Twittering Machines

Miles Davis
Ascenseur Pour L’Échafaud

It’s 1957 and Louis Malle (it was his assistant Jean-Paul Rappeneau’s idea) asks Miles to provide the music for his film Ascenseur Pour L’Échafaud. Miles says yes and records this stunning 10″ on December 4 and 5, 1957 in Paris (he was there to perform anyway). Miles and his band (Barney Wilen – tenor saxophone, René Urtreger – piano, Pierre Michelot – bass, and Kenny Clarke – drums) went to the studio and improvised this music while watching scenes from the film.

I don’t yet own the original release from Fontana (France) from 1957 (pictured) but I will someday*. I did hear this record once and it literally stopped a group of people in their tracks and sat them down in a silent way. “the loneliest trumpet sound you will ever hear, and the model for sad-core music ever since. Hear it and weep.” ~ Phil Johnson

* note: there are 12 vinyl versions of this release according to Discogs

(more…)

Part Wild Horses Mane On Both Sides
Low Fired Clay Escape

Percussionist Pascal Nichols and flautist Kelly Jones improvise over and are mixed deep into “electronics, tapes and old military communication systems” until the sounds they make and the sounds that are made fuse into ritual psychedelic delirium.

Low Fired Clay Escape creates a sound-world that’s so other-worldly, so foreign it hardly fits into any comfortable musical category – are you experienced, again?

Released on Carnivals in 2011 in an edition of 530. (mescaline-induced?) Cover art by Darren Adcock.

Patti Smith
Horses

1975 debut LP from Patti Smith featuring a cover portrait by ex-lover and lifelong friend Robert Mapplethorpe and a damn near perfect two sides of songs.

Recorded at Electric Lady Studios, NYC featuring Patti Smith (vocals, guitar), Jay Dee Daugherty (drums), Lenny Kaye (guitar, bass guitar, vocals), Ivan Kral (bass guitar, guitar, vocals), and Richard Sohl (keyboards). Special guests  -Tom Verlaine and Allen Lanier. Tracks: “Gloria”, “Redondo Beach”, “Birdland”, “Free Money”, “Kimberly”, “Break It Up”, “Land”, “Elegie”.

Patti Smith was raised a Jehovah Witness (“Jesus died for somebody’s sins, but not mine”) in southern NJ then she moved to NYC in 1967.

Einstürzende Neubauten
Kollaps

Their first full-length LP (there were earlier cassette-only releases) from 1981 is also the boys who make noise rawest and noisiest and most primitive, i.e. one my favorites. Blixa Bargeld (Lead Vocals, Guitars, Noises), N.U. Unruh (Percussion, Vocals), and  F.M. Einheit (Percussion, Vocals). The percussion referred to does not involve one scrap of traditional kit – you can see their chosen sonic assault weapons on the back cover:

The thing about pieces of metal, pipes and power tools is they don’t resonant like instruments – their harmonic pattern is askew. When you mix this with found sounds, occasional crappy keyboard, Blixa’s completely and utterly over-driven guitar and otherworldly screaming screeching vocals you get a beautiful record as far as I’m concerned. It’s so beautiful and powerful it nearly hurts.

And it still sounds as fresh as a daisy.

Morton Subotnick
Silver Apples of the Moon

The work is entirely electronic and was composed and realized at my studio in the School of the Arts at New York University. The piece, which was composed especially for this Nonesuch release, is in two major sections that correspond to the two sides of the record. The idea of writing a work especially for a recording presents the composer with a rather special frame of reference . . . it is not the reproduction of a work originally intended for the concert hall . . . rather it is intended to be experienced by individuals or small groups of people listening in intimate surroundings . . . a kind of chamber music of the 20th-century style.

Composed and performed by Morton Subotnick on a custom-built Donald Buchla “electronic music machine” designed by Buchla, Subotnick and Ramon Sender (made possible with a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation).

This album of electronic music represents a signal event in the related history of music and the phonograph: for the first time, an original, full-scale composition has been created expressly for the record medium.

