Saturday Night and Sunday Morning

Houseguests Dude, Jim, Carly, and Amy arrived on Friday night to be billeted at our house in advance of pre-Xmas/Doris birthday celebrations scheduled for Saturday. On Saturday afternoon Tom occupied one side of the kitchen making a cinnamon loaf....
whilst Debbie was on the other side, tending to one of the bits of dead meat that was sure to be consumed.
Early in the evening the crowd assembled to eat the day's labours...


I prefer this scene without the unforgiving aid of the flash...

The next morning they were still at...

until it was time for the troops to leave...

The frost was thick on the ground and car windows parked in the cut...
...and though only a few yards separated them, this little fella had managed to escape the worst of it
After making a pot of tea, Debra headed for the Yellow Room and got down to school work such is her dedication.

Norman Lamont Roadblock

A sleeper awakes...
Roadblock
Norman Lamont
Habibi

There are some albums which hit you straight between the eyes from the first note and others which slowly worm their way into your psyche. With its reserved and understated performances, Roadblock is definitely in the latter category. Sleeper or not, glorious moments creep up and dazzle you with their uncluttered brand of consummate balladry.

Not to be confused with the pugnacious Tory chancellor who famously sang in the bath whilst sterling collapsed about him, this Lamont is an Edinburgh-based songwriter.

A crisp production presents acoustic-based songs laced with some dreamy slide guitar, arctic Lanois-style trimmings and some gorgeous violin flourishes and arrangements. Fronting it all up, Lamont’s voice trembles within the skin of bittersweet melodies that is reminiscent of a nasal Ray Davies, and it’s this likeable fragility which delivers the chills on a run of three standout tracks – “Dorothy’s Book,” the epic ambitions of “The Spell” and the darkly sublime “Anywhere But Here.” These 16 minutes (plus the deliciously gloomy ruminations of the excellent title track) shows Lamont to be a songwriter of depth and imagination.

Only the frankly baffling inclusion of reggae-based clunker “I’ll Be Back” and the ill-fitting strut of “When I Came Home From Egypt” distort the otherwise brooding atmosphere which Lamont creates throughout the rest of the album with such care and attention.

Nominations For God LXIX

Bill Shankly

Three In A Row XI: Leonard Cohen

Various Positions

1984

I'm Your Man
1988

The Future
1992

The All New Electric Muse

Are Folks Electric?
The All New Electric Muse
Various Artists
Island

In recent times boutique labels such as Harvest, Deram, Vertigo, and the more esoteric offerings from Island and Polydor have all enjoyed a revival of interest thanks to a series of well-produced 3 CD sets. Ideal for the newcomer, they all offer a cross-section of hits, misses, curiosities and forgotten treasure from a time when labels were as open-minded and adventurous as the music that was hitting the desk of the A&R department.

Such collections have focussed mainly upon the morphing of pop and psychedelia into underground and heavy rock, touching upon folk music only in passing. We now have an appreciation of a (roughly) similar period when folk and acoustic-based artists danced, dallied and quite possibly tarried a while with its electric cousins.

Along with the imprints previously mentioned, Transatlantic Records were just as eclectic in what they signed. Alongside comedy, jazz and rock they held a large portion of the folk boom of the early 60s on their books. By combining Transatlantic's roster with that of Island and Decca, many of the key names pushing boundaries and setting standards of exploration and discovery that makes Doctor Livingstone seem like an armchair traveller are ably represented.

Yet this is not only a collection of hot-shot guitarists (step forward Davy Graham, Bert Jansch, John Renbourn and John Martyn – all present and correct), the usual suspects when it comes to the folk-rock frame-up (Fairport Convention, Steeleye Span and Traffic), or tragic troubadours such as Sandy Denny or Nick Drake.

There's a welcome straying off the well-worn paths to take in a range of acts whose diversity challenges any notion that folk or even folk-rock is just one standardized brand. Thus we get the unruffled purity of Shirley Collins' vocal coupled to the Albion Country Band's tricksy, uneven meters, Bryn Haworth's dazzling "Grappenhall Rag" (with King Crimson's Gordon Haskell on bass) and shining harmonies rising triumphantly from "It's Dark In Here" by Dransfield.

Also worthy of closer investigation is Shelagh McDonald whose "Dowie Dens Of Yarrow" is graced with undulating drums and radiant Hammond organ. McDonald's own story is worthy of a song itself. Recording only two albums in the 1970s, she walked out on a promising career after one bad acid trip too many. Unlike other more famous acid casualties of her generation, hers is a happy ending, turning up recently and writing material again.

