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1972 is an absolutely incredible year in music history. I cannot help but think what it would've been like to be the age I am now back then. Where would I have stood musically? Would I find myself part of the increasingly popular Glam Rock scene? Would I find myself with long hair and a hog, listening to Deep Purple? Would I be at crux in my life - rejecting traditional rock n roll for the likes of the classical influences inherent in Progressive Rock? Could I be cool enough to have connections to people following the apex of the Brazilian music scene? Maybe I would just be listening to the popular stuff by Elton John, Paul Simon, and Stevie Wonder.
37 years past that particular year, I find myself wanting to be a part of all these scenes, loving many albums released during this year retrospectively. I have no context of what it would have been like to actually have BEEN THERE. I've seen concerts, I've read anecdotes, I'm jealous to not have lived through this time, just as I'm jealous to not have lived through any significant time in pop music history.
As a natural extension and rebirth of the hippies at the end of the 60's, perhaps the burgeoning Space Rock, psych folk, Glastonbury scene would've been the scene for me. These people held true to what they wanted to do, mixing pop, rock and electronics to create music that was similar to that being created in Germany at the time - but distinctly different.
The difference was Hawkwind.
Doremi Fasol Latido came out on the heels of the massive UK single "Silver Machine" - a song that was not found on any Hawkwind album at the time, but still featured a sound that would soon define them. Lemmy's vocals sound like Roger Daltry, the guitar and bass chugging is reminiscent of the heavy rock found in Uriah Heep and Deep Purple - yet there was this ambience added to the music. A constant humming sound that gently slid up and down the scales, not distracting from the music but definitely noticable. Imagine your rock band performing in the middle of a hurricane, attempting to send it back from where it came. You get the point.
Doremi was 7 tracks the first time it was released. Alternating between hard rock, proto punk, kraut rock, and a handful of British folk moments - many consider this their masterpiece.
I've never really understood the genre title of "Space Rock" beyond the occasional synthesizer whirlings. To me, I think of the serene, minimal, bleep blopp fizz captured perfectly in the soundtracks to movies like Solaris, Moon and Sunshine as something "true" to space. I see The Orb as much more indicative of the loneliness I imagine space to be rather than what Hawkwind present it as.
A party. A huge, drug-fueled, week-long, awesome party.
If those soundtracks (or even perhaps the 2001: A Space Odyssey score) are what I imagine the true sound of space to be like, Doremi Fasol Latido is the quintessential soundtrack for teenagers traveling to space in rebellion against their aging parents. You see, there is a sense of urgency and defiance found throughout the album. The guitar is harsh, the recording is shit and everytime lyrics and singing are introduced I can't help but feel that Hawkwind is trying to write some melodramatic space opera.
But the drawn-out, mind-melting, feedback laden instrumental passages rock. This isn't space music to float around to. This is the your soundtrack to conquer space.
It's not a perfect album, I don't think it's even the best Hawkwind album, but it's fun to pull out every now and then and listen to loud. Grow your hair out, put on some bizarre threads. Hell, paint your face if you must. It might not be your version of space, but it's theirs. And it is one hell of a fun vision to have.
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PS. Album includes 4 bonus tracks - none of which I find as good as the any of the preceding 7.
Don't judge this album based on the first track alone. It's that crazy fucking skronk rock jazz noise shit that Ribot is known for and the groups on Rune Grammofon are making hip. It's loud and abrasive as all get out and difficult for me to listen to, but this whole record doesn't sound like that.
Which isn't to say that it doesn't have Ribot's signature all over it. It's still full of blistering guitar, jazz that goes everywhere rather than nowhere, touches all spectrums, but never really drags. Ribot further shows Zorn's diversity with his entry into the Masada Book, because this album sounds like none of the other 6 volumes before it, nor much else any music around it. Dude makes it his own, and it slays. It's crazy, it's not my favorite, but it is definitely an adventurous listen.
