tantric cruiser bikes and the perennial androgyne: exploring ferraro's transexual visions of "the real travel from body to body in one body" in the body fusion albums

"the real man, in the plentitude of his ideal personality,  evidently cannot be only man or only woman, he must  possess a unity superior to both sexes. the proper and  immediate task of love is the realization of this unity-the  creation of the real man-that is to say, a unity free of the  masculine and feminine principles, principles that con-  serve their formal individualization, but have surmounted their essential diversity and their disintegration" 

- vladimir solovyov

"in an androgynous interaction, an individual knows the simultaneous working of that intuitive aspect by which he is able to encompass wholes, with the sensate aspect wherein each minute element of a situation is seen and felt in its relationship to the totality.” 

- june singer

when exploring any of ferraro’s hypnagogic escapades, one is presented with two albums, a curiously textured and dense medley of sounds, and a summoning ritual whose object or location reveals itself in piecemeal. and while most of his prolific output during this period falls on a spectrum bound by elation, nervous activity, and surreal repetitions, there’s only one segment among his releases that i'd describe as disgustingly hypnotic, drowned in trance, and bordering on reproductions of cosmic horror. body fusion 1 and 2 make up a duo-logy that comprises of 159 minutes of recurring trepanations that introduce us to choirs from another dimension, sex change clinics flying around sagittarius a*, and light shows flowering around the shrine of eternity. 

  

1. cover art for body fusion 1 and body fusion 2 (left) 2. the garbbha griha (interior) of the mallikarjuna temple 

there’s nothing that comes close to resembling what's found on here, from the weirdly erotic and explicit album art that features a patchwork of adult magazine cutouts and the interior of an ancient hindu temple, to the absolutely lysergic and often frightening compositions, sounds that call back to a deeply buried childhood nightmare from another life, manifesting while we blink away into an endless sleep and through a tear in space, staring at glow in the dark stickers of stars and planets grabbing onto the ceiling. blistering with abrasive psychedelia and a distaste for gravity, these albums are a collection of sonic spill overs from somewhere else. as the first part of ferraro's hypocapnia induced experiments which conceived the summer headrush series, it shares and even dials up those transcendental qualities found amongst its siblings, along with their thematic obscurities. but at its core, it encompasses the journey from the body to beyond the body, form traveling towards the formless. and so, our own journey begins as we consume these two projects starting with the very interesting cover art shared between them.

after drift of traffic and the wind of mars which ascends the mind into alien body experience the Way of the 3 planets rules the travel down the INVISION of female hormones into realms beyond the stars in the stages of life contained

in typical fashion, the collage here is nothing short of weird, with images of hermaphrodites taken out of skin magazines or VHS covers, a harley davidson from the 90's, the night sky with an enlarged image of jupiter, and the interior of the hindu temple of shri mallikarjuna located in pattadakal, karnataka. dedicated to lord shiva, the temple was built in 740 C.E, and worships the image of mallikarjuna (mallika = shakti or the divine feminine, and arjuna = shiva or the the divine masculine), a union of the masculine and feminine. hindu mythology, particularly legends and the symbolism revolving around shiva and his consort parvati depict the androgyne as a state of elevated consciousness. for example, the form of ardhanarishvara which depicts a combined figure of shiva and parvati (shakti), half male and half female, equally split, as the womb of all existence. the very idol of shiva in the form of the linga comprises of a phallic center and a yonic circular base, in the act of penetration and representing the eternal cycle of creation and destruction, along with the merging of the sexual energies that govern the universe.  

1. illustration of ardhanarishvara (left) 2. illustration of rebis (right)

the presence of the alchemical symbol of mercury, along with a miniature pyramidion on the liner notes of the records acknowledges the presence of the androgyne archetype in the west and in ancient egypt, summoning an image of hapi and rebis, the divine hermaphrodite, a merging of hermes and aphrodite, venus and mercury. named quicksilver by alchemists, the element is part of the tria prima of alchemy, which includes salt (brine) and sulfur. the importance and reverence for the element stemmed from its readiness for amalgamation and myths claiming it to be the elixir of immortality, hence its association with synthesis, creation, and higher states, and its rigorous invocation in almost every ancient alchemical text, namely in the rosarium philosophorum which discusses the alchemical marriage of mercury and sulphur, giving rise to rebis (rebis is also another name given to the philosophers stone, eternal life here implies an equality of the sexual energies within oneself). the three primes signify three distinct principles, salt as the body (material) associated with the feminine, sulphur as the spirit (soul) associated with the masculine, and mercury as the mind. 