If your interest has been piqued by previous box sets such as Strangely Strange But Oddly Normal and A Breath Of Fresh Air, this will reward your attention. On a cautionary note though, contractual difficulties prevent the inclusion of Roy Harper's early 70s visionary synthesis of the genre (a vital part of the folk-rock journey) or the groundbreaking work of Lal and Mike Waterson, June Tabor et al. Nor can it be as comprehensive as Castle Communication's 6 CD New Electric Muse (issued in 1996 and itself based upon 1976’s four-album Electric Muse). Such unavoidable omissions aside though, this is still a must-have collection.

This review originally appeared here.

Desk Duties IV

Currently having lots of fun in the Yellow Room. Some, or indeed all of these album might well be featured in Podcasts From The Yellow Room if only I could find time to record the damn thing!

Random Penguin XLVI

1977
Cover design by Omnific

A New Arrival In The Yellow Room

No, not Bernard but the Power Mac G4. I came by this bit of kit thanks to John Sargent who called round yesterday with it. Knowing I was looking to enter the world of Macs, he very kindly retrieved this one from a long-forgotten cupboard. Sadly it's now minus keyboard, mouse and monitor and power cable.

Thankfully Bernard was able to supply the last item in that the list. He was also able to discern with the aid of reading glasses that this unit hailed from 1999 and consisted of 128mb sd-ram and 20gb hard drive.

I'm going to investigate whether or not keyboards / mouse / monitor / wi-fi / memory upgrades make this baby worth investing in or whether I'd be better advised to save my cash toward something sleeker and up-to-the minute. If any UK visitors to the blog can offer suggestions / advice get in touch by the usual means.

Michah Blue Smaldone The Red River

Music for the best of times and the worst of times...
The Red River
Micah Blue Smaldone
Immune Records

It’s been something of a purple patch when it comes to singer songwriters coming up with the goods. In a year that ushered in the transcendent meditation on loss and hope that was For Emma, Forever Ago by Justin Vernon aka Bon Hiver, we now have Micah Blue Smaldone – not a pseudonym but the real life moniker belonging to American ex-punk rocker turned philosophical troubadour.

Like Bon Hiver’s album, this too contains a sparse production, and tremulous introspective vocals. However, Justin Vernon’s record was a response to self-imposed back-to-nature isolation. Smalldone’s work springs from his travels and encounters around Eastern Europe.

At first glance you would be forgiven for thinking that this is an agreeably sedate album, essentially acoustic in nature, adorned with an occasionally jazzy inflection or a jangling folk-rock style that is sometimes reminiscent of the quaint fragility of P.G. Six’s 2007 record, Slightly Sorry.

But beneath the veneer of dusty Americana there’s a song-cycle carrying a heart-of-darkness travelogue filled with terse observations about the malevolent force within us all that slips off the leash with a depressing regularity.

Smaldone’s words craft vivid images without any unnecessary histrionics or invective; paradoxically they’re delivered with a deceptively restive grace that belies the undercurrent of lurking violence. The opening track, "A Guest" pulses with an ominous dread as he painstakingly describes a nightmare meal with an unwanted guest, covered with the gore of something freshly slaughtered.

Similarly, the title song (imbued with a finger-picked motif suggestive of Planxty’s elegiac West "Coast Of Clare") resonates with an evocative symbolism. Detailing the corruption, excesses and guilt that scar both civilians and soldiers in times of conflict; the river is not red with something benign as the rays of a rising sun but with blood. Upon seeing a woman bathing in the maw, he asks why she chooses to swim in such a foul place “I cannot bathe in waters clear, until such is my conscience.”

Avoiding any crass preaching, Smaldone sings quietly of terrible things. Yet his absence of cynicism suggests these are ultimately songs about, and of, hope.

This review originally appeared here.

Mellotron Nick Awde

Keyboard to ascension...
Mellotron: The Machine and Musicians that Revolutionised Rock
Nick Awde
Desert Hearts

OK let’s start with the facts. Nick Awde’s extensive love song to the Mellotron weighs in with a thumping 590 pages, contains interviews with 21 musicians who’ve either played one of the beasts (or stood next to someone who has), engrossing background interviews with the instruments creators, a series of appendices which include (amongst other things) the dates and places of birth of those interviewed or mentioned in the book along with their star signs (no, really), along with a clutch of period adverts and of course, the all-important Mellotron-related discography and “Top 25 songs and albums” list. Words such as “comprehensive”, “exhaustive” and “obsessive,” whilst certainly applying to the book, don’t really do justice to Awde’s achievement here. Though there's been previous books about the Mellotron, its sound and its influence, none of them come close to this one.

