Episode 74 - Third Time's The Charm

Thanks for Hitting Play and then listening to Hit Play. This episode: triads, triplets, and threes! Some of the plays may contain sensitive topics. For more specific content warnings, check out the timecodes below.

If you like what you hear and want to support the New York Neo-Futurists, subscribe to the show, tell a friend, and leave a review on your listening app of choice. We’d love to hear from you! @nyneofuturists on Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook. If you want to support in other ways, consider making a donation at nynf.org, or joining our Patreon. 

2:11 - Guided Meditation: You're in the Third Circle of Hell by Yael Haskal 

5:55 [CW: sex, death] - in 3s by Hilary Asare, feat Chan Lin, Katy-May Hudson, and Yael Haskal

7:48 [CW: explicit language] - A Conversation with my Inner Devil by Greg Lakhan

10:38 [CW: sex] - Stories of a Third Wheel by Chan Lin

13:47  - Micro-Plastics by Katy-May Hudson feat Aurora-May Hudson

Our logo was designed by Gabriel Drozdov

Our sound is designed by Anthony Sertel Dean

Hit Play is produced by  Anthony Sertel Dean, Hilary Asare, Yael Haskal

Take care!

Transcript 

Show Intro

electronic instrumental music plays underneath.

Yael: Episode 74: Third Time’s The Charm

Hi, I’m Yael – 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 sing you to sleep in the back row of our theatre again.

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 singing to a dying cactus, we’re really singing to a dying cactus, like I am right now.

Some of the work in this episode may contain sensitive topics. For more specific content warnings, check the timecodes in the show notes.

This episode’s theme is: Third Time’s The Charm.

And now, Chan will run the numbers!

Chan: Hi, I’m Chan – a NY Neo-Futurist. In this episode we’re bringing you 5 new plays.

This week’s cast is Yael Haskal, Hilary Asare, Greg Lakhan, Katy-May Hudson, and myself, Chan Lin.

That brings us to 335 audio experiments on Hit Play. Enjoy!

Music winds down.

Play 1: Guided Meditation: You're in the Third Circle of Hell (2:11)

Yael: Guided Meditation: You're in the Third Circle of Hell GO!

SQ: Meditative church organ music.

Begin in a comfortable seated position. Close your eyes. Inhale through your nose. Exhale through your mouth. You’ve been bad. You’ve been very, very bad. And now, you’re dead. Time to pay up. (Elevator ding) Welcome to the third circle of hell.

In his meditative guidebook “The Divine Comedy,” Daddy Dante writes, ''For ever, both in kind and in degree. / Large hail, discolour'd water, sleety flaw / Through the dun midnight air stream'd down amain / Stank all the land whereon that tempest fell.''

Mmmmm. Take that in.

Feel your feet tethered to the ground, and by ground, I mean mud, and by mud, I mean sludge, it’s sludge here. The third circle of hell is reserved for the gluttonous. The hungry. The thirsty. The sssssexually ravenous. The bodies of the gluttons lay around your planted feet, snarfling through the slush of an endless icy rain. Inhale on a “piggy piggy piggy.” Exhale on an “(insert actual pig snort sound).”

As your thoughts wander, bring your attention back to the sludge. Remember that you are in hell, and it sucks here.

With peaceful acceptance, allow yourself to approach the spiritual guardian of this space: Cerberus. Become one with the three-headed hound of Hades, sending energy through every inch of your body as his teeth tear apart your disgusting, guilty flesh. Oink oink, little piggy.

Notice how calm and gentle your breathing is as your limbs are detached from the rest of your body. All of us have a purpose deep inside of us, and his is to absolutely rip you to shreds. Ground yourself in the peace and clarity of that goal. Send some love into those dismembered toes. Mmmm.

Allow your senses full access to your environment. See the writing bodies of the gluttons around you. Hear the screams of the damned. Smell the foul smell of the sludge. Taste the foul taste of the sludge. Touch the tips of your fingers to…wait. You don’t have fingers anymore. Touch your feet against…oops, no feet either. Touch the…actually, just, maybe don’t touch, just, just…be. Be the sludge. Be the sludge. You’re in the Third Circle of Hell, so. Be the sludge.

Namaste.

Play 2: in 3s (5:55)

Hilary: in 3s. GO!

Hilary: Comedy

Katy-May: clear emphasis

Yael: fruit purchases

Chan: Sanxing

All but Chan: Tell us more-

Chan: Three Stars: Fu, Lu, & Shou. Fortune, Prosperity, & Longevity. They’re astrological and mythological deities, depicted as 3 elders arranged together at an altar. When you make offerings at their altar, you will have more fortune, prosperity, and longevity in life.

Hilary: Death

Yael: Bad News,

Chan: Square Meals

Katy-May: A good joke

All but Katy-May: Tell us one

Katy-May: (tells a good joke)

Hilary: Months in a season,

Katy-May: Eyes on the heads on the hound of hades

Chan: Legs on a tripod.

Yael: orgasms–on a good day ;))))

All but Yael: Tell us how many on a great day.

Yael: (tells us how many on a great day)

Hilary: Good to know. 3 word phrase. So was that. That was too. And that also. Also that one. Plus that too. also that phrase. This phrase too. Next phrase too? Bet your ass. Quite enough now. Next play please. What silly business.

Hilary says 3 word phrases as the play fades out

Play 3: A Conversation With My Inner Devil (7:48)

Greg: A Conversation With My Inner Devil. GO!

