Bill Shute poetry reading in Austin, TX, Monday 17 September 2012

I’ll be reading on Monday 17 September in Austin, Texas, at Headhunters Club at 7th and Red River as part of Michael Casares’s “Austin Salon Poetic” series. I should go on around 7:30, but please try to arrive by 7:15 to get a good barstool and get your drink order in. Headhunters (I saw the band Kohoutek play there last year!) is certainly an intimate venue, and it’s a bar with atmosphere to burn, so I’m very much looking forward to reading at this venue, and Virgogray Press mainman Michael Aaron Casares, a former San Antonio resident, always puts on an excellent show as host. This will be my first public reading of anything from the FLORIDA NOCTURNE POEMS sequence, with a premiere reading of the second chapbook in the sequence, MONDO DAYTONA. I’ll also have some copies of MONDO DAYTONA available. My philosophy is to do a quality job in a short time and leave them wanting more. Too many poets drone (not in the good sense of that word, alas) on and on during their readings. I do not and will not. My featured reading slot should run a maximum of 30 minutes. Thus, if you are just getting off work, I won’t keep you long from your dinner or whatever.

Hope you all can come. I don’t have any other readings planned for the Fall of 2012, and may not be doing another reading until January 2013, so if at all possible, stop by Headhunters for this one. I’ve got some exciting collaborative projects going on in Fall 2012, and I’m going to devote my efforts to those…and keep checking the KSE blog to find out about those projects as they develop.

See you in Austin on September 17th…

new DEREK ROGERS album, BORN INTO SYSTEMS (KSE #226), now available…

DEREK  ROGERS

“BORN INTO SYSTEMS” (KSE #226, CDR)

a musical tribute to the late, great Texas-based experimental music writer and champion, Lee Jackson

$8.00 postpaid in the US (if outside the US and ordering only one item, please add $2 extra for postage…thanks)

payment via paypal to django5722(at)yahoo(dot)com

Formerly of Austin, Texas, and now living and working in Los Angeles, composer and multi-instrumentalist DEREK ROGERS was, along with Sir Plastic Crimewave, the first recording artist on KSE. Whether you call it noise-drone-electroacoustic or whatever, he has become a major force in the underground music world and has issued over 60 releases on labels the world over.

Derek had a number of long online conversations with the late, great Dallas-based experimental music writer Lee Jackson (of Broken Face/Foxy Digitalis/Womblife). Both passionate, intelligent, and radical thinkers, Rogers and Jackson covered a lot of ground, and I can remember Derek telling me how pumped he was if I’d contact him after he’d finished a long talk w/ Lee J. There’s no question that Lee pushed Derek into new territory and onto greater heights. So when Lee passed away, not even 40 years old, earlier this year, Derek was crushed, but he also felt energized by what Lee had taught him and by the fire that Lee had in his championing of the cutting-edge, forward-thinking arts, so soon after, Derek went into the studio to record a tribute to Lee, with the tracks being inspired by actual quotes from Lee’s half of their conversations. Derek went into these sessions full of fury and white-heat, and wanting to keep the Texas connection going, he offered the album to KSE, and we are honored to offer it to YOU.

If you are familiar with Derek’s work, this is almost a sampler of everything that’s great about Derek’s previous albums—the keyboards, the guitars, the electronics, the effects—-it can be crunchy and shrill, then it can be majestic and soaring, then it can be solemn and funereal, then it can be feedback-drenched and fiery, then it can be beyond words. It has the energy and the speaker-shredding dynamism that Lee Jackson would no doubt have gotten excited about, but at the same time it’s a serious meditation upon the great things Lee Jackson achieved in his life and the inspiration he provided Derek…and many many others.

The track titles are taken from actual quotes from Lee Jackson’s late-night discussions with Derek, and overall BORN INTO SYSTEMS is an important album by a significant artist inspired by a great and influential figure in the experimental music world: Lee Jackson.