For many, the Tron is as much a part of the 60s and 70s as day-glo Hendrix posters, preposterous platform boots, joss sticks and Lobsang Rampa books. The eerie worlds created by its string and brass settings injected something strangely transgressive wherever it materialised; it could be foreboding, instilling an autumnal woebegone nostalgia for times never had, and a yearning for things that might yet happen. That this mercurial and transformative quality should issue forth from an instrument that in its original housing looked more like a Victorian sideboard than an augury of things to come typifies the contradictions that came with the ‘Tron.

Notoriously temperamental, it nevertheless attracted legions of forward-thinking rock musicians who liberated it from the light entertainment, band-in-a-box circuit to which the Mellotron had been initially marketed. Moreover, this prototype sampler, for all its foibles and irritations (and actually probably because of them) was a catalyst to pushing back the neat boundaries of pop music toward something that was epic, experimental and ambitious.

With heroic conviction, Awde celebrates all of the major players and performers and the records from that era, although perhaps the only significant omission in this magisterial survey of the Mellotron’s reign appears to be Tangerine Dream. Although the Teutonic knob-twiddlers are mentioned in passing, albums such as Atem or their commercial break-through, Phaedra and Rubycon almost collapse under the weight of depressed Mellotron keys.

There’s plenty of interest for King Crimson fans here via interviews with Greg Lake, David Cross, Bill Bruford, John Wetton and Ian McDonald – to whom the book is dedicated. Significant others include Yes, Strawbs, and of course The Moody Blues. If you’ve ever felt the hairs on the back of your neck stand to attention when the sound of a Mellotron enters the music you were listening to, then you must own this book.

Get the book here

Nominations For God LXVIII

Alex Harvey

It's About That Time Of Year...

Inside these respectable looking buildings in a conservative market town somewhere in Northumberland, strange things are taking place...

The Doors Live At The Matrix 1967

The end of the beginning...
Live At The Matrix 1967
The Doors
Warner

So long after their explosive heyday The Doors and Jim Morrison retain their gold-standard of cool. Like all major acts they’ve been incorporated, corporatized and accessorised to the nth degree – a pair of Doors-branded Coverse All-Stars anyone? Of course not everyone however buys into the myth of Morrison as the epitome of rock n' roll shaman dispensing visionary wisdom. As David Crosby caustically wrote about such myth-making in his 1998 CPR song, Morrison, "I've seen the movie and it wasn't like that."

Strip away the fables surrounding Morrison and The Doors and what are we left with? The answer, or at least something approaching part of it, tantalisingly hovers in and out of view on this 2 CD live bootleg.

Although these tapes will be well known by hardcore Doors fans, this is the first time they’ve seen the official light of day. Massaged into life by Bruce Botnik (engineer on those original Paul Rothschild produced albums), they offer a glimpse, as Ray Manzarek observes, of the band having fun. Playing a sizable chunk of their first album and half of their follow up record (yet to be laid down in a studio), the rest of the set is upholstered with a few greasy-spoon standards.
Just a few weeks on from the release of their debut, word about the band’s impending canonisation does not appear to have reached the handful of punters who turned up to Marty Balin’s nightclub in San Francisco, and who can be heard offering only the politest of applause between numbers.

Without the catalyst of audience reaction and in the face of such indifference, the sparks rarely fly and despite Manzarek's assertion about the extent to which this meant the band could stretch out and experiment, we have a performance that only occasionally smoulders, never quite ever catching fire. In truth, ther'’s little evidence here of a group that matches essayist Joan Didion’s description of The Doors as "the Norman Mailers of the Top Forty, missionaries of apocalyptic sex." Morrison’s celebrated "wardrobe malfunction" was still a couple of years off.

Though he would become the patron saint of the rock-star-in-leather-trousers look, here Morrison stands awkwardly at the microphone oozing something between lounge-singer schmaltz and half-hearted karaoke chutzpah that’s a few shot-glasses short on Dutch courage.

Die-hard Morrisonologists will however be cheered by the inclusion of alternate words grasped from his poetic writings and scattered about in songs such as a pulsing cover of the old Them stomper, "Gloria" and their sinuous classic, "The End."

With Kreiger's blazing guitar solo on "When The Music's Over", and Manzarek's faux-classical noodling, there's a lot of potential waiting to be called upon. However, at The Matrix we’re in the company of a somewhat quaint and reserved bar band, prone to stretches of timorous research, rather than anyone dropping their trousers in the face of the establishment. That would all come later and with it, quite literally in the case of The Doors, the stuff of legend.

This review originally appeared here.