Greg: Hello listeners. I’m sure many of you have heard the phrase “There’s a Devil inside of all of us”. So for this play, I thought it would be cool to start a dialogue with mine. What's up Devil?

Devil: This play is gonna fucking bomb.

Greg: You know Devil, I wish you could at least try to be nicer to me.

Devil: I wish you were less of a pussy. But we don't always get what we want.

Greg: Alright so, you and I both know why we're here.

Devil: Because you're not interesting enough on your own.

Greg: Devil, I think we've misunderstood one another for a long time, and I wanna be friends.

Devil: Why, because you don't have any more left?

Greg: I've spent my life ignoring you and trying to pretend you're not there, trying to do the right thing. Mostly succeeding. But you sabotage me a lot too. And it doesn't happen often but it's bad when it does. I'm not mad though. I know it's out of fear. You think the whole world is against you, but it doesn't have to be that way. I for one love me some occasional Satan, and I would really like it if we made our dynamic into Us vs The Problem as opposed to Us vs. Each Other.

Devil: Oh shut the fuck up you fake woke pseudo intellectual drug addict. (VOICE BOOMING) You're not ready for a friendship with ME. You’re too much of a BETA MALE to b00l with THE DEVIL.

The Devil will let out an evil laugh.

Greg: I don't view it as a negative thing to be anti violence and to feel my emotions, so maybe you should watch your fucking tone devil.

Devil: Hmmm. Not bad. Maybe you're not such a pussy after all.

Greg: Thank you. And just for the record, I prefer the title of “Sensitive Savage”.

Devil: How many mental gymnastics did you have to do to convince yourself that that sounds empowering?

Greg: Look, we're kinda stuck together, maybe it would make for a better lifetime if we just chill out a bit?

Devil: Hmmmm. I guess I'll consider your proposal. But on one condition only.

Greg: Lay it on me.

Devil: You have to end this play. Your shoulder is very bony and not very comfortable to sit on.

Greg: Reasonable enough.

Devil: Thanks buddy.

Greg: No problem.

Devil: You still a bitch thooooooo.

The Devil laughs maniacally for a bit, then:

Devil: Respectfully of course.

Play 4: Stories of a Third Wheel (10:38)

Chan: Stories of a Third Wheel. GO!

Chan: Blossom, Bubbles, and Buttercup. Harry, Ron, and Hermione. In any group of three people, two will have a closer bond with each other leaving an odd person out. Sometimes the third wheel is the guest of honor. Sometimes three’s a crowd.

Greg: So I'm usually the third wheel. I had this awful douchebag of a friend in high school who would make out with girls in front of me to emasculate me and make himself feel better.

Hilary: My last two roommates had known each other since undergrad. They shared a closeness I couldn't really be a part of- and I didn't mind that. It was nice to be adjacent to their dynamic.

Chan: I’m the youngest of three siblings. After my sister left for college, it was just my brother and I living at home. He and I would often each be in our own rooms, procrastinating on schoolwork, binge-watching anime. We’d only pause when we realized the other person was also awake at 4am. Then we’d drive to the waffle house by the interstate near us, binge-eat a dinner-size worth of breakfast food, then drive back home, and sit in front of our computer screens until the sun came up for us to go to school. That was how we bonded.

Greg: Most of the time I'm glad to be the third wheel. A lot of the couples I have associated with in the past tend to get into dumb fights that make me glad to be single and have my autonomy.

Chan: I eventually moved to new york for college and my siblings both lived in Florida. They spent holidays together and even lived in the same house during the pandemic, so all through my twenties it felt like they had a closer relationship and I felt left out.

Katy-May: I met up with two friends who had recently started dating and after a few beers, a very obvious hand job began taking place under their side of the table. The receiver of the handjob was red of face, eyes bulging, breathing heavily… The giver was staring into space, with a wobbling shoulder and squeezed little determined lips. The whole table shook. Awkward.

Greg: Sometimes these couples are just being cute and healthy though which makes me long for that connection and I find myself wondering why it hasn't happened for me yet.

Chan: In the last few years my sister has made a lot of effort to travel and spend time with me. Last November, she even moved to new york for work so we’ve really reconnected. Honestly we get along much better in adulthood, but we both don’t really talk to my brother much. He’s busy with his wife and baby and generally not great at keeping in touch. I wish the three of us all talked more, but that’s just the way life is now.

Katy-May: Whichever number wheel you are, in these tricky tricycles of human companionship,

Greg: A third wheel can help balance everyone forward.

Hilary: But it’s also okay to become a bicycle or unicycle. You can still make it there.

Play 5: Micro-Plastics (13:47)

Katy-May: Micro-Plastics. GO!

Katy-May sings:

Microplastics in my soup

Fibers and fibrils loop the loop

Gosh oh gee but I have fun

Swallowing plastics one by one

In every bowl of soup, I eat

There’s Ciggy butt waste with my meat

Miniscule specks, oh me oh my

Will microplastics make us die?

Microplastics in my blood

Lodged in my organs all that crud

Polystyrene, oh shoop shoop boop

Microplastics in my soup

Aurora-May sings:

Microplastics in my soup

Fibers and fibrils loop the loop

Gosh oh gee but I have fun

Swallowing plastics one by one

Show Outro

electronic instrumental music plays underneath.

Yael: 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! 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: Hilary Asare, Greg Lakhan, Katy-May Hudson, Aurora-May Hudson, Chan Lin, and myself, 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, Yael Haskal. Take care!

Music fades out!