When's the next mixtape up, Doc? When can we start submitting tracks?

You just went back to being a comedy graveyard. Was funny or some ****.

Just exactly how drunk are you, on a scale of 1 to Chula?

Your mother, potato monkey.

You're as drunk as my mother? That's really not very drunk. She did enjoy a bottle of Guinness at the weekend, but that was about it. You're a lightweight. I would have expected more from you, metal boy.

Nobody should ever expect more from Bat.

Yes. His family motto is probably a Latin translation of "Keep your expectations low".

I'm more drunk than you expected, bitch.

This is unlikely at best.

The Batlord: Waylon Jennings - Lonesome, On'ry and Mean: One of those “outlaw” tunes from the mid-‘70s when I remember the rednecks of my sleepy little town sitting around on the backs of their pickups drinkin’ “baare” they picked up from the Piggly Wiggly and going on about how much they could relate to the working’ man’s lyrics. Yeah, in the same way that I could “relate” to life in Düsseldorf. Still, this music has a place in some people’s hearts and it has some extra meaning since the guy who wrote this song, outlaw Steve Young, just passed away last year. Waylon came into a steakhouse that my wife was working at while in college and his manager announced to the waitresses something along the lines of “all you girls are lucky to have Waylon around here and one of you’ll get the chance to go home with him.” Eewwww... Anyway, Dylan Carson is a fan.

Kiii: Genesis - Cats With Hats: Best Genesis song I’ve never heard. Nicely textured. I can see the beds of electrocorticogram readings coming off this. The kind of thing I would save with all kinds of other textured moments on file - usually to use within something else - sometimes alone. Bimolecularly embryogenetic in passing.

Frownland: Mike Cooper - Industrial Hazard: I have this fine tune - and fine, relatively recent, album. For decades, he’s done all kinds of interesting stuff from Hawaiian slide, country blues, laptop exotica, a.o. since his first album around 50 years ago. Nice experimental sound on this Vietnamese lap steel and those words! - cut-ups of Pynchon! Nice to hear that age hasn’t dulled his taste for eccentricities.

Trollheart: Sleep Thieves - Sparks: The ‘80s still live apparently. I’ve heard of Sleep Thieves, but I wanted to get a look at the band thru a video. Imagine my surprise when I discovered that the video didn’t show an aging Martha “Motels” Davis look-a-like, but just one girl in a hoodie doing nothing but mugging for the camera for 4 minutes - pretty much as dull as this tune. If you’re gonna join the synth pop revival, then at least try to use someone like Depeche Mode as a starting point or get into synthwave soundtracks a la Cliff Martinez. It doesn’t make sense to still keep doing this to death.

zer0: Bongwater - Nick Cave Dolls: Haven’t heard this in years, but even tho I’ve always wondered how Ann Magnuson could keep trying to keep performance art alive into the ‘90s, in this case, it's really due to Kramer’s work on this and Double Bummer [with Don Cherry (!!) and Gary Windo (!)]. It still works well, when compared with some other performers trying to work in this manner of speaking: East-Village nudge-nudge humor. For me, all modern opera should be done in closer proximity to this kind of thing. It’s too bad that it all ended with Shimmy-Disc shuddering its way into oblivion.

Dr_Rez: Steel Pulse - Born Fe Rebel: Not as good as Handsworth Revolution, but it’s an OK slice of late ’80s/early ‘90s stylee. Oh! You say it’s from the natty dreadnoughts? - OK, well those 80’s keyboards have to go. I can still transport myself back to a sunni ace surf 35 years ago, but I would still be listening more to Wayne Smith or Cocoa Tea or Tenor Saw or …

Aloysius: Aloysius - Cosmos: I like this and see real potential here. I say “potential” because I don’t see it as working as a stand-alone track, but a really good sound catalog of some really fine riffs that can be integrated into a solid composition. I was digging the percussion for a while because I thought that you may be using the guitar percussively in part, but then it occurred to me that it might be a cajón(?). If so, I’m wondering whether more bass-heavy percussion - or at least something that can add some more lower register could help. Don’t know - have to hear… Anyway, good to hear this from you.

rostasi: David Holmes - I Heard Wonders: I have so many layers of love for this track that it’s one of those rare ones that gets played on repeat for 30 minutes at a time every few weeks going on for years now. It has the Krautrock pulse of La Düsseldorf or Neu! married to the gorgeous electronic tunefulness of Harmonia gently undulating with a Jim Reid vocal style featuring lyrics from Suicide’s Martin Rev ... and unlike the squelchy pop of the J&M Chain, it heaves with tension and release in its Enoesque warmth. I seem to remember that the album was nominated for a Choice Music Prize in Ireland (?) Absolutely stunning …as is the whole album.