YOU NEED TO HEAR THIS: Delia Derbyshire - The original Doctor Who theme

Okay, so pretty much everybody's already heard this: the original Doctor Who theme from 1963. But, really, ain't it just goddamned amazing that anyone was able to produce a piece like this back then? Seriously, check it out, and try to imagine how it was possible.

Turns out, it was possible because the BBC Radiophonic Workshop hired an electronic music pioneer named Delia Derbyshire. The theme itself was composed by Ron Grainer--complete with unusual notations about "sweeps", "swoops", "wind clouds", and "wind bubbles"--but actually produced by Derbyshire. The final piece was all electronically-produced sounds, but this was the era before synthesizers, so she produced it all with electronic oscillators and other arcane gear, and assembled them all by physically splicing together bits of audio tape. Grainer was apparently so amazed and impressed with the result that he tried to get the BBC to Derbyshire credit--and royalties--as co-composer.

Anyway, she's also done a bunch of other cool, weird, atmospheric stuff, and you can download some of it at this site. It's very much worth checking out, especially "Dreams" and "Moogies Bloogies".

YOU NEED TO HEAR THIS: Saul Williams - Ohm

I've been seriously busy this weekend working on both a new design for this blog, and also a custom character sheet for the Spirit of the Century campaign I'm gonna be running. Oh, and I probably ought to do my freaking taxes, too, huh?

Anyway, here's some music you need to hear.

Saul Williams is a poetry / spoken word guy whose work achieves sublime, transcendent awesomeness when it's set to a hip-hop beat. I think he might have gotten some wider notice, kinda recently--I noticed that "Black Stacey", off his self-titled album, actually got a pretty serious video--but I first learned about him through his contribution to the first Lyricist Lounge compilation. And that's the song I want to share with you folks today: Saul Williams' "Ohm".

YOU NEED TO HEAR THIS: Tom Waits - Lucinda

Right, so I happened to listen to Tom Waits' "Lucinda" at work today, and I decided that you need to listen to it too. By God, it is good stuff. It's from Tom's awesome 2006 three-disc set, Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers & Bastards (specifically, it's off the Brawlers disc).
Anyway, yeah, Tom Waits is great.