Parle Italiano? What can i tell you about Giovanni Fusco? he died on my birthday in 1968, a year before I was born, so I guess maybe that doesn't really make it my birthday yet. He was born in Italy in 1906. thanks wikipedia. Oh yeah, and he did that kickass soundtrack for Hiroshima Mon Amour (which we gotta get up here one of these days).
AND, he composed all the music for my favorite Antonioni films, which are represented on this stately and serene slab, and do sound so very very lovely on this gray autumn day (if also very very elegaic, melancholic, and basically very fucking lonely). And hey, even though it's currently out of stock at Dusty Groove, you folks can find it right here, in the Forest...
dustygroove: Early soundtracks for Michelangelo Antonioni movies -- penned and conducted by Giovanni Fusco, for films that include L'Avventura, L'Eclisse, and Deserto Rosso. The orchestrations are full, but often have a sense of space that really fits the brooding work of the director -- stark and spare at times, with a lone (or lonely) instrument standing out from the rest -- a woodwind instrument here, piano line there, arcing out with a nicely sensitive quality. Titles include "Tensione", "Tema Drammatico", "Eclisse Twist", "Passeggiata", "Nevrosi", "Happy Surf", "Orgia", "Il Surf Della Luna", and "Atmosfera Suspence".
Almost 500 posts into this leviathan and the words "Gang of Four" not yet uttered?! What is this Satanic transgression?! Herein my attempt to right the wrongs, the carnal sins of this blog with a burnt offering of Entertainment!
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David Fricke wrote in the Rolling Stone: Entertainment! isn't just the best debut album by a British band – punk or otherwise – since the original English release of The Clash in 1977. Nor is it simply a fierce, emotionally taut dramatization of youth's loss of innocence as seen through the clouded lens of neo-Marxist dogma and ambitiously obscure free verse. Stripped of its own pretensions and the burden of sociopolitical relevance forced on it by a knee-jerk leftist English music press, Entertainment! is a passionate declaration of discontent by four rock & roll agents provocateurs naive enough to believe they can move the world with words and music. It's also the first real political partying record since the MC5's booty-shaking 1969 broadside, Kick Out the Jams.
The power, the glory and the paradox of the Gang of Four's mission on Entertainment! is neatly, if unconsciously, capsulized in the last line of "5.45," a typically kinetic dance tract about television news. "Guerrilla war struggle is a new entertainment," rails Jon King in demagogic sing-speak set against a wall of Gatling-gun guitar chords and snowballing bass and drum patterns. Contracted to two of the biggest corporations in the music business (EMI in Britain, Warner Bros. in America), the Gang of Four undoubtedly fancy themselves cultural guerrillas based in the heart of the beast, using its oppressive but efficient offices to issue an encouraging revolutionary word.
Like their namesakes (the four top Communist officials purged from the party in China's post-Mao upheaval), the Gang of Four have drawn scorn from their more extremist New Wave brethren in England for their ties with major labels. The charge, of course, is that mass-marketing dollars spent on behalf of an LP as radical (even in rock & roll terms) as Entertainment! merely reduces both the album and its message to just that: entertainment–no different from a Beatles reissue or the latest Doobie Brothers release.
Yet this is exactly the level on which Entertainment! is most effective and the Gang of Four most subversive. Guerrillas they may be, with weighty political statements to make, but vocalist Jon King, guitarist Andy Gill, bassist Dave Allen and drummer Hugo Burnham have also made a damned entertaining record, angst and all. Allen's explosive bass and Burnham's deft command of funk, reggae and revved-up disco meters form a one-two punch whose tactility and musical strength equals that of the Rolling Stones and the Wailers. Gill ignores routine rock-guitar riffing, preferring instead to fire off polyrhythmic volleys of crackling dissonance that have more in common with ex-Dr. Feelgood guitarist Wilko Johnson than Johnny Ramone.
