Spinifex Takes Concrete 2

Where is Asahara?

Homage  to Central Australia, its residents and transients 1985-1990.

The Jig of Alice

A series of soundscapes to accompany the poetry and earth portraits of Central Australian artist and poet, Rod Moss. Performed at NT Writers' Festival, 2023. Art and words by Rod Moss.

One Ear Is Pressed To The Ground

Sunrise Brings Surprises

Words: Lee Frank 
Music: Lee Frank and Colin Leitch 
Vocals and Guitar: Colin Leitch
Arrangement: Colin Leitch
Recorded: In the wee green hills of Japan, Colin Leitch

Scrape Me A Coconut

Hitchcock and Truffaut discuss - in English and French- the shot sequence for the staircase ascent in Psycho while David Toop cooks spook in the background.  Bogart makes tough in Key Largo, Polanski cuts nostrils and Robert Towne comments on writing for Jack. Roberta Flack tells us about her first time as Mark Stewart gets dirty and gritty with William Burroughs in a mad city that has  Scott Walker calling for the Cossacks.  K.  wakes from a fitful sleep to see his thin legs twitching about his stomach. Outside his window, Raskolnikov, starts his terrible dark day and Celine sets out on a Voyage as Ian Fleming and Raymond Chandler pass by outlining the steps to secure a contract hit. Public Image follows close behind. Miklós Rózsa  and Bernard Herrmann bring us the best darkness of the 50s and Graham Greene comments of Woody Allen and the power of black and white film.  George Pelecanos,  writer of the TV series The Wire , paints Hammett. The Postman Rings Twice and James Ellroy gets up rubbing his eyes  with  Gunter Schickert while Stanley Kubrick talks freely about a scene's truth as Nina Simone sings for Brecht and Weil.  Fritz Lang puffs way and explores violence in modern cinema.

On the sidelines watching it all, Orson decides to join  the party with those infamous cuckoo clock lines from The Third Man.

Intro: TTRH ep 02
Sunset Boulevard Opening
Eurythmics - Love is a Stranger
Elliot Gould - The Long Goodbye excerpt
Bernard Herrmann - Taxi Driver OST
Charles Mingus - Scenes in the City
Siri Vik - It never entered my Mind
Miles Davis - Ascenseur pour l'échafaud
Paolo Conte - Sparring Partner
Jeanne Moreau - excerpt from Ascenseur pour l'échafaud
Portished - Glory Box
Kip Hanrahan - Love is like a Cigarette
Scene from Chinatown
Miles Davis  - Assassinate
Raymond Chandler – The Big Sleep
Michele Bokanowski -Tabou
Scene from Postman Always Rings Twice
Stanley Kubrick Interview on adapting books for the screen and the truth of the story
Miklos Rozsa – The Killers
Scene from Double Indemnity
George Pelecanos   (Writer of The Wire. TV series) – on Hammett and comfort
Noir Désir - Lolita Nie En Bloc
Hitchcock loop (Interview with Truffaut))
Scott Walker - Cossacks Are
John Zorn -Chinatown
Robert Towne (writer of Chinatown) – Interview on writing for Jack
Chinatown – Jack and Roman
Steven Brown – Chinatown
William Burroughs- Puertos De Los Santos
Mark Stewart and the Mafia – Liberty City
BBC Radio Production: James Elroy - My Dark Places
Bohren & Der Club Of Gore – Crimson Ways
Roberta Flack – First Time I Ever Saw Your Face
Gunter Schickert - Uberfalling
BBC Commentary The Rules of Noir on the war in Europe
James Ellroy _Blood’s A Rover
Orson Welles – The Trial
Fritz Lang –on violence in film
Lee Frank – Fear stalks the chance to pounce
Hitchcock – on the transfer of menace
Miklos Rózsa  - Spellbound bedroom scene
BBC Radio Production: James Elroy - My Dark Places II
Paul Jebanasam – Rites I
Kubrick - On the criteria for a scene’s inclusion
George Pelecanos   -  On the nature of noir characters
Xx. Police chief dialing
Pere Ubu – Voice of Sand
Scene from Moaning Low
Scene Key Largo
Adolph Deutsch music and scene  -The Maltese Falcon
Phew: White Lounge So Bright
Extract: Celine Voyage au bout de la nuit
Franz Kafka - The Metamorphosis
Public Image – Home is Where the Heart is
Ian Fleming Interviewing Raymond Chandler on arranging a hit
Graham Greene on Black & White films
Pierre Henri: Valse
Tricky – Overcome (Nouvelle Vague Mix)
Excerpt: The Third man; Orson Welles (the cuckoo clock speech)
Interview: Hitchcock with Truffaut on the cinematography of Psycho (French/English)
Piere Henri: Valse
Jim O Rourke: Flat Without A Back
David Toop and Max Eastley: Burial Rites (Phosphorescent Mix)
Miya Masaoka: Part 4 (while i was walking i heard a sound)
Unknown: Riabinin (11 Bylinas of the Russian North)
Excerpt: Crime and Punishment – Russian /English
Deaf Centre: City
Excerpt: Celine’s Journey to the End of the Night

