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Album #55
Before its formal commencement, Tuesday Never Comes began as a social group, which, among other activities, would drink and listen to strange music. While there was a small set of regulars, others drifted in and out. Some came only once or twice. Sometimes, those who passed through would leave behind an item of interest: a book, a bottle of alcohol, a VHS tape, or, most often, a cassette or compact disc of musical recordings. Occasionally, some of this decades-old music, still crops up on the odd mix, although the physical media and, in many cases, any identifying information is long lost.
In January 2020, I was working on post art for a Loc-Nar & M track, which is currently posted on this site, under the title -MASKS-. In the background, I was shuffling a playlist, Misc 98, consisting entirely of content harvested from old CDs and tapes, including material gifted to us in days past, and my attention was suddenly grabbed by an unusual and very minimal track. It consisted of peels of off-key bells set against a sustained buzzing that frequently flared up into an animalistic squeaking. What struck me was how similar this piece sounded to some of our own recordings. In fact, my first thought was that it was one of our own recordings that had somehow, accidentally, been added to the mix. An inspection of the file, however, revealed that the track had indeed been uploaded in 1998, just like everything else on the mix. Further, the formatting of the file name, “8|29|1948 Social Foraging #12,” was out of line with our archival conventions. And I definitely didn’t remember working on it.
In search of a lead, I brought the track to the group, who dredged up an obscure name. I put out some low-key feelers and, to make a long story short, I eventually made contact with the original source of the mystery track (whose strong preference that his identity remain private is something I am deeply respectful of).
What I learned, on a lengthy phone call with this individual, is that "8|29|1948 Social Foraging #12" is one of almost a thousand tracks produced, in 1948, at Queen's University at Kingston, as part of an attempt to inaugurate a new branch of psychology. The plan was that Queens University would become the leader of the new branch, which would be founded and fostered at a soon-to-be christened campus, in a beautiful scenic location (Rideau Lakes, Ontario, Canada). There would be a huge laboratory complex, outfitted with the most up-to-date technology, a dedicated academic journal, headquartered at the university, and a variety of curricula and accompanying degrees. The new branch of psychology and the new journal were to be called Rat Dream Science.
Between December, 1947, and October, 1949, perhaps as many as four studies were completed, papers were written, the layout process for the first issue of the journal began, and construction was initiated at the Rideau Lakes Campus. But then, for some reason, which my acquaintance said he didn’t know, the endeavor was discontinued. The first issue of the journal never came out. The research papers were never published. The buildings that were in the midst of construction were completed, but no further work was undertaken. And then, in 1950, without fanfare, the barely-begun Rideau Lakes Campus was opened, not as an ostentatious center for a burgeoning Rat Dream Science, but as Queen's University Biological Station: a few modest buildings, which were to serve as a home-base for whatever environmental science research projects could be conducted on the surrounding conservation land.
My acquaintance asserted that his knowledge was not firsthand, but was based on his perusal of several boxes of papers and audio recordings that he had inherited. He read to me what he claimed was the abstract for one of the unpublished Rat Dream Science research papers, “Music as a medium for the conveyance of rat dreams to the human subject” (a transcription of which is re-presented on the album cover above). He said that this experiment was the source of “8|29|1948 Social Foraging #12.”
I asked him if he had any more recordings of the rat dream music and was thrilled when he told me that he had more than 200 tracks. Each track had a name and he said that many of the names were directly related to scenarios described in records of various stages of the experiment. He said that he would be happy to give me access to the files, but warned me that “most of them sound like shit. That social foraging one I put on the mix has a head and shoulders on the rest. I haven't even listened to most of them. Honestly, I’ve listened to about ten. Not only do they sound awful, but a lot of them are just totally bizarre. For instance, there's one that sounds like some kind of speech: religion, or politics— something about how the world is evil and horrible and, then, liberation and utopia. I mean come on. Am I really supposed to believe that something like that could be abstracted from a rat REM sleep EEG? Full human speech? All these weird ideas? How could all that stuff be in a rat's brainwaves? I mean obviously, Fred Hollish says he's taking harmonics and structure into consideration, but is that all? My feeling is that he was trying really hard, specifically, to get the sound of human speech out of those rat brainwaves. I think he felt like it was his job to show off— really shake the world. Like— look at this incredible new field of Rat Dream Science. Like— did you know that rats are actually real people? Did you know that people can be rats? This stuff was supposed to be a huge deal so I’m betting it was a total hype train. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of those recordings or some of the stuff in some of them isn’t even based on rat REM EEG’s at all. Who knows, maybe the whole thing is bs and all those sounds were produced in some other way— especially the human speech. How easy would it have been to just record a guy— human guy— talking. And that abstract? Wow. Permanent rat dream state— what the hell is that? Ridiculous.”
After listening through the files myself, I can’t disagree with his assessment. For the most part, a piece of rat dream music is either an undifferentiated wall of ear-splitting noise or an almost-silent recording, punctuated intermittently by little blips. There are more dynamic pieces, but most of them are weak as well, often owing to the foregrounding of an irritating, inarticulate, warbling moaning sound. In the whole batch of 241 recordings, I found less than 20 that are worth sharing. The mix that constitutes this album consists of nine of these pieces of high quality rat dream music. In these high quality pieces, there are definitely some interesting structures, sounds, and vibes, and it can be fun to speculate about the relationship between the title of a recording and what it sounds like. Also, something I wonder about is: did “8|29|1948 Social Foraging #12,” exert some sort of minor influence on the direction that some of our music took? I don’t know the answer to that, but it’s an interesting question. And how’s this for a joke? Maybe Tuesday Never Comes has been in a “rat dream state” all along.