With King ranting in a pronounced British accent against declamatory harmonies, a background of the other three group members, the effect is one of orgasmic dance-floor release. Going into overdrive in a manic James Brown mutation ("Not Great Men") or in their implosive variation on three-chord, Chuck Berry classicism ("I Found That Essence Rare"), the Gang of Four dare you to go wild–if not in the streets, then at your local rock disco. Sure, their lyrical concerns may be the stuff of furrowed brows in dank college coffeehouses (three of the four Gangsters were students at Leeds University). But even the dour rationalizations about love and sex in "Damaged Goods" and "Contract" aren't enough to neutralize the icy sting of Gill's guitar or to snuff out the propulsive blast of the latter tune's ricochet rhythms, which recall the shotgun thrust of Captain Beef-heart's Magic Band on Trout Mask Replica.
There's certainly a fine art to the Gang of Four's grooving. In "Armalite Rifle" (from their 1978 Fast EP, Damaged Goods, issued in America as part of a Fast compilation called Mutant Pop), the band twisted conventional rock & roll basics to subtle advantage. In his solo break, Andy Gill fought Hugo Burnham's steady tempo with a contrapuntal landslide of harmonically contrary chords. Then, in a split-second reversal of roles, Gill kept time with a single repeated note over Burnham's strident acceleration of the beat. The group's latest English 45, "Outside the Trains Don't Run on Time," employs a similar gambit, each musician taking turns holding to the springy Sly Stone pace while the others chip away at it.
Entertainment! features more advanced but no less danceable applications of the rhythmic possibilities in the Gang of Four's backbeat. Not surprisingly, most of them are initiated by Gill. First, he denies the harmony implicit in most rock rhythm-guitar styles by playing everything from one isolated note to a sputtering cough of distortion, all independent from King's austere vocal outline. Then he fortifies the band's pivotal bass-and-drums structure by creating one of his own in a simulated contest of wills. This guy even creates a conflict with himself in the argumentative guitar overdubs of "Guns before Butter."
"At Home He's a Tourist," the group's best recorded work to date, summarizes Gill's innovative approach to his instrument. Barely seconds into Dave Allen and Hugo Burnham's freight-train intro, Gill is furiously punching his strings with random atonal glee, stepping into a severely abbreviated chord progression to punctuate King's vehement observations about ulcers and urban tension. Like Keith Levene in Public Image Ltd., Andy Gill doesn't play the guitar. He uses it as a medium to transmit a new code of rock & roll signals that describe the social and spiritual turmoil at the heart of the Gang of Four's sound.
Often lost in Gill's blitzkrieg is the ghostly chanting of Jon King, who somehow manages a fascinating fusion of John Lydon's Sex Pistols snarl, a conversational drone and a bit of feverish pulpit pounding. But the three-way instrumental debates between Gill, Allen and Burnham are so absorbing that they stand as great rock art without any words at all. At their hardest and heaviest, the Gang of Four can sound like a goose-stepping Led Zeppelin or a lusty Plastic Ono Band. They can just as easily work up a funky Parliament-Funkadelic sweat ("Not Great Men") or slip into a psychotic stream of echoed PiL-like dub to the melancholy refrain of King's melodica ("Ether"). With all this going on, there exists the very real possibility that one can listen–and dance–to Entertainment! without paying much attention to the issues and imagery contained in the lyrics.
That would be unfortunate. "Guns before Butter" should be required listening for Americans, age nineteen and twenty, facing the possibility of a new military draft. The idea of sex as false emotional advertising is heightened by Jon King's bittersweet readings of "Natural's Not in It" and "Damaged Goods." And in "Anthrax," Andy Gill's orgy of introductory feedback is the cue for a discussion between King, who likens love to a cattle disease, and Gill, who explains why the Gang of Four don't sing about love like everybody else. "These groups and singers," Gill says like a student reading his homework in front of the class, "think they appeal to everyone singing about love because apparently everyone has or can love or so they would have you believe anyway...."
