Twittering Machines

Part Wild Horses Mane On Both Sides
Low Fired Clay Escape

I’m still loving this for its otherness.

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Andy Stott
Passed Me By

Like diving into a pool of dreams, not all good ones. I took some time last night for the first time in some time to sit and listen to this double 45rpm wonder all the way through. I’ve listened to the track “New Ground” which could be considered the single (joke) a bunch of times before and it still resonates with its simple vocal message and stuttered phrasing.

Andy Stott is featured in this month’s Wire where he says, “I felt that my music needed roughing up, dragging through a hedge backwards so to speak.” With bits of sonic decay attached and embedded, Passed Me By feels like what’s wrong and what’s right.

Andy Stott – Passed Me By by modernlove

Tape
Revelationes

Brothers Andreas and Johan Berthling along with Tomas Hallonsten are Tape and Revelationes is their 5th studio album and it is simply lovely. Lovely in a slow restful calming and soothing way like lying in a cool stream on a stiflingly white-hot day.

Layers are built with care from simple melodic pieces, delicately maybe a tad too much so which is the only thing challenging about this music – its lack of challenge. Sometimes, like this time, that can be a good thing.

Anthony Braxton
In The Tradition

Oops. Remember last December when I said we’d heard Volume 2 of In The Tradition at Monkeyhaus and JD said we’d heard Volume 1 and I responded I heard Volume 2? (I don’t really expect you to remember it just read better that way) I didn’t and as JD pointed out we did hear Volume 1 and I think we heard Braxton blowing that contrabass clarinet on Mingus’ “Goodbye Pork Pie Hat”. What a great tune and what a perfectly other sounding instrument that contrabass clarinet is. It sounds almost digital.

Anthony Braxton alto sax & contrabass clarinet, Tete Montoliu piano, Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen bass and Albert “Tootie” Heath drums. What a group, what a record.

“I am really happy with the music on this record” ~ Anthony Braxton. So am I. And in one of the oddest dedications that I’ve read, Braxton closes his liner notes, “with the last couple of years being as difficult as it’s been I would like to dedicate this record to the Roche Pharmaceutical Company.”

Fennesz
Instrument

Some rules, I like. Like – if I see a used record by Christian Fennesz that I don’t own – buy it. And this is the kind of rule, maybe it should be a law?, I should never question. Instrument is Fennesz’s first release (which I didn’t know when I saw its slightly water-damaged cover marked at $9.99 which is why the rule came in extra-special handy). It’s also a scorchingly tasty piece of electronically manipulated crush – moody, harsh at times, atmospheric, machine-driven and achingly human.

I’m sure Fennesz can make some awful-sounding music. I just haven’t heard any.

Rajdulari Aliakbar Khan
Raga Kirwanu, Raga Imni Bilawal

I knew this would be great but I didn’t know it would be enchanting (even though Nat Hentoff’s liner notes say so). Rajdulari Aliakbar Khan was Ustad Ali Akbar Khan’s second wife (of three with 11 children among them all) and he joins her magical vocals on swarmandal a kind of Indian lute along with Pandit Mahapurush MIstra on tabla with tamboura accompaniment.

We’re talking just one raga per side both evening ragas and both concerned with “love as a verb”. Between that and the number of times Nat Hentoff refers to Rajdulari’s voice as “sensual”, I’d say we’re singing and talking about sex. Slow, side-long sex. In any event this was a sealed copy for $5.99 and I don’t have to tell you where I got it unless you’re new here in which case I’ll leave it a mystery. From 1967 on Connoisseur if you see this, buy it.

From the liner notes:

This recording was made with four Sony C37A condenser microphones feeding into specially designed low-noise mixers and custom-built Ampex 350 tape recorders utilizing 1/2-inch tape operated at a speed of 30 inch/sec. on wide track two channel heads. The master disc was cut directly from 1/2-inch, two track 30 inch/sec. master tape copy and no additional equalization, compression, or artificial reverberation was employed, assuring a virtually perfect match to the original master tape. This recording was audited through AR-3 loudspeakers.

No compression. 1967. Ah, the good olde days.

