DEAD ANGEL claims no responsibility whatsover for the following interview. It just sort of... uh... APPEARED. That's it! It just happened! We had nothing to do with it! IT'S NOT OUR FAULT! SOCIETY IS TO BLAME! GOD MADE US FUNKY DAMMIT!
[Milk and Cheese appear briefly without Evan Dorkin's knowledge, just long enough to beat chinawhite senseless with a broomstick as Cheese says, "I can't stand it! It is pathetic! Such 'clever art' -- it makes me wish I had a baseball bat the size of Rhode Island so I could beat the shit out of this whole stupid-ass ezine!" Meanwhile, as chinawhite bleeds profusely and blood splatters the white stucco walls, you, the reader, may begin reading:]
THE SCENE:
The boardroom of the vast ECC Erectophonic Sound Deconstruction headquarters, where a quadraphonic stereo system blares away -- Girlschool from one speaker, Fleetwood Mac from the second, Anal Drill from the third, and Herb Albert from the fourth. Careful attention to the cacaphonous mix reveals that the Albert album has been "modified" by an off-center hole, thus distorting the hip- daddyio trumpets. Normally it would impossible to hold an interview over this din, but fortunately the Headless Sno-Cone Girl, the acting secretary, has amazing powers of concentration.
IN ATTENDANCE:
Mark Gunderson, his brother Dr. Mike Gunderson (main sound annihilator behind the latest ECC releases GUNDERPHONICS and COMPACT DISCTRUCTIONS), the Headless Sno-Cone Girl, your disembodied host, various other oddballs who wander in and out at will....
DA: Just what exactly IS Evolution Control Committee -- band, art project, label, or what?
MIKE: An experiment.
DA: Sort of like DNA testing run tragically amok?
MIKE: Even worse.
MARK: It's a lot more. Naturally, the staple item for The Committee has been directing the flow of evolution, but we've got a very lively area of sound exploration going too.
MIKE: The Committee itself has issued a number of experiments under their own name, but has also had a hand in other things such as Gaga, MelloDeath...
MARK: ...The Weird Love Makers, The Mood Swingers... these involve various members in and outside of The Committee, and a wide diversity of musical genres.
MIKE: [to the HS-CG:] Are we going too fast?
[She shakes her sno-cone: "No."]
MIKE: Are you... blue flavoured?
MARK: Is it made from real, organic, free-range blue?
MIKE: Sshhh!
[HS-CG look as quizzical as an HS-CG can under the circumstances]
DA: Actually, she tastes like cherry.... mmm mmm GOOD!
[HS-CG slaps him, but achieves nothing since he is disembodied]
DA: So how did it all get started and when?
MARK: What was it... 1987?
MIKE: Roughly. It pretty much started with George.
DA: George?
MARK: Our president, George "Spanky" Esoterica III. He decided that The Committee needed to explore some new avenues...
MIKE: "A facelift"...
MARK: Haha! Yeah, "a facelift", he called it. So we started exploring new wrinkles, I guess you'd say. We just thought that there were a lot of genres and mixed genres that weren't getting the exploration or attention they deserved.
MIKE: Like combining polka and industrial.
[The HS-CG claps with approval....]
MARK: Yeah, or upper-level educational songs, or...
MIKE: ... or destroying compact discs so that they play incorrectly.
DA: What about "modifying" Fleetwood Mac recordings so that when the guy with the silly hair... you know, the weird one....
MARK: The drummer? Mick Fleetwood?
DA: ... no, the loopy guitar player....
MARK: Oh, Lindsey Buckingham. He always reminded me of that guy in ERASERHEAD.
DA: Yeah, him. So anyway, modifying the tapes so when he sings some sappy love thing, Stevie Nicks starts singing, like, death metal lyrics or something. Something humorous like that....
MIKE: [Looking dubious] Uhhh... we'll take it into consideration....
DA: Is there a set lineup or is it shifting kind of thing a la Pigface?
MIKE: Mark's a lot of the performance aspect...
DA: Really? Do you ever set him on fire while he's on stage? You know, to get the audience's attention?
