{"id":134,"date":"2019-12-17T22:49:01","date_gmt":"2019-12-17T22:49:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.richbradley.org\/songs\/?p=134"},"modified":"2020-04-25T18:37:41","modified_gmt":"2020-04-25T18:37:41","slug":"bestial-burden","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.richbradley.org\/songs\/201x-favorites\/bestial-burden\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cBestial Burden\u201d \u2013 Pharmakon"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed-youtube wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Pharmakon -Bestial Burden - Live @ FORM Arcosanti 2015\" width=\"780\" height=\"439\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Wo_eer_eyiQ?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>A friend who\u2019d never heard Pharmakon once asked me to describe her music, and the best I could come up with on the spot was \u201cbody horror.\u201d That may not be a recognized musical genre, but I still wouldn\u2019t know what else to call it; it\u2019s aural Cronenberg. Some might try to roll Pharmakon up into the nebulous catch-all \u201cexperimental music,\u201d but I\u2019m not sure what the experiment would be in this case \u2013 Margaret Chardiet sounds like she knows exactly what she\u2019s doing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Wikipedia chooses to label Chardiet\u2019s work as something altogether non-musical: \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Pharmakon_(noise_project)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Pharmakon (noise project)<\/a>\u201d. Like the experimental descriptor, this strikes me as equivocating. \u201cNoise project\u201d implies something disorganized and cold, but Pharmakon\u2019s songs are structured with clear purpose and come from a place of raw emotion. It\u2019s not melodic, and you may not like where it takes you, but it\u2019s music.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That Wiki disambiguation is necessary because \u201cPharmakon\u201d is also a <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Pharmakon_(philosophy)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Derridean philosophical concept<\/a>, which I won\u2019t pretend to totally understand, but I think it\u2019s something to do with language representing a thing that is two opposing things at the same time, i.e. a drug being poison and remedy. Chardiet\u2019s music is both ugly and purifying, inflicting a projection of trauma onto the listener as a way to heal.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The original trauma, in the case of the <em>Bestial Burden<\/em> LP, was a surgery and extended hospitalization during which Chardiet became acutely aware of the gulf between her mind and body. That\u2019s the feeling that permeates this album \u2013 the existential horror of finding yourself a stranger trapped in a corporeal saboteur. Chardiet despairs in the title track: \u201cI&#8217;m just hanging in the balance \/ Tethered by only a thin thread \/ Between a shadow and its source \/ Between this flesh and its form.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It is powerful but extremely bleak stuff. This video, though, is surprisingly fun. An attentive audience sits in an intimate outdoor venue on a beautiful day in sunny Arizona, as Chardiet aggressively stalks the crowd, shrieking \u201cI DON\u2019T BELONG HERE\u201d and knocking nearly everyone in the head with her mic cord. It\u2019s terrifying and hilarious. The poison is the remedy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A friend who\u2019d never heard Pharmakon once asked me to describe her music, and the best I could come up with on the spot was \u201cbody horror.\u201d That may not be a recognized musical genre, but I still wouldn\u2019t know what else to call it; it\u2019s aural Cronenberg. Some might try to roll Pharmakon up&hellip; <\/p>\n<div class=\"readmore-wrapper\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.richbradley.org\/songs\/201x-favorites\/bestial-burden\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[22],"class_list":["post-134","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-201x-favorites","tag-pharmakon"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Bestial Burden - Pharmakon | Rich Bradley<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"&quot;Body horror&quot; may not be a recognized musical genre, but I don&#039;t know how else to categorize Pharmakon; 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