The Enemy Of Productivity IV

You know you're in trouble when you start shouting at the radio or TV as often as I seem to do these days. Over the last couple of months it seems to be the BBC news that sets me off (not to mention that whole business with Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand). However, for all its faults the BBC is a marvellous institution and here's why...

The new archive facility is wonderful - just take a look at all the old radio and TV spots they've assembled on Francis Bacon.

As well as lots of different strands such as this one about working class life...
or this page about pop culture in Liverpool...There's lots of other topics over on the collections homepage.

Off To Newcastle...

Leaving the comfort of the Yellow Room, I took a walk up to the Metro station...

As you can see it was late into the afternoon - a magical hour at this time of year when the sky eagerly grasps onto the very last scraping of sunlight.


I was in Newcastle to buy some speaker cables. Following my recent internal reorganisation I decided I want to move my CD player and amplifier from their current location to somewhere a touch closer ie my desk.

After checking out a couple of retailers, I plumped to get a slightly more expensive bit of bell wire from Richer Sounds. The staff were incredibly helpful and incredibly rushed. In the time I was there (about five minutes or so) there were dozens of people buying hugely costly home cinema systems and the like. It's as though word about the credit crunch and the collapse of capitalism hasn't yet reached these parts.

From there I went to meet Johnny Sargeant, my old mucker from days in local government. We were meeting in somewhere called the Salsa Cafe, which I believe my have been Oz Records in another lifetime.

That reference will be lost on anyone unfamiliar with Newcastle in the early 1970s. On another trivia point, we were sitting over the road from where Change Is nightclub used to be, and that was where King Crimson made their debut live performances in 1969.

Since John and I last met the world is a different place. Some banks have been partially nationalised, uncertainty in the market place is rife, and Gordon Brown is looking happy again. Oh and there's been that minor business about the election of Obama.

Random Penguin XLV

1975
Cover illustration by Paul Hogarth

Remember Remember

This Charming Band…
Remember Remember
Rock Action

Offering up a post-rock pastoralism, this Glasgow-based operation draw heavily upon the worlds already sketched out by the Penguin Café Orchestra or The Durutti Column school of reflective, introspective melodies. Signed to Mogwai’s Rock Action label, there’s evidence that they’ve been listening to some of the more mellifluous passages of Steve Reich’s work as well.

Fostering an air of unfettered, simpler times, much of this music seems ready-made for use in an artfully-lit TV plays and indie cinema hits where the colourists have gone a bit over the top emulating the atmos-of-Amelie vibe.

What that gets you is ten pieces which share a lightness of touch, glittering cyclical textures and uncluttered to-the-point arrangements whose chief characteristics seems to be a faux naiveté and a sense of not quite getting anywhere. Such dithering is all part of the charm here, and isn’t necessarily a bad thing. After all, in such dark and uncertain times, a bit of light relief never did anyone any harm.

Valgeir Sigurdsson Ekvilibrium

A question of balance...
Ekvilibrium
Valgeir Sigurdsson
Bedroom Community

Having worked with Bjork, the Kronos Quartet and Howie B (to name drop a few), in 2007 Icelandic producer and composer Valgeir Sigurdsson stepped out with a debut album that walks the tightrope between those sometimes conflicting worlds of acoustic and electronic music. Essentially a seamless integration of the two spheres, the success of the album isn’t measured so much by the painstakingly intricate production techniques but in his ability to not only produce pieces that radiate poise and elegance, but have the element of surprise.

Throughout the album glorious melodies shine through the gathering clouds of studio atmospherics, or in the case of “Focal Point”, erupt into flight like startled birds. “A Symmetry” pulses with beats from Kimmo Pohjonen collaborator, Samuli Kosminen (who also adds a laid back kick and shuffle to stately procession of chiming Fender Rhodes chords that dominate “After Four”), whilst “Equilibrium Is Restored” – with rustic harmonium, glowering cello, and heat-haze processing - hovers in an amorphous state that brings to mind the evocative and haunting cadences of Gavin Bryars’ “The Sinking Of The Titanic” or “Thursday Afternoon” by Brian Eno.

There are vocals on four of the ten tracks, and with the meticulous ear of a seasoned producer, Sigurdsson knows exactly how to dress these performances to best effect. The icy fragility of Dawn McCarthy’s singing on “Winter Sleep” is a perfect sky-born antidote to the sombre, drifting layers of brass and terse orchestral swathes , whilst Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy’s soulful vocals (sounding not unlike Robert Palmer at times) sway against folds of smouldering strings on “Evolution Of Waters” and the heart-stirring “Kin” to produce a high-tension finish.