[The HS-CG angrily holds up a sign; on the card are the witless duo Beavis and Butthead, with a universal NO! circle and slash covering their goofy faces. The implication is clear and DEAD ANGEL weeps with shame at his social gaffe.]
MARK: [Sensibly ignoring the "fire! fire!" question] You'll usually see me when there's a Committee performance, often solo. Mike has done a couple...
MIKE: ...Compact Disctructions, mainly...
MARK: ...but behind performance, it's everyone. Mike, me, George, Joe, Elanora sometimes... it's a group process, but sometimes. Sometimes not.
DA: Does it every degenerate into a mad, senseless orgy with nudity, fire, body paint, cleavage, and total reckless abandon?
MARK: You seem to have certain things on your MIND....
[HS-CG holds up a card: "What passes for a mind, you mean."]
DA: Absolutely... and Anastasia hasn't even entered the interview yet....
MIKE: I can tell this is going to be an interesting interview.
MARK: Definitely. Perhaps at the end we'll set HIM on fire. Oh, I forgot -- he's disembodied, that wouldn't work very well then, would it?
MIKE: Not likely.
DA: So what exactly does ECC do?
MARK: That's a George question if I every heard one... HEY, ANASTASIA!
[Gorgeous, tall (but empty-headed) blonde bombshell in a long black dress, with titanic waves of bleached-white hair and reeking of peroxide, enters the room; the Herb Albert speaker momentarily switches to the Hollies]
DA [hovering above Anastasia, looking straight down]: My oh my.
ANASTASIA: Yes?
MARK: Can you get George in here?
ANASTASIA: Do I look like a damn maid?
MARK: If I say PLEASE?
ANASTASIA: Well, if you INSIST.... [exits; speaker four returns to Herb Alpert]
DA: Is she available?
MARK: She is a woman of mystery.
DA: So, uh, where were we anyway?
MARK: George is going to enlighten us with his presence....
MIKE: The Committee's been getting into a lot of different things...
[Businesslike guy who bears an disturbing resemblance to Mr. Carleton from WKRP in Cincinnati -- the perpetually frazzled station director's son, perhaps? -- enters the room. He's grinning madly and chomping on a pipe from which the bittersweet smell of "frop" rises into the stale conference room air.]
GEORGE: Hi, I'm George, The Committee's president.
DA: Hi George...
[The HS-CG waves]
GEORGE: You can call me Spanky if you prefer, though. What's the question?
DA: Uh... well... damn, I FORGOT. [To HS-CG] Li'l angel?
[She holds up a card that reads "What exactly does ECC do?"]
GEORGE: Why, a better question would be "What don't we do?"! The Committee seems to be into all ends of media. Besides just our musical output, we're about to release a videotape, we've been producing lots of interesting merchandise, even doormats!
DA: Doormats?
GEORGE: It's a specialty item, limited quantities; one of the better models sports the statement "KILL VEGETARIANS AND EAT THEM"...
DA: [starts writing out a check] I'm sold....
GEORGE: ...never really understood the humour in it, but the boys downstairs assure me it's a hit. Oh, and we're doing web development... can I give out our URL?
DA: Absolutely. We at DEAD ANGEL adore the Web. Even though the last time we visited it, our PC exploded. We're kind of technologically backward.
GEORGE: It's http://www.infinet.com/~markg/ecc.html.
DA: Those two slashes always throw me....
MARK: It takes two bouncers to throw me.
GEORGE: [The marketing gleam in his face vanishes briefly to reveal...] You... I'll throw YOU if you don't... oh! Excuse me, where were we? Ah yes; of course, music is what we're best known for...
MARK: And here you thought we were performance art!
GEORGE: [glaring again] I SAID, music is what we're best known for --but we take a strong hand in performance as well, having put together many different types and styles of performance, incorporating technology to make it into a multimedia event...
ANASTASIA: [reappearing briefly] George! Simian Division on line one.
GEORGE: What do they want?
ANASTASIA: They said something about opposable thumbs.
GEORGE: Sorry, I'll have to take that. Thanks Ana... [leaves]
DA: What a swell guy... I... I miss him already! I may weep....
