BLOG TO COMM

Yup, it's time for alla ya zombiefied post-rock/music/LIFE readers just waitin' for a li'l resensifyin' to truck yer blooze away. And what better way to do that than to settle down with this fresher'n fresh post which I hope will be a respite from most of the zilch-level offal that is tossed out on this thing we call the internet.  And believe ya me we need more energy and spurt in our music in the here and now --- I mean, the way things are goin' (which I gotta say is a sad 'n sorry situation especially when compared to the way the world was when I first clocked in --- sheesh, back then all we hadda worry about were nuclear bombs and underwear skids!) we better eat drink 'n be merry as they used to say, for tomorrow we may all be forced to listen to Lady Caga ad infinitum/nauseum to coin an old one (so outta da loop I don't know of any way more current flashdonkeys to mention --- thank goodniz!).

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Listening to the HEPCATS FROM HELL radio show on disque courtesy of Mister Robert Forward dredged up some of the more pleasant feelings I used to get while spinning various 70s/80s cusp under-the-underground musings from a time when I became rather sickening altruistic on one hand yet Burroughsian jaded on the other. Not only was Richard Meltzer perhaps the ultimo rock 'n roll radio host ever (genial, cordial, bad taste...) but the selection of music he broadcasted sure intermingles a whole lot sweller'n some of the trackage I've seen listed on various podcasts available across the great divide. And Meltzer is one guy who really knows how to bring out the BEST in a guest, usually the best as far as blatant nose-thumbing at FCC rules and general anti-precious petunia thought processes go that is. 

Right now as I'm typing this moosh I'm spinning a show where Meltzer's gabbin' 'bout the then-latest Sugarman-penned Jim Morrison bio with Don and Exene from "X" who come off a lot more lucid than I would have expected given I had the sneakin' suspicion that the two'd be kinda  --- airheaded. Dunno exactly why I would think this other'n because of those sour memories of the group during their decline as well as the various post-"X" acts that I didn't think matched the gutter cool of the group during their late-seventies/v. early eighties height. Not so sure actually since I can't even REMEMBER what a good portion sounded like, but if I could I'm sure this would be the reason.

Even more startling's that night when none other'n Chris D. himself of previous post fame subs for an absent Meltzer --- no guests here and let's just say that Mr. D. coulda taken a few lessons at the Bus Eubanks-helmed "Sharon Broadcast Training" school, but otherwise the show was great what with the man spinnin' alla the tuneage that made a man outta him including the old as well as then-current! A whole lotta budding broadcasters (either via the airwaves or the computer age) could (but probably won't) take a few lessons in hosting and sound selections from HEPCATS I'll tell ya. Not that I've actually HEARD a podcast since I can't be bothered to nor am I even interested in doing so, but if I have heard one I'm sure the hosts could take a few lessons because...what else?

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Once again I came upon some old fan mail written by a guy who decided to play the old "build up/knock down" game with me:

 

Sure brings back bad memories (couldn't've happened at a worse time in my life, as if there were any better ones), though maybe I shoulda been tipped off by the sublime snark that would have been evident had I only read between the lines. By the way, anyone out there in the market for the first issue of TOO FUN TOO HUGE complete with a note from the editor himself? Will let it go for a good price, and the way I feel the sooner the blasted thing leaves the premises the better! 'n no Hinman, you ain't gonna get it even if the thing is high up on your want list (as if he'd even bother to ask considering the loathing he has not only for me but for my entire reason for being) --- I still gotta have some shard of PRIDE in my life y'know.

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Anyway, enough of the crybaby boohoo and onto something a whole lot more funtime, mainly the record (hokay, Cee-Dee) reviews! Got some good 'uns here and by that I mean slabs of sound that really resensify the ol' brain nodes and make you feel like you did when you were younger, stupider (if that's possible) and things sure came off a whole lot more refreshing and as life-reaffirming than they do now. I actually bought a few of the items for review --- the rest were "donated" by the likes of Paul McGarry and Robert Forward who I gotta say really do their oomphest to help keep this blog somewhat afloat.

I must admit that I do feel like a grifter par excellence for allowing these people to send me these burns without them having any thought or hope of getting something back in the process. Then again people like Paul and Bob are souls who do good things for others without thinking about what's in it for them, and if more people thought like this well --- I'd have alla the music in the world that I wanted and for FREE too! Most if not all of you should feel as generous as Paul and Robert and give from the bottom of your hearts while I receive it all with the pleasure knowing that you guys are exemplary specimens of human kindness, or something like that.

Lotsa jazz to be found here which would figure given my current obsession with the more seventies breed of avant wails, particularly those of the AACM variety. Maybe I am flashing back to my late teens when things like the new jazz along with John Cage and the rest of them twentieth century composers took up a huge portion of my musical obsession, a time when combing through the New Music Distribution Service catalog was quite an experience that could never be totally sated given the few pennies I had to scrape together to get even a fraction of the records that I so desired. It's kinda funny on one hand that most if not all of the music that I would have had to pay thousands to hear a good fortysome years back can now be picked up for free on the web, but sheesh even though I am such a cheap miser at heart who in their right mind'd wanna wait so long just to save what could have amounted to a not-so-small fortune?

