Grazing Amongst While Pretending To Be

Self-produced in 1985, a limited edition of 333. Inner sleeves were anointed with colorful sheep by the group members using hand made potato stamps. There were a few FWC stickers inside, as well as an informative insert. All this in a loosely sealed colorful cellophane wrapper.

This album was recorded at the Freshly Wrapped Candies’ infamous Cake House in Altadena Ca. All tracks were recorded live to a 1/4” reel-to-reel tape recorder rented for the weekend. Pioneering live-looping performance, on this first album, the limitations of The Candies’ trademark legendary Lexicon Prime Time II Model 95 were exploited to the extent of completely defining the structures and sonic characteristics of the fwc sound that emerged. Armed with an unbelievable (for the day) 7.68 seconds of digital delay, the group communally patched into, and twisted the knobs of this very interesting “instrument” for the entire album.

“Time is Passing" introduces the evolving loop as a bed for song composition, in a gentle liturgy about the mundane reality of life’s nature. Lyrics below. Listen

“Eventually” is a metal clanging stroll into the recycling of speed-altered feedback into the loop. Roz twiddles away on her vocal feed using her guitar-strap-slung Ibanez digital delay. Listen

“I will go” pushes the boundary of pure loop feedback overdrive. Roz had some type of synth here, and her recognizable squealing keeps this piece grounded. Listen

“In search of” rambles away, a random/out of time/nondescript blob of sound transforming into a swirling, writhing siren of audio slicey/dicey/slushy. The Model 95 was fun to experiment with! Listen

“Biolysis” Chris dials in the perfect soundbed for Roz to channel Akashic records in this excerpt from an epic journey through a gurgling cosmic jungle of tentative engagement and lopsy balance. Has an out-of-body feel to it. On the record, this track trails into the center of the record, infinitely repeating the last rotation. Listen

“So Long” occupies the entire second side of the lp. An ever-evolving loop, weaving sound into, and around the loop. This is a single 7.68 second loop - alternating between the left and right channels every 3.84 seconds for a stereo galloping ping-pong soundstage. Feedback, recycling, overdriving inputs, fader fanning, and knob twisting along with a few well placed guitar notes & some tactfully beat percussion… I remember we had a lot of fun. It was all so new to be able to push around and fiddle with a loop…the Lexicon was (and remains) mind-blowing…we were truly like kids in a candy store!!! So, let go, lose your mind a little bit with this one. By the time it is over, we guarantee you will be closer to the center. Enjoy! Listen