Radio KaraGarga 5: Noir

A groovy jazz satire. An infuriated driver, frustrated by society's  catch-phrase chatter,  plunges  off a cliff after a maddening radio interview, only to find the afterlife ain't what it's cracked up to be. Spoken word with a quirky twist

A 1000 Likes Over the Edge

Presenting the best of 2023's folk, jazz, classical, ambient, electronica and world music RKG explores climate change and AI with comedy, music, sound, film and books. Featuring

Simeon ten Holt/ Canto Ostinato , Section 11
INT: Oliver Sacks / utility of ears 
/ the sounds in music
/ the brain’s response to music 
FILM: Alphaville /  Interview scene
Opulent Night / Songs for Sad Poets
INT: Ted Chiang / AI as the McKenzie Consultant Firm   
Siavash Amini / A Desert of Immobile Winds (Pt. 2)
Harlan Ellison/ I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream    
Ryuchi Sakamoto, Alva Noto / Glass
INT: Ryuichi Sakamoto and  Alva Noto/ collaborating on a site specific work
Nadeau / Forbidden Colours
RKG ID 3 
Colin Stetson / Can’t Keep from Crying
Abdullah Siddiqui  / Mumtaz
INT: Saim Sadiqon / Joyland’s  cast and crew’s  favourite character 
Abdullah Siddiqui / Joyland (Trailer Version)
Kofi flexxx / flowers in the dark
Ligeti / Apparitions
Johann Johannsson / The_Mountain View
Echaskech / Sounds of the Year 2018, Dreaming of Antimatter 
Legati /  San Francisco Polyphony / 
INT: Russell Banks - Outlines ’Lost Memory of Skin’
Hania Rani / On Giacometti 

INT: Banks / Adapting novels as film scripts
Penguin Cafe / no one really leaves
 E.E. Cummings / Anyone Lived in a Pretty How Town
Jana Hunter / there's no home
Sneak Preview : RKG 11 Itchy Feet
 Int: Freya Stark / what is travel?
Soundwalk Collective + Rimbaud /   Le Bateau ivre
Gaïsha / Kam mina lwakti mada
Celine / Voyage au bout de la nuit
The Caretaker /  Long Term (Remote)
Shirley Temple / Good Ship Lollipop 
André Dassary /  Le Régiment de Sambre et Meuse
Tiger Lillies / The Ancient Mariner

RKG 2023 2 degs part 2

2023’s best folk, rock, jazz, folk, classical and electronica mixed with comedy, film and interview clips.