Don’t worry if you are not familiar with LJ: if you just put this album on not knowing what it is, it will nail you to the wall, and you’ll immediately start scouring the internet to get anything else you can find by Derek Rogers.  The time he’s put in listening to Fennesz and Tony Conrad and “I Heard Her Call My Name”-era Velvets and Albert Ayler and Stockhausen and Tom Waits have paid off big-time in terms of attention to texture and modulation and attention to small detail.

It’s a limited, hand-assembled, hand-numbered edition of 123 copies.

Available NOW for only $8 postpaid in the US (outside the US, add $2 for postage if ordering only one item). Payment via paypal to django5722(at)yahoo(dot)com

And while you are making that order, why not pick up the KSE full-sized cdr reissue of Derek’s first KSE release, which originally came out on a 3″ mini-cdr, CIRCUM_NAVIGATE (KSE #221), which is also $8.00 ppd., same terms of BORN INTO SYSTEMS. This reissue is limited to 30 copies! Get yours now…

We’ve got a lot of other exciting CDR releases of experimental music available, all only $8 each postpaid:

KSE #239 (CDR), FOSSILS, “Bells and Gulls”

KSE #238 (CDR), DANIEL HIPOLITO/EVA KELLY/BILL SHUTE, “Fascination”

KSE #235 (CDR), BOOK OF SHADOWS, “Chimaera”

KSE #228 (CDR), UNMOOR, “Night Driver”

KSE #226 (CDR), DEREK ROGERS, “Born Into Systems”

KSE #223 (CDR), ALISTAIR CROSBIE, “A Campfire In The Snow”

KSE #222 (CDR), MASSIMO MAGEE, “Sopranino Solo”

KSE #220  (CDR), MATT KREFTING, “Sweet Days of Discipline “

KSE #214 (CDR), SABRINA SIEGEL,”Bottlecaps” 

KSE #207 (CDR), ALFRED 23 HARTH & CARL STONE, “Gift Fig”

KSE #206  (CDR), ERNESTO DIAZ-INFANTE, “Emilio “

As we enter our seventh year, we thank you for your support of KSE and of independent artists and micro-presses and micro-labels.

Derek Rogers, Austin, TX, June 2010

new poetry chapbook from Jim D. Deuchars, “Thelonious Fakebook” (KSE #236)

JIM  D.  DEUCHARS

“THELONIOUS  FAKEBOOK” (KSE #236)

volume 71 in the Sound Library Series

poetry chapbook, $5 ppd. anywhere

payment via paypal to  django5722(at)yahoo(dot)com

Now 71 chapbooks strong, KSE’s “Sound Library Series” has been devoted to varied investigations of the relationship between music and poetry. The results have been diverse, and KSE has been happy to provide a literary laboratory for this kind of experimentation. Poets as different as Brad Kohler, Christopher Cunningham, Adrian Manning, David Keenan, A.J. Kaufmann, Stuart Crutchfield, Bill Shute, and Michael Layne Heath have done entries in the series, and the music investigated has ranged from John Cage to Brian Eno to Kim Fowley to Ennio Morricone to Sonic Youth to Arcesia. When the series began, the first few volumes were devoted to poems inspired by European sound library music (hence the sound library tag). This seemingly disposable yet richly atmospheric music served as a backdrop to “movies in the mind,” which were then transferred to the page. And the series “Jes Grew” from there. We’re now entering our SEVENTH year of Sound Library poetry chapbooks, and number 71 is certainly one of the best and most visionary.

Pittsburgh poet Jim D. Deuchars is a totally original poet who owes little to any “school” of poetry…there might be a smidgin of Cummings and/or Berrigan, but references points such as Nabokov or Joyce would be just as helpful, or not helpful. Better to just investigate his work. His first chapbook for KSE, PIECES OF EIGHT (KSE #96) was a kaleidoscopic poetic study of the various possibilities of the concept of the number eight…and lest you think that might be tedious and academic, keep in mind that Jim is a punster of the first rank. And there are so many levels of irony, I’d need a flow chart to keep them straight.

