uncommon ambience

MVY Waves! Surf into ten hours of uninterrupted ocean waves, hints of 808, drifting sounds, wind, and a bird chilling amidst the dunes of Aquinnah. Mellow beats, ocean waves, nature, some distant human machines, and chords. Whether you're studying, working, reading, sleeping, or unwinding after a long day, this immersive ambient soundscape provides the perfect background soundtrack. No talking, no interruptions—just pure beach relaxation and meandering sounds. Ignore the World.
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So the backbone of this episode was recorded on the footpath, about 40 feet from the surf of Gay Head Town Beach (Moshup Beach) on Martha’s Vineyard. It was recorded last week (as of this episode’s release) while vacationing in my favorite place on Earth—with more episodes from MVY on the way (stay tuned).
Anyway, why is it “Gay Head Town Beach” when the town is Aquinnah? Shortest possible answer: the island was taken from the Wampanoag by settlers and, as with the United States mainland, the tribe was pushed further and further westward into a place we incorporated as “Gay Head.” The tribe had nowhere else to go but the sea... (And I know that ellipsis is doing a lot of work.)
So in 1997, by popular vote, residents changed the town name from Gay Head to Aquinnah, or “land under the hill,” which alludes to the clay cliffs and some of the taller elevations on the island. The cliffs really are remarkable—I’ve visited them almost every year of my life—they don’t get old.
But settler colonialism isn’t much of a chill ambient podcast subject, so I’ll save the bitter pills for more historically focussed channels. (Or consider surfing over to the Aquinnah Cultural Center.) 
It’s summer after all (huzzah), so let’s wade into less heady waters. Something got stuck in my craw over vacation that I had to yank out. Have y’all ever pondered how musical artists sound more native in specific formats? (And forgive me if music folks already pondered this, I didn't look bc I don't want to get rid of what I've written so far.)
I’ll stick to what I know—90s-era hip-hop—to demonstrate. And it’s very Vineyard for me, as my obsession with hip-hop bloomed in the summers of the ’90s. So while I was folding T-shirts at Island Breeze or washing cars at Old Colony Service, I was making paychecks disappear at Aboveground Records (and Al’s Package Store, but that’s a different tale).
Cassette is easy: nothing sounds more cassette-native than DJ Shadow, Black Moon, or the Beastie Boys. The griminess of backpack and alternative hip-hop belongs in analog.
And while I'd put Raekwon in the vinyl format camp—he did release “the purple tape.” (which I purchased at the music store in Vineyard Haven—think it’s a paint store now.) Just slip “Glaciers of Ice” onto your turntable and you will understand why. Maybe just buy the purple tape and display it.
Definitely CD for CRU’s Da Dirty 30; a very solid project that plays best uninterrupted—while being able to exit tracks quickly to skip intros that didn’t age well. Also, one of the tracks, “Da Dirty 29,” pretends to be a damaged section of the physical media, complete with medium-specific error sounds. So if you play it on CD, you’ll hear skipping. Basically, it’s much easier to realize that the damaged sounds are an intentional artistic choice on CD.
On the cassette side of "Da Dirty 29" it plays as if the tape is being eaten to mush by grinding gears. Look, find some Gen X ******* and ask them how it felt when their favorite cassette started making a grinding sound. You could even drop a cherry on it with, “think of the film clenched in your teeth while the dentist has that nuke-cannon X-ray machine aimed an inch from your face.”
That was the sound of your favorite cassette dying.

