These are the people behind The Messenger

The Reason For This Whole Thing ...
        Bryn Jones!

Unfortunately Bryn is no longer with us. He therefore can't compose an autobiographical piece but I'm sure if you take the time to work your way through the site & read all the reviews, interviews, articles, comments & especially listen to the music you'll glean an idea of what he was all about.

June 17, 1961 - January 14, 1999

Biographical Note, or
        How I got Here ... Jeremy Keens

The boring stuff out of the way first - I am a lecturer in Anatomy at RMIT in Melbourne, just pushed past 44.

Right. The first single I bought (with some Christmas money) was The Beatles 'Love Me Do/PS I Love You'. At about the same time I bought Georgie Fame's 'Yeah Yeah' & my sisters & I got 'Help' as a present - I still have those singles & The Beatles albums we were given, though I don't have Acker Bilk 'Stranger on the Shore' & someone else doing 'A Walk in the Black Forest' that I got for Mum & Dad as 'leaving England' presents. But I am a collector.

With my first pay packet ($16 for 40 hours!) I bought my first album: the Easy Rider Soundtrack. Since then I haven't looked back - birthdays, Christmas, any time is a chance to expand. My first CD was Van Morrison & the Chieftains, bought on the night I got a CD player. But I wanted the player so I would have a reason to get Eno's 'Thursday Afternoon'. I now have about 950 CDs - my database counts each individual disc so that is singles, albums & each disk in multi-disc sets - & about 12 foot of vinyl, & a lesser count of cassettes.

My interest has always been in seeking out new music, testing for myself the various artists, styles or releases described in magazines (or, more recently, across the 'net). & of course by the managers & staff in record shops. A formative encounter came soon after my arrival in Melbourne 8 years ago, when I found a shop called 'CVs' which moved & became 'Peril 305' & now 'Peril Underground'. There Darrin started pointing me in new directions, most of which I have followed willingly. Only after a while did I realise he was Shinjuku Thief & Mr. Dorobo.

One disc he led me to was a second hand Muslimgauze - 'Veiled Sisters'. Darrin explained it was a great ambient album, so what the heck, I handed over the money. It was love at first listening, but the passion burnt slowly. I built up my collection here & there (a second-hand 'Abu Nidal/Coup D'etat' in California, mail order 'Fatah Guerrilla', more from Darrin - 'Azzazin', 'Arab Quarter' highly recommended - & my sister-in-law was lucky enough to go to the Staalplaat shop). Bryn's death has spurred a further burst of activity, ongoing.

My feelings about Muslimgauze are expressed in the reviews & articles already in the site.

Also through Peril I got in touch with the editor of 'Vivisect', an industrial/ambient fanzine, & my reviewing career began. Then came 'ambience': first a magazine & then (after distribution problems) a net-zine. Why do I do it? Self-promotion, I love seeing my name in print or pixels; the chance of free CDs, which I take; I like the opportunity of finding new music, unsolicited disks which please & surprise. But mostly the chance to promote music I like - to try & interest people in some of the weird, little known, but wonderful stuff I listen to - as a way to thank the musicians.

As Official Reviewer, I am not a hundred percent sure what my role is - but you can always expect honest, but fair, reviews, which aim to describe the experience you will hear.

Finally some pointers to my musical tastes. The triumvirate of Eno/Bowie/Fripp stand central to my 'mature' position: mainly Eno, but the other two came first & introduced him through 'Low' & 'no pussyfooting'. The Eno/ambient strain is probably the most significant part in all its glories: from Nyman, Bryars, Toop, Budd & others introduced through the Obscure label to Orb, FAX label, Obmana, Robert Scott Thompson & others influenced by him. In a 'serious' direction: the Metamkine label, Naxos Alte Music, Kronos & Balenescu Quartets, Glass, the little acknowledged Factory Classical mark: another axis - Dorobo, Snog/Black Lung/Soma, Ikeda & the microwavers. PiL/Wobble, Bill Nelson, Sylvian, Jethro Tull, Main, Style Council, Peter Gabriel, Aube - & on & on. In a few words, diverse & perverse.

