What a head fuck. Musical polyglot and soothsayer Bob Bucko Jr “scored” a short story collection by Matthew Burnside called Infinity’s Jukebox. Art-form overlaps are at play (songs-as-stories-as-songs), inviting some sensory smearing and questioning.

There’s a huge range of sounds here. “Only Seven Left” rattles low-frequency oscillations, solemn organ, and the static of 60s space-sitcom computer processing. “Equal But Opposite Suffering” has the space and compact themes I associate with soundtracks, the guitar ringing with Twin Peaks’ uneasy kitsch. “I Can’t Ever Count Them All” wraps underwater sax and bagpipe electronics around an alternating 5/8 and 6/8 hypno-riff. “Hey Got a Light” must be the elevator music in purgatory.

Off into conjectured conclusions. This project seems to question our impulse to impose “order” on our perceptions. Is art like songs in a jukebox, a collection of compartmentalized thoughts to shuffle through and access with a nickel? The fourth-wall button pushing beginning and ending “To Kingdom Come!” approximates this act – it’s choosing a song, or pressing the red circle of recording, or perhaps radio surfing or cassette rewinding. Are we all junkies for ordered experience? Just try not to connect the dots on the cover into a “picture.”