All One Song :: Matt Valentine on "Berlin"

We’re coming dangerously close to the end of the road for this latest season of Neil Young deep dives. And the end of the road is the topic at hand when it comes to today’s song — “Berlin.” Now, we’ve covered some deep cuts over the course of the past two seasons. But “Berlin” has to be one of the deepest. It was passed over on the recent Archives Vol. III box and you can’t even stream it via Neil’s site; the only official way to experience this moody tune is to watch In Berlin, the concert film that captures the last performance of the semi-chaotic Trans tour of Europe in 1982. With its doomy synths, piercing guitar, tortured vocals and synthetic handclaps, “Berlin” provides a fascinating glimpse of this short-lived band, which featured a grab-bag, rag-tag bunch of players from Neil’s past, all grappling with a new decade and new sounds. In Berlin itself is an amazing document, highlighted by Neil and Nils Lofgren performing bizarro dances and duets on such Vocoder-laced tracks as “Transformer Man” and “Sample and Hold.” You gotta see it to believe it.  Here to talk about “Berlin” with us today is someone we've been fans of for a long time now—the mighty Matt Valentine. MV has been making beautiful noise for over three decades now, from Tower Recordings to MV & EE (with his partner Erika Elder) to various solo excursions and collabs. For the past decade, Matt’s primary focus has been Wet Tuna, which also features Erika and bassist Jim Bliss. The latest Tuna LP is called Vast — and you’d be hard-pressed to come up with a better title for this collection of strange and funky flights. Released on the venerable Three Lobed label, it’s a wide-open, far-flung album, deeply textured and ridiculously detailed, but somehow spacious and inviting. A psychedelic micro-galaxy/macro-dose that teems with life and imagination. You gotta hear it to believe it.  You also gotta hear the recent Wet Tuna Lagniappe Session, which was posted up over on Aquarium Drunkard earlier this spring. One of its many highlights is an inspired medley of “Cortez the Killer” and Sonic Youth’s “Providence” that lasts close to 30 minutes. It’s outrageous.