 Wayne
Butane
"Swipes" CDR
Flaming
Canine
Genres: sound collage, plunderphonics
Flaming Canine
603 N. Orange St
Mesa, AZ
85201-4807
Aug 13 - 19 2004 |
Few know it, but I'm a huge fan of plunderphonics. There's
nothing like a clever audio collage to get me staining my pants in
hysterics. People Like Us, Negativland, and The
Bran Flakes, as well as lesser-knowns like Klarc Qent and Jabberwocky,
all get me laughing every time. So once I popped Wayne Butane's
Swipes album into my stereo and heard the opening "Good
Evening... is that Wayne?" I knew I was in for a treat. But
how is it? Well, Butane is up there with my
favourites. While his insanely diverse, culled-from-everywhere
compositions - each one exactly twenty-four minutes long and
encompassing hundreds of sound sources - are miracles in silliness and
clever stupidity, they don't quite match the brilliantly hilarious
conceptualism of scene vets Negativland and Vicki Bennett.
Instead, Butane's collages are far more scattered and much less
memorable. Regardless, Swipes' content is actually quite
satisfying, taking jabs at everything from Michael Jackson to
the Chicago Blackhawks. A particularly clever moment comes in
"Nut Roll," when Butane cut-n-pastes the words
"President Bush" into a grisly newscast, describing the
American President's tearing off of a little boy's arm. Wayne's
unfailingly spirited brand of comedy runs through Swipes'
seventy-two minutes of sex jokes, satire, song-dissection, and
frequent swipes at Johnny Mathis. I love it. You
will too.
87%
Matt Shimmer [Vitals:
3 tracks, distributed by the
label, released 2003] |