2023: The world breaches the 2-degree warming threshold, while Artificial Intelligence bursts into our daily lives, reshaping reality
Oliver Sacks / Why the Brain Loves Music
Fushitsusha & Peter Brötzmann / A Seldom Seen Means of Displacing Humiliation
Shoji Hano + Werner Lüdi + Peter Brötzmann / Dedicated to
Lord Haw Haw : last broadcast. 
King Charles coronation
Gian RKG crows

RKG 09 ID 1

Max Champion  (Joe Jackson) / Why Why
Comet Ambience 
INT: Kazuo Ishiguro/Summary of Klara and the Sun 
         			/ When AI understands emotions
 				/ When AI comes up with the next big idea 
Pram /  The Midnight Room 
Film: Robot Monster / Human Death

RKG 09 ID 2 Gian
RKG testimonials /  ROBIN 
Art Ensemble of Chicago / I Feel like Dancing 
FILM: THX 1138/ Confession Scene  
Ambience 2 
Fripp /Travis (Soft Machine/ Gong) The Apparent Chaos of Everything
Film: Her  / We’re all leaving
INT: Robert Fripp / is this the life for me?
INT: Fripp / getting antsy with music journalists 
Alabaster Deplume / greek honey slick
Ulda / Our Forgotten Ancestors 
INT Beirut/ life isn’t like an American anti-depressant ad 
Beirut/ island life 
Pharoah Sanders / Peace In Essaouira (For Sonny Sharrock)
INT: Pharoah Sanders / 1964
/ homeless in New York
/ the New York scene - Sun Ra, Billy Higgins
/ playing with John
/ nature of sound

Zorn and Laswell /  Pharoah Sanders
Pharoah Sanders / Thembi  
Canto Ostinato / Section 11

RKG AI part 1

Part of the Tokyo Jam series. Recorded, A Stone's Throw  Tokyo Daigaku Studio, 330 am Jan 1st 1998. Guitar and voice: Colin Leitch. Voice: Lee Frank
A lecherous blues talkin' dope fiend gives the low down on getting down. Spontaneous blues and comedy.

Honey B Suckle: Tokyo Jam Series

This is a song from an award-winning drama based on the meteoric rise and equally meteoric fall of Rod Ansel, the self-styled adventurer on whom Paul Hogan based his Crocodile Dundee character. The play delves into identity and celebrity and the outmoded notion of what it is to be Australian. I wrote and sang the piece, then sent it to Gian, who, on the other side of the world,  had just that night been working on an instrumental track without knowing anything about the play or the song. The way his music and my song fit was astonishing.  Music: Gian Luca and Lee Frank. Lyrics: Lee Frank. The Image is from a stage set design for the production.

Hollywood Dream from Last Anthill of the Wild Wild North

Adapted from an award-winning short story .

The Colours Of An Arm

Based on a true story. Joe Frank and Ken Nordine find magic mushrooms growing off a goanna's back but one of them sprouts a different tale: the reptile.  With cameos from  the police, Facebook, Alice Springs and a cheeky goanna.

Goannas Living The Dream

A track written in the lead-up to the 2024 nightmare. In the tradition of The Last Poets, J G Ballard and Joy Division. PS If you like this, you'll probably lean towards this
https://soundcloud.com/radiokaragarga/welcome-the-mongul
Another stroll through the carnage of dystopia but written and recorded in 1995.

America the Hydra

Strange fruit hanging
From the popular trees
Muslim Jew Black
Could be new on me
 Say they stand for Justice 
but they kneel on necks. 
I can’t breathe. I can’t breathe.
Who’s gonna be next?

America  the Hydra 
America the brave 
cocking an Uzi as you sell lemonade
America the Hydra, 
America the scared 
kids go to school with wills prepared

Second amendment
Keeps me secure and safe.
Get out of my driveway.
Unless you want to be waste-

Ted riding shotgun on
Highway 95.
He’s stopping for no one 
Coz he knows he’s right.

Got a  60 tonne rig
Of jet fuel and glory
Soon the whole world’s
Gonna know his story

America the Hydra,
 America the con, 
The President’s a smirking 
gold-ringed Don.
 America the Hydra, 
America the scream,
Romans by the wall 
shooting up morphine


Lady Liberty scratches at veins
Bugged by meth and QAnon games.
Uncle Sam waltzes kids down the aisle.
Let me show you how to hate with a smile.

Can’t control our body weight.
So we’ll control the border.
Get the dog sniffed up.
We’re bringing law and order.

