Rust 4 The Art and Science of Rust

 

Rust 4 The Art and Science of Rust

by Tim Mungenast & Astro Al

Another album write up

1. Evolution #99 - A racing rush of sounds. The joy of improvising music is the unexpected layers of sound that rush forth. The problem with improvising is sometimes you get nothing of interest. It happens. So you just cut out the boring bits and keep the good bits until you have enough good bits for it to work. Even some bad bits can become a sound source to manipulate.  Title by DNA Girl (I think).

2. Merry Go Rust - Tim plays the saz a bit on this one. The saz is a really cool instrument that I first became aware of thanks to our friend, Greg Grinnell (who fronts an amazing band called Mission Creep) who is an incredibly gifted musician and artist. Acoustic instruments can rust just as well as electric ones. Tim did tasty work on this one.

3. What Are You? -This is my favorite track on the album. Deb's vocals give me the chills. I didn't think we could make this one work but it does. The sense of menace builds pretty well. Feels like a creepy horror flick. I couldn't recall how we got that cool sound at the end until I talked to Tim who created that sound using his Babybox analog synth. It is a wild sound and perfect to close out this track. What are you? A robot, an electronic ghost, a sound of pure chaos?

4. Levitating Saucers of Rust - The favorite track of someone who actually bought the album. Yes, sometimes people actually buy our stuff. A dreamy breezy ambient soundscape of escape.

5. Rust of the Codemancer - What is a Codemancer? It's a necromancer who creates magic through programming. The words for this one all grew out an improv piece that I recorded at Maudslay state park then spliced into the track. Rust can be beautiful. The Honey Tone 5 are part of the story and referenced again in Rust Triptych. This track is about sacrificing yourself for beauty and to help others. True beauty is helping others and maybe rust can show us the way to that beauty.

6. Rust Triptych - Three rust stories. Each story is independent of the other. We purposely kept each other in the dark about what we were writing for the words. DNA Girl's Rusty the rabbit story is my fav of the three. Bias? Perhaps. The line "night of the musical Lepus" is a reference to one of the most ridiculous "horror" movies ever made, Night of the Lepus. It's about giant killer rabbits and they used real rabbits for most of the "special" effects scenes. It's even more ludicrous than it sounds. The Honey Tone 5 teach love and being better together. 

This album was released on March 25, 2025

Credits:

Tim Mungenast: Teak Wonder guitar, Marshall MS-2 toy amp, Mesa Boogie Studio.22+ amp, Babybox analog synth, FX, overtone singing, vocals, whirlie, balalaika, voice, cymbal, saz

Tim is a truly gifted guitarist and wonderfully quirky collaborator of sounds, ideas, and fun.

The Rust series of albums was his idea. He told us one day that he wanted to make an album that sounded like rust and that started it.

How many Rust albums will we create?

I don't know but another is being mixed/edited as you read this...

Astro Al is:

DNA Girl: PRS Piezo SE guitar, vocals, Ibanez mandolin, Gold Tone octave mandolin, wah-wah tube, FX, steel drum, synth, tongue drum, cabasa, slide, voice

Count Robot: Vocals, voice, microphones, duotron, monotron, springatron, acoustic and electric kazoo, DVD player, Aztec death whistle, metal, genometer signal generator, FX, boom box

-Oh you might be wondering how you play a DVD player and a boom box? You play them by putting a microphone that picks up electronic frequencies and then feeding that signal through FX pedals and an amp.

Part of the voice narration for Rust of the Codemancer was recorded in the bunker in Maudslay State Park. MA. If you find yourself in MA visit this spot. You won't regret it. It's one of the best sounding recording spots I've ever been in. Sounds better than any of the studio spaces in any pro-recording studio I was ever in and yes I was in more than a few in Boston.

Everything else was recorded in Weirdfield, MA, and Allston Spa, NY

Written, performed, produced, and mastered by Tim Mungenast & Astro Al

copyright 2025 Tim Mungenast & Astro Al

Rustingly yours,

Count Robot