"Asmodeus" is the seventh installment in John Zorn's Masada Book II. In case anyone reading is unfamiliar, a brief introduction: in the early '90s, Zorn began exploring his Jewish and Jazz heritages through the composition of a songbook of themes that could serve as a sprinboard for improvisation. He composed some 200 songs for the original jazz quartet, eventually expanding the project to be performed by other acts. Over a decade after its inception, Zorn revitalized the aging (by his standards) project by injecting a new songbook into the mix-- the Book of Angels, a collection of around 300 new themes. Instead of focusing on a band this time, Zorn has had different groups perform the material. "Asmodeus" presents ten pieces from the book as performed by a rock power trio led by guitarist Marc Ribot, ably supported by bassist Trevor Dunn and drummer G. Calvin Weston.
What follows is something that, even moreso than Electric Masada did, will shake your impression as to where this project can go. From the opener "Kalmiya"-- it's clear that this is something forceful-- Ribot comes blazing out with a frantic, noisy, overdriven guitar solo over a raging rhythm section before settling into a bit of a monster groove, with the melody eventually floating above (or perhaps in opposition to) a freely associating Dunn and Weston. Quite frankly, it's like Ornette Coleman's Prime Time project on steroids.
While the record admittedly settles down a bit (the second track, "Yezriel", finds the trio slinking into a blues rock feel after the explosive opener), the performance maintains a raging intensity and seemingly endless blistering guitar pyrotechnics throughout. Admittedly, at times this causes the performance to deviate a bit, capturing this sort of performance almost universally works better in a live setting where you can really see and feel the interaction and energy between the band, and here it can cause the pieces to occasionally feel disjoint ("Kezef" where Ribot seems tentative, "Armaros" where Dunn does, at least after his solo). Sometimes I suspect this was the intent-- if the goal was to capture a live energy here, it would stand to reason that you'd avoid repeated takes and sometimes you'll end up a bit disjoint. On the other hand, sometimes you'll end up so disjoint that what you'll have its a piece that bubbles over with so much energy, you can't help but be in awe of it, and Ribot's sound, while consistent on the record, still somehow manages to be all over the map, touching on John McLaughlin ("Yezriel"), Sonny Sharrock ("Cabriel") and Blood Ulmer ("Sensenya"), not to mention literally dozens of others.
One thing I can safely say about "Asmodeus", by the time it wraps up, you can almost feel exhausted. It is an immensely powerful record, and again while perhaps not as consisently successful as other entries in the Masada Book II catalog (the Masada String Trio record comes immediately to mind), this one is so overwhelming in its dissection and deconstruction of the rock idiom that it's hard to think of it as anything short of fantastic. Recommended.
-Michael Stacks, Amazon.com Download Here
This album is fucking bizarre dudes. Another set of Zorn tunes, but this one is definitely one of the most far out from the Book of Angels series. The album is all over the place. One song will be Jewish/Turkish electronic fusion stuff like Balkan Beat Box, the next will be traditional, the next will sound like heavy metal, the next traditional, the next jazzy, the next fusion etc. It's a fucking blast and definitely NOT background music. Not for everyone, but if you are a fan of bands like Secret Chiefs 3 or whatever, this album is pretty good. Find joy in the schizophrenia.
Koby Israelite has issued two previous CDs for the Tzadik label, Dance of the Idiots and Mood Swings. Both showed a tremendous flair for composition, instrumental acumen, humor, and an ability to shift genres without batting an eye. Israelite was born in Tel Aviv, and has played everything from traditional Hebrew folk music, classical music (he was trained on piano at a conservatory from the age of nine), and he's a huge fan of heavy metal and has played in a number of metal and punk bands. This set of John Zorn tunes -- from Zorn's second Masada book -- Orobas: Book of Angels, Vol. 4 was handpicked by the composer. The results are stellar. There's the Yiddish gypsy blues that meld with funk and jazz on "Czgadi," where accordions engage in contrapuntal free form with a fretless bass before guitars and trap kits move to the center of the mix. The startling metal guitar riffing that introduces "Zafiel" is splayed out by Turkish folk melodies by mid-track. Then there are the mariachi-styled melody lines played by trumpets, electric guitars, Farfisa organs, and a drum kit on "Khabiel"; the mood changes, the genres smash and meld effortlessly (klezmer melodies and reggae enter and leave seamlessly and the track is taken out by a kind of prog-surf metal before it ends), and the music becomes hypnotic while remaining exciting, even breathtaking. The other musicians who lay here -- trumpeter Sid Gauld, Stewart Curtis on recorders, piccolos and clarinet, and Yaron Stavi on bass, (Israelite plays no less than eight instruments himself) -- are in top-flight, and this feels more like a band than an individually directed effort. And perhaps that too is a strength Israelite possesses, to place his imprint on Zorn's music in an idiosyncratic way, and still give his ensemble an individual identity. As for the series, Orobas: Book of Angels, Vol. 4 is another essential Four-for-four and counting. This is the most exhilarating set of recordings Tzadik has offered in quite some time. For those who haven't yet checkout Israelite, this is a fantastic opportunity.