 

the energy of estrogenising the masculine experience, implant of estrogen ascends the mind into dream beyond the stars and earth naps the souls of the stars which lay underneath the snake lady of night

 

the mediator and the in-between, a manifestation of change and exchange, marking its placement between the male and female heads of rebis (both of whom are accompanied by the sun and the moon respectively). mercury has a presence in eastern alchemy too, particularly in tantric alchemy where it is viewed as a key ingredient in the elixir of life (amrut), as well as a key ritual ingredient in practices such as vajroli, where the practitioner reaches their height of inner cleansing by taking in carefully prepared amounts of the element through their genitals and into their bladder, keeping it filled for extended periods of time and then releasing the fluid, both as an exercise for strengthening the vitality of one's body, and as a pre-requisite to certain tantric rituals whose effectiveness rests on the physical purity of the practitioner. mercury is considered as shiva's fluid, manifesting in forms such as the rasalingam, a linga made out of solidified mercury. all influences eventually boil down to the venerated activity of transformation and existence at the median.

1. egyptian hieroglyph KA drawn like two uplifting arms, standing for the double androgynous personality (left) 2. a rasalingam installed in the sri dattashrama temple in telangana (right)

"division into sexes was the result of sin, but it will come to an end in the reunification of man, which will be followed by the eschatological reunion of the circle of earth with paradise. christ has anticipated this final reintegration. "

- mircea eliade

perhaps it is this very emphasis on transformation and the balance of sexual energies culminating in the form of the divine androgyne that can provide context to the sequence of elements within the album art. tracing our eyes beginning from the right, we are greeted by a hyper masculine signifier in the all black cruiser bike, a conduit for 20th century western machismo, and moving leftwards we end with an androgynous figure. in a poetic sense, the inward journey of the album itself, from viewing the cover, to getting into and dwelling upon the other worldly sounds found within, the entire structure of the project mirrors the architecture of a literal temple. a familiar feature found on the outer walls of many ancient hindu temples is sexual imagery, amorous couples, nude figures, and the like that populate the exterior, catching the eye of anyone who glances at the intricate stone work. as we enter the structure however, these passionate figures are replaced with engravings and art of various legends of the gods, the erotic is replaced with tales of heroism, devotion, and faith. and finally at the center we reach the sanctum, the god head. 

the eyelid operation of nudification represents

the stable breath of the elated our development implants are taken draining the eclipse, the real travel from body to body in one body

the purpose of such design is to ground the devotee in acknowledgment of their surface inclinations, a reminder of the flesh and the material, and as the journey inwards continues, so do the many figures surrounding the devotee transform and mirror the inner journey from base to higher ideals, finally culminating in an effigy of divinity itself. this to me perfectly reflects the listeners journey when engaging with these albums, beginning with shock and disturbance at the explicit imagery they're greeted with, only to leave the occasion with exalted disorientation. even when viewing the cover with its depth in placement, at the forefront we are met with these marks of substance and body, backdropped by the interior of a temple, and at the very end we encounter the universe itself. 

liner notes and illustrations for body fusion 1 and body fusion 2

FANTASY, BEYOND YOUR WILDEST DREAMS!!! FANTASY, 1-800-660-458!!! FANTASY, ADULTS ONLY!!! FANTASY, ONLY $5 FOR **********inaudible**********!!! FANTASY, 24 HOURS A DAY!!! FANTASY!!!

the sex hotline recordings that mark the beginning of the album's run (and littered throughout) quickly switch to extraterrestrial keys, noodling their way through distant nebulas and in between comets. the whole experience feels like being seated at an open air theatre on an arid moon with nothing but the stars and a distant quasar above, bunched up together with alien deities on either side while a band of singers and dancers perform at the center, oscillating and motioning with each colorful breath of the universe. every movement and compositional change feels like a nail hammered through the top of one's head. the gradual piling on of sonic elements, with dazed vocals, chimes, and synth passages feel like arms subsequently assembling to embrace, and abduct us into the formless void, as we descend deeper and deeper into those gaps between the patterns of phosphene that welcome our closed eyes.