America the Hydra, 
America the mad
Oxy and apple pie
With God in the bag

America the Hydra 
America off rails
Sucking the star spangled banner
As the empire flails


Fingernails stream Fox News
Twenty-four seven
I scroll cannibal clips 
I’m seething in heaven

Zoom down rabbit holes 
to echo chambers, 
We spread  coded secrets 
Like  Intimate strangers

Facts dont matter when 
clicks mob the truth
King capped Kennedy
 in a  Detroit telephone booth

America the Hydra 
America the free
Shrieking lifted skirts 
and  liberty
America the hydra 
America the new
That knock on the door 
could it be for you?

America the Hydra (Syd on the Moon mix)

Lee Frank: voice, words and musical direction.
Aidene: sung voice and violin.
Remi: organ.
A spoken song composed whilst travelling along the coastline of Papua New Guinea from Port Moresby to Sepik River via Rabual. How 19th century London and bordellos appeared as a source for this song in that setting  I'll never know. Kudos to Aidene  (https://soundcloud.com/aidenearia) and Remi for magnificent understanding and patience. Their musical skills are exemplary. 

Take Me To the Whores of London

Additional vocals and violin: Aidene
Who never misses a beat of brilliance
"The Lookout of Forever" lays out a story of yearning for connection and understanding in a world slashed with chaos and disillusionment. Awash with striking metaphors and imagery, the song presents love gone awry, the struggles of everyday people, and the hit and miss nature of relationships. It's Dylan and Cohen stranded on a beach in the South Pacific.

Lookout of Forever  (Shaved Hidden Mix)

A hilarious cosmic country tale of a lonely chook farmer’s  heartfelt quest for connection, wrapped in twangy refrains and surreal alien encounters. Johhny Cash swigging tequila with Douglas Adams and biting the worm as filmed by the Coen brothers.

Aliens Don't Abduct Chook Farmers Like They Used To

A work in progress. This will be the basis for a song Edge of Zanzibar. Here's a sample of the lyrics:

Old Bondi it raised me
With its rockpools and seas
But westwards my folks moved
To strangling weeds and TVs

I clawed my way to radio
When it still could save your soul
Played a song that got me sacked 
When the boss stormed in and howled

That was a three-headed platypus
Spewing shit  at the evening star
The only place it’ll ever be played
Is on the edge of Zanzibar

I skipped school to ride trains 
Visit my Dad’s dive in the Cross
Tossed pebbles to his window 
For him to undo  locks

A junkie in a kimono
Came stumbling out of a bar
Took one look at me and slurred 
I know exactly who you are 

You're a three-headed platypus
Barking love at the evening star
The only place you’ll belong
Is on the edge of Zanzibar

A psychic she did ring me 
Said her I had to see
Her spirit guide had guided her
To read my cards for free

She said her guide possessed her 
And she handed me a pad 
The words were wild across the page
And this is what I read 

He’s a three headed platypus
Barking love at the evening star 
The only place he’ll ever belong 
Is on the edge of Zanzibar 


Edge of Zanzibar

An instrumental track for a piece of experimental crime flash fiction

Committment's Like a Bowl of Cherries in the Slaughterhouse

A feral, tragic Balkan cabaret where heartbreak swings, love burns, and madness swarms, 

A Wound in Love

Theme for an award-winning neo-noir Australian oitback short film
Semi-finalist, Sydney Indie Film Festival 2018
St Kilda Best Australian Shorts 2018
Best Theatre Script, NT Literary Awards 2017

Two mates fish off a river bank  in the Top End of Australia but snag a prized lure. A piece of proverbial, you’d say, but only an hour before they've spotted a 3m croc and something else is dark and nasty and lurking between them.

Theme for Lured

Satire on the well to do and oh so beautifully looking - Written and recorded Tokyo 1995 long before influencers. Crafted by the incomporable Colin Leitch. 

