Wow & Flutter 017 | Requiem
Doug Kallmeyer on letting the drone take you, eurorack, and having more music available than ever.
Welcoming the New Year (why, how is it 2025— how are you all feeling?) by highlighting my real life friend, collaborator, Doug Kallmeyer. I rounded out last year playing improvised dub? Techno? I don’t know, I can’t remember the BPMs— in a little vegan bar outside of Washington DC called Galaxy Hut with Doug, and his wife and long time collaborator Monica. We dragged our synths, PA, projector screen over and let it rip for two hours without practicing. They are local heroes for me in their compassion towards new musicians, commitment to organizing local shows, and unending creative output. They are the humans I try to model myself after, but I know their wisdom is hard won. Watching the music industry from behind a console or bass guitar over a 40 year arc has a power and a discomfort. Here’s a few words from Doug on trying to connect with the world and these machines in 2025. Doug’s project Requiem plays DC’s Rhizome tomorrow, Monday January 6th. You’re invited to bring canned goods and make a donation to prop up a community member needing support.
W&F: Where to begin! How about— where's home base for you?
Doug: Right now I am living in Virginia, just south of DC with an Alexandria zipcode. But really it’s Annandale. MMMMfood.
W&F: Care to catch us up with a brief history of Doug in the music industry for 40 years?
Doug: There were a lot of paths, all at the same time. I started playing shows around age 12, and played bass— everybody needed a bassist. This got me playing with lots of people, all age groups, and into clubs at 16, then on tour as soon as I graduated high school. Of course, this led to recording and an instant fascination with that, and also live sound since that was a necessity— building and cobbling together PA gear for shows from the beginning. The people I hired to run sound for my bands started hiring me since I could call out frequencies really well and had an opinion, which led to owning rigs, working in clubs and ending up on international tours of all levels as a sound engineer. Simultaneously, with friends I managed to put together enough gear to have a 16 track tape studio in one of my band houses. That Tascam MS16 tape machine and Ramsa desk ended up in the back of the van a lot, as a mobile rig. I would pull up to bands houses and drop a snake in their rehearsal room, or schlep it into venues I worked at and track shows. That led to working in recording studios, tape op to producer, and always having my own mixing room since. Other avenues taken on this ride include running an independent label for 5 years, teaching bass guitar, building custom boards and racks, designing and touring video projection systems, all while touring and releasing my own musical collaborations on a dozen or so labels.
W&F: We played a show together this autumn— you're relatively new to eurorack. Why modular synths now? I'd say you're pretty great at it and have a natural knack for it. Is it comparable to other things you've done?
Doug: Honestly, it is largely a way to escape computers. Screen time has become a problem for me. Especially now that mixing music, live or in the studio, usually includes a screen as a main interface. I want to escape that for performance / art sake. My whole life involves signal flow and cabling, so routing modular is a bit second nature to me. I also don’t approach either digital or analog platforms for discovery as much as to execute an idea in my current practice, so modular can be the best because the nut jobs that build these wonderful things typically don’t operate on a level that’s looking to fulfill a check list for maximum consumer potential. So what you get is a lot of wild ideas, curve balls and heroic doses of sonics which is a great for twisting that preconceived idea right out of your skull. I’ll add that eurorack— the way I have it set up is as a full work station so currently arrangements are committed to 2 bus with the mix being the process. Which means more artistic commitment, and less screen time associated with the music. It’s less perfect, but more impactful. It’s very influenced by the dub mixing I discovered in the 1980’s that cemented my interest in mixing gear.
W&F: Let's talk about drones. Drones are tough. And yet, you engage huge audiences with your drone projects. What makes a drone unique? What does it take to hold an audience's attention with a drone?
Doug: Drone is indeed very tough. My honest feeling with that art form is that it is more about opening yourself up, instead of closing yourself off in order to do it. It requires being patient enough to make the sonic developments necessary outside the realm of normal time conditioning. There is also audio frequency and brain wave frequency synch to consider here- the keys and intervals used absolutely affect this aspect, as does volume and duration. The most success I have had involves a particular instrument tuned a particular way (providing a specific harmonic interval), with a movement that orbits around the base tone, modally. Duration is the hardest part. To get the best results for me, it takes a good 20 minutes of immersion. The best solution to keep group focus long enough has been through collaboration with a visual aspect. Using cadence of movement, color, and content that matches the pace of the drone, it is easier to distract people from their programmed awareness of time. Drone is unique in that it is ultimately the application of physical frequency and the impact on emotional states.