"the problem with which the alchemist-as well as surrealism and analytical psychology are concerned-is to bring this shattering reality back to man's consciousness; in other words, to endow man with the awareness, the alchemical aurea apprehensio (golden awareness) of this marvellous reality: we are gods, because we all are man and woman at one and the same time."

- arturo schwarz

the crossings found here range from the ambient bliss of albums like heaven's gate, to the crazed dynamism of tracks found on genie head gas in the tower of dreams, with the second half of body fusion 1 featuring some of the most beautiful minutes of drone to ever grace my ear, while closing off with a psychedelic yet nightmare inducing assortment of interstellar bells, the whistles and horns of a flying saucer, and vocals that sound like the soliloquy of a demon standing behind. it's nothing short of astonishing what ferraro manages to achieve here with the soundscapes he's chiseled out. body fusion 2 is similar in atmosphere and feels like a continuation of the world building, although with additional moments of percussion and a slightly tamer sound in comparison. reminiscent in style to some of the jarvid-9 albums. although not as meditative, it is much more active while maintaining the same occult air of an estrogen rite happening under a starry winter sky.

UNLEASH YOURSELF IN, FREE YOUR IMAGINATION, ESCAPE YOUR REALITY, IT'S A PERFECT PLACE, THRUST INTO ANOTHER WORLD WHERE EVERYTHING IS WHAT YOU MAKE IT, IT'S MAGIC, IT'S ********INAUDIBLE********* WHERE ALL YOUR IMAGINATION ********INAUDIBLE*********

the great tragedy of the two albums is the fact that none of the liner notes on any of the copies are legible, especially the one found on body fusion 2, with only the track titles being clear, erasing much wealth of context.

[1]                                                                                                                    [2]

BODY FUSION                                                                                     DE JA VU AXIS

SPECIES WITHIN                                                                                 EARTH JUMP

PREGNANT AIR                                

                                              GENETALIA ECLIPSE 

SHEMALE                                                                                             DARK MERCURY

GYNE PLANET                                                                                     DATA IMPLANT

ANGEL ALIEN                                                                                     CLOWN FISH PRAYER 

                                                                                          

GENIE    

however, what little has been deciphered (courtesy of the wonderful members of ferrarocord) and uploaded onto the discogs page of body fusion 1 does offer a decent couple of clues. implants, estradiol, injections, drainage, the language used is clinical yet mystical, treating medical transition as a mirror for internal transmutation, mercury and estrogen as catalysts and boundary crossers for the divine sexual balance, alchemical mergers and hormone therapies, expressions of a drive to reunite with the whole. "the real travel from body to body in one body" is perhaps the most clear formulation of what is being done here. a sort of transmigration and rebirth through sexual transitioning, an interior journey without even stepping out of our skin, which when completed enriches our spirit to reveal rebis. what the adult magazine cutouts reduce to shock spectacle, the temple of body fusion elevates to worship. the song title's are deeply evocative of the general theme of the album, from clown fish prayer (sequential hermaphroditism in nature), gyne planet, and genetalia eclipse, to data implant, species within, and pregnant air. dark mercury again ties in the alchemical aspects around this work, alluding to it's shadow aspect and it's nigredo stage (putrefactio or the dark night of the soul), where all true transformation begins.