[Gundersons look at him like he's lost him mind; HS-CG holds up a sign that reads, "He gets moody and emotional when he's disembodied."]
DA: Anyway... sniff .... how does each project come together?
MIKE: Some are special purpose, like the Compact Disctructions thing, which focuses just on the CD experiments, and Gunderphonics, which is exclusively tape edits...
MARK: ...but some are spin-offs, like one that just started up, called Flur. It's a shoegazer style, like My Bloody Valentine. Other projects, like Gaga and most of the others, involve non-Committee members, so it's best to adopt another name for the project.
MIKE: Often, different styles alone necessitate a different name.
DA: That's true... I've changed my name so many times I don't even remember who I am now.
MARK: You know, you're a very strange anti-guy....
DA: It's what makes me so loveable. It's also why I'm a freak magnet.
MIKE: It's probably a good thing you're disembodied right now... no telling what might happen if you started running amok....
DA: What's the motivation/satisfaction behind your work?
MIKE: Ummm...
MARK: Exploration...
MIKE: Yes, definitely. Experimentation.
GEORGE: [sticking his head in the door] BABES!
MIKE: ANATASIA! George needs another 10ccs!
MARK: To me I see a big gap that we're filling... like the Gunderphonics material; besides John Oswald and Negativland, there's not a lot of exploration in that area right now. And like that Flur project I mentioned, other bands have gotten compared to My Bloody Valentine, but none are really as experimental as they've been, and I think there's a need there.
MIKE: I guess you'd have to say I'm a sound scientist. I just need to experiment in different areas, explore different avenues. The Committee gives me a good environment to do this in.
DA: What projects are currently in the making or recently finished?
MARK: Flur is one of course...
MIKE: We're about to release a subliminal tape...
MARK: Yes! It's great: It's an overlap of a dozen or more subliminal or suggestion tapes, so that when you listen you'll simultaneously lose weight, gain creativity, get a better job, stop smoking, et cetera. Side two is the same thing backwards, so you gain weight, get demoted, smoke more...
[The HS-CG drops her notes laughing]
MIKE: It's kind of a manic-depressive tape! [laughs]
MARK: Yeah! We've got a video too...
MIKE: Most performances have accompanying "slide-videos"; they're videos but done with two slide projectors. They're syncronized to the music, so the material is actually relevant. The videotape will mostly be those, but a few other things as well.
MARK: Some of the slide-videos are on public access TV, mainly in Columbus and Ann Arbor right now, but hopefully more to come.
MIKE: The singles...
MARK: Of course: Eerie Materials, a label in Berkeley, is going to release a Committee 7" single of the Herb Alpert/Public Enemy duets from the GUNDERPHONICS release, and probably a MelloDeath single too.
MIKE: It seems likely that The Committee will also be releasing their own CD within a year.
DA: What's on the table for the future?
MIKE: What, generally speaking? That would be a George question, but I think he's still on the phone...
ANASTASIA: [shouting from the other room] Don't you even THINK of interrupting him, either!
DA: You know, I'll bet she'd make a really good dominatrix.
MIKE: She might already BE one... we're afraid to ask!
MARK: He told me that we're going to start advertising soon, and he's working on getting better distribution. Right now distribution is almost solely direct from us, and the shipping department is having a hard time keeping up...
MIKE: ...lots of delays...
MARK: Yeah. We were going to hire off-duty postal employees as temporary help, but they kept insisting we allow them to bring their AK-47s with them, so that didn't really work out.
MIKE: The web site should become a popular place, and will hopefully have a sort of weekly audio comic strip. It's called The Sub-Atomic Opera; it was originally intended for radio, and perhaps its appearance on the web may find it a good radio home.
MARK: I wouldn't be surprised if a collection of those gets released too.
DA: How do you see ECC fitting in with the current state of music?
MARK: Hmmm... Mike?
MIKE: Well... I've always wondered how bands could just stick to one genre, almost like experimentation outside of such is a crime. I think, or maybe just hope, that eventually people will become interested in more diversity, more experimentation...
MARK: ...and that's where The Committee comes in... we've been exploring combinatory musical styles and have a lot of ground-breaking stuff already available.
