There was a question about the first TUNER album on the guestbook recently. Jim enquired
“Hello, the other day I reacquainted myself with the debut Tuner CD Totem. In the first track "Flinch" there is a sampled recording of a woman speaking on the phone. During this "phone call" she mentions Ocean State Job Lot, a "dollar style" discount store based in Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New Hampshire. The locals here in Rhode Island lovingly refer to it as "Job Rot". My question is, who is this woman, and does she have any ties to the New England area? Just wondering.”
Thanks to the miracles of modern science, Markus Reuter got in touch to let us know that the voice in question was non other than a sample of Lenin’s wife, Nadezhda Krupskaya. Interestingly, Markus tells me she was speaking in Russian therefore it’s unlikely she actually says Ocean State Job Lot but something that sounds a lot like it.
You can hear Flinch, off the first album, Totem over on their myspace site as well
as some bits from their new CD, Pole (you can read my review of this toe-tapper
over on the blog.)
TUNER will be playing some gigs in Estonia later this year. They'll be sharing the bill with The Humans - the new project between Toyah Willcox and REM tub-thumper, Slow Music director and all-round good guy with white hair, Bill Rieflin. You can hear some snippets over at their myspace site.