tac - Next




A comment hit out of the blue but at an opportune time. If you missed this majestic collection first time around, you are forgiven.

Maybe you haven't heard of tac, the name used by Tom A. Cox of Tennessee for his music since 1984. If you haven't, then let's change that. Cox self-released cassettes (and then CDRs) in very small editions, adorned with clearly labor-intensive silkscreen art and sculptural materials. His music was forbiddingly alien in nature and opaque in substance. Some of it is a tactile noise rush of mysterious origin, harsh and difficult and uncompromising. Later on, tac reversed gears and created albums of nearly-inaudible scrapes and bodiless whoosh.


This massive retrospective box of six 100-minute cassettes collects material from the first ten years of tac's work. Some of it is previously released (not that very many people heard it the first time round), and much of it is not. Collaborations with like-minded artists Small Cruel Party and factor X take up one cassette. If you're a fan of Runzelstirn & Gurgelstock, G*Park, Hands To, Yeast Culture or John Hudak, these six-hundred minutes of fascinating audio ought to keep you enthralled for a long while.

Released in 1997 by Suitcase with a baroque package as demanding as the sound within: painted tapes, silk-screen mesh box, silk-screened booklet.

merry

christmas

14 comments:

zdarma 7 May 2018 at 22:07  

Many thanks for this. I have been wanting to hear this for a while.

Anonymous,  1 June 2018 at 06:13  

Thank you for uploading your rare collection.
Can you post TAC's other works after noise music?
It is very difficult to listen to his sound source right now...
Please consider.

badgerstump 22 March 2023 at 17:54  

it was only five years ago ... what's your excuse?

tac,  22 December 2023 at 19:39  

i am glad to see that this stuff was at least once available for free downloads. i hope you get to re-up some of the tac stuff sometime.
all the best -Tom Cox - tac

Double Dubz 24 December 2023 at 18:21  

Thx thx thx...Tom is a super good guy, we corresponded a bit recently and he sent me a very generous care package of free stuff (refusing payment), all hand-decorated, some seemingly with/by mold etc. And I used one of his source tapes (with permission). as accompaniment when I played a show past summer at Tua Lingua in Charleston, SC...happy holidays, you two xo

Anonymous,  25 December 2023 at 15:01  

Thank you Bleak Bliss & TAC for this wonderful collection!!!

Mjy,  25 December 2023 at 16:13  

Thanks upon thanks, a truly brilliant artist

FlaccusMUC 25 December 2023 at 18:38  

Excellent - thanks a lot! And happy holidays!

Anonymous,  27 December 2023 at 21:07  

Have loved tac for years, thanks for posting these!

Anonymous,  1 January 2024 at 17:55  

Caligari:
thanks a lot !!!

magnetic vessel 4 January 2024 at 15:34  

this has been a very enjoyable collection to take in! thanks for the wonderful creations tom and for sharing, badgerstump!

J.H.M. 6 January 2024 at 10:59  

Thank you so much for uploading this. Since I see Mr. Cox himself appears to have seen this, on the off-chance that he swings by again, I just want to let him know that his work has been really inspirational for me. Genuinely some of the most beautiful, strange and haunting sound art I've ever listened to.

Anonymous,  11 January 2024 at 03:58  

Caligari:
still listening to it
A sourceful of wonders