The beautiful 12" vinyl version of our album is pressed on translucent clear 180gram vinyl and comes with a digital download card.
Includes unlimited streaming of To Combat Loneliness: Compositions Based on the Works of David Foster Wallace
via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
ships out within 3 days
$20USDor more
Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album
Item comes in a standard plastic CD jewel case with full color printing. Liner notes on the inside booklet.
Includes unlimited streaming of To Combat Loneliness: Compositions Based on the Works of David Foster Wallace
via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
This piece is actually based on a separate short story within DFW’s book, “The Broom of the System”. One of the characters is a reviewer and often recounts various stories that have been submitted to him. He does this with Lenore, the main character of the book. They do this often in conversation to pass time and as a way to amuse themselves. It’s not what the main plot of the book was about at all, but instead a curious story that fit in with this project’s theme of loneliness and sadness.
There is a man in NYC that can fall in love at the drop of a hat. Like full-on, head over heels love. It could be anybody that catches his attention and/or attraction. Needless to say, his propensity for saying untimely and inappropriate things to strange women has gotten him into some serious trouble over the years; slapped, kicked, fired from jobs, thrown in jail, etc. Because he is continually pushed away, he is constantly lonely. Eventually he decides to seek the help of a love therapist. She concludes that he needs to interact with women that are the opposite of what he finds attractive. Women that he could never fall in love with. By doing this, hopefully he can build a control mechanism over the chemicals in his brain that go haywire when meeting someone he desires. A way to keep from jumping too far ahead in a relationship and instead get to know someone slowly and fall in love over time. So he remembers this woman he saw on the subway earlier that day. She is unkempt, has coke bottle glasses and is grossly overweight. He noticed how unattractive she was when she got up to leave the subway, and when she did, she forgot her Thermos under her seat. The Thermos rolls across the floor and ends up right by the man. He picks it up and finds her name and address written on the bottom of it on masking tape in case it is found somewhere. The man finds the address and goes to her house to return it to her and strike up a conversation, and after a lot of awkward explaining and a few more meet ups, they become friends. There is no pressure, and even though he isn’t attracted to her, the man enjoys talking to the woman and going for walks with her. He thinks the love therapist’s advice is actually working. The woman, lonely and tired of feeling unnoticed and unwanted, is simply happy to have a man to talk to and spend time with. The man begins to look forward to their time together and has enjoyed getting to know her. The one thing he can’t figure out is why she always seems to wear a bunch of scarves around her neck. She often touches them on one side and rearranges them slightly. He thinks it’s a nervous tick and forgets about it. The woman feels a new confidence in herself and ditches the coke bottle glasses, dresses differently, and begins to lose weight. This continues over time, until the woman has completely changed her appearance and both have grown quite comfortable around each other. The man realizes that he has come to love this woman, and now finds her beautiful. They finally express this love by spending the night together. In the course of the evening, the woman allows the man to undress her, including the inordinate amount of scarves she has continued to wear around her neck. She’s nervous, and he is curious as to what is underneath. Once he has them unwrapped, he finds a small toad living in the crook of her neck. She explains that it is a family custom, and she is well aware that it isn’t normal and is the main reason why she always kept to herself and felt like a societal outcast in the past. He finds this all adorable and they are in love and begin their relationship in earnest. The woman brings him to meet her family, and over dinner he sees that everyone has some form of clothing that covers their neck. The woman doesn’t hide her toad anymore, and allows it to be out in the open for all to see. She feeds it little morsels of food while her parents watch in disapproval. They are not happy with the man, whom they figure is the cause of all this change in their daughter. A rift develops in the woman; on one hand she is happy with her new life, self confidence and relationship with the man, while on the other hand she feels familial pressure to continue to uphold their customs and make her parents happy again. It causes her too much anguish, so she breaks up with the man. He is crushed, and falls back into his old ways of expressing love to strangers and being rejected. The woman is also heartbroken, and takes her own life. One day the man hears a noise at the door. When he opens it, he finds the woman’s toad staring up at him, slowly blinking.
Aaron Kerr--"This ended up being the first song on the album. Appropriately, this was DFW’s first book as well.
Looking back at all of these compositions is giving me the chance to see some of the influences in my composing. There is this fantastic Estonia composer named Arco Part who I can’t get enough of. He is, by
a long shot, my favorite modern composer and my composing style has
been compared to his more than a few times. He pioneered a method of composing called tintinnabuli, a rule where the melody and the accompaniment are one. It is kind of like minimalism but more meditative and trance-like. It’s also subtle - the counterpoint needs to be done perfectly in order for it to sound right.
I’m doing something similar to this in this piece - there are two lines of notes moving together with a repeated bass rhythm underneath. The two lines move only slightly and where they sit harmonically they
almost sound like the same note. There is just enough separation and
counterpoint to recognize that there is movement in the music, but the
movement is subtle enough to hide their intervalic and range
differences.
I am addicted to this - simplicity and unity.
Produced by Tyson Allison and Justin Deleon
Recorded at IPR studios in Minneapolis, MN
Engineered and mixed by Justin Deleon
Mastered by Tom Garneau at AUDIOACTIVE in Minneapolis, MN
Copyright 2019 Humble Mumblings ASCAP
Emperor Penguin Records began in 2003 in St. Paul, MN and later moved to Milwaukee, WI in 2015. The label is run by
musician/producer Tyson Allison. EPR enlists and caters to singer/songwriters, introverts, experimental weirdos, bookish people, and crafters that paint pictures with words and toy with your emotions on a well-placed chord. Thank you for your interest!...more
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