[Landline] Uncanned heat, Rosali, Green-House and how to turn into a jaguar

“LANDLINE” — AN EMAIL BULLETIN BY JAY BABCOCK

No. 0021

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 7, 2021

Greetings friends,

Days are all over the map temperature-wise but we’re definitely headed into colder evenings now. Which means it’s getting time for the traditional late autumn set-up: in one hand, a glass of body-warming herbal firewater; in the other, a relaxing, sparkly pipeful of aged mugwort. That’s certainly one way to be, but okay, everybody—maybe just a nice cup of hot tea and a brisk walk during witching hour will do quite nicely. That, and something entrancing to get into. Regarding the latter, here are a few suggestions that might work for somebody… 

1. FULL CONDOR, ALL CITY

“The Offender”: A 22 ½-minute groove from dance rock band Endless Boogie, who are so great at going to that spot, hitting it and then staying in that lean-yet-expansive mode, repeating repeating repeating with correct amount of solo/duo/trio vamp sizzle to a point of positive derangement. No melody, very few chords, all uncanned heat: somebody has to do it. Gimme infinite boogie—make my head swivel and hips shake. And a tour with Mdou Moctar. Thank you. 

2. AND THEN I BECAME A JAGUAR

"After about ten minutes, I started feeling that my whiskers were growing, my teeth were getting long and sharp, my mouth tasted of blood. I started eyeing the chickens that were clucking around...and decided not to attack them. I started feeling like a feline, as if I was turning into a big jungle cat... I was even thinking, 'You know the tobacco paste is strong when the anthropologist starts attacking the chickens.'"

— Cosmic Serpent author Jeremy Narby, in a fantastic recent podcast interview with host Brian James supporting publication of Narby’s new book Plant Medicines: Ayahuasca, Tobacco and the Pursuit of Knowledge, co-written with Rafael Chanchari Pizuri

3. EVERYBODY KNOWS, EVERYBODY SEES, EVERYBODY SAYS

More than one staggered listener to Rosali’s No Medium has commented “Chrissie Hynde fronting Crazy Horse” and well, they’re all right. We do not use the holy words “Chrissie Hynde” and “Crazy Horse” in vain in this house: this hit-after-gut-punch-hit, recovery-themed album, recorded with obviously inspired members of the David Nance Group, belongs in that tradition/lineage. I knew Rosali Middleman socially in the brief period (2008-9) I spent witnessing the astonishingly fertile Philadelphia scene— a scene that in the intervening years has borne so much beautiful new fruit (Kurt Vile, Steve Gunn, Mary Lattimore, The War on Drugs—incredible!). It’s a pleasure to hear Rosali achieving at this level. A privilege, really.

4. INNER PLANT MEDICINE MUSIC

Los Angeles-based Olive Ardizoni has done the entirely sensible thing of getting back to the garden and making electronic music there for all beings. This is bright, serene music that proceeds with dignity, simplicity and whimsy, steady as photosynthesis; you can hear the blossoms opening, the influx of water into cells. Listeners of a certain vintage may hear Music for Living Spaces as an answer/alternate soundtrack to the 1972 sci-fi eco tragedy Silent Running — one human, three robots and a biodome full of animals and plants floating together across space in a fragile, gorgeous spaceship, in something approaching harmony… Well, that’s what I see! Calming and lovely: perfect for cold nights and uneasy days.

Keep it together,

Jay Babcock

Tucson, Arizona

p.s. Landline is a free email newsletter dispatched to over 4,300 friends and colleagues — shelter-givers, legal aid people, native plant gardeners, Mohamed Salah fans, old heads from the Arthur Magazine days, and other curious sweetfolk — made up of ideas, nudges and announcements that hopefully form a small bailiwick outside the cruddiness at large. Landline is free to read, but paying subscriptions make Landline possible, and paying subscribers get extra stuff. Hopefully Landline is worth the cost of one cup of fine dark union-made coffee a month. Thank you kindly.