"i think aspects of human culture that some people regard as unimportant actually operate within a really deep system of ancient symbolism and human archetypes, hard rock cafes, strip clubs, gyms, celebrities, etc. are all great examples of this, of roadside temples"

- james ferraro

interestingly, every rotation of this album differs to me, although its larger nature of an alchemical exercise in dissolving and then transcending the internal sexual binary, and as a sort of abduction from here (similar to ferraro's other album in the summer headrush series pixarni) remains intact, the abstract nature of the journey itself remains open, not to mention the feverish dreams that appear with each listen while falling asleep. i've talked about the general association of ferraro's albums from this era with regards to their role in dreams and blurring reality in other posts , however these two albums exacerbate the strangeness and dissonance of this activity to another level, und unlike the rest of his early discography that almost exclusively operate in the space of transportation, these albums simultaneously engage with an inner pilgrimage and change. the intercessions of the sex hotline recordings in between the tracks feeds the impressions of intergalactic misdials whose hold music physically drags you to different places. andro-hypno that is by far some of ferraro's best work, claustrophobic yet liberating in an almost cosmic sense. the churning in the back and forth of the chaotic noise and euphoric drones refuses any intention to keep this as something playing in the background, the divinations encountered when absorbing this awake or when drifting into sleep is fascinating, burning into one's mind an image of the body fusion found in ardhanarishvara, and of the crescent moon in the night as the half open eyelids of the universe itself. 

return to skid row: james ferraro's wild ride a decade on

“skid row started as a collection of poems, it came first as words, then grew into becoming the lyrics of skid row… i was writing about the state of the world around me, living on what feels like the brink of societal collapse while also seeing high excess everywhere. all the sounds of the streets crept in, the blood and tears on the street, the echoing sirens in the early morning fog, soaked into the poetry and it became evident that la is a hyper america.”

- james ferraro 

“although city leaders periodically essay schemes for removing indigents en masse… such ‘final solutions’ have been blocked by council members fearful of the displacement of the homeless into their districts. instead the city, self-consciously adopting the idiom of urban cold war, promotes the ‘containment’ (official term) of the homeless in skid row along fifth street east of the broadway, systematically transforming the neighbourhood into an outdoor poorhouse.” 

– mike davis

“you live in a dumpster?”

 – bart simpson

los angeles, 500 square miles in the golden state of california condensed into a triptych of plastic palm tree orchards and syringe-bathed sidewalks, crowned with a bullet-riddled HOLLYWOOD sign, which when folded in reveals a poster of william friedkin’s 1995 thriller to live and die in LA. a zone that balances between the fault lines of its own mythology and fate. a dizzying mural where stars are born through self-mutilation, and snuffed out by an overdose. 

yet there’s something so familiar and even human in this rather extreme over-saturation of tragedy, success, and the faustian spirit. ferraro has always had this incredible ability to weave conceptual opposites into a singular confrontation that sinks us into the present state of affairs, and on “skid row” he dresses up this marriage of two conflicts in the context of the history and hype of LA. 

read the full article at listencorp 

a theatre of the fantastical: peyote occultism and eerie encounters in the canon of james ferraro

"our experience of the world is navigable and communicable because of this sameness. it determines our rhythmic regime – a specifically anthropomorphic regime: linear time, simultaneous, three-dimensional space, and objecthood are its framing parameters – its tempo or its beat. inside these parameters, diverse and idiosyncratic rhythms unfold – but they never break the beat...what if “forwards” and “backwards” were to lose their meaning entirely? what would it feel like to interface with a spacetime – an alien rhythm – that does not follow any recognisable human pattern and whose agency remains opaque? who are these perverse creatures that would desire such a thing?...memory ceases to function; names evaporate in the zone. those who enter it finish up by becoming something else, subject to invasion by exterior forces. artists of dissolution, driven by desire for an alien rhythm. “you want to know what it’s like in there?” asks seasoned stalker emil bonaventura of his protege in nova swing, “the fact is, you spend all those years trying to make something of it. then guess what, it starts making something of you.” connection wrought through division." 

- amy ireland 

alien, one of few adjectives that seems to perfectly resonate with every fan of ferraro's early 2000's output of low fidelity drone and noise albums. expressing something as entirely extraterrestrial, in a way that implies an intrusion from a place "not here", a brand of music whose sole purpose is not to describe or exaggerate the real and its affects, but rather to subvert it entirely and create universes of their own, numinous subways that form the exoskeleton of infinite possibilities. absconding to positive spaces of freedom, moulded by a brand of esotericism both immanent and ancient. it is only the alien that can guide us up a rope (woven with contradiction). we do not know where these sounds are from (and deep down we do not want to know), and it is that very severance from encountering the known that helps thrust us into the unknown. of all of ferraro's releases in the early part of the new millennium, one album stands tall in the context of his inclination towards the mystic and describing a tangible gnosis through a tailored film of degradation, aperiodicity, and musical arrangements that both frighten and delight the listener.