The Gang of Four would have you believe that the body politic is a higher authority than the body physical. But the exclamation point on Entertainment! suggests they really know better. All revolution and no rhythm makes their more radical British peers (the terminally eclectic Pop Group and the sub-Ramonesish, reactionary Crass) extremely dull entities. A brilliant, ferocious dance band, the Gang of Four have something to say, and they say it best with body language. These musicians may not change your mind, but they'll definitely grab your attention.
A twisted, world-class cocktail of R&B, soul, voodoo, acid, gospel and juju beats. Plus he's an intense & fascinating fucker to boot.
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Wiki bio: Macfarlane Gregory Anthony Mackey, who recorded as Exuma, was born in the early 1940s on Cat Island (Bahamas) to Ms. Daisy Mackie and died in Nassau in the Bahamas on January 25, 1997.
Exuma was known for his almost unclassifiable music; a strong mixture of carnival, junkanoo, calypso and ballad. In his early days in New York's Greenwich Village, Tony McKay (his self-given name) performed in small clubs and bars. Later, along with his then-partner and lifelong friend, Sally O'Brien, and several musician friends, Tony launched EXUMA - a 7-person group that toured and recorded albums, starting with Exuma: The Obeah Man in 1970 and ending with Rude Boy in 1986. His songs invoke influences from calypso, junkanoo, reggae, African and folk music with his lyrics dealing heavily with Obeah {VODUN}. His backing band known only as the Junk Band has included names such as Sally O'Brien, Bogie, Lord Wellington, Villy, Mildred Vaney, Frankie Gearing, Diana Claudia Bunea, and his good friend Peppy Castro.
After growing up on Cat Island, Tony McKay moved to New York City at age 17 to study architecture. However he did not complete his studies and soon entered the music industry in a group called Tony McKay and the Islanders. In New York's 1960s Greenwich Village folk scene McKay often found himself performing with such greats as Bob Dylan, Richie Havens, Jimi Hendrix and Barbra Streisand among others.
He soon gained the attention of Blues Magoos manager Bob Wyld. Wyld brought MacKay to Mercury Records and convinced them to sign him. In 1970 McKay, now redubbed Exuma, released the albums Exuma and Exuma II. From those albums he released the singles "Exuma, The Obeah Man", "Junkanoo", "Damn Fool", and "Zandoo". Exuma also garnered recognition for his song "You Don't Know What's Going On" which was featured on the soundtrack to John G. Avilsen's 1970 film Joe starring Peter Boyle, Susan Sarandon and Dennis Patrick.
Exuma left Mercury in 1971 to sign with the Kama Sutra label, where he released the albums Do Wah Nanny (1971), Snake (1972), Reincarnation (1972) and Life (1973). From these albums he released the singles "Do Wah Nanny", "The Bowery", "Brown Girl", "Rushing Through the Crowd", and a cover of Paul McCartney's "Monkberry Moon Delight". After low sales and seeking the freedom of independence, Exuma was no longer featured on a major record label for the rest of his career. He released Penny Sausage, Going to Cat Island, Universal Exuma and Street Life in the early 1980s, but none of these albums received much exposure.By this time, Exuma was enjoying his greatest recognition. In the Bahamas, he even scored two hit singles, "Shirlene" and "Rose Mary Smith." He had moved to New Orleans and was a regular at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage festival. He performed regularly at the Old Absinthe Bar. These nights could become jam sessions, as he had a habit of starting songs that were not in the set list and he still attracted great musicians, such as Bill Wyman and Bob Dylan's backing band. In 1986 under the ROIR label, Exuma released Rude Boy, which garnered slightly more attention and featured songs from some of his previous 1980s releases.
In the late 80s, Exuma suffered a mild heart attack, and thus devoted much more of his time to painting, his other great talent. His paintings have been exhibited several times and collected by many art lovers. Never abandoning his music however, Tony still wrote and performed his original music. He continued to perform at the New Orleans Jazz Festival until 1991. The last years of his life saw him splitting his time between Miami, FL and Nassau, in a house that his mother had left him. He was happy, if not horribly rich from three decades in the music business. Away from the Bahamas he spent much time in Florida living a life without luxury. He died in his sleep in the late nineties just as he was shopping around for a label to release a new album.