Sink into ten hours of uninterrupted lo-fi ambience featuring mellow beats, ocean waves, drifting melodies, soft textures, and nostalgic vinyl pops. Whether you're studying, working, reading, sleeping, or unwinding after a long day, this immersive ambient soundscape provides the perfect background soundtrack. No talking, no interruptions—just pure lo-fi relaxation and meandering sounds.
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Going to be on vacation, so I have premade and scheduled this post. So as you read this, I am hopefully on a beach staring toward the horizon, thinking of the Spanish Navy captain whose ship was ambushed by pirates and sunk. The captain survived ten days underwater.
The year was 1634, February 13th, a day before Valentine's—but Captain Ortega was from Spain, so they wouldn’t be celebrating Valentine's Day yet. To him, it was just a Wednesday. Captain Ortega, a youthful Santa Claus-looking dude, parked his tall ship behind a barrier reef for the night.
The pirates snuck in on a sloop and blasted Ortega’s ship with cannons. There was a terrific fire that crippled the ship and plunged her into the depths.
Ten days later, Ortega was found sprawled out on a beach, clutching his logbook. He eventually described how he survived the attack and was rescued by brightly colored sea Smurfs called Snorks. They were no bigger than his thumb, he relayed, and he was not believed. The historical record notes that Ortega had delirium.
Fast forward to the 1980s: a man has found Captain Ortega's logbook in a monastery overlooking the sea. The man who found the logbook is also (ostensibly) a sea captain—he's wearing a sea captain's hat like that dude from Captain & Tennille. I guess that makes him... Captain. Another captain...
Anyway, the Captain & Tennille-looking captain from the 1980s believes what he has read in Captain Ortega’s logbook. “There’s something about Captain Ortega’s story that makes me believe it’s true.”
Now I’ve told you the whole story. See it here if you don’t believe me. Do the Snorks exist? Or was Captain Ortega drunk-driving his tall ship?
Also, I watched all the seasons of Snorks, and humans never show up. The Captain & Tennille-looking captain’s story ends in the Season 1 Snorks cartoon intro. We never get a resolution, never see another human again in the show.
Moreover, we're talking 1664, and Captain Ortega is not in Spain. What were you up to, Ortega?

This week we are waiting on a flight in some Mid-Major airport. A nice liminal space to relax or sleep with. 10 hours of airport sounds including muffled announcements, large room air-conditioning, timely takeoffs, airport denizens, and drift.
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We’re waiting for a late-night flight to somewhere awesome, tucked into a dark corner with a view of the runway fading into the milky darkness beyond. Vehicle lights twinkle. The runway blazes with multicolored bulbs. And my favorite person, the waving double-flashlight dude (I always wondered if these folks ever pretended to be Jedis). Planes speed down the runway in the distance, like racing Christmas trees.
In the 90s I had the perfect spot at Atlanta airport near my favorite eatery, Gyro Wrap (you fostered my love of the gyro, thank you Gyro Wrap). I loved watching the nighttime choreography of massive flying machines and service vehicles while awaiting that late connection to Columbia, SC, and back to my military school bunk by midnight.
One trip nearly ended with me joining the Army by accident. A very stern-looking dude from the U.S. Army (reception cadre) double timed over to me as I headed for the Taxi stand of the Columbia Airport. “No gum. The hell are you chewing gum for? Take those headphones off when I’m speaking to you.”
I’m like, “Uhm.”
He starts laying into my posture. I wasn’t standing straight. Gum out right now. Hand outstretched to a line of people in the distance. “Eyes straight. Let’s go.” And I see a line of dudes rigid with fear. “You made all of us late—“
I jumped in, “sir, I’m sorry, I didn’t join the Army. I’m in military school. I have to catch a cab.”
His eyes widened at my interruption, then his expression softened into something much friendlier—even jocular. “Ya—! Ooooh… I was about to put you on the bus.”
He asked how long I had been in military school and I was like, “Six years.”
“Six years? Do they not teach posture? Chest up, shoulders back…” And he clapped me on the back, "See you in a few months."
I wanted to do add a "sorry but I will be attending another military school in a few months." But he was back to his charges telling them the wait would continue.
Speaking of airport nostalgia, this week’s episode cover is a homage to the stellar Catch Me If You Can opening credits. Which is itself a nostalgic, Saul Bass–ish 1960s film opening. I’ve never seen Catch Me If You Can, but the credit sequence was formative in inspiring where I wanted to take my career. I should leave out that my mantra became “I will only work on documentaries or major motion picture credit sequences” (and whatever job I could get at MTV, I’ll mop the TRL studios).
The Catch Me If You Can credit sequence by Kuntzel + Deygas is unassailable. And middling designers (such as myself) will make any excuse to play with others’ wonderful work and call it homage. (See my recent Matrix episode for more).
I mean, it is self-gratification. Can I say that? And leave aside the vulgar common understanding—it would be like my buying a home-run baseball on eBay. Some other person caught the ball, or ripped it from a child’s hands, put it in a box, slapped on some stamps, and shipped it across multiple states. Now I’m holding up that baseball as if I accomplished something.
Then again, it was fun to make.