"live smokeshows from inside the ciguri cave hazed diamonds with windswept hair" released by ferraro in 2005 (under the name teotihuacan) is by far the closest one can come to an actual abduction from the present to a lysergic outside. combining sprawling keys, a wall of ritualistic vocalizations that sound like shamanic drones, submerged whistles and hums, and muffled percussion that sound like tribal drums buried behind a fountain of ice, all concealed under the veil of the crackles and breaks of its tape recording, this album is as out there as it can get in the context of ferraro's vast catalog of noise releases.  

cover art for “live smokeshows from inside the ciguri cave hazed diamonds with windswept hair”

like many of ferraro’s other albums from this era, it retains the extremely rewarding endeavour of digging through the occult and esoteric references he sprinkles throughout his work, every decision made when it comes to his releases brims with a certain intention (wether it be to create a very particular aesthetic schema or to work as a backdrop to a certain spiritual/metaphysical reflection), and so we begin with the pseudonym under which this album was released (what's in a name?). teotihuacan (translated as the birthplace of the gods) is the name of an ancient mesoamerican city, filled with immense spiritual and religious significance for the civilization it once sheltered many millennia ago. characterized mainly by the two great pyramids that delineate the city's main boundary (the pyramids of the sun and moon). 

"recorded october-december 2004 in tijuana mexico and the desert outskirts of el cajon california.  music for the desert temples of extraterrestrial light." 

- liner notes on the casette

the album art contains a royal lace medallion dolly (a specific design for paper mats) with what looks like a backdrop containing a starry sky (modest in detail compared to ferraro's more densely packed black and white collages). however, the more intriguing ties to the native american culture inferred so far come from a term in the album title, "ciguri". the first (and only) mention of the term i could find was in the account of french artist antonin artaud's travels through mexico, in particular his time spent with and learning the rites and rituals of the tarahumara tribe, situated near the north of the country. in his book titled "the peyote dance", artaud describes his experience with the hallucinogenic cactus called peyote, the rituals associated with the consumption of the psychedelic, and its many spiritual and metaphysical insights that were disclosed to artaud during his participation in the ceremonies of the tarahumara culture. 

"for the hierarchical order of things dictates that, after passing through the all, that is the many, which is matter, one returns to the simplicity of the one, which is tutuguri or the sun, only to dissolve and be reborn by means of this process of mysterious re-assimilation. this dark re-assimilation is contained within ciguri, as a myth of reawakening, then of destruction, and finally of resolution in the sieve of supreme surrender, as their priests are incessantly shouting and affirming in their dance of the night."

- antonin artaud

the peyote cactus (and in the context of the rituals performed called the ciguri plant) is used to help dissociate the real from the unreal, truth from untruth, good from evil (the tarahumara do not view good and evil as two opposing forces, rather, they describe good as that which is real and eternal, and evil as that which is fleeting and false). the peyote dance which the tribes engage in involves consuming controlled doses of the cactus in its powdered form, and with the guidance of a priest, engage in a long and trance like dance that brings the participant in contact with the primordial force of ciguri (a creative force). antonin describes many more fantastical elements that marked his travels and interactions with the tarahumara people, including detailed accounts of the life of the tarahumara, the history of their rites, his profound visions under the influence of ciguri, its role in helping him reconcile and make peace with many of his inner struggles, the pneuma-somatic relation between the liver and one's ability to sift through spiritual truth, and a rather wild concluding deduction where artaud claims that the person who introduced the cactus and its magical healing properties to the region many generations ago was jesus christ himself. for anyone interested in a concise account of the specifics of the ritual, one may read the below poem written by artaud titled "tutuguri, the rite of the dark sun".

and down below, as at the base of the bitter slope,
cruelly heartbroken,
the circle of six crosses opens,
far below,
as if embedded in the mother earth,
unclenched from the filthy grip of the drooling mother.