As a longtime resident of one of the greatest American cities, Pittsburgh, Jim desired to do a kind of history/core sample of the city, inspired by W. C. Williams’ Paterson and Olson’s Maximum Poems, but 100% Jim D.  That Piitsburgh series of chapbooks has turned out to be a trilogy, with two volumes already completed and published (and, alas, now out of print, although we hope to see the entire trilogy published in book form in the future): ALLEGHENY RISING (KSE #114) and MONONGAHELA ABSTRACT CONSTRUCT (KSE #155). As you can see, each is rooted in one of Pittsburgh’s  Three Rivers, and the third and final chapbook in the trilogy is due in 2013. I can’t wait!

So much for Jim’s backstory. Now what about THELONIOUS  FAKEBOOK? Thelonious Monk was a complete original. Though he emerged around the same time as bop, and though he played as a sideman in his early years on a Coleman Hawkins session, he had his own sense of time, of rhythm, of non-traditional harmony.  And as a composer, he produced compositions that allow for a wide variety of interpretations and that somehow take whoever is playing them into Monk’s world. Think of the many recordings of Steve Lacy interpreting Monk and how endless those possibilities are. In a sense, this chapbook is Jim Deuchars playing Monk compositions, except in this case the tunes have been transposed into poetry. As the author himself describes this work,  “it’s a fakebook in the literal sense. Each piece charts the head of that given Monk tune. I just scored ’em  in poetry, rather than western standard notation.”  What more needs to be said?  This is a bold undertaking, and Jim has spent at least a year on this work (when I visited him while in Pittsburgh in May 2011—see the pic from that visit—he was starting it).

In  Jim’s new chapbook, THELONIOUS FAKEBOOK (KSE #236), he has quite literally attempted to take the form and structure and aesthetic of pianist-composer Thelonious Monk and transpose them to the world of poetry. Years of thought and decades of listening have gone into this, and IMHO, the chapbook is an amazing success. Jim is one of the most creative thinkers in poetry today, and I’m proud that KSE has been behind his work for a number of years now. Remember, this totally original and important creation can be yours for only $5 postpaid anywhere. Just send payment via paypal to django5722(at)yahoo(dot)com

And why not pick up some of our other excellent literary offerings while you are at it, only $5 each, all hand-assembled, hand-crafted, and in editions of under 100 copies, where you never know what combination of cover stock and inks and papers you will get with any given copy of any chapbook…try some of the following:

KSE # 216, JOHN SWEET, “Brave Retreat” 

KSE #232 , BILL SHUTE, “Tonalist Fury,” Volume 70 in the Sound Library Series

KSE #234 BILL  SHUTE, “Shades of Night Descending: Florida Nocturne  Poems, Book One”

KSE #197,  A.J. KAUFMANN, “Love Lions of Paris” 

KSE #193,  MICHAEL CASEY, “The Wall Board Knife”

KSE #181,  JOHN SWEET, “Continuum.”

and a reprint of this in-demand piece from 2008-2009

KSE #106, A. J. KAUFMANN, “East West Train”

Brad Kohler, Bill Shute, Jim D. Deuchars (Pittsburgh, May 2011)

free “Inner Mystique Radio” broadcast with purchase of any two KSE cdr’s…OFFER CONCLUDED…

UPDATE: These are all gone now. If you got your order in by 25 AUGUST, you will be getting your copy…thanks to all who responded

yes, that’s right…an attractively packaged edition of my Christmas 1989 “Inner Mystique Radio” show, originally broadcast on CFMU-FM, Hamilton, Ontario…not for sale…available ONLY as a free premium, while they last, with the purchase of any TWO Kendra Steiner Editions cdr’s, but you must send a note with your paypal order specifically requesting it…IM Radio, a kind of offshoot of my Inner Mystique column in Chris Stigliano’s BLACK TO COMM magazine, played a wide variety of music and sound, this particular show being in the punk-garage vein…

and what two cdr’s can you buy? well, how about any of these:

