On June, 13th, 1986, Charles Goff III and Killr “Mark” Kaswan performed as Disism before a live audience for the first time. After Disism’s set, they joined with Robert Silverman and Steve Schaer (of the then defunct –ING) for a live tape loop improvisation. They called their makeshift group: “The Musical Muscles.” Stuart Sands had been invited to join in the fun as well, but he didn’t make it. Unfortunately, there are no surviving recordings of the Musical Muscles performance. However, these sonic explorers did get together in various groupings at other points in 1986, and recordings from two of those sessions were released by Taped Rugs on a cassette entitled: “Flexing The Musical Muscles” in 1989.

This excerpt from the Herd Of The Ether Space podcast series focuses on a gathering at Taped Rugs studio held on March 1st, 1986. In attendance were Goff, Kaswan, Sands, and Silverman. Their afternoon adventures in sound were recorded on the Taped Rugs Frippertronics-style tape loop system. Most of the sounds they created originated in some way from electronic guitars, but a few other instruments, a couple of prerecorded tapes, and even some microphoned vocals also vibrated their speakers that day.

Here Taped Rugs presents two pieces from the session: “Photo” and “Up The Reverb Without A Paddle.” “Photo” was the first piece recorded that day. Goff had placed an usual photograph, which had been taken by his niece, Katrina Guiney, on the floor where all the musicians could see it, and asked that they look at it while they improvised. The photograph above that accompanies this podcast is a small reproduction of the picture that inspired the group’s musical muscles that day.

TAPED RUGS PRESENTS will revisit “Flexing The Musical Muscles” in a future podcast. But before that happens, we will take a detour to where the kettle boils over and unveil another session featuring Goff, Kaswan, Sands, and Silverman.

THE AUDIO COMPONENT OF THIS PODCAST HAS BEEN REMOVED TO ALLOW MORE EPISODES IN THIS SERIES TO BE POSTED. IT IS NOW AVAILABLE AT THE LINK BELOW:

http://www.archive.org/details/HOTESTapeLoopImprovisationsVol3