Review of Music from the Magic Ambulance

By V. Vale of RE/Search Publications

In the tradition of Jean Jacques Perrey and Bruce Haack, Reverend Al and his zany cohorts have created diabolically-compassionate sound collages which not only amuse but actually enlighten as well. There are eruptive moments of mirth scattered throughout these somewhat amazing "compositions," which are often unified by truly instructional omniscient male-voiced narratives straight out of the fifties. Here "avant-garde" gets disguised by satire. Incorporating the best of fifties high school driver's safety short films and first-aid training films, these compositions boast car crash sound effects, emergency phone calls, electronic swooshes and almost-melodic tonalities, sometimes punctuated by gorgeous female sounds and shrieks. Rarely has sex and violence been so compellingly distilled into such pleasurable sonic fables and parables for our schizophrenic millennium. Today, with Valley of the Dolls aids such as Prozac illuminating life's pathways, how can we falter? If we do, the reassuringly "scientific"-sounding narratives from our friends, the Art of Bleeding, will surely guide us back to the straight and narrow.

---- AVAILABLE ON ITUNES

Gory Details now on iTunes

Thanks to our friends at White Label Music, the "Best of" Collection of Gory Details stories is now available for download on iTUNES!

Just search for "GORY DETAILS" or "ART OF BLEEDING."

A more "musical offering" "MUSIC FROM THE MAGIC AMBULANCE" is coming soon.

Gory Details Distractions

I feel bad I haven't written for a while and have this (pathetic?) fantasy that some of my new LJ friends may have actually missed hearing from me, so I'm throwing this out for now.

I've been very distracted lately trying to produce a CD of people's grisly stories of medical emergencies. At least initially, it will just be available via iTunes, but I also plan to burn some physical copies to sell via our website (www.artofbleeding.com) once we get some publicity rolling.

The stories in this "GORY DETAILS" collection were either recorded via a dedicated phone line (888-467-8535 ) I set up or collected from interested passersby who stopped into the Art of Bleeding ambulance on one of the several weekends it was parked out along Vermont Avenue in LA's Los Feliz neighborhood.

Anyway, I' ve been writing background music for the varioius stories, and doing the artwork for the cover, and it's taken up most of my free time. Hope to get back to journaling soon.

Call the phone line if you're interested. This batch of stories is only the first installment, and the line remains open for business 24 hours a day.

Gory Details Sample 1

Strong stomach?

Listen here.


It's all true.




As an offshoot of my Art of Bleeding paramedical vaudeville shows, I've been taking the ambulance out on public streets to record people's true personal stories of medical emergencies. It's called The Gory Details Project. I have about 100 right now, and have an offer to release them as an iTunes thing, which I'm going to be starting on soon. Need to select some of the best ones, so I'm going through what I have on this page. Feel free to let me know which ones you think should go on the "Best Of" compilation.

Also, feel free to call in your own after you've looked at the page and have an idea of what it's about: Just leave your story as a message on the toll free hotline, and i'll upload it within the day to our audio archive.


GORY DETAILS HOTLINE: 888-467-8535.