There’s the chance employed by musicians schooled in improvisation, and then there’s the chance that’s occasionally foisted upon ’em — by the elements, by circumstance, by the Post Office. Steve Roden‘s ongoing “airform archives” blog (inbetweennoise.blogspot.com) recently included a snippet of an LP damaged in transit. While the pictures over at his website might seem to tell more than enough of the story (one of them is shown here, to the left), the resulting sound has a groove all its own (MP3).
Leave it to Roden to not only find the music in the instance, but to locate a parallel between the broken vinyl and the work of Matisse. And, of course, that champion of readymades, broken or not: Duchamp.