Street Life CXLIII

Nominations For God LXVII

Miroslav Vitous

Fire In The Sky

Street Life CXLII

Chaos In Theory And Practice (One More Time)

Displacement activity can be a terrible thing. In the face of a particular piece of work or a pressing deadline we opt to do something else. Sometimes it's with the intention of doing some "thinking" whilst engaged in another task, often a physical one.

Usually my displacement activity is making a pot of tea but over a week ago I decided to start rearranging the working space within the yellow room. Needless to say, once I'd started I had to stop and leave everything in a state of disarray whilst life and pressing deadlines got in the way. Yesterday, I finally got things back the way they should be.



Of course I'm not claiming that this is in any way tidy but at least now I can get some work done now!

Random Penguin XLIV

1980
Cover photograph Tony Evans

TUNISIA

Thinking outside the beat-box…
Tunisia
Unsung Records
Known for enthusiastically embracing different musical challenges, drummer Pat Mastelotto continues his adventures in sound by teaming up this time with theremin ace Pamelia Kurstin, trading together as Tunisia.

The eerie qualities of the instrument, in which the notes are plucked quite literally out of thin air, are well known from sci-fi movies such as The Day The Earth Stood Still (Bernard Herrmann’s awesome score) and Brian Wilson’s micro-symphony, “Good Vibrations.” Known for her pitch-perfect renditions of jazz standards and with a career that has seen Kurstin work around the world with luminaries such as Bela Fleck and David Byrne, Tunisia have threaded together a supple and often surprising record, which despite its foundations in simmering electronica, has an unexpectedly organic and human feel.

The first sounds from Kurstin have the emotive yearning power of a duduk (the Armenian double-reed reed woodwind instrument – see Djivan Gasparyan), flowing against a constantly percolating burble of plucked harmonics and shuffling electronics. And again her swooping melodies soars over Mastelotto’s trademark heavy hitting rock blasts on the stand-out track, “The Use Of Black,” where she adopts a tone not dissimilar to Adrian Belew’s eastern-sounding strings when soloing on Crimson’s “The Talking Drum.”

Sultry and exotic, with a hint of menace laced into its shape-shifting ectoplasmic spook-tones, the theremin is a versatile lead, capable of digging deep into the window-rattling bass end sub-strata which Mastelotto’s music often inhabits. Often racing and brimming with skittering dance beats throughout, there’s also plenty of moody colour to vary feel and pace.

As far as Mastelotto’s expanding portfolio of partnerships is concerned you could safely place this one next to TUNER, his prog-rock electronica hybrid with touch guitarist Markus Reuter. Mastelotto’s winning and inquistive streak continues to delight.

On Some Journey II

I'm up at 7.00 a.m. and nobody is more surprised than I am given that I didn't get to bed until 3.00 a.m. After getting back to my room after the gig I made the fatal mistake of turning on the laptop and checking mail. From there it was a zombie-style mouse-click fest and before I knew it...

I opened the window to the feel the cool morning air and hear the crows calling in the park opposite the hotel.

My home for the last two days...
Lobby call at 9.45: Mats Johansson drove us to Copenhagen and along the way there were some truly beautiful skies...





Then onto the impressive span of the Oresund Bridge




Into Copenhagen airport...

And then an hour later into Schiphol in Amsterdam...

A lay-over of three or four hours enabled me to plug in the laptop and get a bunch of work done. After a gate change, and clearing security, I was on the plane home to Newcastle.

IB Expo 08

Along with a capacity crowd, I’m in Halmstad, Sweden, watching Isuldurs Bane romp through a track that trades under the name "Magnificent Giant Battles." I know what you’re thinking. A band with a name purloined from the pages of Tolkien must surely be awash with soaring mellotron, bombastic guitar and thunderous drumming that would rattle Middle Earth to its very core.

Whilst this might have been true of their very beginnings (the band have been around since 1976) numerous line-up changes and refinements has the band recast as a clearing house for ideas to establish a coalition of different styles and ideas.

Considering themselves now to be more of an electronic chamber orchestra, there’s a refreshing gusto and relish in the way they tackle the complex and detailed arrangements that is a feature of the work of keyboard and principal composer for the band , Mats Johannson. Utilising trumpet, vibraphone, cello as well as keyboards, bass and guitar, the sound of IB (as they prefer to be called) has more to do with Frank Zappa or Henry Cow than anything from the symphonic rock pool from which they initially emerged.

Keen to expand their horizons the group has hosted an annual series of workshops leading to a performance since 2006. Borrowed from the collaborative aspect of a festivals such as WOMAD, IB Expo aims to bring diverse musicians from around the globe, put them in IB’s excellent rehearsal / performance facility in Halmstad and see what happens.