Composed, recorded and released in 1967, you have to wonder why I haven’t talked about this magical record before. The relatively brief liner notes by Morton Subotnick are superb – “This gives the flexibility to score sections of the piece in the traditional sense . . . and to mold other sections (from graphic and verbal notes) like a piece of sculpture”, the music is wonderfully . . . subotnick (is there a more fitting name for a composer of music for an electronic music machine?) and the Yeats reference in the title is preciously perfect (“The title Silver Apples of the Moon, a line from a poem by Yeats, was chosen because it aptly reflects the unifying idea of the composition, heard  in its pure form at the end of Part II”):

The Song of Wandering Aengus

I went out to the hazel wood,
Because a fire was in my head,
And cut and peeled a hazel wand,
And hooked a berry to a thread;
And when white moths were on the wing,
And moth-like stars were flickering out,
I dropped the berry in a stream
And caught a little silver trout.

When I had laid it on the floor
I went to blow the fire aflame,
But something rustled on the floor,
And some one called me by my name:
It had become a glimmering girl
With apple blossom in her hair
Who called me by my name and ran
And faded through the brightening air.

Though I am old with wandering
Through hollow lands and hilly lands,
I will find out where she has gone,
And kiss her lips and take her hands;
And walk among long dappled grass,
And pluck till time and times are done
The silver apples of the moon,
The golden apples of the sun.

William Butler Yeats

! (I like to imagine that’s a poem about being an audiophile)

James Brown
Hell

Four sides of deep pure funk from 1974 brought to you by the Godfather of all things funked. Hell is hot. Smokin‘. Good God.

“He’s too strong, we can’t stop him”
“That’s because he’s the Godfather.”

These guys could play the funk out of the phone book. Killer cover art by Joe Belt. Smokin’. Good God.

no need to look up badass in the dictionary

Toumani Diabate
Kaira

I don’t think you can mention the kora without mentioning the Diabate family. Toumani’s father, Sidiki, is the “King of the Kora” (he was also the first to record the kora) which makes Toumani its rightful Prince. Self-taught beginning at age 5, this is Toumani’s first solo record recorded in October 1987 and released on Hannibal Records (UK & US) the same year.

Its also worth pointing out that Toumani Diabate can trace musicians back through 71 generations in his patriline, from his father to his father to his father…When we say someone has music in their blood, in the Diabate’s case we’re not speaking figuratively, we’re speaking historically. Kairi the LPs title and title track means “peace” and that’s another fine thing about being a musician from a family of musicians as opposed to so many other things one can build or destroy.

Another beautiful mind-expanding record for those so inclined.

Pharoah Sanders
Karma

If music could kiss your soul, and what’s to say it can’t, it would sound like this.

Recorded February 19, 1969. On Impulse! Reissued on LP in 1972, 1980 and 1987 so everyone can have some.

Popol Vuh
Aguirre

The double whammy. The soundtrack. Well, sorta. This record came out in 1975 while Werner Herzog’s Aguirre: The Wrath of God came out in 1972. So let’s consider this record a compilation seeing as only two tracks are actually from the film. By this time, 1975, Florian Fricke had pretty much laid down his moog in favor of acoustic instruments like piano and spinett but songs including the side-long track “Vergegenwaertigung” (nearly a side-long title), pre-date this unplugged period so we get moog-ie mist, lovely guitar work from Daniel Fichelscher and dreamy vocals from Djong Yun.

In some ways it’s difficult to connect this beautiful peaceful and dreamy music with the jungle, or “chunkle” as Herzog would say (“I have a very stark view of the jungle or nature,” Herzog tells NPR’s Guy Raz. “I think the jungle is vile and debased and full of lewdness and obscenity”), and Herzog’s emotional-mind-fuck that is Aguirre: The Wrath of God the film. Herzog claims to have written the screenplay “in a fever” and in just a few days after being set on fire from reading a half a page about Lope de Aguirre the 16th C. Basque Spanish conquistador. Herzog actually wrote a bunch of Aguirre on a bus trip with his soccer team and one overly partied player puked on a few pages which Herzog summarily threw out of the window (he says he doesn’t recall what was on those pages, maybe it was the happy ending).

Filmed in the Peruvian rain forest in and on the Amazon, Aguirre would be an inspiration for Coppola’s own mad chunkle river adventure. But no one does mad like Klaus Kinski, not even Dennis Hopper, and this was the first Herzog/Kinski pairing on film. They’d known each other years prior, Kinksi had rented a room from Herzog and terrorized him and everyone else in the house so Herzog knew that Kinski was his Aguirre from the moment he dreamed up his ecstatic truth version of this otherwise true story. On set, Herzog would purposefully piss Kinski off, an apparently easy thing to do, before shooting a scene because he wanted Kinski’s Aguirre to smolder whereas Kinski wanted him to rage. So Herzog had Klaus let out his rage and began filming after it had run its course.

