What is OTE?

Over the Edge is a radio show that started around 1981 and continues on today. The former leading man, Don Joyce, passed away in 2015. Don put in an inconceivable amount of work collecting audio material to play every week —several hours' worth every time— for decades; some of the shows were done solo by him. Don Joyce and Negativland members David Wills, Mark Hosler, Richard Lyons et al. each play various different reocurring characters for comedy bits or sprawling narratives (and yes, one of those characters is Crosley Bendix, which is where my name comes from). OTE included at least one lengthy Receptacle Programming segment on most shows, a segment where callers are allowed to contribute their own sounds to the ongoing mix without being screened beforehand, and left on the air only as long as their contribution remains interesting. The vast majority of OTE recordings are available on archive.org.

This era of Over the Edge, the Don Joyce one, is the one I am most interested in. Here, I will go over the 1,295 tapes of Over the Edge available on archive.org, dated from the start of the show in 1981 until Don's passing in 2015, which are also listed on the rateyourmusic "album" page, rate them, and do a little writeup for each one (unless I have nothing to say).

This thing is a work in process. I would have made an entry for every tape, but sadly I didn't think to start making this list until I had already listened to 197 of them. I will be logging my thoughts on each individual tape from #198 onwards, and eventually get back to reviewing the first 197 tapes. The entries in this blog will be dated by the month of the year in which I wrote them.

More information

Rating criteria:

• GREAT: Tapes of exceedingly high quality or contextual importance.
• GOOD: Good enough to listen to at least once.
• SKIP: Not enough content or interesting moments to justify listening.
• DUPLICATE: For alternative tapings of shows that have come up earlier in the list.

Further reading:

• GET YOUR OWN SHOW! (1995 Essay by Don Joyce)
• Fair Use: The Story of the Letter U and the Numeral 2
• HOW RADIO ISN'T DONE - A Documentary about Don Joyce
• Don's notes

We in Negativland quite enjoy flirting with confusion, which is often a healthy and productive state of perception in which conventions are being overturned, evaluations are remote, and the senses go primitive. Confronting something unfamiliar and unexplained, one actually thinks and perceives very acutely, drawing up meaning from within oneself.

Tape Index