This Is Irritainment!
Irritainment is a delicate balancing act. The trick is to take an intrinsically annoying concept and make it entertaining. Too much annoyance and the whole mixture falls apart. Few have ever had the skill to master this shadow realm of entertainment. WFMU, the Church of the Subgenius and the collective known as KBZ (or KB Zed).
The Exotic Trilogy project is a concept anyone who has ever made tape collections will know all too well. Search through any decent size records collection and you'll discover countless versions of various standards. KBZ has zeroed in on three of the touchstones of the exotic genre - "Quiet Village", "Caravan" and "Taboo" - and assembled two colections of various covers. To add to the entertainment value, these compilations work in a sort of tape loop style alternating the three songs over and over for seven total loops.
What proves KBZ's mastery of the fine art of irritainment is the fact neither collection truly annoys. Instead, the listener is presented with seven cycles of the exotic trilogy, each perhaps progressively stranger, perhaps not. The difference between each version can be quite remarkable, and can only truly be experienced if you program your CD player to only play the tracks of one specific tune. Taken as a whole, however, these two volumes serve more as an type of muzak - a repeating program that hits you on an almost subliminal level.
According to the liner notes for Volume Two, KBZ plans five more volumes in this series. One can wish desperately for the day when the five CD changer can be loaded with five Exotic Trilogys for an entire day's worth of delightful irritainment!
Volume One
Quiet Village: The Surfmen - Len Stevens - The Ensemble of Seven - Eddie Baxter - Vinnie Bell - The Exotic Guitars - The Clebanoff Strings
Tabu: Robin Richmond - The Aliis - The South Sea Serenaders - The Flying Guitar - Tarrangano & His Orchestra - Terry Snyder - Winifred Atwell
Caravan: Irv Cottler - Sir Julian - Buddy Merrill - Jack Anderson - Billy Vaughn - Dick Hyman - Eddie Layton
Volume Two
Quiet Village: Ted Auletta - Tommy Garrett - Bill Justis - The Aliis - Ferrante & Teicher - Hawaiian Brass - Al Bollington -
Tabu: Douglas Gamley - Billy May - Hal Shutz - The Ensemble of Seven - Geri Galian - Orizaba - Al Hirt
Caravan: The Three Suns - Living Guitar - Marty Gold - Enoch Light - Lloyd Burry - Hal Mooney - George Wright
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