Fireside Chat

Alan Bishop

Sublime Frequencies, Seattle, USA

Alan Bishop is a true musical maverick: He spent years playing, touring and recording with the Sun City Girls, one of the most confounding, thrilling and versatile bands to emerge from the American post-punk, post-hardcore scene. Forever going off in several directions at once, they celebrated musical freedom by diving headfirst into wild improvisations, world music explorations or rocking noise. They fully embraced the traveling lifestyle, too, and it was during travels through Africa and Asia that Alan Bishop laid the foundations for his label Sublime Frequencies by recording hours and hours of music, announcements and static from local radio stations and collecting countless tapes and records from stalls, taxis and stores along the way. Now nearly 50 releases into their existence as a label, Sublime Frequencies represents a musical parallel universe where Thai surf music and Burmese radio stations meet Syria's folk/pop hero Omar Souleyman or Sahara giants Group Doueh. We caught up with Alan during a recent Sublime Frequencies label tour to talk about using the radio as an instrument, finding musical gems in the desert and the old issue of authenticity.