KSE #239 (CDR), FOSSILS, “Bells and Gulls”

KSE #238 (CDR), DANIEL HIPOLITO/EVA KELLY/BILL SHUTE, “Fascination”

KSE #235 (CDR), BOOK OF SHADOWS, “Chimaera”

KSE #228 (CDR), UNMOOR, “Night Driver”

KSE #226 (CDR), DEREK ROGERS, “Born Into Systems”

KSE #223 (CDR), ALISTAIR CROSBIE, “A Campfire In The Snow”

KSE #222 (CDR), MASSIMO MAGEE, “Sopranino Solo”

KSE #220  (CDR), MATT KREFTING, “Sweet Days of Discipline “

KSE #214 (CDR), SABRINA SIEGEL,”Bottlecaps” 

KSE #207 (CDR), ALFRED HARTH & CARL STONE, “Gift Fig”

KSE #206  (CDR), ERNESTO DIAZ-INFANTE, “Emilio “

CDR’s are $8 each postpaid anywhere…so for $16 you can get any two of the above AND the IM radio show…go for it!

payment via paypal to django5722(at)yahoo(dot)com

Daniel Hipólito – Eva Kelly – Bill Shute, “Fascination” (KSE #238, poetry-and-electronic music cdr), now available

Daniel Hipólito – Eva Kelly – Bill Shute,

“FASCINATION” (KSE #238)

poetry and electronic music cdr

recorded live at the Kendra Steiner Editions 6th Anniversary Concert

Austin, TX, 4-29-2012

Daniel Hipólito (of Smokey Emery, Lumens), tapes and electronics

Eva Kelly (of Unmoor, Sprills of Ore), guitar and electronics

Bill Shute, voice and poetry

This new and limited CDR is an audience recording of the performance Daniel Hipolito, Eva Kelly, and I did of my poem “Fascination,” live at the KSE 6th Anniversary Concert. The performance is 21:14, and consists of the five sections of “Fascination,” with the first section of  “Tonalist Fury” as a kind of prologue. Daniel and Eva, two of my favorite Austin musicians (so it was an honor to work with them!), took a lot of time to compose music to surround and support the poem, and we did some rehearsing at their home, so the end result is very successful, IMHO. Not enough people are mixing poetry and free-improv/electro-acoustic music, and I feel that many of my pieces lend themselves to this treatment, so if that concept appeals to you, please grab a copy of this cdr. The performance received a rave review in The Austinist, and when Daniel, Eva, and I finished, we knew we’d succeeded. This IS a live recording, and the music comes through very clearly. My vocals are also heard fine, but don’t expect studio quality. The good thing is that the excitement and spontaneity of the performance come through very clearly on this recording. I’ve done a number of poetry-and-electronic music performances in the last two years, but this is the first one KSE is releasing. Even if you are unfamiliar with my poetry, fans of Daniel’s and/or Eva’s music will love this recording as it captures them in an exciting setting, and you are certainly welcome to consider the words as atmosphere to the music. If you buy a copy, you can “consider” whatever you want!

Available for $8 postpaid anywhere (add $2 if outside the US and ordering only one item). Payment via paypal to django5722(at)yahoo(dot)com

DANIEL

EVA

Under the Smokey Emery moniker, Daniel recorded a fine 3″ CDR for KSE called “Incident At Town Lake” that came out in 2011 and is now out of print, and Eva has just issued an album for KSE as half of UNMOOR (with Andy Hendrix) called NIGHT DRIVER (KSE #228), and we’ll have a writeup on that up here soon. The UNMOOR album IS available for $8 ppd., same as Fascination. KSE  should be issuing an album from Eva’s solo project SPRILLS OF ORE later this year or early in 2013, and we hope to get Daniel back for a full-length album when he gets time in his busy schedule.

