Local Musicians Come Together for Compilation Capturing Life in Indiana
Indiana living means a little something different to everyone. From crisp autumn nights to muggy summer mornings, every Hoosier has their own perspective of what life in the 19th state feels like to them.
With this in mind, longtime Indianapolis musician Andrew Gustin presented 20 different Indiana artists with the challenge of creating a two-minute instrumental composition capturing what living in Indiana feels like to them. Not surprisingly, the results he received varied vastly in style and state of mind, from the electronic musings of Eeeka, Mark Tester and Rob Funkhouser to some jazz-inspired introspection from Charlie Ballantine and Mina Keohane.
Since putting the collection of tracks together, Gustin has started a crowd-funding campaign, where listeners can pre-order the Two Minutes in Indiana compilation on vinyl from now through Feb. 1. With a goal of reaching 100 pre-orders, Gustin has committed to donate any profits from the release to musical Family Tree.
Having made solo music under the moniker of Loud Diamond in recent years, Gustin first got the idea for Two Minutes in Indiana after contributing to another compilation with similar parameters.
“I contributed to a project where a label in Amsterdam was putting out a communal album where everyone had a track that was one minute, and I liked that limitation of giving that guideline,” Gustin says. “I was thinking I wanted to do something like that here locally, but two minutes was probably better. And then, in thinking about the format of an album, I could get 20 artists and just sequence it into a full album.”
Upon birthing the concept, Gustin began reaching out to local artists in the community, both personally and through social media call-outs. While drawing some inspiration from Landon Caldwell and Mark Tester of Indy-based experimental label Medium Sound, he also wanted to make sure Two Minutes in Indiana was representative of other instrumental sounds in the state like classical and jazz.
“I really like and admire the work that Landon and Mark do with Medium Sound,” Gustin says. “So I kind of wanted to do something like that, while reaching out to some different people as well — people who were more on the jazz side and classical-type stuff. And then, see how those people would take that same prompt.”
As the compositions started making their way into his inbox, Gustin realized Two Minutes in Indiana would really be something special. “It just blew me away because I had no idea what I was about to hear,” he says.
For this reason, he wanted to give the compilation a proper physical release, allowing it to be preserved for generations to come.
“I really wanted it to be a physical release and not just on Bandcamp or something like that,” Gustin says. “So I decided to go for a crowd-funding pressing, to show that if there’s 100 people interested in it then we can make this happen.”
Two Minutes in Indiana will be available for pre-order from now through Feb. 1, with all proceeds benefiting Musical Family Tree. Additionally, those interested in getting a taste of the compilation should be sure to tune into MFT’s weekly radio showom/mftonwqrt?lang=bg on 99.1 WQRT on Thursday, Jan. 13 at 7 p.m., when it will receive a radio premiere.