the earth of black coal
is the only moist place in this crevice of rock.
the rite is that the new sun must pass through seven points
before bursting forth from the mouth of the earth.
and there are six men, one for each sun,
and a seventh man who is the raw sun itself,
dressed in black and red

now, this seventh man

is a horse,

a horse with a man leading it.

but it is the horse who is the sun,

not the man.

to the tearing sound of a drum and a long,

strange trumpet,

the six men

who were lying down,

curled against the earth,

leap forth one after another like sunflowers —

not suns,

but turning grounds,

water lotuses,

and with each leapcomes the increasingly dark

and inward beat
of the drum,
until suddenly one sees, arriving at full gallop,
with dizzying speed,
the last sun,
the first man,
the black horse with
a man on it — naked,
completely naked and virgin.

having leapt, they advance following circular meanders,

and the horse of bleeding flesh grows frantic

and prances without cease

at the summit of its rock,

until the six men

have finished completely encircling the six crosses.

now, the major tone of the rite is precisely

THE ABOLITION

OF THE CROSS.

having finished circling, they uproot

the crosses from the earth,
and the naked man
on the horse
raises high
a great horseshoe
which he has dipped in a cut from his own blood.

a tarahumara shaman seated with peyote buds on cloth, mexico (1892). 

the second half of the album title "hazed diamond with windswept hair" might actually refer to a procedure (widely considered a scam now) by which companies produce diamonds partially containing human hair and the ashy remains of a cremated body. this transformation of material as base as ash and hair into a diamond seems evocative of ciguri's description as a force that reintegrates the fundamental and primary into something complex. 

it makes perfect sense to see why ferraro's tendency to combine the occult with his brand of dizzying drones and noise is a perfect vehicle for an eerie revolution of our basic intuitions. musical dissonance functioning as epistemological dissonance, breaks in the ordinary life, the sounds he moulds work so well to evoke this feeling not because they're entirely foreign, but precisely because they retain enough familiarity (notably through their sampling of older music, obscure media, and his own voice stretched and torn beyond recognition) to work as a crossing path. it is neither random clamor, nor is it conventionally digestible music, balancing on a razors edge whose ends tear through a tapestry. employing crackles, noise, and a transmuted perversion of the expected to create these worlds. artists like ferraro (and spencer clark) would be better described as experimental metaphysicians than noise artists. 

 the peyote cactus (sections of the stem called buttons are used in rituals for their hallucinogenic effect)

"the fantastic can emerge and can once again scatter in our consciousness its phosphorescence and its haze. and this fantastic is of noble quality, its disorder is only apparent, it really obeys an order that is fashioned mysteriously and on a level which normal consciousness does not reach but which ciguri alows us to reach, and which is the very mystery of all poetry. but there is in human existence another level, obscure and formless, where consciousness has not entered, and which surrounds it like a mysterious extension or a menace, as the case may be...for the rite of ciguri is a rite of creation, which explains how things are in the void and how the void is in the infinite, and how they emerged from it into reality, and were made...we can no longer understand god unless he first touches our souls, and our dance will be nothing but a mockery, and the phantom...the phantom which pursues ciguri will be born here once again!"

- antonin artaud

even if we discount the mystic undertones found here, the music sounds distinctly timeless because its elements defy the contemporary association we hold them to, music outside of its time, music that breaks it, brought back from the dead and reimagined not as a revival, but rather as a tool to grind down our concept of linear rhythm. the ritual chants and instrumentation not only work as a sonic ornament, but instead solicit an outside, a time machine. it is this ritualistic aspect of the music that has allowed their brand of low-fidelity music to sidestep the rapid commercialization of the approach in other genres. poverty that refuses to be sublimated, suspended in a sphere of its own making. take for example the second track on the album titled "extraterrestrial light", the section that truly sets the album in motion. containing some of the most beautiful arrangements in ferraro's entire discography replete with glittering keys, what sounds like drawn out moments of throat singing, and uplifting walls of synths, all amalgamating into something that resembles a brief peek into a divine experience found on albums like "heavens gate", "genie head gas in the tower of dreams", and other releases that feature a greater presence of ambient tracks. 

