Roughly Enforcing Nostalgia, Moshe EP the Plunderphonic Power Pop Band of Chicago

Through The Looking Glass
  (1:30)[11/30/99]
Lyrics adapted from the novel by Lewis Carroll.
  MP3
  Liner Notes

’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

“Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!”

He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought-
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.

And as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.

“And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!”
He chortled in his joy.

This piece specifically tackles Carroll’s “Jabberwocky” poem, using a series of canned drum loops to represent each character as they appear in the story: a bubbly, woodblock-infused part illustrates the “burbling” of the Jabberwock, while a reoccurring jungle beat acts, literally, as a theme for the jungle itself. The storytelling is split between several outlandish characters, featuring a mysterious narrator, a sporty hardcore rap-rocker, a patronizing father, and an oily game show host whose final chummy end tag rattles off the booty of prizes gifted in return for the main character’s brave slaying of the Jabberwock.

The visual end was acted out using a line of vending machine figurines called Homies™, all dressed in various inner-city garb; certain figures were sought out to play certain roles, such as the adolescent lead character who, in hopes of winning the acceptance of a drug dealing father figure, sets out to slay a Narc, envisioned by him as a monstrous Jabberwock. The fantastic imagery and ever-changing backgrounds (of jungle- and Sci-Fi-scapes) are meant to respresent the divorcing from reality that the protagonist must do in order to perform his goal; by imagining an otherwise blameless victim as threatening beast, he’s able to defer some of the guilt from his murder. The Jabberwock’s presence in this piece is ubiquitous even after the slaughter, giving a frighteningly unkillable shape to the lead character’s gnawing guilt. Absurdly comic, this is one of our most densely visual works, and features some of nearly every technique used for the other Instant Classics: stop animation, CG elements, 3D characters and sets, motion picture sampling, cut-outs from ads, and large amounts of compositing.

XX-Extreem Drum Loops
Black Butta Drum Loops
Richard Thompson – “Backlash Love Affair”
Homies™ vending machine figurines
Francis Ford Coppola – Apocalypse Now
Peter Weir – The Mosquito Coast
Boaz Yakin – Fresh
David Byrne – True Stories
Peter Hyams – 2010: The Year We Made Contact
Web jpeg of .38 Snubnose pistol
Photo of Buck Rogers XZ38 disintegrator pistol
Web jpegs of police badges
Best Buy advertisement – image of TV
The Newlywed Game & Card Sharks game show video clips
Mark Smotzer – Jabberwock model & animation
Self-sampled – guitars, bass guitars, buzzers, & vox