I wrote about Corntuth’s lovely new album, Letters to My Robot Son, in last week’s Capsule Garden, and I highly recommend giving it a listen. His mix for Foxy Digitalis collects music that inspired the album; with the added context, new layers and realizations about it come into view. Here’s what Corntuth has to say about the mix:
This is a mix of some of the material that inspired my new record Letters To My Robot Son, alongside some songs I’ve been listening to lately. The album bridges more rhythmic sequences, like those on ‘Patchwork,’ ‘Arrival’ or Conlon Nancarrow’s beguiling ‘Studies for Player Piano,’ with looser, spacier ambient (as on Seretan or the Harold Budd). This mix has a bit of both. The lead track, Benjamin Brunn’s ‘Something You Must Not Talk About,’ inspired me to get the Korg Poly-800 mkII I used across the record. That synth is programmed via sound on magnetic data cassette tapes, and it got me thinking: What if a robot kid could be programmed the same way…
Letters to My Robot Son is out now on cassette and digital formats.
Tracklist:
Something You Must Not Talk About – Benjamin Brunn
Ring With Three Concentric Discs – Craig Leon
Patchwork – Laurie Spiegel
Arrival – Domenique Dumont
Portofino 1 – Raymond Scott
Otis – The Durutti Column
Adams: Hallelujah Junction: 1st Movement – John Adams, Nicolas Hodges, Rolf Hind
Your Pulse – Minami Deutsch
Warszawa – David Bowie
Studies for Player Piano: Study No. 6 – Conlon Nancarrow, Ensemble Modern, Ingo Metzmacher
Bismillahi ‘Rrahmani ‘Rrahim – Harold Budd
in colors just a little too vibrant to be naturally occurring – Ben Seretan
Dripsody – Hugh Le Caine
Water Music – Roberto Musci
Zum Wohl – Cluster
Something You Must Not Talk About – Benjamin Brunn
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