BTW, if anyone would like to order the chapbooks from which the material on the Fascination cdr was taken, the two chaps are available for $5 each: FASCINATION (KSE #217) and TONALIST FURY (KSE #232). Please leave a note w/ your paypal order letting me know which items you are ordering.

There are a number of new KSE releases ready, and I’ll try to get a new one up here on the blog every day or two until they are all spoken for. As always, thanks for your support. This is a total DIY operation, everything is done by hand in-house, and our releases are NOT available from the established alternative/underground distribution system. Stay tuned!

new poetry chapbook from John Sweet, “Brave Retreat” (KSE 216), now available

JOHN SWEET

“BRAVE RETREAT”

KSE #216 (poetry chapbook)

$5.00 ppd. anywhere, via paypal, to django5722(at)yahoo(dot)com

Good to have John Sweet back at KSE for another poetry chapbook. Mr. Sweet, working out of south-central New York state, has been a kind of quiet warrior in the contemporary poetry world, eschewing the usual self-delusional self-promotion and the laughable “outlaw” posing of so many who use attitude to compensate for lack of talent. Sweet’s work speaks well for itself—no hype or backstory is needed to prop it up.

Simply put, John Sweet’s poems are terse, finely sculpted, razor-sharp pieces that capture the violence and illness under the surface of contemporary life. On the level of the intimate relationship, the family, the community, the nation, the world—Sweet presents closely observed episodes, full of tension at the level of the phrase and the line and the stanza, and sets them up like spring-loaded traps.  This new collection of eight poems, BRAVE RETREAT, examines many subjects:  families who talk but don’t communicates, the burning secrets inside those closest to us that never come out until too late, the bleakness of Rust Belt America, the futility of overseas military adventures as we surrender to forces we don’t understand on the home front, the burning need to create and to change and the ways those with that need are snuffed out by society or simply suffocated by marginalization. And it’s all presented in the form of specifics and precise details with not a wasted or flaccid word—the precision of a Cid Corman, the caustic understatement of a Samuel Beckett, but in a natural contemporary American voice. Though I don’t believe Mr. Sweet is a poet who does many readings, there is an exciting sense of drama and pacing captured on the page that makes it seem as if the poems are being read to you dramatically by an actor with great subtlety but capable of great menace—think Willem Dafoe or the early Christopher Walken. This is the America of 2012, and it’s the melodrama of life in any period. No one captures the pain, the stepped-on and discarded dreams, the way John Sweet does.

The new poetry chapbook from JOHN SWEET, “Brave Retreat” (KSE #216)…scalding shards of verse from this master craftsman, pieces found broken and abandoned on the internal battlefields of contemporary America…from  the author of Human Cathedrals, Continuum, and This Moment Reflected In Ice…proud to have him back for another KSE chapbook…fads come and go, but John Sweet remains a constant, the real thing in a world of posers and dilettantes….

Looking for more fine contemporary poetry chapbooks, each one hand-assembled and hand-numbered DIY editions of under 100, with different mixes of cover stock/internal papers/ink colors so that there’s unlikely to be more than 5 of the same combination among any edition? Why not try these:

KSE #236  JIM D. DEUCHARS, “Thelonious Fakebook”, Volume 71 in the Sound Library Series

KSE #232 , BILL SHUTE, “Tonalist Fury,” Volume 70 in the Sound Library Series

KSE #234 BILL  SHUTE, “Shades of Night Descending: Florida Nocturne  Poems, Book One”

KSE #197,  A.J. KAUFMANN, “Love Lions of Paris” 

KSE #193,  MICHAEL CASEY, “The Wall Board Knife”

KSE #181,  JOHN SWEET, “Continuum.”

and a reprint of this in-demand piece from 2008-2009

KSE #106, A. J. KAUFMANN, “East West Train”

 

poetry chapbooks only $5.00 each postpaid

payment via paypal to django5722(at)yahoo(dot)com