Then there’s the story of Kinski getting pissed off at the noise coming from a nearby tent so he shot at it and accidentally blew off a crew member’s finger. Or the one about Herzog hiring natives to gather 400 monkeys for the final scene, the natives getting a better offer for the lot from some poachers, and Herzog showing up in the nick of time at the airport claiming to be a veterinarian and also claiming the monkeys, all 400, needed their shots. He got them back, filmed them and set them free. In the chunkle.

Daniel Fichelscher, Djong Yun and Florian Fricke

Of course none of this is in this music but if you see the film, you’ll have the wonderfully good fortune of experiencing both.

The Great Concert of Charles Mingus

Recorded Sunday, April 19, 1964 at the Thèâtre des Champs-Elysées, Paris featuring Charles Mingus (bass), Johnny Coles’ trumpet, Eric Dolphy (alto, clarinet, flute), Clifford Jordan (tenor sax), Jaki Byard (piano) and Dannie Richmond (drums). Three LPs worth of damn-near everything you could ask for from a record. Loose, tight, fast, slow, in, out, quiet, mad, angry, silly, moving, touching, introspective and rousing and more.

Officially released in 1971 on America Records (France/Canada) and on Prestige in the US in 1982, there are some sonic issues here including the occasional feedback but I only mention this because it doesn’t matter one bit.

The day before April 19th Johnny Coles collapsed on stage from a stomach ulcer and had to be rushed to the hospital so the band plays minus 1* (Coles’ trumpet sat on stage atop a flight case throughout this performance in tribute). While the LP-version also leaves out the Byard solo tribute to Art Tatum and Fats Waller “A.T.F.W.” and “So Long Eric” which are found on the 2003 Universal Music Jazz (France)/Verve remastered CD, there’s still plenty of Byard who plays monstrously throughout and Dolphy is peaking and prime just months before his premature passing. Mingus is in typical form bantering with the audience, joking one minute and talking about concentration camps being built in the US the next all the while speaking in clipped, broken sentences as if his brain doesn’t adhere to speech-time.

*Because of recording problems found on the actual opening songs from April 19, this LP opens with “Good Bye Pork Pie Hat” which was recorded the previous night – so we get a taste of Johnny Coles after all. The aforementioned CD restores the full April 19th performance.

All told, a truly great live record, among the greatest I’d say. If you don’t already have it, you need it.

Albert Ayler
Spirits

Spirits is Albert Ayler’s 2nd LP (by release date) recorded on February 24, 1964 in New York City and originally released on Debut/Denmark (as was his first recod My Name is Albert Ayler from 1963) in 1964. This is the UK release from Transatlantic Records from the same year (not to be confused with Spirits Rejoice on ESP from ’65). For the US version on Arista / Freedom (1975) the title was changed to Witches & Devils. Featuring the Albert Ayler Quintet – Ayler on tenor sax, Henry Grimes and Earle Henderson on bass, Norman Howard on trumpet and Sonny Murray on drums performing Ayler’s “Spirits”, “Witches and Devils”, “Holy, Holy” and “Saints”.

I think its fair to call this music spiritual music. You can hear traces of New Orleans, blues, bebop, R&B, marching bands, hymns and ballads all devoured, digested and reformed. Ayler was one of two people along with Ornette Coleman that Coltrane asked to play at his funeral and if you listen close you can hear him lift your spirits. I’d call that magic.

Luciano Berio / Cathy Berberbian
Sequenza VI, Chemins II/III, Epifanie, Folk Songs

“She has a unique witches’ Sabbath of sounds…” Darius Milhaud

Indeed, a unique witches’ Sabbath of sounds and Ms. Berberian uses them to full effect on “Folk Songs” the main reason I was so excited to find this lovely boxed collection. The other is its led by the composer himself, Luciano Berio who was also Ms. Berberian’s husband when he arranged these ‘Folk Songs’ in 1964 just for her. “Folk Songs” was originally scored for voice and seven instruments (voice, flute, clarinet, harp, viola, cello, and percussion) and that’s how it’s presented here. They were also arranged for large orchestra by Berio in 1973.

