Release date:
February 6, 2026

— Limited edition of 250 LPs, hand assembled with care
— First ever vinyl pressing
— Latest release from uncommon¢, an ongoing series from FT$
— Vinyl purchase includes a multi-format download redeemable via Bandcamp

Expert musicianship, top shelf production value, and anachronistic genre bending define Jack Spence’s Bamboo Sun and place this mysterious album in a rare air apart from the murky stream of innocuous music being unspooled from 4-track machines through the global network of the DIY cassette community of the 1980s. 

Recorded in Los Angeles in 1985, Bamboo Sun is the sole release accredited to Jack Spence, a musician and multi-instrumentalist with only one other discernible credit for playing a sampler on poet and political activist John Trudell’s 1986 album AKA Grafitti Man. There’s no documentation of where or how Bamboo Sun was recorded, but it’s clear that someone, presumably Spence, made a significant investment to produce the album, evident in the fidelity of the recording and the session players employed. 

Bamboo Sun is largely instrumental, but when vocals appear, they are provided by Mary Ellen Quinn Wire and Carol Eckstein, both of whom hold credits on a small stack of arbitrary albums made in the LA area at the time. Frank Wire and Bob Glaub contribute guitar and bass respectively, while Spence is credited for every other instrument on the record, and some vocals alongside Quinn Wire and Eckstein. 

Issued as a C‑45 cassette on Equator Music, based at a residential address in the Mar Vista neighborhood of Los Angeles not far from Venice Beach, the album was presumably issued by Spence. Advertisements for the cassette were placed in OP Magazine, the egalitarian and influential music magazine based in the Pacific Northwest, and Sound Choice, shoulder-to-shoulder with notices from Jandek’s Corwood Industries and Algebra Suicide. A review in Sound Choice noted that the instrumentals on the album “don’t seem to push hard enough in any direction.” 

Quite the contrary, Bamboo Sun pushes in all directions, its spontaneity, and exploration of form and function, making the album a special specimen. The atmosphere is one of a humid, wet tropical rain forest. Mystery lurks around every corner, sometimes inviting, and other times with a tangible air of tension. The album veers into Fourth World elements fashionable during the era, but Spence had his own imaginary landscapes in focus, with alien arrangements, acoustic percussion ensembles, and slow, pulsing rhythms leading the path. The synth-centric pieces emanate a distinctly human feeling, occasionally touching up against the conventional vocal led songs, made more impactful due to their scarcity on the album.

Considering the climate of independently released music exploring similar terrains when Bamboo Sun arrived, that by enterprising artists like K. Leimer, Jorge Reyes, and Richard Horowitz, the album becomes even more of a curiosity in its dramatic dismissal of genre from one track to the next. At times Bamboo Sun leans into ambient (“Amoebic Tripods”) and kosmiche (“Curious Things Awake”) escapism, and at others samba electro (“He Let Go”) and proto-techno (“Cyeta”). These turns may all share some fringe qualities, but when a full-fledged New Wave track (“Go Bongo”) appears, Spence’s intention returns to square one. Who was Spence making this music for? If an audience of one, who was Spence?  

Little else is known of Spence. A few years after recording, he was tragically murdered in Santa Cruz, California. Yet Bamboo Sun survives as a document of a true musical explorer, a rare entry in the seemingly endless archive of 80s DIY cassettes still waiting to be discovered. It’s an album that asks nothing of history except that it be heard.

Jack Spence’s Bamboo Sun arrives again February, 2026 in a limited vinyl edition and digitally (though not streaming) as part of uncommon¢ (“uncommon sense”), an open-ended, serialized endeavor from Freedom to Spend that provides new meaning for rarefied recordings from music's outermost fringe.

LP

Side A (33 RPM)
A1. Bamboo Sun (3:46)
A2. He Let Go (5:20)
A3. Amoebic Tripods (2:54)
A4. Mongolian (4:02)
A5. Bamboo II (2:20)

Side B (33 RPM)
B1. Torch III (1:32)
B2. Dripping Pygmies (3:09)
B3. Go Bongo (2:39)
B4. Cyeta (3:34)
B5. By Torch Light (2:52)
B6. Curious Things Awake (4:45)

DIGITAL

1. Bamboo Sun
2. He Let Go
3. Amoebic Tripods
4. Mongolian
5. Bamboo II
6. Torch III
7. Dripping Pygmies
8. Go Bongo
9. Cyeta
10. By Torch Light
11. Curious Things Awake