2020 * 2021 * 2022 * 2023 * 2024 * Music Exchange Guidelines
Our 2021 Exchange is now underway! If you would like to participate in the exchange for 2022, contact Austin.
Here is our playlist for 2021:
01: January: Cyveiliog
This cassette release is a very unique way to start off the exchange, as it is sort of a different kind of musical exploration than what most folks will be offering for this exchange. Still, Cyveiliog is a project that explores the boundaries of music, and offers a release for this artist to let out all the different ideas that they’re trying to get out. This particular tape is divided into two tracks, and I think they are both excellent. A great opening volley for 2021!
02: February: Kiley Petencin
New to our exchange group this year, this EP of singer / songwriter songs by Kiley Petencin is an excellent introduction to their work. Intimate and personal songs about life, with a wonderfully DIY feel to every element of the package. It’s always exciting to have new artists in the group, and I think Kiley will be a force in years to come.
03: March: Brett Opel
Updating his release from last year, Brett has a new song that they recorded, to round out this collection of covers and originals they recorded themselves. Professionally duplicated, with help from Austin Rich on the packaging and production, this disc is a welcome addition to this year’s releases, and a little something to brighten your day.
04: April: Delusions of Parasitosis
Also new to our exchange group this year, this EP of electronic, sample heavy music is the first release by the long-time-coming project, Delusions of Parasitosis, a group that I have been hearing demos of since the late 90’s. Somewhere between electronic dance and the political ideology of Negativland (with occasional rock and roll jams), this is EP is a wonderful slab of dance tunes that will give you pause and a chance to reflect when the workout is done.
05: May: The Basement Tapes
This year, Heather Zajkowski has offered us a tour through material that has been languishing away on cassette in a basement for far too many years. This is a journey through music that Heather has been involved with, but also includes a number of unreleased, local, and otherwise cassette-only sounds that are hard to find almost anywhere else. That is, except for the members of this group!
06: June: LOB – In Thee Age Ov No Stage
Lob Instagon is a performer of a wide range of skills and talents, and a pandemic really stops someone like him in his tracks, pretty hard. So something like “In Thee Age Ov No Stage” is the perfect antidote to that kind of captivity. Lob offers poetry and compositions, on a professionally duplicated CD! This one is a lot of fun, and is unique for this particular music exchange! Enjoy!
07: July: Cozeth & The Ilwacos – A Smattering of Live Sauce
This collection of live recordings from Cozeth & The Ilwacos only offers a handful of songs for us to enjoy, but the immediacy of the performances, and the intimacy of the songs, really makes. you feel like you are there at the bar with Cozeth, enjoying the music while you enjoy a cup of tea with you fellow patrons. Not sure if these will play in a conventional CD Player (mine is .mp3s on a DVD-RW), but the songs sound just fine, on their own, anyway. Well worth the wait.
08: August: The Short Pockets
Time to get short, with The Short Pockets! Containing two different members of our exchange, when our August exchange member had to drop out, I decided to ship this disc out to fill the hole in our schedule. This disc features both “singles” we recorded in 2021, and offers a nice dose of the kind of rock music we tend to offer. We even managed to play a show in 2021, making this release for our group incredibly appropriate.
Only six songs, an EP in the common parlance of our time, enjoy a few tunes that are fairly tongue in cheek, and looking to help you find the funny in this time where there just isn’t that much.
09: September: Pernicious Vomiting (Obadiah Baird)
Using a differing moniker, this year Obadiah Baird delivered a new single of screaming punk rock, that clocks in at about three minutes. With drums / production / mixing by Austin Rich, and pro-duped CDs, this is a pretty great dose of anger and frustration that you are often willing to do just about anything to purge it from your system.
10: October: Kalaloch – Worry demo
Seven new songs by Kalaloch, a duo who explore equal quantities of pop music and experimental sounds and noises. This husband & wife combo are dedicated to this project with such determination that each new release contains every ounce of feeling and wonder that you feel when watch a beautiful and chaotic ocean on a stormy day.
11: November: Greathumour – hex on media
One of the more unusual releases in our exchange this year, this cassette contains collage and rearranging of quite a bit of material, some very familiar, some more obscure, but creates the impression of channel flipping, dial tuning, listening to two stations at once… and more. “Hex on media” is a fun listen and an interesting meditation of our relationship with media. And it’s also fun to get more tapes.
12: December: The Eleven-SixtyFours
Brand new music by a brand new project, started this year, for this exchange! Old-Man Punk songs, on three CDs and two Postcards! 16 songs total. This is “The Complete Discography,” as it were, with three-chord, short blasts of things to be angry about.
Austin Rich 