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We're going to rip it through this. Do I need anything? I just want to tell you it. I'm just going to tell you it.
Okay. Maybe I'll play you some music as well. Sure. Okay.
Three, two, one. Hey, I'm Jan Abumran. I'm Robert Kowich. This is Radio Lab.
The podcast. I'm sorry. I should say that way. The podcast.
Yeah. More declarative. Front and center. So I thought for the next 10 minutes or so, let me tell you about this band that we ran into.
I don't think you mean that literally. It was not a band that you had a collision. No, I kind of did. Well, let me give you the back story.
Okay, please. So you remember when we were doing the Parasite Show? Yes. Hey.
We did several pieces about hookworms. The first of which was about hookworms in the south. I do, I do. Just a jog.
Here's a brief clip. We think that these people are sick from something because they don't behave like we do. What does that mean? They are slow.
Not mentally. They're slow physically. They're pale. Okay.
So we went to our secret weapon. Her name is Karen Havelick. She works a couple of cubical rows down from us. We asked her, do you know anything that's kind of southern, bit twangy, but not?
It kind of has an edge because these hookworms are taking over people's minds. So it's got a little bit of an edge to it. She gave me all this stuff and then she's like, oh, check out if you can gas, gas, gas. So to make a long story short, she handed me a CD, this one right here called Butte and Gace.
And I was like, I was totally wrong for the show. But it was so right in some of the other ways. I was like, okay. So, so yeah.
So here we are. I visited Butte and Gace in Brooklyn in this little basement apartment where they play. And should we just hear something? Please.
I've been a fan of Butte and Gace for not yet. It's really hard music to describe. For instance. I'm Aaron.
It's Aaron Dyer. Aaron is one of the members of the band. Here's how she describes what they do. Imagine a recently retired schoolhouse janitor riding the back of a big horse that's galloping over different scenes.
Like one scene could be a really calm, rose petal, surfaced pond. Jump over that and then it gets into another scene where there's a big party. With topless beach goers that are totally pruned out from hanging out on the beach and they're very surprised. And it jumps into another scene where there's an angry mob.
With pitchforks and flames. And they're writing after rabbits that have just stolen all of the carrots and cabbage. And they're not going to be able to eat their feast because of it. So they're very angry.
But that's what the janitor is jumping over and he's excited about it. And I would be too. In this scenario? Weird.
I just made it. Are you the janitor? So you guys are janitor on the horse? No, no.
I would say the audience would be the janitor on the horse. So that's how Aaron describes it. But there's another Aaron in the band. Aaron Sanchez.
Two Aaron's. And here's his attempt. It's like miniature, it's like the loudest miniature fuzz. Alright.
Here's a bug in Gaze rehearsing a song called Two Frogs. As far as we got. It's so hook with me. I mean like right from the get go.
Totally. Now the amazing thing is that all of that noise just came from two people. Yeah. Just trying to make as much noise as we can.
The reason that they're able to make that much racket is because they heavily messed with their instruments. Aaron the girl plays something called a bug. A bug is a baritone ukulele. Or Nina's in bugle.
That is the instrument she plays? Yes. She plays a ukulelele. She plays a bass flavor.
This is yours, right? Yeah. Very cute. It's like a miniature guitar.
It's really light too. Aaron's wooden body. And he knows it has two pickups. This is a...
She's actually taking this bugle and modified it. Added some strings. Electrified it with some pickups and outputs and such. Two outputs.
So it's a serious. That's the bugle. Now the Gaze seems even more complex. So this guy...
That's what Aaron the boy plays. This is the Gaze. And this has basically this is a hybrid between a guitar and a bass. Get it?
Guitar. Bass. I'm just trying to think of what it would look like. Well it actually looks just like a normal acoustic guitar.
But... It's actually a long-gated and taught hookworm. Do you sing on this one? Except it would be hard to play because it'd be biting fingers all the time.
So the other thing that's happening when they play is he's beating a kick drum with his left foot. She's got bells on her ankles. This is a really high-stress bell. So this is one of those people who walk around in central Europe with nine instruments doing them all simultaneously.
A little bit, yes. This is Guec and Gaze performing from their first album, a song called Bundle Talk. Long-guit doesn't play together. We met in 2000.
And then we ran a band in 2003. Called Haunted. That band broke up? We broke up.
We broke up. Because we were dating at the time. This is the first time we've ever said that. Really?
Yeah. What are you now? If you mind me asking. Friends?
We're bandmates. We're friends. We're friends. Now I kept trying to push and prod the two errands about why they broke up.
They wouldn't tell me. I probably wouldn't tell me either. Suffice to say something happened. And then they just stopped speaking to each other for a really long time.
We didn't speak for like three years. Three or four years. Really? Yeah.
Aaron the girl basically moved away, gave up music altogether, and started racing bikes. And then one day out of the blue, for no real reason that he can explain, Aaron the boy writes an email to Aaron the girl. He said, so how's the cycling going or something? I think I did say that.
He did. We've never really talked about it. Really? Yeah.
And beyond that, they wouldn't really talk about it. But their music has something in it. Some kind of like hook where me angst. Maybe it comes from the stuff they don't talk about.
There's something about your music that feels possessed. My temptation, maybe wrongly, is to say possessed by some sort of history you guys have. Perfect. If large armies of bunnies are going to steal their carrots, then they're just living in an anxious world.
The truth is, you can fear the rabbit. I don't think they would disagree with you there. Well that was Buchanan Gace recorded with help from Michael Rayfield. You can find out more about Buchanan Gace at Buchanan Gace.com.
I hope you spoke Buchanan Gace. And Gace? G-A-W-S. If you have any trouble spelling that you can just go to our website, radiolab.org, we will link you there.
And for all you New York listeners, here's something. June 1st, Buchanan Gace, who are going to join, actually join us on stage for the second installment of our performance series that we're calling Amma Gace. So we're going to have Prune and Gace on our stage. You can do it.
But she'll be pruned out. She may as well. And that's June 1st, here at the Green Space. Check our website, radiolab.org for details.
Oh, and by the way, the first one that we did, which was just a few days ago, the video is now on our website as well. Radiolab.org. It was a really fun evening. We had basically two guys talking about swarms.
Swarms, you know, the science of swarms also making art from swarms. Very cool. Radiolab.org. That's it.
So, it's your favorite poster. A radio lab listener from Oshkosh, which talks about the radio podcast and funded by the National Science Foundation and the Swarms Foundation. You hear it like that. No.
You start on your one. One. Wait. You're not playing the same line.
Yes. Are you? Pretty much. We should do it together.
Well, no, do your bass line. Do the bass line because it's the same. Right, so here's your one. There's your one.
But one, two, three. One, two, three. One, two, three. One, two, three.
One, two, three. Mine is in here. One, two, three. Mine is in here.
One, two, three. Mine is in here. One more time. But...
Where's your open up?