Joining the regular IB line-up this year were Mick Karn (bass), Pamelia Kurstin (theremin), Pat Mastelotto (drums and electronics), Christian Saggese (guitar), Janne Schaffer (guitar), and Valgeir Sigurdsson (keyboards / electronics).

The show was a patchwork of material representing and showcasing the different talents on display. At times this lead to a degree of unevenness in the programme, producing wild contrast such Janne Schaffer’s Metheny-style ruminations versus the febrile electronica of Pat Mastelotto and Pamelia Kurstin’s Tunisia project.

Stand out moments included three pieces by Valgeir Sigurdsson and the premier of ravishingly delicate tracks from a forthcoming album by IB regulars Fredrik "Gicken" Johansson and cellist / vocalist, Linnea Olsson.

With some sparkling solos from trumpeter Luca Calabrese, and the dazzling tuned percussion work of Klas Assarsson underscoring the left-field terrain of IB's music, there was a constantly shifting extra edge that added surprising textures and unexpected flavours.

Valgeir Sigurdsson at the laptop

IB supremo Mats Johansson

Linnea Olsson gets the message across

Linea Olsson, Pat Mastelotto, Janne Schaffer

Luca Calabrese

Linnea Olsson, Janne Schaffer, Gicken Johansson

Valgeir Sigurdsson, Pat Mastelotto, Kjell Severinsson

Mats Johansson, Valgeir Sigurdsson, Gicken Johansson, Kjell Severinsson, Klas Assarsson

Gicken Johansson, Klas Assarsson

Janne Schaffer, Mick Karn

Christian Saggese

Pamelia Kurstin

Pat Mastelotto, Pamelia Kurstin

Mick Karn

On Some Journey

A taxi ride to Newcastle airport got me there in plenty of time which was just as well as the queue to clear secruity was huge. I've done quite a bit of air travel this year but this was the first time I've been ushered to join a queue for "gentlemen only." Quite why this gender segregation is necessary I don't know but as a result I cleared the line in a fraction of the time that it might otherwise have taken.

And so to the lounge...

On the plane I read about the creation of the Obama team and the inside dirt on Sarah Palin's differences with the McCain team. The story of this election when it comes to be written up will be absolutely rivetting.

A nice flight through to Amsterdam. A relaxed stop-over of a little less than two hours. I plug in and do some work and eventually make my way to my gate.

A very relaxed flight with lots of room for me despite the fact that the plane is full. In baggage reclaim I plug in a find out in an email from Tim A that the guy who did the voice for Mr. Ed - Alan Young came from North Shields. An all-American talking horse from North Shields? Of course! Tim A could well be making it up though.

If it's Friday it must be Copenhagen...


If it's Friday it must also be Sweden...Malmo Syd to be specific. I had cause to speak to three people between the airport and the train journey from Copenhagen to Sweden. They all spoke perfect English.

Halmstad bound...
I was met at Halmstad Station by Thomas - one of the organisers of the IB expo, my hosts for the next couple of days - who took me to Hotel Clarion. Not having eaten since this morning, I I tucked into the excellent buffet available to hotel guests. Thomas and I were joined by Mick Karn and trumpeter Luca Calabrese. Not long after that, Pat Mastelotto appeared. All were in high spirits clearly enjoying the week of playing together, learning new material and creating a joyous sound by all accounts.

Thomas drove us all to the venue in Halmstad - a superb arts centre brimming with facilities and creativity.

Nominations For God LXVI

Erik Satie

The Jesus And Mary Chain The Power Of Negative Thinking

C'mon feel the noise...
The Power Of Negative Thinking
The Jesus And Mary Chain
Warner
Where would pop music be without reverb? From the early slap-back echo that vibrated within the lashed-up Sun Studios to the boffin-led sophistication of Abbey Road, the alchemical qualities of studio reverb was the means by which all manner of base materials could become pure pop gold. Bathing both voices and instruments in an exotic halo that spoke of the immeasurable distances of the heart, it was often the sole source of radiant illumination on songs that doubled as lonely roads of the soul.

In putting together the Jesus And Mary Chain, Jim and William Reid intuitively understood this magical process and combined it with booming fusillades of feverish hyper-deranged guitars. Cleverly, the result on 1985’s Pyschocandy was to coat rumbling and sulking song in cavernous hangars of retro-echo; a hallucinogenic veneer that was paradoxically both grittily angular and curiously smooth.

And if reverb is an essential part of the pop and rock diet then the B-side is also a staple of the menu. When ubiquitous remixes and releases fed the ever-hungry marketing machine, all that vinyl had to be filled with something and like just about every artist in the 80s, JAMC did their bit. Whilst some of this material has previously appeared dotted across other compilations this 4 CD set helpfully gathers it all together into one sonic scrapbook.

