Back in July I was witness to a wild and woolly midsummer’s melding of the minds featuring a number of the area’s greatest weirdos: an all-day affair that took us from killer early sets by Gay Shapes and Solid State Entity to a mind-melting late night blast by Quits. The reason for the season? The release of YDLMIER050, the fiftieth (!) release by Somerville’s own YDLMIER label, a neatly-packaged DIY box set comprised of three whole cassettes’ worth of kick-ass. Now here we are almost a month later, which is about the amount of time it actually takes to really properly take in so much music, and I’m finally ready to tell you all about it.
The mood is set from the get-go with Matt Krefting‘s hauntological combination of warm vinyl crackle, cascading classical piano and what sound to me like fireworks going off around some very pissed-off dogs. The overall effect is somehow much more inviting than you’d think, which sort of becomes the theme of this entire box set.
While an outsider’s perspective of “out” music might be as something cold and unapproachable, and maybe even downright hostile, there is very little of that attitude on display here. That hostility can definitely be a part of the larger noise scene, but the bubbles and gurgles, laser sounds, laptop explosions and contact mic weirdness that take up much of YDLMIER050 sound warm and inviting to my ears.
Perhaps this is because of the nature of the project itself: The coming together of 50 different projects to celebrate 50 different releases by a man who has devoted much of his life to exposing the world at large to sounds they never even knew they needed to hear. What could possibly be LESS hostile than that?!
I could tell you about the standout tracks. About how Side B is start-to-finish perfect and Greg Kelley‘s track is a beautiful tribute to New England now that he’s left us for the left coast. But the project is kinda taken best as a whole. Dive in and feel refreshed.
Get in touch with Sam at YDLMIER to find out if copies of this behemoth are still available. You can find artists from this compilation including Via App, W00dy, Homeowner and some of the others linked above playing around New England all the time. Hell, at least one of the artists from this comp is probably playing somewhere near you RIGHT NOW! So go check em out!