Beautiful People

ALL CREDIT to DJSCHLOCK for this remarkable track. One of three songs that accompany the short story: The Man With Too Many Names. Set in early '90s Tokyo—its bars and dives and clubs, the detritus of the burst bubble, and the tense lead-up to the Aum Shinrikyo attack—The Man With Too Many Names follows a down-and-out sketch artist who falls into the orbit of a charismatic drifter, just as the fragile bonds holding his ragtag band of expat housemates begin to unravel.  Suka Cha, a chilling, hi-tech, low-empathy vision of the future, emerges from the artist’s fevered attempts to capture a nightmare on paper one night on the subway. As a song, it twists the innocence of a children’s nursery rhyme into something closer to the original Grimms' fairy tales—raw, cruel, and terrifying.

Suka Cha: The Scissor Man Rework v2

All credit for music to DJSchlock (SOundlcoud)  Take a peep into the world's future in 2050 from Tokyo in 1990. The Grim Brothers go cyberpunk and come out swinging.

Suka Cha Ck! Rework v1

Intruders was a multidisciplinary performance inspired by Andrew McMillan’s award-winning book, An Intruder’s Guide to East Arnhem Land, featuring choreographed readings with 5 narrators and dancers and musicians (cello, violin, didjeridoo and soundscapes)
Voice: Damian Lewis
Words: Andrew McMillan

Intruders_First gusts of Wayruck

The taxidermists—preservers of lifeless things—as agents of loss and destruction.   Shades of Leonard Cohen’s existential melancholy, Tom Waits’ macabre whimsy, and Nick Cave’s gothic staggers. All played out against a slow sad slide into the dismal future

Taxidermists Win Again

A daring cycle of satirical Zen parables. In the sandals prints of fabulists like Donald Barthelme, Haruki Murakami, and Kenji Miyazawa, blending fable, satire, and philosophy with take-no-prisoners political and cultural insight.
Oh, yeah, its mean to be funny.
Soundtrack tag since the series is meant as a cinematic piss take.

Zen In the Era of the Nanosecond Prime Ministers: Intro

A capricious lord's contradictory commands drive his loyal vassals toward disaster—until one clever servant turns chaos into liberation and vanishes into myth. Inspired by the feudal like power dynamics I witnessed playing out in Japanese schools and companies.

Zen in the Era: I The Revolution of a Broken Circle

 As a nation lurches through crisis after crisis, a prophecy foretells a parade of fleeting, ineffectual leaders—each more hollow than the last—guiding the headless body of government into absurd oblivion.

Zen in the Era: III The Nanosecond Prime Ministers

 Between the cosmic and the human drifts All I Wish. Distilling  epic emotions into a minimalistic song, it is haunted by haiku, ancient love poetry, and William Blake's aphorisms.

all I wish 
is to slay the crows
of three thousand worlds

and thereupon
rest beside the one 
who fires my heart

All I wish

Sharing the same theme chartered in the short story The Happy Film, an aged courtesan, a streetsweeper, a factory press operator, a monk and an artist  lament  the burden of memory, longing for escape, and the aching desire for oblivion through the mythic river Lethe.

Free Me from these Visions

A humble man’s haunting, wordless song at Ikebukuro Station swells into a radiant, otherworldly force that stirs the soul, disrupts the city's rhythm, and is swiftly silenced by those who fear its power. Part of The Ikebukuro Suite (published by Kyoto Journal)  soon to be released on Bandcamp.

The Ikebukuro Suite,  Room  3: The Song

Thanks to  Bill Laswell and Bob for keeping the faith. As Bob says ""I had no song in my repertoire for commercial radio. I sang about debauched bootleggers, mothers who drowned their own children, Cadillacs with only 5 miles to the gallon, union hall fires, floods. Darkness and cadavers at the bottom of rivers wasn’t for radio. There was nothing easy-going about the folk songs I sang. They weren’t friendly or ripe with mellowness. They didn’t come gently to the shore." NB The Radio KaraGkatsu eps are aural worlds without number; a sonic ventures interweaving music, sound, comedy, audiobook extracts, film dialogue, poetry, interviews, soundscapes and goobledegook.

Radio KarasGkatsu!

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