Label: Creel Pone CP 221 CD

2002年に他界したアメリカの作曲家、俳優であるClark Gesner。氏が1969年にプライベートプレスしていた中古市場にも滅多に出ない激レア10インチ[Found On The Elevator 205 W. 57 2/11/69]。船の通信ブース内に閉じ込められた孤独な旅行者の物語が展開され、ザワザワとした風景、未来を想像したレトロな科学音響、歌い泣き喚く、そして最終的には絶望のテーマが押し寄せるという、そのイメージから全てのサウンドの質が凄まじく面白い作品。オリジナルのブックレットを再現した小さなインサートが付属しており、文字が小さく肉眼ではほとんど判読できない為フレネルレンズが付いています。大推薦。



Reproduction of this mythic 1969 Private-Press 10” of an “Outsider” Hörspiel piece by noted writer & voice actor (he features prevalently across many Captain Kangaroo & Peanuts-related Children’s records) Clark Gesner, itself posited as a “Reissue” of “An 8½" 20RPM disc found on the elevator at 205 W. 57th Street in New York City on February 11, 1969.”

Across the two, roughly 10-minute pieces, a narrative unfolds around the plight of a lone interdimensional traveler, locked inside a comms booth on an undisclosed vessel. Themes of paranoia, absurdly future-retro science, and ultimately despair creep in in an effective way, creating an air of pure malaise. What makes this relevant to the CP program are the sound designs, born of a certain "Cinema Pour L'Oreille" spec, consisting largely of the sort of interface pings & tiny electronic chimes that would have populated any number of sci-fi affairs, yet all done inside the sound design of the piece itself; all totally believable as even contemporary sounds. As a narrative audio experience, it's an incredibly singular one, rife with exactly the sort of posited alternate realities that Electronic Music itself often explores.

This was written about/featured in Beryl Korot’s Radical Software (Volume 2, Number 3; "Videocity") as “The Record by Decker, T. L., J-3, CMR 00965 transcribed by Tom Martin” & is a fascinating, eerily prescient breakdown of mental stabilities in the surveillance-age that presages THX-1138 & the like by a few years. This edition comes inside a six-panel "Gatefold" booklet, which reprints both the minimal jacket & the included baby-blue insert as well as a separate insert/reproduction of the RS article. As the typeface of the latter (rendered in something like 2pt) is damn-near illegible to the naked eye, the CP PTB have included a handheld fresnel lens (in its own electric blue slipcase) with each & every copy.