April 27, 1999

Another Load Of Tripe, or
        Why This Exists At All ... The Edge

When Jeremy took up the gauntlet, as official reviewer, I had asked him for a brief autobiographical note. It seemed like a very logical idea to give all of you an idea of where this gentleman was coming from.

A brief explanation, which may be in line, of the request of Jeremy's services. He had already contributed a great deal of writing to the site & I was very impressed by his work. I was also attempting to get some reviews for many of the items that we don't hear much about. Jeremy, as he expressed, will be honest & fair & has a nice level handed writing style. I'm sure we'll all enjoy his contributions. Besides all this he's a nice guy & to make sure we're a truly global affair, Bryn was from the England, Jeremy's from Australia & I'm from Canada.

Now, why am I here. Well I guess I first realized there was something different with my musical tastes when everyone was raving about the Beatles (1964) & I couldn't get enough of the thundering drum kit of The Dave Clarke Five's "Glad All Over". The first record I was given was Jimi Hendrix's "Are You Experienced" which I quickly traded to my sister for "Fresh Cream". This was the true beginning of my love of music. Jack Bruce's voice & bass playing, his & Pete Brown's amazing song writing & Ginger Baker's drumming were wonders to my ears. Everything sort of followed that vain until Jack Bruce's "Songs For A Tailor" was released & the horns & arrangements took me in a jazzier direction as well.

I spent a lot of time hanging out with the gang from a local record shop (of course they were the only shop to carry UK & European imports) which exposed me to a great deal of previously unheard material. ( A quick aside: if you haven't read Nick Hornby's "High Fidelity" & you also hung around one of these shops, you're missing a real blast.) In the early seventies I stumbled upon Roxy Music & via that Mr. Eno. I discovered Cluster & then ran upon one of the most interesting artists yet. Conrad Schnitzler! A brilliant, totally unique talent & I guess from that point everything became fair game.

A note in Jeremy's piece that caused a chuckle was his comment regarding Brian Eno's "Thursday Afternoon". I had bought this CD immediately upon release, along with the NTSC version of the video, but didn't have a CD player for a couple of years after that. (A big "sound" of vinyl fan.) The one positive was at least I got to listen to the music via the video. I had a little 14" TV that was easily turned on end, to accommodate the vertical format video, but of course the sound stunk.

My musical tastes are quite wide & varied. (note - these are in no particular order) Cabaret Voltaire & Richard H. Kirk's various guises, David Thrussell's many projects, Bill Nelson's various projects, Peter Gabriel, Peter Hammill/Van der Graaf Generator, Jon Hassell, Daniel Menche, Darrin Verhagen's projects, Jah Wobble, Public Image Ltd., J. A. Deane, Art Zoyd, Patricia Dallio, John McLaughlin, Jeff Beck, Steve Tibbetts, Paul Schütze, Bourbonese Qualk, :zoviet*france:, etc. etc. etc. & of course Rapoon & Muslimgauze!

Sorry for the lengthy rant. Now to the real business.

I first heard Bryn's work in 1984 via the "Buddhists On Fire" release on Bourbonese Qualk's Recloose label. This work totally enthralled me. I immediately got in touch with Recloose & they got me in touch with Bryn. To my excitement, I discovered he had done some other work & had copies available. I got hold of these (all on Bryn's own Limited Editions label) & was thoroughly won over. A truly unique & impressive artist. Bryn & I maintained a correspondence over the years, with him letting me know when new stuff was available & me immediately getting them from him. Very rarely did he ever have a decent distribution deal so this was the only way to get them. By going through this process I started to get to know Bryn a bit at a time. I always marvelled at his music but very soon began to be taken by his enthusiasm & his belief in what he was doing. I began to take a look at things from a different perspective & understand his point of view.

I felt very strongly that more people had to get the chance to hear the music of Muslimgauze & get the chance to learn more about what Bryn was basing his music on. I wrote to Bryn & asked if it would be acceptable to create the Web site & he was quite pleased with the offer & bestowed the "official" status to it. Everything just took off from there. A more timely correspondence began via fax until one rainy afternoon the phone rang & upon answering this very quiet voice said "Hi, this is Bryn". After all these years we finally got a chance to actually chat. It was brilliant. (Can't explain why I never thought of doing this before, doesn't really look great when you've spent twenty some years working for a telecommunications company.)

