March. April. May. The days have long since lost all meaning, blurring into one another as we improvise with adapted rhythms of life. Winter in Montreal is finally over, with June just around the corner. Things have gradually begun to reopen here, though the virus is not contained. Border still closed, travel discouraged, working remotely if able. Whatever happens, there’s no going back to “normal.” Being able to sit in the sun on my balcony certainly makes the restrictions easier to bear, but priorities have changed. I’ve tried to use the time, the seeming sameness of repetition, to focus on the differences. Becoming aware of the return of the birds, what time the cat walks up the alley, the ongoing squirrel drama.
2020 will certainly be a point of demarcation. It very much feels like there will be a “before” and “after.” Before, under the pretense of secularism the caquistes government in Quebec had passed a controversial law banning religious symbols (including hijabs and turbans). After, without saying so, the government finds itself reluctant to make the wearing of masks mandatory during the ongoing Covid crisis, of which Montreal is the center in Canada. Nonetheless, I’m cautiously optimistic. Before, the students in my Science Fiction class couldn’t imagine that the world could change very much. The future will be more of the same, just worse probably. After, how quickly the world can do otherwise. Whatever the cause, we’ve seen that there are other ways of living than the status quo.
Cato the Elder says, “Never am I less alone than when I am by myself, never am I more active than when I do nothing.” Seems like a welcome perspective, perhaps even a corrective, to the loneliness and alienation so many of us have been feeling. But in fact those of us who live with others haven’t had much time to ourselves at all. We keep hearing so much of #AloneTogether, but instead my mind keeps going back to Alone With Others. That’s the title of Stephen Batchelor’s 1983 work of secular Buddhist existentialism. But it also captures the feeling of learning to live differently as we reorient our lives and social relations.
After EVERYONE IS BORED and KINDA BLUE , I knew that I wanted to follow with a mix themed around feeling alone. The first mix toys with monotony, while the second plays with our sense of time on a different scale. ALONE WITH OTHERS explores juxtaposition and dialogue, thinking about collaboration and solitary activity. I began by selecting a few jazz duo records: guitarist Jim Hall and bassist Ron Carter’s Alone Together, saxophonists Joseph Jarman and Anthony Braxton’s Together Alone, bassist Ray Brown and pianist Jimmy Rowles’ “Alone Together.” I had some other tunes in mind leftover from previous mixes, and filled out the connective tissue with songs that have “alone” in the title. In retrospect, I can hear that I gravitated to tracks that make prominent use of guitar. I can’t be the only one who has been listening to heavier music lately, but this mix balances the heavier moments with some extended meditations.(Joseph Sannicandro)
TRACKLIST
The KLF | Alone Again With The Dawn Coming Up | Chill Out | 1990 |
Valley Of The Giants | Claudia + Klaus | Valley of the Giants | 2004 |
The Upsetter Review | Closer Together (feat Junior Murvin) | Arkology (Reel 3) | 1997 |
Swans | No Words/No Thoughts | My Father Will Guide Me Up A Rope To The Sky | 2010 |
Swans | Not Alone | Swans Are Dead (Black Disc) | 1998 |
Fly Pan Am + Tim Hecker & Christof Migone | Tres Tres Avant | Rarities & Compilation Tracks | 2007 |
Red Sparowes | Alone And Unaware, The Landscape Was Transformed In Front Of Our Eyes. | At The Soundless Dawn | 2004 |
Jim Hall – Ron Carter Duo | I’ll Remember April | Alone Together | 1972 |
DEEP MAGIC | 3. Alone In Her Cave | Reflections of Most Forgotten Love | 2013 |
Birds Of Passage | alone and raw | Without The World | 2011 |
Joseph Jarman / Anthony Braxton | Together Alone / Dawn Dance 1-Morning (Including Circles) | Together Alone | 1974 |
A Silver Mt. Zion | 13 Angels Standing Guard ’round The Side Of Your Bed | He Has Left Us Alone But Shafts Of Light Sometimes Grace The Corner Of Our Rooms | 2000 |
Can | Don’t Turn The Light On, Leave Me Alone (From Cream) | Soundtracks | 1970 |
Shadows (ft. PE) | Alone (Noise) | Steppin’ To The Shadows | 1989 |
Low | Alone | Long Division | 1995 |
Boards Of Canada | Pete Standing Alone | Music Has The Right To Children | 1998 |
Bugseed | Stand Alone | Bohemian Beatnik LP | 2010 |
Caterina Barbieri | Information Needed To Create An Entire Body | Patterns Of Consciousness | 2017 |
Ray Brown /Jimmy Rowles | Alone Together | Jazz Moods (Jazz At Night’s End) | 1999 |
Wallias Band | Musicawi Silt | Ethiopian Grove: the Golden Seventies | 1994 |
Uusitalo | Vesi Virtaa Veri | Karhunainen | 2007 |
Kali Malone | Locus of Repetition | Organ Dirges 2016-2017 | 2018 |
Pit Piccinelli, Fred Gales, Walter Maioli | amazonia 6891 part two | amazonia 6891 | 1986 |
Black Swan | Alone Again With The Dawn Coming Up | A Tribute to The KLF’s Chill Out by Apparition (pre-Black Swan) | 2001 |
Ras G | Move Alone….. | VHVL & Ras G – Seat Of The Soul | 2014 |
Tim Hecker | Not alone | Anoyo | 2019 |
Charles Mingus, Eric Dolphy Sextet | So Long Eric | Complete Live In Amsterdam (CD 1) | 1964 |
bvdub | No One Will Ever Find You Here | The Art of Dying Alone CD | 2010 |
Tropic of Cancer | More Alone | Restless Idylls | 2013 |
Angus MacLise | Description of a Mandala | The Cloud Doctrine | 2002 |
Koen Park | Am I Really Alone When I Dream? | Warbled Demos For Lone Dreamers | 2016 |
Vic Chesnutt | You Are Never Alone | North Star Deserter | 2007 |