For years the National Speleological Society has hosted a Cave Ballad Salon wherein spelunkers enter cave-themed songs that they’ve penned into a compeition that is judged by their peers and associates. The results of these musical interpretations of the caving life are then announced at the NSS’s national convention.

While rummaging through an antique store in recent months, Mason Brown excavated a vinyl LP that had collected the entries from the 1972 Cave Ballad Competition. Given that Speleogen’s modus operandi is to transform our sensorial experiences of cave environments into sound and visual art, this decades old example of cave song craftsmanship proved almost too good to be true, connecting our own efforts to a long and apparently storied tradition.

Titled Where the Rain Never Falls, this record comprises a compilation of both folky and jokey cave tunes, which Mason has remixed and manipulated to create his very own interpretation that is equal parts Christian Marclay and King Tubby.

Where The Falls Never Rain

the fur is softer there

Moon the moon. Recorded at 12:34am on January 16, 2004. The moon was so swollen, y'all. Chubby light! That lil munchkin's got my heart aroused. 

Yikes! Enjoy.

Moon da Moon

RIP Mike Skinner. 

Appeared on Coco Art's 2009 Head on Collusion Box Set. www.cocoart.org

Mike Skinner - First Moment Of A Lurch

CoCoArt