[Incredibly ancient man speaks up from the corner of the room, holding a mop]
JOE: Not to mention, The Committee's a lot more fun.
MIKE: Who are YOU?
MARK: That's Joe, our janitor...
MIKE: What do you mean, that's Joe? Joe is YOUNG! He has long, stringy hair and indiscriminate facial fuzz like so many of his Generation X brethren! He's the ex-Nobel Laureate who couldn't cope with the stress of academia and turned to a mop for solace! For God's sake, JOE USES A SMART MOP[tm]! And this... this is just an OLD MAN!
MARK: Obviously you don't know about Joe's peculiar habit of dressing up as a senior citizen to infiltrate the Social Security Administration lobby....
[The incredibly ancient janitor pulls wildly at his head; the convincing latex mask pops up just long enough for all to see that, indeed, Joe the Janitor is quite a young and handsome guy. Then he puts the mask back in place and continues to mop.]
JOE: Hi...
DA: You know, you look awfully FAMILIAR.
JOE: That was me in Metallica's video for "The Unforgiven." I did that in between shifts at the SSA lobbyist meetings. They never knew....
DA: How cool. Did you get to meet them?
JOE: Oh, yeah. It was kind of a letdown... they've totally lost that wild-kid street vibe, you know. Too busy getting measured for ostrich-skin boots to bother with writing real music anymore, you know.
DA: So you groove on the Committee a lot more, huh?
JOE: Sure. Like I said, they're a lot more fun. Less poofy hair, too.
MARK: Yeah, he's got a point; we do tend to take things less seriously, and I'm sure it shows...
MIKE: George is a bit of a whimsical manager.
DA: What does the band/entity hope to accomplish in the future?
MARK: Extra set of hands for humans.
DA: God knows I could use THAT....
MARK: And I'm sure we don't want to know WHY....
MIKE: Better vocal capabilities for pets. Talking cats.
MARK: That's always been a controversial one. I've always thought the Snausage- flavored cockroach mutation was a good one, though...
MIKE: ...just picture it: Dogs will hunt them down! No more roaches.
DA: How about finding a head for the Headless Sno-Cone Girl so she can talk? Reading her really bad handwriting is getting kind of tedious.
MIKE: I might have an extra in the lab...
MARK: So what HAPPENED to that head-thing of hers, anyway?
DA: I'm not sure. It's something to do with a mission she was on while she was still working for the CIA. I think the Men In Black stole it in an attempt to "photograph" her brainwaves and steal sensitive information that way. But I don't really know... she declines to discuss the subject....
MARK: And what's with the damn sno-cone, anyway?
DA: I think it's a symbol of hope... you know, the implication that someday she might be able to eat it again.... She sure spends a lot of money on sno- cones that just end up melted and uneaten, though.
JOE: I kind of like it. It's cool.
DA: Yeah, but you don't have to clean up all the puddles every day, either.
[TH-SG hurls her melted sno-cone at the disembodied ezinester]
MARK: [Directing conversation back to the original topic] Musically, I think you'll be hearing a lot more about The Committee and connected projects. I've heard George talking pretty excitedly about the PR he's got planned, so I think The Committee is going to be heard a lot more in the future. 'bout time, too...
MIKE: ...well, I dunno... the obscurity has actually afforded us a nice shield when dealing with potentially lawsuit-inspiring projects such as Gunderphonics. I'll be sad if that has to go.
MARK: True. I guess this remains to be seen. I wouldn't want to be the next Negativland, getting sued by some big-bucks label...
DA: Is Greg Ginn a big-time weenie or what?
MIKE: ...but on the other hand, that's a road that desperately needs to be paved. Maybe that'll be something we'll find ourself doing.
MARK: Maybe.
DA: Cool. Can I drive the steamroller?
[All exit as Blondie's "Pretty Baby" plays on the four speakers, but each speaker is one second out of sync with its neighbor. George can be seen in his office snapping his fingers to it, nonetheless. Joe gets out the Smart Mop[tm] and soaks up the puddle the HS-CG left. Mark is seen fumbling with a PZM microphone, recording the sloshing sounds.]