Their Track / Download: Raspberry (unreleased)
Get The Entire Compilation: Bandcamp / I Heart Noise
Bio
Big City Orchestra is a long running art/anti-art group based generally in California. With an ever rotating cast of musician and nonmusician members.
Formed in 1979 as house band for network of artist residences in the South Bay area of Los Angeles.
Almost comedically prolific, BCO sailed through the cassette culture movement of the 80’s & 90’s with about 130 hour long releases on over 100 labels. Other work has included; four video collections, five 7” singles, one 8” single, 8+ compact discs, well over 40 CD-Rs. and more than compilation appearances. – Last.fm
Band Members:
Das + rotating cast of other musicians
Interview with Das (conducted by I Heart Noise)
More recently, BCO celebrated 30 years of its activity.
What lies ahead for the band after countless tapes, mp3 releases and CDrs/CDs – and is BCO going to turn into Rolling Stones of cassette culture? (just kidding, of course)
more like the BONZO”s
yep tons more releases in the works.
the bigger question is how does an artist release works in the future ?
There are, apparently, impostor/fake sites for BCO popping up all over the place
Do you feel that they reflect a growing popularity/acceptance of the band or is it just a shameless attempt to rip off BCO?
aaaaaahhhh keep me/us out of the cult of commercial recognition. the colour of my shorts is no one business.
since bco refuses to hold any copy right or writing credits, bcio is ripe to be plucked.
fortunately only the past can be stolen, and we’re busy with tomorrows project.
You contributed a piece called “Raspberry” to “Gone In 60 Seconds”. What was the inspiration (if anything) behind it?
a sixty second compilation track is a strange thing, enough time to scream for attention, harder to scratch out details.
first release with our friend brook hinton in 15 years.
Some other bands on “Gone” include PBK, Ene and Blue Sausage Infant, all of which seem to share some of the interest/background in cassette culture with BCO.
Are you familiar with those artists and their work?
pbk is a old friend of bco’s and we have been on many releases with him. we’ve even had him up to the bay area to do shows.
If rock’n’roll is truly dead, do you think that BCO is at least partially to blame for this?
didn’t john lydon claim to have done just that ?
nah, the public at large will crush or consume any interesting art form, with some 50 cds last year claiming 92% of sales, the rest of us are lucky to have a project break even.
it all comes down to love of the work!
Selected Discography
Arph, Arph, Arph Cass (A.R.P.H. Tapes, 1985)
Bob Hope’s Fruit Loop Special Cass (Audiofile Tapes, 1986)
Massacre Again Cass (Tonspur Tapes, 1986)
Hand Of Fear Cass (Calypso Now, 1987)
In The Near Future Cass (Freedom In A Vacuum, 1988)
The Four Cassettes Of The Apocalypse CD (The Subelectrick Institute, 1990)
Beatlerape CD (Realization, 1993)
Greatest Hits And Test Tones CD (Pogus Productions, 1993)
The Consumer CD (Commercial Failure, 1995)
The Collected Works Of Od McUb CD (Vinyl Communications, 1998)
New Beat For Baby CDr (Negative Foundation, 2002)
The Big City Orchestre 30th Anniversary Disc CD (UBIUBI, 2009)
See Discogs page for an entire list of BCO releases.
Further Info: Official Site / Last.fm / Wikipedia / WFMU’s Beware Of The Blog / Friendsound / SF Weekly Blogs
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