Whether conceptual or performance art, electronic music, counterculture, minimalism, drone sounds or Fluxus – New York City in the 1960s was a hotbed for experiments of all kinds.
62 minutes with Angus MacLise, Henry Flynt, La Monte Young & Marian Zazeela, Richard Maxfield and others.
Featured cover art: Henry Flynt – Raga Electric
Playlist
Richard Maxfield – Bacchanale
Musique concrète collage without electronically generated sounds. (1963, New World Records)
La Monte Young & Marian Zazeela – Oceans
From an aborted session for an LP on CBS, recorded by David Behrman. (1969, not on label)
Angus MacLise, Tony Conrad – Druid’s Leafy Nest
Collaboration between the first drummer of The Velvet Underground and the pioneer of drone music. (undated recording, Boo-Hooray)
Jack Smith – Buffalo Song
The icon of early underground cinema and performance art draws inspiration here from Jimmy Rodgers, one of the first superstars of country music. (between 1962 and ’64, Table Of The Elements)
Henry Flynt – Raga Electric
Indian raga traditions from the perspective of a conceptual artist. (1966, Locust Music)
Tuli Kupferberg – Fields Matrimonial Service
An enactment based on marriage advertisements. (1966, ESP Disk)
John Cale, Angus MacLise, Terry Jennings – Terry’s Cha-Cha
Pop song dedicated to saxophonist Terry Jennings. (1967, Table Of The Elements)
Henry Flynt & The Insurrections – Dreams Away
On the fringes of avantgarde garage rock. (1966, Locust Music)
William S. Burroughs – Inching – Is This Machine Recording?
Exploring the Inching technique on a tape recorder. (1965, Industrial Records)
Plastic Clock Radio/Steve Weber/Gerard Malanga and Ingrid Superstar/The Velvet Underground – The East Village Other (excerpt)
Gathering of New York City’s counterculture in support of the radical underground newspaper The East Village Other. (1966, ESP Disk)
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