-Thom Jurek, Allmusic.comDownload Here
I should probably first admit that I don't really know enough about Prog and the Canterbury scene to fully try to digest an artist like Robert Wyatt. No, in fact, it wasn't until last year that I actually delved into a few of Wyatt's solo releases (with the joy that Comicopera was), and I've loved most of the Soft Machine's albums for years.
Shleep is an excellent release in a pretty spotty discography, sounding very akin to a 70s ers Brian Eno record. The title of the record is apt, as it provides a great, hazy, beautiful, dream-like quality and atmosphere that is constructed around what are pretty decent pop songs. This record was not recorded in the 70s (though Eno did help), but it was recorded in 1997.
Anyway, it's a nice listen. Experimental and out there, but not nearly as bracing as much of his other work. It serves as a good introduction to an otherwise hard musician to digest.
Robert Wyatt was the drummer and founding member of the Canterbury, England based Soft Machine, who played arty, psychedelic, Pink Floyd-influenced jazz-rock fusion. Although his output has been spotty and sporadic, he has been revered for escaping the syrupy art-rock pretentiousness that his colleagues drowned in. Like Captain Beefheart, Wyatt has maintained a playfully unselfconscious experimentalism that may make for difficult listening, but is never boring. Shleep is a welcome comeback which, on first listen, reminded me of an old Brian Eno album. Sure enough, the booklet revealed that Eno did indeed arrange the first song, "Heaps of Sheeps." He also plays on two other songs. Wyatt's high, fragile voice is also similar to Eno's. Like this album, Wyatt's mid-70s solo albums, Rock Bottom (1974) and Ruth Is Stranger Than Richard (1975), mined the same cracks found between pop, art-rock and the avant-garde as Eno's post-Roxy Music solo albums of the same era. The main difference on Shleep is that the music is a gentler, prettier version of the old Wyatt, who could at times be abrasive in both sound and his ruthless politics. His lyrics are not all flight and whimsy, however. "Free Will and Testament" and "Blues in Bob minor" show that his politics have only grown more subtle in his old age, making more timelessly powerful songs in the long run.
-A.S. Van Dorsten
-Fast n Bulbous.com
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AMG has this album rated at 1.5 stars. Really. Check it out here.
Yes it's not the best album that Gryphon put out, but it's not bad. It's a delightful little prog rock album, steeped in the keyboard flourishes and a krauty, droning sound. It catches a lot of flack because it is definitely different than Gryphon's albums before this, which were sort of like really nerdy medieval folk prog pieces, which are a lot of fun in their own right. However, the variety on Raindance is why I like it.
Track 2, "Raindance" is basically just a 5-minute interpretation of falling rain, simulated by a keyboard, and that is followed by the great Lennon/McCartney song "Mother Nature's Son"...here done in a bit of a more 70s, folk rock manner. Immediately following that is "Le Cambrioleur Est Dans Le Mouchoir" which sounds like the soundtrack to some funny movie from the 30s. And the next song sounds like it should open up a PBS special or something.
Listen, it's not the best album, but it's an enjoyable listen with lots of variety in the sound. At the very least, you should download this album for the closing track "(Ein Klein) Heldenleben" which is 15+ minutes of Prog gloriousness.
It's not a challenging listen, but it's fun for sure.
RYM Reviews
Prog Archives Review
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