Perhaps Professor and fellow Bahamian, Alfred M. Sears said it best when stated that Exuma was, "A Bahamian visionary, humanistic philosopher and people's poet. Exuma gives expression to the beauty and power of the cultural life of the Bahamas - the people's every day experiences, folklore, myths, stories, junkanoo, rake and scrape, pain, joy, struggle and survival. His life and art reflect the wonderful cultural heritage and personality of Bahamians, drawing on the roots of Africa and the branches of the Amerindians, Europeans and Americans." Alfred M. Sears (1995-09-07). "The Nina Simone Web - Exuma". http://boscarol.com/nina/html/manual/friends/exuma.html. Retrieved 2008-04-29.
Tony McKay had many children including Gavin, Acklins and Kenyatta. His first son, Shaw and his mother, "Sammy" were murdered in the early 1970s in New York's Lower East Side. Both Acklins and Kenyatta Alisha are gifted vocal artists, carrying on the tradition of their father through their individual genres.
amg: Volume Two (three CDs) in this series reissuing all the material found on the long out of print Ultimate Edition box sets (for more background on the series as a whole, see La Vie Electronique 1) is much more interesting than volume one, and the pick of the first six volumes. The music comes from 1972-1975 (but mostly 1972-1973),a rich period of experimentation, as Schulze was gradually forging what would be known as his "classic" sound, nearly palpable by "Blaue Stunde," the 38-minute piece from 1975 concluding the set. This second installment contains more finished works than the drafts-and-jams-packed volume one. "Das große Identifikationsspiel" (42 minutes) is a very good suite of rather experimental music written for a science fiction radio drama by Alfred Behrens. The 27-minute "Titanensee" was done with a ballet in mind, never to be produced; again, it is a strong work in Schulze's experimental vein. However, the undisputed highlight of volume two is a whole album's worth of collaborations with Hans-Jörg Stahlschmidt, a project that had been brought to completion, only to gather dust on a record company's shelves. On this set of tracks, Schulze steps outside of his usual style, his partner's acoustic guitar and vocals (Schulze also plays some acoustic backing) drawing the music close to Popol Vuh territory. For fans curious about Schulze's artistic development,this volume is the one to get, as you can see him trying out ideas and working on collaborations with other artists, and even other art forms.
"All those stories and there's no one tell" but boy, i could write about this band all fucking night. like how i saw that billboard of them playing at the KCMO airport the wknd of Curry's 2nd wedding. LOL. SAD. but hey, he did do winona right? or rather, she done he? still, he played a presidential inauguration! shut up dumb fuck, get to the music.
"what are you doing here, in my nightmare?" just the facts, spazz. produced by bob mould. their 2nd album. and along with the one directly following this (While You Were Out), by light-years far and away the best work in their canon, ever, and premier among the best eighties-midwest-indie had to offer. better than that, it still stands the fucking test-of-time, imo. this album can be ballsout metal with the best of them, and heartfelt fungerpicking, too. hooky-pop-purity in the midriff.
"look at you now, you look like an angel" the lyrics are impeccable, pirner at his most beauteous poetic untouchable observant brilliant, rhymes and observations to leave you chuckling in wonder. i would kiss the man's hand today. he is a fucking god among mortals. and I would blow his crew without 2nd thought, except that godblesshisheart Karl Mueller is no longer with us, so the deal's off, boys. i bought this album junior year of HS, one of my first CDs, and it's so old now it doesn't even play on most computers. hah. cept for this one.
"stepping back into the stupid years, gets me nowhere" when scarcity is great, the great are scarce. i only had about 7 or 8 new albums that year, and like a good old boy, i kin name em all. b/c I bought wisely, with my well-earned pennies. and REsearched. the reason i bought this one was b/c we'd seen 'em open up for something like 4 or 5 bands at the metro, and became righteous converts. for a while there there wasn't another band we saw more. their live shows were transcendental gut-shaking events that i will take to my grave, and put a smile on my face to recall even as i type, twenty years on.