“In this suite, those who know Berio as avante-garde composer ranking with Pierre Boulez, Luigi Nono and Karlheinz Stockhausen will discover him in unaccustomedly light mood.”

So this is what Berio-lite sounds like? Contrary to the title, these are not all strictly speaking folk songs – “Black is the Color of My True Love’s Hair” (Nina Simone’s version is also splendid) and “I Wonder as I Wander” were written by Kentucky folk singer and composer John Jacob Niles and Berio himself wrote two others. The liner notes claim that Berio wrote these songs for Berberbian but some wise-assed scholars point out that this would have been difficult seeing as he didn’t meet her until two years after he wrote them. Ah, love has the power to transcend time or re-write history or both.

One thing that ties most of these 11 songs from the United States, France, Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan together, beyond Berio and Berberian, is love. Crazy love, mad love, passionate I’m outta my head (over you) love. And its consequences and contradictions “he with no spouse seeks one, and he with one wishes he had none” from Joseph Canteloube’s Chants d’Auvergne (not to mention the fact that Berio and Berberian’s marriage was nearly over by the time they first performed this piece in public).

Berberian discovered the last song “Azerbaijan Love Song” herself on an old 78rpm record which she transcribed by sound since its mainly sung in Azerbaijani a language she didn’t speak. There are many things to love about this record including the mad love it portrays so madly.

“Lalalalala…Love makes even the wisest mad, and he who loves most has least judgment. The greater love is the greater fool.” from Berio’s self-penned Folk Song “Ballo”

But this music isn’t for everyone – what is – and some prefer other performances of Berio’s “Folk Songs”. I have a few including Dawn Upshaw’s on the CD Osvaldo Golijov: Ayreon [Deutsche Grammophon B000ASDG9E] and Jard Van Nes with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra under Richard Chailly [London 425 832-2]. While I enjoy these as well, I wouldn’t recommend passing the Berio / Berberian by. You may have to set aside some baggage to fully immerse yourself but as I see it that’s our only job as listeners.

Kawabata Makoto
White Summer Of Love Dreamer

“Don’t Open ’til Christmas”. I did.

A gift from Stephen and one of his Favorite Records of 2010, Kawabata Makoto’s White Summer Of Love Dreamer is also one of mine. This is a solo outing, no Acid Mothers Temple…, but there is plenty of Makoto on acoustic guitar, electric guitar, bouzouki, sarangi, tambura, organ, hurdy-gurdy, electronics, field recording, and vocals all layered and building up to an ecstatic swirling, pulsing soundfield of pure spirit.

At least that’s what it sounds and feels like Makoto is going for. Meditative drone for the mind to the bone.

This is my first record on Blackest Rainbow Records and it’s lovingly produced (music produced & engineered by Kawabata Makoto) with photography and layout by Joe Blanchard (he’s also Mr. Blackest Rainbow Records) with a tip on cover on super heavy stock, pressed on “heavyweight virgin vinyl”, limited to 494 copies. Transcends heavy.

PJ Harvey
Man-Size

45rpm, 200 gram audiophile pressing. Nah, just kidding about the ’200 gram audiophile pressing’ part but damn! this record sure sounds great (it was produced by Steve Albini). Released in 1993 on Island Records as the second 12″ single from PJs second LP Rid of Me, I’ve been looking out for this, and some others, for ever. Truth be told, when I watched the latest PREX ‘New Arrivals‘ video and spied Rid of Me as Jon flipped through the stacks, I nearly ran out the door. But I waited a day or so because I’m older and more mature.

Nah, kidding again. I just had more important shit to do. But luckily this was still there when I was. So I bought it. Yes it cost more than I would normally spend on a used record at $19.99 but for me this record is more than worth that price. Besides, the 12″ 45rpm single is an audiophile pressing as are white label promos and PREX typically has very shopper-friendly pricing in my experience and this record looked unplayed (not any more).

Plus and more importantly PJ and the boys (Rob Ellis on drums and background vocals, and Steve Vaughan on bass) rip through the not-on-the-LP version of Willie Dixon’s “Wang Dang Doodle” made famous by Howlin’ Wolf and made so much sexier by PJ Harvey.

(more…)