Famous for the brevity of some of their early performances where an entire gig might be done and someone dusted up in a matter of minutes, things here are equally short and sharp. Littered about the discs are another aspect of their live shows - various cover versions of tracks by artists who occupy a dark corner of JAMC’s personal mythology. Thus Prince, Elvis, Leonard Cohen and a few more besides all get walk on parts. There’s also an act of homage to a young man and a man who knew how to crank up a guitar in his day, Syd Barrett.

For all its legendary rarity status in Floyd circles, Barrett’s Vegetable Man remains one of his least memorable excursions into the surreal, and here it stubbornly resists JAMC’s heroic efforts to irradiate life into a song that was always way past its sell-by date. Sometimes all the lip-sneering attitude and sleight-of-hand distortion in the world can’t hide the paucity of the original.

Elsewhere, as the acoustic scraps and sketches reveal, beneath the squalling sheen of feedback these are often perfectly ordinary, almost drab little pop songs; three chord tricks performed with a defiant sneer that is as much power-pout as power-play.

Like most out-takes, remakes, and all manner of cast-offs dispatched to occupy a couple of minutes of needle-time, these necessarily range from the impressive to the throwaway. Each track carries a cache of documentary intimacy. Like hastily snapped polaroids of the creative process, they’re fuzzy, up close, personal but occasionally blessed with an unguarded vulnerability that tells a different story to the one we think we know.

Way To Go Gore

One of the highlights of the long-haul election night was seeing the venerable Gore Vidal being interviewed by David Dimbleby.

Vidal comes from a pre-television age where spoken sentences are discursive, require attention and might be read at least two ways. Thus in an age when TV has become as reductive as possible Vidal comes across as impossibly anachronistic.

Here we get the execrable Dimbleby attempting to nailing things down on behalf of a public he believes couldn't possibly understand what Vidal is getting at. Vidal, as you can see, is having none of it.

Long Time Coming...

23.20
I'm downstairs in the Red Room watching the television coverage of the US presidential election. The last time I did something like this was back in the 80s. Back then there was a bunch of mates and lots of cans of Bud. Tonight it's just me and a pot of tea.

The polls say it's going to go Obama's way but I'm never convinced about these things.

23.30
Tom has come down and joined me. "it's history in the making" he says. It might well be at that.

24.00
The BBC tells me that McCain has 8 votes in the electoral college whilst Obama has three. Of course the polls and more importantly the exit polls can be very unreliable. What seems slightly more indicitive is watching the body language of several McCain supporters being vox-popped seems to indicate that there's a real aprehension about how this is going to turn out.

1.03
Watching McCain say goodbye to the press corps on his plane looked uncannily as though he was conceeding - possibly a bit of wishful thinking on my part. Currently McCain is 16 to Obama's 67.

1.16
Technology is wonderful. Watching television, talking to Sean via Facebook and watching MSNBC's coverage on the net. Looks like Obama is on course for Florida.

1.22
Tom is too tired to stay up and so has gone to bed. I guess history can wait until tomorrow.

1.30
Pictures of voter's standing in line for hours is jaw-dropping. I simply cannot imagine punters in this country bothering to wait.

2.00
Keith Olbermann reports that Biff country (that's Wisconsin) is projected for Obama. They are also saying Arizona is too close to call! McCain's own stomping ground. Blimey. Ditto Florida! Blimey if only UK politics was as exciting as this.

2.15
Over on the BBC Simon Schama is sitting in with Dimbleby. They are joined John Bolton is saying that Sarah Palin has been a boon to the ticket. Whilst she might energise the base can she appeal to the independent voters? Whilst maintaining that Palin was good news, Bolton is another Republican who thinks McCain's campaign was inept. With friends like this who needs enemies?

2.25
Ohio is being called for Obama which puts him in sight of the magical 270.

2.40
Schama is telling Dimbleby to call the election for Obama. Olberman is saying that the math stacks up for Obama. The map is looking very blue.

Having worked on a couple of unsuccessful election campaigns in the UK I'm familiar with the crushing sense of defeat and despair which the Republicans must be feeling right now.

2.55
MSNBC are saying that McCain and Palin are currently in a meeting. Oh to be a fly on that particular wall.

3.00
Iowa goes Democrat. Florida still too close to call.

3.27
Well this is some kind of history unfolding. Will this chage in political direction be able to address the weight of expectation that now sits on Obama's shoulders? Being a weepie-eyed sentimentalist, as I look at the mixture of faces in Grant Park in Chicago, I really want him to be able to fulfill the rhetoric of the last few months. Of course this being practical politics, the realist in me knows he can't. That doesn't matter for now.