"everything's so true-to-life, when you're not living" internet-bereft, i pored heartily over the lyrics w/ radio shack headphones. they were all but incomprehensible, until one day, they broke through, like the cold but bright midwestern sun on a cloudy winter's day.
"i can't change the world by complaining,
and you can't change it with a kiss"
"i would tear out my insides,
just to find a place to hide"
and the one that popped into mind last night, as I lay in bed unable to sleep, thus prompting this post:
"I'm just sitting on the roadside
Watching all the crowds and the clouds roll by They may pass me by But i need a better reason to cry Growing pain it leaves a stain That's similar but not the same It's down the drain and what remains Maybe you're the one who's a little insane"
but of course, the real sleeper on this album is "Ain't That Tough...":
"like a plug without a socket
your finger trigger's itching
but you forgot to cock it."
"it's like a dream machine that never leaves the garage"
This is the music I'd make if I lived in my moldy concrete basement, drank a lot of cough syrup and coffee, downed gobs of sensemilla, eat Saltines, wore one big wooly sweater and sunglasses (no pants) and slept all day (Quiz: A few of these things I already do. Please name two). Or if I was German.
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AMG: Pop music has never sounded stranger than on Der Plan's debut full-length, Geri Reig, a unique blend of Residents-inspired experimental pop and innovative electronics. A cohesive and endlessly listenable record, it creates a sense of detachment and mystery found in all the best records of the new wave era. Startlingly unique, Geri Reig helped define the sound that Der Plan and their record label, Ata Tak, would fully develop throughout the 1980s and 1990s. It was released as a CD with Normalette Surprise in 1996.
One of the founders of synth pop, Der Plan were mainstays of the music underground of Germany in the 1980s. Singing almost exclusively in German, they inspired a countless number of like-minded groups as part of the Neue Deutsche Welle (German New Wave) scene. Inspired by the synthetic beats of Kraftwerk and the quirky styles of the Residents, Der Plan created a unique blend of electronics, pop music, and surrealism.
Kurt "Pyrolator" Dahlke left D.A.F. after their first LP and formed Der Plan with Frank Fenstermacher and Moritz "RRR" Reichelt. While many German underground acts were playing derivative Sex Pistols-inspired punk, Der Plan aligned themselves with predecessors such as Kraftwerk to focus on the use of electronics in pop music. In 1980, they released Geri Reig, a strong debut with an off-kilter pop sensibility and innovative use of electronics. Though never receiving much chart success, Der Plan developed a strong cult following. However, they did manage to crack the German Top 40 with their 1980 single Da Vorne Steht Ne Ampel. Der Plan continued to grow artistically by incorporating innovative rhythms into their songs with their second full-length Normalette Surprise.
Der Plan continued to perform and release music throughout the 1980s and early '90s, though never equaling the strength of their early material. Their record label, Ata Tak, released some of the most innovative electronic music coming out of Germany during the 1980s and '90s. They were responsible for releases by artists such as D.A.F., Andreas Dorau, Holger Hiller, Oval, and Wirtschaftswunder. Der Plan called it quits in 1992, but Frank Fenstermacher and Kurt Dahlke formed A Certain Frank, releasing a full-length on Ata Tak in 1996.
Who am I to buck a mini-trend. We all need suggestions for how to live...
The Paris, Texas OST is something I tend to throw out there a lot when describing other things. It's a point of reference. So, instead of being purposefully obscure, let me hand you over the real deal for your examination. It feels, um, Texasy... but not in a ZZ Top sorta way (to Baywatch's relief).
A good record to give in to.
A good record for a crash - physical, emotional, metaphysical.
A good record for being tired.