From that point on there were numerous phone calls & numerous faxes. People started to 'line up' for interviews & the site really got rolling. It's been a great joy to be involved in this project & was & is truly a work of love.

So this is why I'm here & I assume you're here because you either enjoy Bryn's work or want to find out more about it. Well, browse through. There's lots here & more coming all the time.

April 27, 1999

joining the faith...my story so far!

It was a difficult time when Bryn Jones' music entered my life. Being a solitary person most of the time, it was odd when my circle of friends had expanded to the point that I began drinking & doing drugs quite heavily. This all led to the worst place I can imagine - jail.

Music had always been an important part of my life, but I went from early Wax Trax industrial like Ministry & Revolting Cocks to the extreme opposite side of my mind listening to the Orb & the KLF's early works. The idea of music that didn't have a club-play mentality was such a new concept.

I went to a friend's house for my birthday party in September 1992 & he had the "Zul'm" release. I had never heard anything so beautiful. I immediately asked my friend whom that was I was hearing. He explained, rather incorrectly at the time, that Muslimgauze would press a few of each record & donate the proceeds to underground organizations & hospitals for Palestinian relief. I never was a very political person, except when it came to gay rights, but I began to think about more important things.

For several years, I would watch Bryn release material, but I had gotten involved with my, now, soul mate & music took a back seat to building a life together. My friends all went by the wayside as well, but I remember seeing music catalogs & the Muslimgauze section got bigger & bigger, the more I looked. I never did forget that first release I had heard.

It was not until December of last year that I rediscovered Muslimgauze. I was at work surfing the net & somehow I came across the infamous site. When the discography page loaded, my jaw dropped. I clicked on the scroll bar & the page went down & down & down. There was only 86 releases then, but that was overwhelming to me. I started thinking about music again. As I got to the bottom of the page I saw the word "MP3". I had gotten so involved in computers that it jumped out at me. I immediately clicked on the "Fedayeen" page & noticed they were not available. I returned to the discography page & clicked on the "Melt" page. I was so happy to see them available that I immediately downloaded the 4 tracks. At first listen, I was confused. It was not at all like the ambient sound I had experienced six years earlier. I kept at them, though, until they became ingrained in my brain.

Next comes the part that The Edge will remember vividly. I began e-mailing him constantly. I wasn't sure of his connection with the Muslimgauze world, but, with the first positively intelligent answer he gave me, I had more questions. He was always so friendly & knowledgeable.

I've been collecting Bryn's work now for 8 months & I have a substantial amount. There is still a great deal that I have to find, though. At times it's discouraging, but, at other times, it's a great inspiration to continue.

When I heard of Bryn's passing, I was upset with respect to obtaining the music. I couldn't believe that so early into my collecting career, I saw the end of the fun. Little did I know that Bryn had been so prolific that the releases would just keep coming & coming. The other feelings were ones of sadness that someone so inspirational had been torn from so many lives. How will so many get along now? Strength in numbers, is how I feel.

After the barrage of questions to The Edge regarding compilation appearances, he asked me to compile my own information & write a discography for the page. I was floored. To be considered in such great company! I still can't believe it. I've been working for a while, & I have to admit that it's much harder than I initially thought. So many people have helped, that it would be impossible to thank them all. I just hope that all the hard work by the entire Messenger site will be appreciated for years to come.

I suppose that's all I have to say for right now, but as The Edge can attest, I won't be quiet for long.

- Israhim Saod el Fahad

April 27, 1999

Are you still with us...? Ty Hodson

(MySpace)

I'm the anal freak of the bunch. I require ordered lists & concise organization. & where this is lacking, I create it for no other reason than, well...it was there. Case in point: The Muslimgauze Sonography.