Enjoy.
Before its formal commencement, Tuesday Never Comes began as a social group, which, among other activities, would drink and listen to strange music. While there was a small set of regulars, others drifted in and out. Some came only once or twice. Sometimes, those who passed through would leave behind an item of interest: a book, a bottle of alcohol, a VHS tape, or, most often, a cassette or compact disc of musical recordings. Occasionally, some of this decades-old music, still crops up on the odd mix, although the physical media and, in many cases, any identifying information is long lost.
In January 2020, I was working on post art for a Loc-Nar & M track, which is currently posted on this site, under the title -MASKS-. In the background, I was shuffling a playlist, Misc 98, consisting entirely of content harvested from old CDs and tapes, including material gifted to us in days past, and my attention was suddenly grabbed by an unusual and very minimal track. It consisted of peels of off-key bells set against a sustained buzzing that frequently flared up into an animalistic squeaking. What struck me was how similar this piece sounded to some of our own recordings. In fact, my first thought was that it was one of our own recordings that had somehow, accidentally, been added to the mix. An inspection of the file, however, revealed that the track had indeed been uploaded in 1998, just like everything else on the mix. Further, the formatting of the file name, “8|29|1948 Social Foraging #12,” was out of line with our archival conventions. And I definitely didn’t remember working on it.
In search of a lead, I brought the track to the group, who dredged up an obscure name. I put out some low-key feelers and, to make a long story short, I eventually made contact with the original source of the mystery track (whose strong preference that his identity remain private is something I am deeply respectful of).
What I learned, on a lengthy phone call with this individual, is that "8|29|1948 Social Foraging #12" is one of almost a thousand tracks produced, in 1948, at Queen's University at Kingston, as part of an attempt to inaugurate a new branch of psychology. The plan was that Queens University would become the leader of the new branch, which would be founded and fostered at a soon-to-be christened campus, in a beautiful scenic location (Rideau Lakes, Ontario, Canada). There would be a huge laboratory complex, outfitted with the most up-to-date technology, a dedicated academic journal, headquartered at the university, and a variety of curricula and accompanying degrees. The new branch of psychology and the new journal were to be called Rat Dream Science.
Between December, 1947, and October, 1949, perhaps as many as four studies were completed, papers were written, the layout process for the first issue of the journal began, and construction was initiated at the Rideau Lakes Campus. But then, for some reason, which my acquaintance said he didn’t know, the endeavor was discontinued. The first issue of the journal never came out. The research papers were never published. The buildings that were in the midst of construction were completed, but no further work was undertaken. And then, in 1950, without fanfare, the barely-begun Rideau Lakes Campus was opened, not as an ostentatious center for a burgeoning Rat Dream Science, but as Queen's University Biological Station: a few modest buildings, which were to serve as a home-base for whatever environmental science research projects could be conducted on the surrounding conservation land.
My acquaintance asserted that his knowledge was not firsthand, but was based on his perusal of several boxes of papers and audio recordings that he had inherited. He read to me what he claimed was the abstract for one of the unpublished Rat Dream Science research papers, “Music as a medium for the conveyance of rat dreams to the human subject” (a transcription of which is re-presented on the album cover above). He said that this experiment was the source of “8|29|1948 Social Foraging #12.”
I asked him if he had any more recordings of the rat dream music and was thrilled when he told me that he had more than 200 tracks. Each track had a name and he said that many of the names were directly related to scenarios described in records of various stages of the experiment. He said that he would be happy to give me access to the files, but warned me that “most of them sound like shit. That social foraging one I put on the mix has a head and shoulders on the rest. I haven't even listened to most of them. Honestly, I’ve listened to about ten. Not only do they sound awful, but a lot of them are just totally bizarre. For instance, there's one that sounds like some kind of speech: religion, or politics— something about how the world is evil and horrible and, then, liberation and utopia. I mean come on. Am I really supposed to believe that something like that could be abstracted from a rat REM sleep EEG? Full human speech? All these weird ideas? How could all that stuff be in a rat's brainwaves? I mean obviously, Fred Hollish says he's taking harmonics and structure into consideration, but is that all? My feeling is that he was trying really hard, specifically, to get the sound of human speech out of those rat brainwaves. I think he felt like it was his job to show off— really shake the world. Like— look at this incredible new field of Rat Dream Science. Like— did you know that rats are actually real people? Did you know that people can be rats? This stuff was supposed to be a huge deal so I’m betting it was a total hype train. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of those recordings or some of the stuff in some of them isn’t even based on rat REM EEG’s at all. Who knows, maybe the whole thing is bs and all those sounds were produced in some other way— especially the human speech. How easy would it have been to just record a guy— human guy— talking. And that abstract? Wow. Permanent rat dream state— what the hell is that? Ridiculous.”
After listening through the files myself, I can’t disagree with his assessment. For the most part, a piece of rat dream music is either an undifferentiated wall of ear-splitting noise or an almost-silent recording, punctuated intermittently by little blips. There are more dynamic pieces, but most of them are weak as well, often owing to the foregrounding of an irritating, inarticulate, warbling moaning sound. In the whole batch of 241 recordings, I found less than 20 that are worth sharing. The mix that constitutes this album consists of nine of these pieces of high quality rat dream music. In these high quality pieces, there are definitely some interesting structures, sounds, and vibes, and it can be fun to speculate about the relationship between the title of a recording and what it sounds like. Also, something I wonder about is: did “8|29|1948 Social Foraging #12,” exert some sort of minor influence on the direction that some of our music took? I don’t know the answer to that, but it’s an interesting question. And how’s this for a joke? Maybe Tuesday Never Comes has been in a “rat dream state” all along.
Enjoy.