Hank Williams
Honkey-tonkin’

I had a feeling just from looking at the cover. JD did too, especially after seeing the vinyl. I’d been waiting to get a Hank Williams record, passing over dozens of cheap copies until I found one (cheap copy) that just felt right. This was it.

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Little Axe Records
The exclusive distributor for Mississippi Records

Need we read more? I know I mentioned Little Axe in the New Releases post but this news deserves its own. Finally a one-stop shop for all things Mississippi Records.

My only recommendation for their site is to have a “I would buy this record if you reissued it” button along with a field for entering your email address under each of the records on the Discography page. This way anyone who doesn’t yet own Washington Phillips heavenly What Are They Doing In Heaven Today? can let Mississippi Records know they’d like another chance.

The Peter Brötzmann Octet
Machine Gun

Free jazz lovers take note – Slowboy Records of Düsseldorf, Germany has reissued The Peter Brötzmann Octet’s legendary Machine Gun (1968) on LP in a limited run of 500. Here’s what I had to say about this record and here’s what Volcanic Tongue has to say about this reissue:

Beautiful deluxe reissue on heavy vinyl with 3 colour silkscreened tip-on sleeves of this seminal Central European free jazz blow-out from 1968, only Brotzmann’s second album as leader and still one of the founding documents of European improvisation. A parallel to John Coltrane’s epochal Ascension, Machine Gun combines ferociously aggressive ensemble playing that mimic the sounds of artillery with some incredible break-out soloing from Evan Parker, Fred Van Hove, Willem Breuker and Brotzmann. In between the walls of sheet metal there are occasional big band vamps that function as transports to earlier big band traditions as the group simultaneously honour and raze jazz tradition. The line-up is phenomenal, with the horns of Parker, Breuker and Brotzmann going up against two drummers – Han Bennink and Sven Johansson – two bassists – Peter Kowald and Buschi Niebergall – and pianist Fred Van Hove. Still one of the greatest free jazz sides ever recorded and central to any collection of free jazz. Can’t recommend this enough and this edition *sounds* better than ever. Edition of 500 copies and already sold out at source.

The original LP on FMP is hard to come by and not cheap (think $75 and up) and the CDs can run $25 and up so this looks like a sound investment. Run don’t walk…

Bob Dylan
Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid
Original Soundtrack Recording

Director Sam Peckinpah didn’t know who Dylan was when it was recommended he be brought in to write music for his film. So Dylan went down to Mexico to audition:

“Sam says, ‘Who’s Bob Dylan?,’” recalls James Coburn.

“Oh yeah, the kids used to listen to his stuff. I was kinda thinkin’ of that guy Roger whatsisname, King of the Road guy, to do it.” And we all said, “What!! You gotta see Dylan,”…He said, “Okay, bring Dylan down.”…So the night we were over at Sam’s house and we were all drinking tequila and carrying on and halfway through dinner, Sam says, “Okay, kid, let’s see what you got. You bring your guitar with you?” They went in this little alcove. Sam had a rocking chair. Bobby sat down on a stool in front of this rocking chair. There was just the two of them in there…And Bobby played [his songs]. And Sam came out with his handkerchief in his eye: “Goddamn kid! Who the hell is he? Who is that kid? Sign him up!”

The story also goes when Dylan first showed up on the set of Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid to play his part as “Alias”, Kris Kristofferson joined him while director Sam Peckinpah showed them some dailies and Peckinpah was so pissed at the quality of the footage he stood up on his chair and pissed on the screen (Someone should compile all of the ‘people pissing on things’ stories like Jackson Pollock peeing into Peggy Guggenheim’s fireplace and separate the book into two sections – people who were drunk when they did it, and people who weren’t). All’s I can say is I love this movie, even the cut-version (sorry Sam), and I love the soundtrack especially “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door” (who doesn’t?).

On “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door”:

Drummer Jim Keltner cried, “There weren’t any overdubs on that, the singers were singing live, little pump organ, Roger McGuinn I think played [guitar]. This was for a particular scene in the movie when Slim Pickens is dying and that’s the first time I ever cried while I played. It was the combination of the words, Bob’s voice, the actual music itself, the changes, and seeing the screen…In those days you were on a big soundstage, and you had this massive screen that you can see on the wall, [with] the scene…running when you’re playing. I cried through that whole take.”

