:: the fun years ::

*The boyz school us on their new record "baby, it's cold inside" due to shock and awe ear drums July 2008 via Barge Recordings:

Ben flew out to give a guest seminar and work in Boston and prep for the Fun Years mini-tour. He stayed at Isaac's. He drank fancy things containing quinine and rare botanicals and smoked some really scary (good scary) weed. After countless hours spent listening to Gas records on a retrofitted Victrola, the Fun Years droned out. Much to Ben's surprise, Isaac's "studio" was really just a big walk-in closet with a loft bed. You'd think after all of these years recording together, he might have previously noticed this, but anyways....It kinda resembled a freshman dorm room at a state school, but smaller. Ben set up under the loft. Isaac manned the decks across the room. After a few trips to the Rat Shack and one standard waste of a trip to Guitar Center, they managed to route cables, but were never able to find the source of that persistent buzzing sound. Fuck it. The Fun Years can roll with some 60 Hertz noise. Isaac was also perfecting his optimal Rice Krispie Treat recipe at that time. Choco-nilla -- that's some raw limited edition shit (although you can't f with the original). Between the green and gin and marshmallow-heavy diet, they worked a bunch of improv, and decided to hone five of the "tracks" for live performance. Through repetitive practice, the tracks nearly became songs and developed their own sort of natural dynamic. But they were still flexible enough to play on the road--from a quiet office rave in Boston to scenester spotting in Brooklyn to mad-art-school-kid-freak-out in Providence. At each show, these tracks were recorded yet again.

So then Ben goes back to California with thirty odd hours of recording. The editing begins. Finding the best bits, trying to decide what makes each song, sending drafts across the information super net to Isaac, having him send back more takes to add to the insurmountable recording archive, discovering more crucial artifacts... After much whittling away and back and forth, you get "baby, it's cold inside."

We start off with "my lowville," a plaintive little ditty with extra emphasis on the wall of sound... turntable dc offset meets distorted guitar tape loop. We segue our way into "auto show day of the dead" where we riff off a somber loop from some old Kay Gardner record. Kay Gardner (R.I.P.) has some old school Jamaica Plain cred. Sound Healing Composer Extraordinaire way before New Age was the cool shit. In the process of recording, Ben destroyed that record by trying to be like Isaac. Word to the wise, don't let Ben near your records.

The buzzy synth then bleeds into "fucking milwaukee's been hesher forever" where we have way too much fun with our tremelo plugins. But everyone has to admit it's true -- fucking Milwaukee is filled with some unapologetic hesher motherfuckers. We follow up with "re: we're again buried under." That's a creepy one where Ben kind of landed in this weird parameter setting on his rig that just droned out this one evil note. And we don't know where those other sounds came from. Isaac passed out mid-recording, and ghosts took over. But then we resolve it all with a little indie rock number called "the surge is working." Dude, it's a year later, and The Surge is still *totally working*. Can't deny that shit. This track ends with what Isaac fondly refers to as "Category 5 Guitar Hurricanes" that slowly dissolve into the locked groove at the end of one of our thrift store gems. And we come full circle.

THANKS FOR LISTENING. TFY 2008

BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION:

BARGE: Isaac, please tell us a little about Ben.
ISAAC: Recently Ben has thrown down at techno parties with Mike Uzzi, rocked the dance-punk with the Dan Bensons Project, and played out solo as Localfields.  He has released music with zer0g sounds, Unlockedgroove Records, Unfoundsound Records, Adhesive Records and Clever Music.  He has toured extensively throughout the US and Europe and his sound art has been exhibited in the Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art, the Cooper Hewitt Museum and the ARS Electronica Center.  Ben’s collaboration with the DSP Music Syndicate called "Concrete Music" won a prize in the Vida 6.0 Art & Artificial Life Competition.  In collaboration with James Patten, he designed the electronic music performance tool "Audiopad" that has also won a several awards.  And he got a fucking PhD from the MIT Media Lab.  Yawn.  Dude's a boring braggart.  

BARGE: Thanks.  Now Ben, please tell me a thing or two about Isaac. 
BEN: Isaac is an old, embittered hip hop deejay who spent the better part of the 90's making mixtapes and playing basement parties around the upper Midwest.  He definitely doesn't have a PhD from the MIT Media Lab; he kept it real getting his BA in Journalism at the University of Wisconsin.  When he's not making drone loops or beats to scratch to, Isaac likes to create and screen-print TFY t-shirts (www.isaacsparks.com).

BARGE: Do you have any musical influences you wish to share?
TFY: We can't give away our musical influences because it would take away from the mystery and the joy.  However, we both agree that Master of Puppets is the greatest metal record of all time. 

BARGE: What about your musical techniques and/or processes for recording and performing live?
TFY: Unfortunately, we haven't used Technics since early 2005.  We drink Sparks (fuck Bud Extra).  Port wine is acceptable.  Other red wines work.  Botanicals and quinine are a recent innovation since Isaac's stomach stopped working.  We're looking into ways of bypassing the GI tract for alcohol intake.  We'll keep you posted of our progress.

BARGE: Thanks.
TFY: No, thank you.

DISCOGRAPHY:

2007 : life-sized psychoses : CD + IA - presently in print - Barge Recordings

2006 : the crippling paranoia of fluorescent quinine : CD-R - out of print - self-released

2006 : $3.99 yourself to death : CD-R - out of print - self-released

2005 : minimal hardcore : CD-R - out of print - self-released

2005 : why we're all below average : CD-R - out of print - self-released

2004 : now that's what i call droning, volume 4 : CD-R - out of print - self-released

*COMING SOON: Exclusive MP3s, ringtones, steak and scollop recipes and poems by Ben.

::

contact the fun years: thefunyears ( at ) bargerecordings.com

Official TFY Website: http://www.thefunyears.com/
TFY Virb Page: http://virb.com/thefunyears