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AMG: Suggestive of both the imagery of Win Wenders' movie Paris, Texas and the desert itself, Ry Cooder's score is a peaceful, poetic journey into the soul of an acoustic guitar. "Paris, Texas," "Brothers," and "Nothing Out There" open the album as meditative blends of guitar twang and scratching ambient effects. The songs move at a pretty, slow place, and the opening track sees Cooder plucking his guitar's strings and letting that sound vibrate into thin air; it's a motif that he returns to repeatedly throughout the score. There's a bit of both humor and mystery to the stillness and the echoing, edgy sound effects that crop up. "Cancion Mixteca" includes a memorable turn on vocals by Harry Dean Stanton, singing in Spanish. "No Safety Zone" is almost completely ambient in its ethics, with fleeting experimental guitar playing, as the song works more as a mood-setter than a traditional song. "I Knew These People" begins with an extended segment of dialogue from the film before Cooder's somber guitar creeps in. The effect of the dialogue makes the track a fine, artistic statement, but the moment works better in the context of the movie than as a track on an album. The dialogue comes from a scene where the characters played by Stanton and Nastassja Kinski have a particularly emotional meeting. The majority of the score is delicate and stunningly pretty. The overall sense is that Cooder was reaching for spare, emotional movements. The score is stark, quiet, and as uplifting as it is sad. Cooder makes the music sound as modern and stylish as acoustic music can sound. The album is at once alien and organic. Since "I Knew These People" includes dialogue from Paris, Texas, the score works best for people who have seen the movie, but it's still a powerful and immensely evocative journey for those whose experience with the material is the album alone.
I've been a BIG BDP fan for a sizeable chunk of my earth-time but, unlike most of the other bands n such who've gained my fancy, I've never been able to actually put my finger in what it is about the Birthday Party that gets me chubby. I never really took them too seriously, like one might an Einsturzende or Bauhaus or Joy Division. If anything I've thought that Nick Cave's theatrics subtract from what is, essentially, a steaming groove machine. Scrape away the quasi-Iggy Cave nutscratching and there's something really super right-on and smart about this band. Layers of burning organ and guitar obscure a solid propelling groove. They're actually really funny, clever, glimmer in the eye anarchistic, smartass Aussies who, more than any of their post-punk peers, solidly did not give a fuck.
You be the Judge Reinhold.
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AMG bio: The Birthday Party were one of the darkest and most challenging post-punk groups to emerge in the early '80s, creating bleak and noisy soundscapes that provided the perfect setting for vocalist Nick Cave's difficult, disturbing stories of religion, violence, and perversity. Under the direction of Cave and guitarist Rowland S. Howard, the band tore through reams of blues and rockabilly licks, spitting out hellacious feedback and noise at an unrelenting pace. As the Birthday Party's career progressed, Cave's vision got darker and the band's songs alternated between dirges to blistering sonic assaults.
Originally, the Australian band was called the Boys Next Door, comprising Cave, Howard, Mick Harvey (guitar, drums, organ, piano), bassist Tracy Pew, and drummer Phill Calvert. After the Door Door album and Hee Haw EP under that name, the band moved to London and switched its name to the deceptively benign Birthday Party. Once they arrived in Britain, their demented, knotty post-punk began to gel. They released their first international album, Prayers on Fire, in 1981, earning critical praise in the U.K. and U.S. While the band was preparing to record the follow-up, Pew was jailed for drunk driving; former Magazine member Barry Adamson, Harry Howard, and Chris Walsh filled in for the absent Pew on 1982's Junkyard.
After the release of Junkyard, the Birthday Party fired Calvert and moved to Germany, where they began collaborating with such experimental post-punk acts like Lydia Lunch and Einstürzende Neubauten. Harvey left in the summer of 1983. The group briefly continued with drummer Des Heffner, but it soon disbanded after a final concert in Melbourne, Australia. Cave had the most successful solo career, recording a series of albums in the '80s and '90s that maintained his status as a popular cult figure; Harvey joined Cave's backing band, the Bad Seeds. Howard joined Crime & the City Solution, which also featured his brother Harry and Harvey.
If you don't like this album you suck. Officially. That or you have nothing but black, smoldering hate in your heart... which still kinda means that you suck.
