Far Off Sounds is a webseries of documentaries about the infinite story of music on Earth. From harsh industrial noise performed for fish in an aquarium, to a heavy metal cruise ship in the Caribbean, Far Off Sounds has been filming the ways that humans use and engage with music for a decade. The Far Off Sounds Podcast expands on this project. The show's creators, Jacob Hurwitz-Goodman and Nick George, interview ethnomusicologists, experimental musical meme pedagogues, musicians, label artists, journalists and others in long-form conversations about music, as well as providing a behind-the-scene glimpse at the doc series' production.
Nick George and Jacob Hurwitz-Goodman
Palmer Keen from Aural Archipelago joins Nick and Jacob to talk about how his DIY Ethnomusicological exploration of Indonesia came to fruition. We find out what it's like to blindly trust strangers on the internet and travel thousands of miles away to have a chance at capturing a music tradition he caught a glimpse of via youtube.Aural Archipelago is an online repository for the musical sights and sounds of Indonesia, the most musically diverse country on the planet. Part digital archive, part blog, Aural Archipelago mixes field recording, video, photography, and in-depth articles compiled from years of travels across the archipelago. The project is the work of Palmer Keen, an American DIY ethnomusicologist based in Yogyakarta, together with a huge network of collaborators and musicians across Indonesia. With this project, the hope is to allow audiences (local and foreign) free access to music that is often difficult or impossible to hear otherwise.All music is shared with permission of the artists featured. When performances are explicitly commissioned for documentation, artists are compensated appropriately.Aural Archipelago's social media pages - Facebook and Instagram - can be followed at the small links below.Palmer can be contacted at auralarchipelago@gmail.com.
Old School FOS homie Rebecca Mahay joins Nick and Bryan on the show today to chat about underground music in her hometown of Leeds and in the UK, comical approaches to experimental music, her unexpected path to finding sonic absurdism, and how living with chronic illness has impacted the way she approaches performance.Check out her tunes here:https://wildrani.bandcamp.com/album/post-work-jams
TEASER: We talk about shooting the episode 'Onyx Ashanti Programs Himself' back in the summer of 2016, on the cusp of a global paradigm shift, when optimism and cynicism felt a bit more in balance.
Ladies and gentlemen, the Podcast about the Podcast. After we talked about Caveh on our Holiday Special last. month, and then Caveh listened to the episode, and then he talked about the mixed experience he had listening to us talk about him in his public diary later that week, we have finally completed the circle. Caveh joins us to talk about creating, funding, and navigating criticism of his unique brand of self-reflexive filmmaking.
Eric Lennartson uses a cutting-edge programming method and an old analog circuit-testing machine called an oscilloscope to create immersive sound and visual performances that get us thinking about the link between sound and sight, humans and machines.ericlennartson.com
We decided to get together to record a couple hours of 100% banter. If you're looking for substance, please feel free to skip this one. There is nothing substantial here. Just Nick, Bryan, and Jacob talking about IBS, Caveh Zahedi, crashing our cars to certain types of music, xmas music that isn't explicitly about xmas, the anti-woke film fest, and most importantly a bunch of ZENCASTR TRASHING.
We go behind the scenes of a couple Far Off Sounds docs that were made abroad, solo, without the usual team. First up we go deep into Jacob's episode 'The Disappearing Bamboo Wind" shot in Vietnam, and the second is Nick's "Orkes Keroncong Tugu", shot in Indonesia. We discuss Eminem's new restaurant "Mom's Spaghetti", as well as Pho, garlic, and the domain-name black market.Listen to the whole episode by patronizing us on patreon.com/faroffsounds
Jacob and Nick catch up on life, crypto, the Chaos Era, and "that face". It's a long one. Happy holidays.Music: Ne Me Quitte Pas by Jacques Brel
Cherie Hu and Diana Gremore from Water and Music join FOS to talk about their Decentralized Autonomous Organization dedicated to music industry research and data collection. For access to the full episode, consider joining as a Far Off Sounds patron - https://www.patreon.com/faroffsounds
John Yingling travels the world, making films about underground music scenes. So obviously we had some common ground to go over with him. His biggest, boldest project to date was a multi-year tour of China with several underground punk and experimental groups. We talk music in Communist China, building a cabin in rural Wisconsin, and the wide sonic world in between.This was a trailer. Full episode available on our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/faroffsounds
Nick went to NYC some years back an interviewed Adrian Rew about his field recordings of casinos in the American Midwest. Are they all tuned to "C"? What makes them so hypnotic? Do the sounds make me lose all my money?I also complain about expensive ramen at the end. I no longer believe that $26 is too much for a bowl of ramen because the entire service industry is fucked
We're joined by the guys behind Nina Protocol, a new platform for buying and selling music on the blockchain. We talk about how it works, is blockchain a scam, experimental music, discogs, and archiving music for generations down the line.Full episode available on our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/faroffsounds
Jacob and Bryan have been collaborating remotely on Far Off Sounds podcast stuff for months without really knowing each other. Today, they sit down to uncover how they know each other, a shared history in the suburbs of Detroit, and to ask some urgent "desert island" questions. A friendship is forged. NOTE: this is a teaser for a Patreon episode. We release one free episode per month. To hear this ep, and many others like it, consider signing up for our Patreon at www.patreon.com/faroffsounds
TEASER: Jinn April joins us for a conversation about growing up in Korea, moving to America for art school, and living in Detroit after developing a love affair with Detroit Techno and Midwestern dance music. We chat lore and dive deep into her work while discussing the struggles of the "music industry". Check her out - amazing stuff! https://www.jnnaprl.com/And if you want to hear the full episode, please consider joining our Patreon community:https://www.patreon.com/faroffsounds
Did you know Dr. Sushi isn't Nick's real name? We talk about fish, life transitions, and Pure Michigan. Don't worry, be happy. ( NOTE: this is a teaser of the full episode. To hear the whole thing, hear a whole bunch of full episodes, see secretly released episodes and deleted scenes, and support Far Off Sounds production, check out our Patreon! patreon.com/faroffsounds )
Hardcore musician, experimental artist, and leftist pro-tenant organizer Jesse Sanes sits down with Nick for a deep deep DEEP dive into music, the death drive, the personal, the aesthetic, the political, and how these zones interact or don't. For the full episode, patronize us at patreon.com/faroffsounds
Forest Juziuk of the Asra Agency joins us for an hour of storytelling, wisdom, Port Huron lore, Ann Arbor weirdos, San Fran Frisky, and spirited discussion on the state of contemporary music.
Nick and Jacob revisit the making of Cambodia, California. To hear the full version, visit our Patreon and give us a lil bit of your sweet sweet money
Nick and Jacob sit down with our old friend Arrington De Dionysio for a chat about the state of DIY music culture, collaborations abroad, the role of spirituality and ritual in music, and of course the weather.https://www.patreon.com/faroffsounds
Marginal Consort is a Japanese collective/free improvisation group made of sound and visual artists, who have played one concert annually since 1997. We look back at the video we made with them and talk about our feelings.
FOS hosts La Meme Young on the show to discuss pedagogical memeology, starting a music school on Discord, and the insanity of everything.
FOS sits down with Detroit-based writer Imani Mixon. Full episode at faroffsounds.org/patreon
We got invited to screen at a film festival in New York, we learn that it has a bit of an agenda.Visit patreon.com/faroffsounds to hear the whole thang
Jacob and Nick are taking the plunge. We discuss what kind of show this is and where it's headed. Also a debate over whether we should have small talk.