Jerry Fielding, who was brought in to ‘supervise’ Dylan on his soundtrack, thought, “It was shit.”

Starring Kris Kristofferson, James Coburn, and a cast of the crustiest cowboy character actors this side of Durango – Chill Wills, Katy Jurado, Jack Elam, Slim Pickens, Barry Sullivan, Dub Taylor, R.G. Armstrong, Elisha Cook, Jr. and Paul Fix. And of course Bob Dylan as “Alias”. Released in 1973 the soundtrack came out the same year.

I had an opportunity to see Eric Clapton perform “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” in Philly in the later ’70s and it was the highlight of his portion of that show. Muddy Waters had opened for Clapton which was the highlight of the entire show.

Rev. Charlie Jackson
You Got to Move: Live Recordings, Vol. 1

You can pre-order your very own copy of this a-punch-in-your-soul of a record directly from 50 Miles of Elbow Room today! Read more about it at the Wall Street Journal (really).

Warning: to listen is to love:

Cicciolina Holocaust | Sermonizer
Albeit Albeit | Sibelius Spiders

Is it too soon to love record label Forced Nostalgia? After just two releases? For me and my tastes the answer is clearly no.

Side A performed by Florim Prishtina and Rezart Veseli. Recorded 1984, Firenze (Italy).
Instrumentation: guitar, Korg Poly 61, Korg KPR 77, cornet, self-built machines, Tascam Portastudio (4-Track), effect pedals, tapes.
Previously released as private cassette edition. Digitally remastered directly from analogue tapes.

Side B recorded and mixed at Agucchi Home Studios 1983-1986 on 4-track tape recorder.
Instrumentation: synthesizer, guitar, violin, drum machines, electric shaver and other found objects.
Guest vocals on Copulator by Meana Rozzi. Guest aura by Aurelium Spitty.
Compiled by Fré De Vos.

Cicciolina Holocaust takes us on a ride in the belly of the beast (are we Jonah?), a constant gurgling drone the only indication we are in fact moving through some dark, very dark, place infested with Luigi Russolo‘s machine-music nightmare sounds. And coronet…Sermonizer kicks up the sound-diversity-ometer and adds some very nice analog (read: human) treats amid their wowing and fluttering Russolo machine. Meana Rozzi’s guest vocals on “Copulator” are, um, inspired and inspiring.

Incessant (both sides), great-sounding (both sides esp. considering the sources), great band names, ambient post-industrial yada yada yada, all adding up to what is for me a nostalgic trip that is in no way forced.

More, please.

Cicciolina Holocaust – Silent Killing by Forced Nostalgia

Sermonizer – Mystery by Forced Nostalgia

It was my birthday a few days ago (I have President Obama beat by a few days) and while thinking about what record to play, I thought of Let it Bleed probably because of the cake on the cover. As I browsed to “R” in my rock rack, I noticed something strange – I had two copies of Let It Bleed yet I only remembered having one; a barley listenable record that was generously gifted to me by one of my brother-in-laws along with a milk-crate full of others all equally sonically handicapped by what I can only imagine were many great parties that included coordination-altering substances and record playing. We are talking 1969.

His ex-copy of Let It Bleed had the telltale personalized markings of previous ownership in the form of my brother-in-law’s full name written in green ball point penned script on the back cover as well as on the record’s label. This from the days when records were an important guest brought to every party and I’d bet that in 1969 more than one copy of Let It Bleed showed up at most parties making personalization a necessity. My other Let It Bleed, a cleaner unmarked and better-sounding copy that includes the original poster was the mystery guest in my house for my birthday party. And what a welcome guest it was and remains.

A little detective work, the price sticker was the dead giveaway, revealed that I bought this record at a Monkeyhaus past from a Baltimore record dealer (who shall remain nameless or I’d have to kill you and me) who occasionally shows up with a few boxes of super-choice used records for the ‘haus crew’s perusal. I must have planned ahead and bought this record and then purposefully forgot that I did for this very special birth day play. Or so I’d like to imagine.

