I Got A Big Electric Fan To Keep Me Cool While I Sleep

by al Riggs

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janieryan When my CD copy arrived in the mail I was actually already listening to the digital version for maybe the 3rd time. The whole thing is just so beautiful and triumphant sounding the entire way through. It has the exact energy I need right now in my life. I'll have to add a favorite track later, its so hard to choose. Thank you Al for the music. Favorite track: Ragged But Right.

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1.	The Most 04:08	buy track
2.	The Explanation 03:08	buy track
3.	Long Light Mantle 03:44	buy track
4.	Wishes and Clapping 03:27	buy track
5.	America's Pencil 03:15	buy track
6.	Young and Encouraged 04:54	buy track
7.	Blighted By The light 03:10	buy track
8.	End Up Found 03:54	buy track
9.	Emo Revival 03:54	buy track
10.	Collar Song 04:00	buy track
11.	Ragged But Right 03:12	buy track
12.	Nun In The Tower 04:58	buy track

about

Junky, hissing, ultimately triumphant queer country.

PRESS RELEASE BY SPOUSE FOLLOWS

The title of this album is a verifiable statement.

There is a big, honking, humming box fan in the bedroom of our barely-insulated century-old Durham house. Like most meaningless noise, it is white.

Noisier than this fan are the earworms that pervade the space. They’re in the walls, the floorboards, and even the couch cushions. The earworms--let’s call them Strum, Kick, and Wail--nest in our second bedroom: a de facto recording studio. I try not to interrupt the work. But upon hearing the demos for piano-powered “America’s Pencil” and the rhythmically elusive “Emo Revival,” I kicked the door in and, wearing little more than a handful of shaving cream, proclaimed “that’s the hit!” But they knew that already.

Living with a musician is a very specific kind of existence. Living with a queer, non-binary, anxiety-addled musician with low-self image and a flare for anatomy-based metaphors has its own specific rewards. For perhaps the first time, sounds coming from that second bedroom have attacked me at the cellular level. Quarantined with the sounds for more than ten months, I know every individual note on every isolated track. When a change is made, I damn well know about it. And I’ve never been afraid to throw a flag on the field if something hits the ear wrong.

Those we know and/or love are present and accounted for. A.C. Niver’s pure tones make “Wishing and Clapping” a Three Stooges-esque harmonic casserole while Chuck Johnson’s pedal-steel witchery makes “Blighted By the Light” as dreamlike and borderless as a Carolina Country Night. Neither queer nor country enough in their own right, Al booked two of the gayest fabric samples in the business Patrick “Lavender Country” Haggerty and Paisley Fields to plug up the holes in “Ragged But Right.”

Like shuffled pages from random chapters of a yet-to-be-finished novel about being an old queer married couple (in our 20s and 30s yet), the sonic scraps have been dropping clues to what was to come: I Got A Big Electric Fan to Keep Me Cool While I Sleep. Somehow the cat made it onto the album three times. Myself, the Lawfully Wedded Spouse, I think presents once: as the belly upon which said feline snoozes.

-Dustin K. Britt; arts journalist and husband

credits

released April 2, 2021

“i got a big electric fan to keep me cool while i sleep” by al riggs

all songs written by al riggs except “ragged but right", trad., arranged by al riggs.

"nun in the tower” contains elements of “way back when” and “christmas in prison” by john prine

recorded february-december 2020
front cover by areon mobasher
all photos taken of nightlight in chapel hill, nc
all sounds by al riggs except

a.c. niver- vocals on “wishes and clapping”
chuck johnson- pedal steel guitar on “blighted by the light"
dylan balliett- vocals on "emo revival"
"paisley” james wilson and patrick haggerty- vocals on “ragged but right”

for the queers who strive for their own version of home.

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al Riggs Durham, North Carolina

Sad Songs For, About, And Written By Birds

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al Riggs recommends:

Sauna
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Phil makes sometimes quiet, sometimes ear shattering, always pretty and dense records and this one is no different. As big as all outdoors and as small as a small wooden shack, as to be expected. al Riggs
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Uyai
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Dance to this all night and then the morning and then the afternoon until your legs turn to noodles or the landlord starts a-knocking on your floor/their ceiling with a broom. Whichever happens first. al Riggs
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The World Is A Loud Place
by Landlady

Landlady live is a force of nature, on record they are just as gorgeous and anxious as they are in the Flesh World. More Nervous Energy for those who like tremendous drumming and proper earworms. al Riggs
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