The Sonography grew out of two seeds: 1) I had a similar project going, dubbed by a friend the Legendary Pink Dots Sonography. This was an attempt to keep straight all of the song titles used by the Dots & their various side-projects. I set out to do this partly because I thought it would be neat to see all of their known tracks listed irrespective of release, band name, etc. It also showed some interesting relationships that I would not have noticed otherwise, like themes in titles, concepts, & other trends. 2) Muslimgauze's immense discography seemed a perfect application of such a venture. One thing that has bugged me is that even to this day I can only identify a few Muslimgauze tracks by name. There are so many to keep track of, several titles appear on multiple releases (even if they are different tracks), some tracks (or themes) appear on different releases with different titles. & don't even get me started on the topic of track misspellings. All this makes people like me lose sleep at night...

So, The Edge was kind enough to express an interest in including the Muslimgauze Sonography on the web site - an offer I enthusiastically accepted. I continue to hope that others find it a useful tool for tracking down specific tracks, or simply find it to be an interesting read.

I can relate to Israhim's experience pertaining to misinformation about Muslimgauze. My first introduction to MG was hearing it at a record store in 1994. I loved it, but was turned off when I heard that proceeds from Muslimgauze sales went to support Palestinian terrorist groups. What a drag to have missed out on several years of hearing MG due to such an absurd notion. I rediscovered Muslimgauze with the 1998 Lahore/Marseille release, at which point I dropped everything. Most other "experimental" or "industrial" music became bland & uninspired once I discovered Muslimgauze. My already (admittedly) elitist taste became even more so...

If I could name a definitive piece of music that put me on "the path", it would have to be Mike Oldfield's "Tubular Bells" album, which my Dad played for me frequently as a kid. He also tells me he put my crib next to the stereo & played Roberta Flack to relax me, so I suppose it could have started there... I think the former sent me down one path (the electronic/experimental path), & the latter sent me down another (the pop music side of things). 1986 was the beginning of an active pursuit of music to challenge my expectations. A little shop called "The Ooze" in Portland, Oregon (whose owner, Charles Powne, would later go on to found Soleilmoon Recordings) was the focal point of this activity. My friends & I would make frequent trips to this mecca of weird so that Charles could enlighten us with new sounds (little did I know that even then, Ooze Tapes was probably working with Bryn Jones). Over the years I have honed in on what I feel are the more important groups. Among these is Cabaret Voltaire (et al), & I have helped out with probably the "most official" unofficial web site for CV: http://brainwashed.com/cv.

Anyway, I always knew I wanted to play music. I majored in percussion performance for a few years & graduated with a music degree. I have played in a number of capacities over the years - gigging with many ensembles & bands at some great venues. From a writing standpoint, I have been heavily influenced by what I've been able to glean from interviews with Bryn Jones about his approach to creating music. I find it astounding that he didn't use samplers & computers, especially considering that much of what he did was years ahead of what other people have managed to accomplish *with* computers. While I can only aspire to possess that kind of time & innovation, I fear I'll have to give in to the shortcuts of the West (as he might put it) & look for ways to marry my computing & acoustic drumming experience to meet my musical needs. I don't know. Maybe I'll just bag that & play dub music in my basement.

November 15, 2000

I am Mo, graphic designer & an active listener of Muslimgauze’s music.

Every single person I know already heard, at least, once about Muslimgauze, even my baker & my neighbor who is 87 years old.
I discovered Muslimgauze when I was 14 (in 1994), I created the Muslimgauze’s fan site ‘Arabbox’ in 1999 (the year he passed) & I am now working on a musical tribute to Muslimgauze involving musicians from many countries.

For me, there is Muslimgauze & the others. I think Bryn Jones created the most revolutionary sound of the century & I hope his work will be recognized one day as a very important contribution in music history.

Through his sounds, Muslimgauze was stressing issues that were often going far beyond the frame of music. I guess there is a lot to say about his numerous & polemical sources of inspiration. I would advise anyone who want to go further into this to start from the titles of his songs (that also give an idea of his subtle & provocative humour).

Personally, I think that the keys to understand his message are all in his abstract music, if you listen carefully you will hear more love than violence.

Peace
Mo.

March 20, 2009