Labor Day (US) and Suitman Jungle’s Liquid Lunch (UK)
A man in a “monkey suit” (not the animal) plays jungle music and meditates on work.
The question of work is one I’ve often struggled with. The typical disconnect between what one does for a living and what does in their “personal life,” meaning everything but work, has emerged as a struggle for me more than once. Suitman Jungle, on Tape Club Records, available on Bandcamp.com, has a full album out that has a lot to say about this disconnect and other aspects of work.
“Amen Break – Commercial Break” is the first track that really hits on work as problematic. “I need a breeeeeaaaaaaak,” goes the processed vocal. The artist behind Suitman Jungle, Marc Pell, gives a listing of types of breaks, with some repetition. I’m not sure what an “amen break” is, but it suggests to me that the world of work needs to yield to, at least at times—or to integrate—a more sacred view of humanity. I’d like to hear an updated version of this track, one brought up to date with the plight of many work-from-home employees and the different types of breaks the post-pandemic crisis work world affords. The casualization of work is something I know academics in the UK (where Suitman Jungle hails from) have been protesting and taking industrial action in the face of for years. The work-from-home capabilities computers and smartphones bring into play can work for and against the worker, leaving the door open for unscrupulous employers to demand 24-hour access to their employees. This could figure into an updated Liquid Lunch album.
I wasn’t familiar with jungle music and called the soundtrack to Pell’s meditations on the topic of work, drum and bass. Genre naming is not my strong suit (no pun intended). One aspect of the jungle music is that the city has often been called a jungle, and the old expression, “It’s a jungle out there,” point up lawlessness (think of corporate “misbehavior” aka criminality) and competition as key aspects of public and work life in a big city such as London. I haven’t been to London, and I don’t live in a big city, but I’ve been told one large American city is a “meat grinder.” I didn’t dig for details on that one, and maybe I should have.
One of the most curious things about this album is the claim on Suitman Jungle’s Bandcamp page, for the album Liquid Lunch, is about how it was made. “It was produced in OpenOffice spreadsheet processor and mastered in a cracked version of Microsoft's Powerpoint,” is the claim. At first, I thought this must be a joke. Perhaps it really was done this way! A spreadsheet would permit processing of digital audio in an uncompressed format such as WAV. I have no idea how one would master an album in PowerPoint, though! This is a work of art, Liquid Lunch. If it really was produced this way, which I still have trouble believing, it adds to the reflection upon work and the tools used by many white-collar workers.
It's a trip to listen to. The bass tests my stereo system. It’s danceable, especially the track “It’s a Suitman Jungle.” This is not an album done by someone sitting at home at a desktop computer, using digital audio workstations to produce MIDI music. Marc Pell is a percussionist and uses “live effects” and guitar pedals along with his “standing drum kit.” Many of the sounds he gets—and he does use “a clunky office keyboard” in some way—are new to my ear. The track “7 Parts to a Week” has a beauty that exceeds the rest, an ethereal sound palette with a compelling beat. Does he perform on the street this way? That would be fantastic. Suitman Jungle in the suitman jungle.
The Amen break is famous sample used across countless hip hop and drum and bass records. Lots of fun videos about it on YouTube! And yes he’s taken this to the streets of London - also worth a watch on YouTube 🙏🏻🙏🏻