Ah well, I got some goodies lined up here even though I'm positive than positiver that you will beg to differ:

Les Rallizes Denudes-'67-'69 STUDIO ET LIVE CD (The Last One Musique Records)

Pick of the litter's this reissue of the tres obscure Les Rallizes Denudes platter from the days when this trailblazing bunch were still feelin' around with regards to defining their sound and general psyched up outlook. It's a righteous holy mess, complete with a cut from a late '68 gig (reminiscent of that Big Brother and the Holding Company/Quicksilver/Oxford Circle Family Dog jam which should have been pressed up ages ago), an "Out of Focus"-inspired instrumental and a whole slew of what'cha might call more "straightforward" tracks definitely of the nugget if you duggit variety. Not only has the sound been beefed up but two bonus tracks including an instrumental cover/deconstruction of "Tobacco Road" were tacked onto the end only adding to the goodness graciousness of it all! Play this for your friends who think that all Japanese music's nothing but them koto plinks you used to hear in old moom pitchers and Kyu Sakamoto pop and find out that you probably won't have any friends left.

By the way, The Last One Records have reissued the three early-nineties Les Rallizes Denudes Cee-Dees, the ones originally released by the group themselves long before the deluge of post-Rallizes albums swept the underground hipper 'n hip market. Therefore, you really don't have any excuse to pass on these since they're up 'n about and won't cost you the usual collectors fees the originals fetch these days. Better yet, you can wait ten years and have Paul McGarry or Robert Forward burn up a copy for ya. 

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Peter Brotzmann/Fred Van Hove/Han Bennick-JAZZ IN DER KAMMER NR. 71 CD-r burn (originally on Trost Records, Germany --- if ya wanna hear it try here)

Sometimes this Euro free play can sound somewhat slick and perhaps even downright sterile, and it's not hard to understand why considering how many of these continental types tend to sneak a whole load of classical influx into that hard Afro-based sound. Then again the Art Ensemble of Chicago used to do that and it still sounded like Great Black Music to me. Maybe these Europeans are just too straightforward --- dunno but anyway this '74 live show from Peter Brotzmann, pianist Fred Van Hove and percussionist Han Bennick does fall somewhat into the trap.

Still fine beyond belief, even if the overall crispness and clarity recalls the whole reason for being that made up the ECM label. Well, at least that oft-cringe-y company had more'n a few good moments and if this platter was on ECM this would be just one of 'em. Brotzmann is --- well, BROTZMANN and as you'd expect if you've been following his fiftysome-year career he plays just as out-crazed here as he did on those early whackers --- really brain crunching over-the-top resensification. I gotta admit that Van Hove on piano can, when the pressure builds, kinda sound like Cecil Taylor with alum in his veins, and Bennick gets maddening when left to his various devices. If you've heard alla this New Thing in Jazz ruckus for the past few decades all I can say is --- you ain't heard this outer reaches effort which might even get you to forget MACHINE GUN, if only for a second or two.

Any platter with a track called "Filet Americaine" is bound to grab my attention (really!), and even if you're not as hung up on extraneous things like track titles you just might like it yourself!

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Various Artists-ROCKY MOUNTAIN LOW --- THE COLORADO MUSICAL UNDERGROUND OF THE LATE 1970s CD-r burn (originally on Hyperpycnal Records)

As someone like me who was born and bred in the western Pee-YAY! area can tell you, when all of the ideas and flashes of what was going down in such burghs as London or New York finally hit the boonies it looked as if all of the power and innovation the originators had brought forth had definitely lost a whole load of potency. Kinda like when the hurricane finally makes its way up here during the autumn...all of the dangerous winds and deluge have long dissipated and all we're left with is three days of gunky weather! 

The same sure can be said about musical trends such as "punk" --- that newer than new music, the kind that was supposed to wipe out the lunkhead AOR dribble which ultimately made its ways into little enclaves filled with disaffected kids all across the United States. By the time the news hit this locale the sound sure came off like an aural version of a copy made on a sheet of carbon paper that was used up way beyond its lifetime. Personally, I'd much rather have lived through three days of snizzling rain and bad television reception than have listened to some of this nth generation punque that came off like nothing but a huge embarrassment, especially to those who were giving it the big rah-rah only a few years earlier!

I was expecting the music on this comp of seventies punk unto new wave made by a buncha Coloradoans who were rich enough to subscribe to CREEM and NEW MUSICAL EXPRESS to come off just as pallid as many of the local groups I struggled through listening to back in the danker'n dank days of the eighties and nineties. But once again I was wrong, for a good portion of the groups who appear on ROCKY MOUNTAIN LOW, even those patterned after past accomplishments that might have seemed rather redundant by this time, still have enough of the spark and insight to make them more'n just the usual precocious and sainted types that used to proliferate during the ol' "don't touch me, I'm new wave" days of yore.

