parallel Giant Slalom

Slopestyle

Snowboard Cross

Mixed Team Snowboard Cross

Women’s Big Air

Halfpipe

Parallel Giant Slalom

Slopestyle

Snowboard Cross

Alpine Skiing

Men’s Combined

Downhill

Giant Slalom

Slalom

Super-G

Women's Combined

Downhill

Giant Slalom

Slalom

Super-G

Team Event

Curling

Men’s

Mixed Doubles

Women’s

Biathlon

Men’s 4×7.5km Relay

10km Sprint

12.5km Pursuit

15km Mass Start

20km Individual

Women’s 4x6km Relay

7.5km Sprint

10km Pursuit

12.5km Mass Start

15km Individual

Mixed Relay

Nordic Combined

Men’s Individual Large Hill

Normal Hill

Team

Bobsled

Four-Man

Two-Man

Two-Woman

Women’s Monobob

Figure Skating

Men’s Singles

Women’s Singles

Ice Dance

Pairs

Team Event

Hockey

Men’s

Women’s

Freestyle Skiing

Men’s Aerials

Big Air

Halfpipe

Moguls

Ski Cross

Slopestyle

Mixed Team Aerials

Women’s Aerials

Big Air

Halfpipe

Moguls

Ski Cross

Slopestyle

Speed Skating

Men’s 500m

1000m

1500m

5000m

10,000m

Mass Start

Men’s Team Pursuit

Women’s 500m

1000m

1500m

3000m

5000m

Team Pursuit

Cross-Country Skiing

Men’s Individual Sprint (Freestyle)

Skiathlon

Team Sprint (Classical)

4x10km Relay

15km (Classical)

50km (Freestyle)

Women’s Individual Sprint (Freestyle)

Skiathlon

Team Sprint (Classical)

4x5km Relay

10km (Classical)

30km (Freestyle)

Short Track

Men’s 500m

1000m

1500m

5000m Relay

Mixed Team Relay

Women’s 500m

1000m

1500m

3000m Relay

Skeleton

Men’s Skeleton

Women’s Skeleton

Closing Ceremony

Play 1c: Quality/Quantity (10:18)

Yael: Quantity/ quality every night before bed, I take 100 milligrams of Lamictal, 20 milligrams of Cymbalta, then another 30 milligrams of Cymbalta because my pharmacy doesn't stock the 50 mg pill. Ironically, taking these three pills every day helps me not take the whole bottle at once.

Play 4: 99.9% (10:48)

Anthony: 99.9%. GO!

This is a script that is read by every neo, I will have fun fading in and out all of the voices. Some times one, some times layered. I will record the audio track first, and then ask everyone to listen to it while they record in an effort to speak close to unison. Words that say how we feel about something are ________ and you can say what is honest to you, I will edit a mix of these voices being what we say and or sound effects. Or maybe some like word sound track that sounds like the sounds of evolution. WHAT DOES EVOLUTION SOUND LIKE SHELTON? You may ask.

The answer is probably chill hop.

ALL:

You wake up and you breath and you’ve been breathing and there is breath in your body. And it comes ______ (breath in)_____ and it goes _______ (breath out)_____.

And you’ve not even done anything, except for the everything your body has been doing, since you fell asleep, but you wake up and you think. Or some days you think, or today you think, _________.

You get dressed, One assumes, even if you are dressed only in your mannerisms, cloaked in your you ness. And then their is __________ (something you do ever morning, coffee, tea, stretching, teeth brushing. ect) before the day can really get going, just another coded moment of being human, of being alive, of a being who thrives on being a being, because you’ve never been anything but this. _____ (space for anyone who strongly feels they have been something else)

Well we have all been other than this. Last week, last year, 7 years ago, the womb, the egg, the zygot, the ancestor, the atoms in the apple, the garden, the fish with legs, walking on land, kurflump

kurflump

kurflump

Where were you going, then? Do you rememberdoyouknow? Does the legacy of you remember? Some where, is some part of you, some part that was of me, that was of us, that was of _____ (A thing you love)

THE PLANET

THE OCEAN

THE MOMENT THE MOON STORMED OUT OF ITS EARTHLY EMBRACE

A MOMENT OF SPACE IN THE SOUND DESIGN.

and you go about your day and at some point something happens to you and you think _______ (the word you swear in in your head)

Mostly we are different.

Some may say very different.

Tall, short, black, white, male, female, non binary,

(LIST THE WORDS YOU USE TO DESCRIBE YOURSELF IF YOU WERE TOO.)

But 99.9 percent of me is you. Is in you, is in the makeup of eachother.

Our dna so shared were are each other sentences, with only the occasional different (------) name a part of speech.

99.9 percent the same with eachother!

when it comes to how different we are it’s just point 1 percent. Thats all the difference, between us both and I don’t even know your name, you whose listening, but encoded in me is much of you life.

Is much of all life.

Life is so much the same.

We’re not even that different than.

(the below will be layered interestingly)

Bonobos

98.7

Cats 90

Mice 85, no wonder we use them in labs

80 with cows

61 with fruit flies

60 with a banana

So when the differences seem far to great. Inside, our cells, our shells, ours selves

We are

(the below will be layered interestingly)

The same

Twinned

Alike

Duplicates

Matching

Nearly identical

Play 1d: Quality/Quantity (13:53)

Rob: Most mornings I like to have at least one cup of coffee with Lion's Mane mushroom in it. It gets me going and keeps me focused. And on a good day. I like to make it as a pour over. So there is some breath and ritual in it as well.

Play 5: INFLATEGATE (14:22)

Yael: INFLATEGATE. GO!