4.00
NBC have called Obama the next president of the United States. Quite a sight down there in Grant Park!

4.18
And over seven hours after my official bedtime, Florida has been called for Obama, and McCain is making what sounds like a gracious concession speech.

4.53
The BBC are showing some scenes from Times Square - an extraordinary place at the best of times somehow made even more day-glo than usual. The most entertaining sight however was Gore Vidal swatting the unctious Dimbleby aside, ending his croaky cranky statement with an imperious "OK it's your turn." I hope to see this up on Youtube asap.

4.59
It's been a long time coming but Barack Obama has taken to the stage...

Random Penguin XLIII

1982 Cover design: Omnific

Blue Notes The Ogun Collection

These Notes Are For You...
Ogun Collection
Blue Notes
Ogun
It’s difficult to overestimate the effect and impact that Chris McGregor (piano), Dudu Pukwana (saxes), Mongezi Feza (trumpet), Johnny Dyani (bass) and Louis Moholo had upon the progressive wing of the UK jazz scene when they arrived in 1965 from their native South Africa. Collectively known as the Blue Notes, this multi-racial group injected a fiery physicality that invigorated and excited those lucky enough to see and hear them in action. Something of that magic is presented in an extensive 5 CD box set beginning with a gig in South Africa in 1964 and ending in a moving tribute to a fallen collegue1987.

Live In South Afrika, captures a group clearly enthralled to the Monk / Silver traditions of American jazz. Light and airy (complete with an appealing high-ceiling ambience), though this clutch of original tunes by alto player Pukwana and McGregor are firmly in the bop tradition, there’s an edge to the playing that would only come to full power once they’d left their country and apartheid behind.

As exiles they set about making friends in Europe where Chris McGregor’s Brotherhood of Breath became a clearing house for some of the brightest jazz players in the country. From here the individual ex-Blue Notes fanned out, connecting to other territories and forms. McGregor vamps on Nick Drake’s Bryter Later whilst Feza’s shrill clarion blasts can be heard on Robert Wyatt’s Rock Bottom and Henry Cow’s In Praise of Learning.

Feza’s death from pneumonia was marked by a tribute in which Pukwana, McGregor, Moholo and Dyani laid down nearly 3hours of music. Originally released in 1976 in a highly edited version, this new edition of Blue Notes For Mongezi is fully restored across two CDs. Sadly this freewheeling frequently joyous and intense performance is marred by a sub-standard piano that struggles to stay in tune at the top end.

Blue Notes In Concert originally released in 1978 (now expanded with previously unreleased material) has the band at their blistering best, indulging in extended bursts of free jazz rough and tumble. McGregor’s agitated pin-sharp clusters of notes provide a deeply detailed foil to Pukwana’s often brutal rasping attacks. As far away from the original group as it’s possible to be, there’s nevertheless continuity in their good-humoured approach. As on the other discs, Moholo’s fast-moving work on kit, cymbals and sundry percussion is the thing that often steals the show.

The final disc, Blue Notes For Johnny, is an extended valedictory song to Dyani. This is a beautiful recording with Pukwana’s soaring tones (often multi-tracked) taking the lead as chief mourner, articulating the connection between the jubilant traditional South African folk tunes and the cathartic release which jazz is so often associated with.

The deaths of Nick Moyake in 1966, the passing of Feza in 1975, Dyani in 1986, and then McGregor and Pukwana in 1990 leaves Moholo as sole survivor of this legendary outfit. These CDs (plus 20 page booklet) is a splendid memorial to their individual and collective talents. Stunning.

A Productive And Useful Life After Tuesday

Fireworks Over Whitley Bay

The Golden Age

I’ve spent a fair amount of time recently talking to a pal about the 60s and 70s being the definitive age for popular music. Our conclusion, hardly earth-shattering or unique I realise, is that this was indeed the golden age – a time of discovery, ambition, pioneering spirit and rule-breaking chutzpah.

In short, this period equipped modern popular music with all the expressive tools and vocabulary it would ever need. Everything else that has followed basically boils down to variations on the themes established in the 1960s and in particularly, the 70s.

This is not to say that there haven’t been a few toe-tappers of note since the mid-70s, but basically it’s all been done before as even a cursory glance at the Electric Proms or Jools Holland’s Later show will confirm.

OK, I know there are probably far more important things to be talking about right now given the financial meltdown, the race for the White House and Lord knows how many wars are being waged around the globe as we speak, but this is important!