They should change the name of a "smoothie" to a "wee." _________________________
Dusted sez: Since its inception in 2003, the Numero Group label has carved its niche into what seemed the all-too crowded market of soul restoration and revisionism. Whether through worthy connects, impeccable taste or pure missionary zeal (surely some mix of the three), the label has succeeded in unearthing not just slices but full blocks of soul strata from histories dusty piles.
Last year, the label unfolded its Asterisk imprint intended for full-lengths that, having floated to the surface in their endless pursuit of great and lost musics, stand strong enough for a slightly less librarian presentation than the usual Numero project. Their latest and fifth release, Wee’s You Can Fly On My Aeroplane fills one more crack in their remapping of Columbus, Ohio, as a soul center (or at least fascinating outpost).
For all intents and purposes, Wee is the solo outlet of small-time hustler Norman Whiteside. Although the band existed prior to his involvement, Whiteside usurped the group and brought them from bowling alley relegation to regularly sold-out shows at Columbus’ Joe’s Hole, capturing the hearts and underwear of the city’s finest prostitutes along the way. Whiteside’s life plays out something like an Eddie Bunker novel – auto theft, dope-peddling, petty robbery, shady cohorts, a web of baby mamas and one unfortunate and deadly car wreck – ultimately culminating in a prison sentence for a conspiracy to cover-up murder charge he unwaveringly claims is misattributed.
Aware of their predominately female audience, Wee cultivated a thick and buffed jazz-funk style full of Spanish Fly magic and sexual synaesthetics. Echoing Whiteside’s slick con-man persona, You Can Fly On My Aeroplane‘s dense arrangements are full of ‘70s excess and cocaine charm. Guitar phase, strong synth and slippery bass push Whiteside’s distinct tenor (and even stranger falsetto) afloat. It’s a rather fat reissue, too, including more outtakes and alternates than true album tracks.
You Can Fly On My Aeroplane is not the dug-up bones of some disinterested or distracted amateur; it’s the lone full-born, actualized dream of a man whose passion is making music and whose means to that end was criminal. Though he is still writing music, he is currently unable to bring those pages to life.
In 1969 the band had quit the States following the departure of drummer Philip Wilson (for Paul Butterfield's Blues Band) and were now living in Paris where they actually gained the 'Of Chicago' tail to their name. Following a brief drummerless period (though every member was more than proficient in the percussion department) they finally began working with Don Moye.
Long sought after and whispered about by jazzheads in awed tones, the world can now finally catch up with what many regard as one of the best jazz albums of all time. The reason it works so well is the variety contained herein. The two saxes of Joseph Jarman and Roscoe Mitchell combined with Lester Bowie's trumpet can veer from swing to classical with ease. In fact they apply this stylistic dexterity on two adaptations of a Monteverdi theme.
What's more even when the band blow free (as on the appropriately named Theme Libre) it's always with a cheeky sense of humour. Voguishly the track Theme Amour Universal saw the whole band moaning and wailing a la the Morroccan Master Musicians of Joujouka, adding credence to their motto of making music that was ''Ancient To the Future''.
And topping it all off is the inclusion of Lester Bowie's wife at the time, Fontella Bass. The opening track, Theme For Yoyo, has long been regarded as a jazz funk masterpiece. It's cascading brass entry ushering a blistering vocal cameo that's oddly erotic and surreal at the same time. ''Your fanny's just like two sperm whales floating down the Seine...Your love is like an oil well, dig it on the Champs Elysee'' wails Bass.
While the Ensemble were to remain in France and record great albums for Freedom and BYG labels, this album still stands as a pinnacle of its era. Or any other for that matter...
Wouldn't it be bitchin if people made records like this today?
Maybe they are and I'm not caring enough?
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Wikipedia:
Aftermath, first released on 15 April 1966, by Decca Records and ABKCO Records as the fourth British studio album by The Rolling Stones. It would be released on 20 June 1966, by London Records and ABKCO in the United States as their sixth American album. The album proved to be a major artistic breakthrough for The Rolling Stones, being the first full-length release by the band to consist exclusively of Mick Jagger/Keith Richards compositions. Aftermath was also the first Rolling Stones album to be recorded entirely in the United States, at the legendary RCA Studios in Hollywood, California at 6363 Sunset Boulevard, and the first album the band released in stereo.