This week we have a Summertime Vibe, a bright nostalgic front-yard audio space.
10 hours of summer sounds: sprinklers, birds, lawn mowing, some drift and sounds inspired by the heard but never seen ice cream truck. (Anyone have kids? My kids never hear "do the dishes," but they can geolocate an ice cream truck 3 neighborhoods away based on the jingle volume).
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Summertime! Throw on Dove Shack or a summertime mix by Jazzy Jeff and Mick Boogie (after listening to this week’s ambience). Or everything at once with Peruvian takeout and a karate kick to that rotten bastard who cut you off in traffic. Huzzah! Summertime!
I hope everyone has a safe and memorable season. Maybe let the outside world do what it does and embrace some selective apathy. Take some time for yourself and those who are important to you. 
One easy step: turn off cable and commercial news. 
Cable news is a for-profit industry staffed by people who fill on-air time with content intended to hold eyeballs hostage so they can expose viewers to commercials of erectile dysfunction pills. Pretty easy task—just stage an on-air Chuck E. Cheese fight. 
Cable news producers invite hacks and debate freaks willing to put their reputations on the line to mock victims of war or shout at each other. “Get your ******* hand out of my face!” is a much simpler way to stack the ENPS rundown of their show than gather or vet stories.
Has anyone ever sidled up to you with erectile medications during a restaurant fight? Maybe they should? In the real world, shouting “Bro, eat my fist!” is going to grab a lot of eyeballs—you could then conceivably sell stuff. 
Give it a try: initiate a ridiculous argument over at the Skee-ball machine. Then switch to, “Everyone! All of you should buy my **** pills!” 
No one would be okay with that.
Look, when you flip your TV to cable news channels, you are not witnessing anything. They are actively taking your eyes through cringe and anger before mushing your face into banking ads and mounds of fast-food meat. 
And you still won’t know what is actually happening in the world.
**** them, it’s summertime.

Magical Big Ben belfry ambience for fighting off procrastination or for mechanically induced focus. 10 hours of Big Ben, clock innards, musical plucks, London street ambience, and classic British broadcasting.
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If I were to quickly pitch the episode ingredients: we have a sprinkling of Big Ben, London street ambience, and a 60-year-old BBC episode I found online. Tossed together with all sorts of clocks and drifty stuff. I imagine we are amongst the bells of the belfry with an FM Radio. Enjoying whatever magical clock-mechanic sounds happen all around. (I envision the magic fits between Tinker Bell and Rube Goldberg.)
All of the above is meant for procrastination thumping sounds, get a bunch of work done!
Ok, so lately I’ve been listening to What's All This Then, a delightful podcast hosted by two British expats and a guest covering British minutiae. So like beans on toast, why British folks don’t rinse their dishes after lathering them in bubbles, et al. During a recent episode, a host mentioned that if you were to stand at the base of the Elizabeth Tower — or, as yanks know it, “Big Ben” and listen to BBC Radio 4, you will hear the live recording of the bell before the sound can travel down from the heights. Radio signals travel faster than sound waves.
And that was all I needed to spiral into a manic mini-obsession over Big Ben... Also Big Ben is just the bell?
I listened myself to BBC 4—the bell's gong plays at the top of the hour and the ringing is live.
I also learned Humpty Dumpty wasn’t a cannon(?)
I did my best to explain all of the above to my wife over dinner, including the Humpty bit, and she was like, “I thought Humpty was an egg?”
Also, I was like, “Hon — did you know A1 is not American? And they’ve got this whole other brown meat sauce!”
She's like, “This is the most boring conversation I’ve ever had.”
I reminded her that she regularly shares the contents of her dreams during meals. The night before, she recounted Six Flags opening a location in our basement and the cat got lost down there. You want to talk boring? Recounting efforts to rescue a cat out of a dream-basement tilt-a-whirl.
PS: Nerd stuff — if you guessed that I positioned the hands of the... Big Ben clock(?) to 7:30 as an homage to the late great emcee Big L (from his track Criminal Slang)—you would be correct. "If you 7:30, that mean you crazy..." And the title is referencing a super nerdy mash-up of DJ eccentrics and jazz/funk drummers.
Have a nice weekend!