W&F: You released a cassette recently. When the cassette made it to my mailbox, it was so thoughtful, DIY, and economical— it has been dubbed on a thrifted mixtape. Tell us about this.
Doug: That was a limited run from the awesome Histamine Tapes, for the “Monuments” release by Requiem. Sonically that was a series of live performances captured during the pandemic. We would go to various non war memorials/ monuments in DC and live stream drone meditations. Histamine came up with a very unique approach to the artwork and medium of sonic delivery as artwork. Upcycling on used cassettes gives this random aspect to it, a whole other story of people is included. This fit so well with the music conceptually, as it was more about our experience together, shared, than a presentation of something isolated.
W&F: You have strong opinions on the current state of the industry— which, for the record I tend to agree with. What most frustrates you right now, particularly as a seasoned person observing this with a long, first-hand tenure?
Doug: The music industry has been collapsing in on itself the entire time I have been involved. This is just a reflection of current American society. Late-stage capitalism is scary. It’s not getting better, I don’t know what else to say. It is harder than ever. Yet— we have more, better music than ever.
W&F: Okay that was loaded— how about something fun? Give us three pieces of live sound knowledge you wish everyone knew, or paid better attention to. Maybe that’s loaded too.
Doug: All I can think of is stuff that gives me PTSD. Vocalists that can’t/ don’t / won’t project so their vocal mic becomes a cymbal mic, bands that rely on an engineer to sound like something because they have so many tracks, or people playing / singing over the exact same thing, recorded. Don’t do any of that, please. Leave the karaoke for Honey Pig (Annandale MMMMFoood reference).
W&F: You collaborate often with your long time partner, artist Monica Stroik. I am biased here and think she is great— would you ever want to share the fire story, because I think it's amazing how you met.
Doug: I answered an ad in the City Paper, was looking to play bass in a band. Monica was in that band. We kind of had an interest in each other, but she was in a relationship, so I ended up taking on a bunch of mixing tours for a couple years and disappeared into road work. One day I was working an Orchestra Morphine show, and she walked in the door. Neither of us was looking for a relationship, so of course it worked out perfectly. We do support each other 150%, and just to make our art and to support each other and the artistic community around us.
*Editor’s note— Doug skated over the part where his house burned down and Monica said he could live at her house. The rest is history. Monica and Doug continue to work together as Requiem (here they are kissing on the cover for POPulist Agendas) and Oms.
W&F: What projects are next for Oms and Requiem? Any other bands I am unaware of?
Doug: Oms is currently trickling a series of drone meditations called Burial Hymns, one at a time, on Bandcamp. Two to go.
Requiem has three long-form pieces, which we are just about to master and figure out how to release. I am in an improvisational group called Fanoplane which is supposed to release 1st quarter next year. The Mantis DC (psych rock band) is supposed to release next year. Right now there really is a lot of flux going on. Finishing these releases will be the close of a chapter, as activity is dying down for a lot of these collaborations and I am looking forward to taking a bit of time to evaluate and plan the next step.
W&F: What are you listening to right now?
Doug: The joy of live sound engineering is getting to hear fresh, new musicians almost daily. A recent duo that killed it as a live electronic, duo act called Body Meat. On my turntable, right now is Laraaji’s “Flow Goes the Universe”.
Great interview of a wonderful soul, with whom I've shared the stage many times over past years, beginning with Lost Civilizations experimental music project (https://www.tedzook.com/lost-civilizations/), then the Heterodyne improvisational ensemble (https://www.tedzook.com/heterodyne/) and now the Fanoplane improvisational ensemble (https://www.tedzook.com/fanoplane/), which will be sharing the bill with Carolyn Snow's Tangent Universes at Arlington's Galaxy Hut on November 7 (https://newmusicusa.org/events/carolyn-snows-remarkable-tangent-universes-project-will-be-joined-by-the-fanopane-improvisational-ensemble-at-arlington-vas-iconic-galaxy-hut/).