 nakoda and cree men and women sitting around a fire, praying silently during a peyote ritual

another aspect i've come to appreciate particularly with this release in his series of drone and noise albums is the layer of dissociation that resembles listening to mainstream media through cheap speakers in the worst acoustic environments possible, from south indian songs i've heard blast from garbage trucks early in the morning, to bhajan cdr's no longer in press being played in the open atmosphere of a crowded temple complex, the music expresses an uprooting of media from its original source to a forced rebirth within the confines of sub-standard tweeters and subwoofers, an effect that cannot solely be reduced to simply graining out the audio. an intentional divorce to redefine the familiar beyond relentless splicing and remixing of the source, a re-situation of audio into liminal architectures. the eerie is then pushed into the alien with what i would describe as a complete reinvention of the way sound as function is used by ferraro. (more focused examples from the discographies of ferraro and clark include albums like foreign correspondence, night dolls with hairspray, and others)

"one enters an anechoic chamber, as silent as technologically possible in 1951, to discover that one hears two sounds of one’s own unintentional making (nerve’s systematic operation, blood’s circulation), the situation one is clearly in is not objective (sound-silence), but rather subjective (sounds only), those intended and those others (so-called silence) not intended. if, at this point, one says, “yes i do not discriminate between intention and non-intention,” the splits, subject-object, art-life, etc., disappear. "

- john cage

the skaters' reinterpretation of functional sounds, in particular incidental ones that are a byproduct of the functioning of a certain object or environment, as opposed to functional sounds that work to pass on a message (the sound of an alarm clock's function is to wake one up, whereas the beating of ones heart is a sound that is a byproduct of an already functioning system) is another feature which i feel lends to the absolutely unique atmospheres their work builds. taking the incidental approach to functional sound and blurring the lines with the intentional, the music samples sounds that feel so familiar (like direct references to contemporary objects; for example, i can't remember the number of times the percussion on some of the tracks on their noise albums like the jarvid trilogy, and skaters' releases like "wind draping incense" remind me of the rhythmic whirring of a washing machine), and then turns them on their heads with all sort of twists and distortions to the source to transform these incidental sounds into something unheard of while keeping that root sense of a reference to an actually existing object (when there isn't), a central aspect that helps appreciate why their music sounds so unearthly (bizarre to our daily experience). 

huichol art depicting peyote motif 

this category of sound as function and not as aesthetic, remodeled to invoke functions, objects, and environments that don't really exist to us, combined with an aesthetic reconciliation of the distant past and the hyperreal and industrial present is in my opinion the central pillar that guides and moulds his early (and spencer clark's current) discographies into audio that works as a guided sonic disintegration of the anchors that weigh us down, much like the peyote as an instrument to channel a similar disintegration and breakdown of our linear rhythms to better observe and separate the truth of reality from falsehood.

"eerie impasse[s]’ arise ‘when mismatching modes of intelligence, cognition and communication confront one another. when brought into contact with an eerie outside agency, ‘“we” “ourselves” are caught up in the rhythms, pulsions and patternings of non-human forces’. because both the weird and eerie describe the ‘new’ in this radical way — an intrusion of alien outsideness — whether as the operation of an eerie agency or of something in the environment which does not belong — they automatically indicate the impossibility of knowledge and explanation: 'when knowledge is achieved, the eerie disappears."

 - mark fisher

given the lore of peyote attached to this album, i’d consider this a sort of accompanying release with other projects featuring the plant as a central motif such as "observatory cg II & III (coconut of teotihuacan)", “chiuiji cactus juice energy of the eagle me”, and “peyote cactus rituals”. vertigo melodies for a hallucinogenic cactus trip, this album features mindblowing moments of low-fidelity hypnagogia and drone that would surprise and elate even the most seasoned of ferraro fans. meditative and confrontational in nature (if you allow it), there's a real potential in albums such as this to compel one to throw away their books, and see god in every street corner. a true hidden gem and a high-ranking favourite of mine in his ouvre of tribal ambient and noise releases, and a great introductory album for those curious to explore ferraro’s pre-far side virtual releases.