The album is also notable for its musical experimentation, with Brian Jones playing a variety of instruments not usually associated with rock music—including sitar on "Paint It, Black", the Appalachian dulcimer on "Lady Jane" and "I Am Waiting", the marimbas (African xylophone) on "Under My Thumb" and "Out of Time," harmonica on "High and Dry" and "Goin' Home", as well as guitar and keyboards.
As with all the Stones pre-1967 LPs, different editions were released in the UK and the USA. This was a common feature of British pop albums at that time—the same practice was applied to all The Beatles albums prior to Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band—because UK albums typically did not include tracks that had already been released as singles, and because British pop albums generally included 13 or 14 tracks, while American albums usually featured 11 or 12 tracks.
The original British version of Aftermath was issued in April 1966 as a fourteen-track LP. Issued between the non-LP single releases of "19th Nervous Breakdown" and "Paint It, Black", Aftermath was a major hit in the UK, spending eight weeks at #1 on the UK album chart.
The American version featured different cover art and an alternate, shorter running order that eliminated "Out of Time", "Take It or Leave It", "What to Do", and "Mother's Little Helper". All four tracks were later issued in the US on other compilations, and "Mother's Little Helper" was also issued as a single, in 1966, peaking at #8 on the Billboard charts.In their place, the album substituted their current # 1 hit "Paint It, Black". The revamped Aftermath still reached #2 in the US, eventually going platinum.
These fellows are certainly not unknown nor unsung; I'm merely posting to exclaim how pleased I am that it seems the Lips consulted their debut self-titled EP of 1984 in sourcing influence for their most recent double LP, Embryonic. I truly thought they were never flying back from symphonic Floofville. Sure, it was a gorgeous and luscious Floofville, but all those symphonics left little room for the dirty decay of their early years. An interesting note on this EP: though Wayne plays guitar on this, his brother Mark is on vocals, his last before leaving the band.
Granted the Black Dice schtick has worn pretty thin the last few years, this 2002 release was so delicious, so pleasant, so new, so right on. Cue this up. Get a smoothie. Sit on the roof. Invite Bob Hope. Watch the meteor shower.
Oh and I adore the cover. Black Dice always nails the cover.
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AMG: And now for something completely different. After two full-length discs and several singles of avant-core that came off like Void covering Metal Machine Music, the noisy Rhode Island warmongers slipped into something a little less comfortable on Beaches and Canyons. Even though the disc might appear a more docile dossier on the surface, what with skronk replaced by electronic chirps and more silence in the space of one disc than Black Dice had accumulated in its career to date, a look beneath sees the vitriol hasn't vanished, it's just morphed into something else."Endless Happiness" by itself is indicative of this: It starts off with tranquil recorders piping atop symphonic synth blurbs for about five minutes before John Bonham-like percussion shakes life into the track, which gradually increases tempo and timbre and tenor and tumults for another four minutes, whereby it slips into the sound of the sands washed in a pleasant tide, which plays out the last five minutes of the track, making it about three-quarters (relatively) silent but deadly. Even disc-closer "Big Drop," the most abrasive cut to make the cut, is more artifice than facetiousness, relying on the hum of electric pulsations to make its points far more than the horrific screams that are reminiscent of John Zorn's most metal moods. The combination of brain and brawn is a revelation for the band, and their enthusiasm alone would be enough to carry Beaches and Canyons, yet that enthusiasm by itself only scratches the surface.
Continuing the series of influential acts coming forth from the Forest, please turn your ears to the underrated Gordons. Last night's conversation about Bailterspace reminded me of their better prior incarnation. The Gordons were distinctive from other NZ bands because they lacked the murky quality that seemed to be a signature of the majority of the bands coming from that area. Have a little listen and tell me what you think.
Gordons and Beyond: a chronological history of the Gordons and how they turned into Bailterspace.