Luigi Nono
Como una ola de fuerza y luz/Yentonces comprendio
Slavka Taskova, Soprano | Maurizio Pollini, piano
Claudio Abbado and the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra

In 1970 Salvador Allende was elected president of Chile becoming the first democratically elected Marxist to lead a nation in the Western Hemisphere, something that the Nixon administration was particularly unhappy about. After suggesting a coup to keep the Allende adminstration out, the American administration began a plan to “make the [Chilean] economy scream.” In his first year in office, Allende nationalized Chile’s copper mines and began economic and industrial reforms. Allende’s rule would continue until 1973 when he was ousted by a military coup [supported by the USA] led by General Pinochet.

In September 1971, word reached Nono of the death of Luciano Cruz, a major player in Chile’s revolutionary left movement. Of Cruz, Nono wrote: “I had got to know him that June in Santiago as a man of great intelligence, which had led to a friendship based on solidarity. It was his presence and yet physical absence that determined the choice of sound structure and caused us to ask why.” For Como una ola de fuerza y luz (Like a wave of strength and light), Nono chose to incorporate a poem by Cruz’s friend, the poet Julio Huasi, lamenting and celebrating Cruz. To a setting of this poem were added an electronic part that transformed sounds made by human voices and the piano of Maurizio Pollini, a longtime collabrator of Nono’s.

Luciano!
Luciano!
Luciano!

in the hazardous winds
of this country
you will keep on
glowing
young as the revolution
in every one of your people’s struggles
forever alive
and as close by
as the grief for your death.

like, Luciano!, a wave
of strength
young as the revolution
forever alive
and you will keep on
glowing light
for living.

voices of children
accompany
gentle bells
for
your youth.

“I realized that it was no difference whether I was writing a score or helping to organize a strike. They are just two sides of the same coin.” ~ Luigi Nono

Como una ola de fuerza y luz for soprano, piano, orchestra and tape was written in 1970-71 and this performance was overseen by Nono as was the B-side Y entonces comprendio which speaks to the Cuban revolution mainly through the words of poet Carlos Franqui (who was pro-revolution anti-Castro).

Harrowing, eerie, forceful and majestic. All that for $2.99 and the recording quality is first rate to boot.

Pelican Daughters
Fishbones and Wishbones

“Pelican Daughters is fab. Two spins this weekend.” ~ Simon Says

“This album blew me away the very first time I heard it, and I’ve listened to it at least once a day since first scoring a copy for myself; they pull off a sound that quite a few groups of the era reached for yet only occasionally succeeded in grabbing hold of.” ~ Other Music

“Genuinely jawdropping archival reissue from the Forced Nostalgia label, the first time on vinyl for this unique album recorded in the mid 80′s using analogue synths, found objects & DIY tape loops, drawing lines between the the postpunk movement and into the more introspective sounds that would go on to typify so much electronic music of the early nineties.” ~ Boomkat

Recorded on Portastudio, 1985-1988, Sydney, Australia by Andy Rantzen, Justin Brandis, Bryce Cannon and Andrew Holmes.

Versions of this album have been previously released on tape by Cosmic Conspiracy Productions (1988), on CD by Silent Records (1991) and as download on 4-4-2 Music (2009).

Special thanks to Alex Karinsky, Kim Cascone, Adrian Elmer and Andy Lonsdale for keeping these tracks alive across the years.

This version compiled by Fré De Vos, © Forced Nostalgia, 2011.

I have to agree with with everything those other guys said – Pelican Daughters Fishbones and Wishbones is one supremely bad-ass record. The attention to sound as abstract form the industrials love, repetitive minimalist patterns as psycho-motivator, stranger in a strange land found sounds, funked up bass beat, and distant voices all put together, bent and stretched into a taut humming sound force you’ll be more than happy to reckon with – time and again. Mind blowing, jaw dropping fab.

Pelican Daughters – Insect Wing by Forced Nostalgia