This play is short and squeaky. The headlines start off regular and rhythmic, ramping up in speed and pitch (post-prod helium effect), until we reach a terrible chipmunk-y climax.

YH What Is Inflation?

RN Where Is Inflation Headed?

GL Your Questions About Inflation, Answered

MB Larry Summers on Inflation

SL John Taylor on Inflation

YH Fed Chair Powell Grilled on Inflation

RN Americans ‘Clobbered’ By Inflation

GL Tyson Foods Loves Inflation

MB What A Corn Snack Says About Inflation

SL Snacks and Beef Drive UK Inflation

YH Meat Volumes Feel the Heat of Inflation

RN The Great Buffalo Wing Inflation

GL US Probes Big Beef’s Link to Inflation

MB Pork, Petrol, and Noodles – Inflation

SL Inflation Hits Guacamole

YH Inflation Is Hitting Sandwich Shops

RN GL MB SL

Inflation is Coming! Inflation is Hitting! Inflation is Rising! Inflation is Killing!

ALL Inflation

(overlapping) Inflation

Inflation

Inflation

Inflation

AAAAHHHHHH

Voices repeating “inflation” overlap and rise in pitch until they sound like a bunch of chirping chipmunks. The voices morph into a high-pitched group shriek. Long beat. Then, a helium-level voice: CURTAIN.

Play 1e: Quality/Quantity (15:25)

Greg: I meditate for at least an hour a day. It makes it easier to filter out negative thoughts and helps me achieve a sense of mental liberation from internalized doubt. Shit fuckin’ slaps.

Play 6: Voicemails from Rob (15:38)

Meg: Voicemails from Rob. GO!

Meg: I keep a handful of voice messages saved on my phone from family and friends. I keep them to be able to hold a piece of them while I’m far away or if I were to never hear their voice again or for nostalgic fun reasons. I have a voicemail from my Nana from 2016, she passed in 2019. I don’t ever listen to the message, I think it might hurt too much. I have a voicemail from Neo-Futurist Roberta Collindrez from the morning of my wedding. It’s her apologizing for not being able to make it that day, she would be going to the Tony’s that night, she won. I have a voicemail from Neo-Futurist Kevin R. Free congratulating me on my pregnancy. I have a voicemail each from my husband, my parents and my sister. You get the drift. It’s a tiny digital pocket where I keep things.

I have 13 voicemails from Rob Neill saved on my phone.

Voicemail Rob: Hey, what's going on, it's Rob. Sorry, I just got your text, responded to it and I thought, I'd call you…Meg, what is going on? Hi it’s Rob, I was just about to put the…

Meg: The bulk of them are entirely transactional. Rob uses the phone a lot. He’s big on calling. He always leaves a voicemail. I very much enjoy talking on the phone with Rob. Especially these days, our late night post show barroom chats now replaced with midday calls as I feed my baby or drive to pick up groceries.

I started saving them because as Neo-Futurists we are constantly mining our lives for content for our relentless show, the Infinite Wrench. We often think, let me hang on to this old typewriter, mannequin head, letter, memory and maybe I can use it for a play one day. We are sculptors and our clay is the meat of our lives. Rob has been sculpting Neo-Futurist plays for the better part of the past 30 years.

Rob, what are you holding on to with the hopes of making it into a play?

Rob: What am I holding on to? Hmmm Props wise, definitely. Goggles and wind up clapping monkeys, robots and dinosaurs. I am hoping to make a play out of Bitmoji voice messages. And I also want to make a play out of a whole bunch of color catchers from laundry that I've been saving. I've kind of used them, but I think there's a bigger play out there with them that focuses on them. Maybe that's what I'm thinking.

Meg: I went back and listened to all of the voicemails to write this play and it was a bit like a time capsule, the ones from our days in the company together asking about logistics and the ones from after just checking in on a friend.

I came across this one from March of 2017. I think this is the one I want to keep. The one that gets filed in the ranks with the voicemails from my family.

Voicemail Rob: Hey, it's Rob. I'm just stopping … right now to call you to say you shouldn't quit. I think you're doing a great job. I'm not up on all the things that are happening but I got you. I love you and yeah, sorry I missed you, and I guess I will call you tomorrow. All right. Talk to you later

Meg: I don’t remember why I wanted to quit or what from but whatever it was I didn’t and maybe I didn’t because of Rob’s voicemail. Sometimes I really need to hear that I’m doing a good job.

Rob, if you could have a voicemail from any person living or dead who would it be?

Rob: My great grandmother, Snyder

Meg: What would you want them to say?

Rob: I would just love for her to leave, leave me a voicemail that kind of walks me through her day. Probably be a long voicemail, but it was so long ago that maybe she was my great great grandmother. Wow. But there weren't voicemails back then, and I only have a vague idea of how amazing she was, living her life in Chicago.

Meg: Hey Rob, never stop leaving voicemails ok?

Rob: Thanks Meg, You bet.

Show Outro

electronic instrumental music plays underneath.

Greg: Thanks for hitting play and then listening to Hit Play.

If you liked what you heard, subscribe to the show, tell a friend, and leave a review on your listening app of choice! We’d love to hear from you - leave us a voicemail at ‪(646) 820-4733. If you want to support the New York Neo-Futurists in other ways, consider making a donation at nynf.org, or by joining our Patreon - Patreon dot com slash NYNF.

This episode featured work by: Meg Bashwiner, Greg Lakhan, Rob Neil, Shelton Lindsay, and Yael Haskal

Our logo was designed by Gabriel Drozdov

and our sound is designed by Anthony Sertel Dean.

Hit Play is produced by Anthony Sertel Dean, Hilary Asare, and me Greg. Take care!

Music fades out!