a house in bali

i’ve always been interested in gamelan music. the first time i heard something like it was in the soundtrack to akira. there was a haunting and sad element to it but tremendous energy and beauty. in high school i had a crappy copy of the akira soundtrack and i listened to it over and over again. it was one of those albums where you lay on the floor to listen to it cuz it’s high school and yr so moved by the music that you can’t do anything. it wasn’t until a few years later when i was living in chicago that i came across a used copy of one of the nonesuch explorer series gamelan albums at reckless. i bought it for seven dollars and after i got home and listened to it i was hooked. the music was mind blowing. all the syncopated polyrhythm, the loud soft dynamics. it all killed me. and what was awesome was at the time i couldn’t even imagine what kind of instruments were capable of creating such sounds.

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