HAPPY ACCIDENTS

Back around 1990, give or take a year or so, I happened to be on an early Internet forum with a bunch of other musicians (at least one of whom is in a band list on this site). We found that many of us owned keyboard sequencers, and decided to untertake an unusual (we thought) project. We would sequence some tracks, and send them to the next musician in line, who would add to the song, and pass it along. The result was pretty weird, but very disjointed. I played a tape of the song for musician/music journalist Michael Bloom, who told me that another band had been doing something similar.

This is at least the second album where The Rascal Reporters, Steve Gore and Steve Kretzmer would lay down tracks, and send them to other musicians. Their final results were far better than ours. But then it certainly helps that the other musicians were from such notable bands as Dr. Nerve, The 5UU's. Motor Totemist Guild, The Muffins and Univers Zero.

Each side of the album is a suite of songs. And the one thing I notice the most is that at the points where the music is the most melodic, there is a strong resemblance to the Canterbury style of Hatfield and the North. But the music doesn't stay there. Each song veers into wonderfully bizarre RIO excursions. And all of it works quite well.

Side two, the suite called Trucks, to me is the better side. The songs are much more experimantal. But all are beautiful.