Hey, some of these obscurer-beyond-obscure acts're even pretty original, or at least sound just as good as those groups that used to get the huzzahs because of their rawness and low fidelity genius. For example the Dancing Assholes got that cheap crank out gruffness that had people paying exorbitant prices for Fuckin' Flyin' A-Heads records. Their tracks first saw the day in '09 when this compilation came out, but man had they only been released at the time they would have stymied more'n a few avid collectors including a certain guy who for some strange reason liked to put green tape on his own prized possessions (as well as a few that he felt needed to skeedaddle his collection).

Even when these Coloradoans "borrow" from the biggies well, they sure borrow good. Some of these groups're quite proficient, or at least as proficient as they could get working in such isolation (such as with the Dirty Dogs' post-Dolls/Stooges roar-ons "Sorority Girl" and "I Wanna Be Loved" which ain't thee "I Wanna Be Loved" but wha' th' hey...). 'n even when you think a group or song is gonna be another wishy-washy heard-it-all-before-and-didn't-like-it-the-FIRST-time tossout it sneaks up behind ya and kicks you hard in the henry thus dissipating all of those preconceptions about podunk after-the-fact rock 'n roll for good! Just 'bout every track here is better'n many of those inspiration-less living room splats that you usedta hear on the Maximum Rocknroll radio show, the ones that got the go-ahead if only because the band in question sang something nasty about Ronald Reagan. Sheesh, that green tape ref. about sure brought out quite a few long-buried (and I thought for good!) memories in me.

For a buncha amateurs they sure act like the kind who had a whole lot goin' for 'em! Of course you knew they never were gonna achieve even a shard of fame and fortune because they were stuck right inna middle of John Denversville ("People like David Bowie and the New York Dolls exist only to satisfy the sick and far out"!!!!!), but in this present day and age it really matters because of the energy and devotion that made up these groups' lust for life. It's four decades later but I get the feelin' that the acts who popped up here sure needed alla the lovin' and hosannas that they shoulda gotten the first time 'round, and this offering gives it all to 'em and then some!

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WCSB LIVE LOST TRAXXX - DEVO AND THE RUBBER CITY REBELS CD-r burn

Not having been whatcha'd call a fan of the Devites since their second long player (didn't even care that much for the singles!) I must admit that this live '77 show from the legendary Crypt in Akron was better'n I woulda expected. The group sounds pretty goldurn loose and closer to their Roxy/Sparks roots than they would be after falling into the same new unto gnu wave trap that irritated me in just a few short year's time. The early takes on later-on familiarities makes me wonder where they went wrong (not as if we all eventually knew...) and, like with early Pere Ubu, it's nice hearing what they sounded like before the suits got their way and the pretension set in. I'll bet someone presses this up on vinyl and sells it for exorbitant sums.

I much prefer the Rubber City Rebels who sound like what alla those mid-seventies local beer 'n leather groups shoulda sounded like.  I can remember when it was this style of hard local power sound was being bandied about with the "punk" tag, but just barely.

Here's hoping that WCSB continues with this series because there were a whole load of local acts that needed this kind of exposure and well, better forty-five years later'n never I always say!

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Joseph Jarman/Famoudou Don Moye-EGWU-ANWU (SUN SONG) 2-CD set (India Navigation Records)

There are so many albums by the Art Ensemble of Chicago and related groupings that have come out since the seventies that it is practically dang near impossible for me to keep track of 'em all. Wading through their massive discography would cost me a whole lotta time, effort and of course moolah that I just can't part with. So at this time I'm just taking what I can when I can, and although I will go to my grave missing out on a whole lotta these definitely crucial efforts at least I gave it the extra oomph effort as if that's gonna matter to St. Peter one bit.

Here's one AEC spinoff that I sure had more'n a tad bitta interest in o'er the years. India Navigation was a fairly good source for some of the more outta the way jazz recordings of the late-seventies, and this double-disque from longtime members Joseph Jarman and Famoudou Don Moye is everything I woulda expected from the pair --- free reeds and drums with sidesteps into Asian themes and African percussive workouts that evokes everything from "World Music" to "turn down that racket!!!!!!" 'n I'm really glad for it.

Even if I should hate it for being recorded at some boho artist hideaway in Woodstock I find EGWU-ANWU quite a gem, what with Jarman and Moye engaging in moments that go from atonal bluster to passages that are so quiet you'll have to do a little bit of ear straining to get the total effect. The tenor playing/free drums on "Na Enu Igwe" does present the state of the post-Ayler jazz trajectory what with the two recalling everything from INTERSTELLAR SPACE to those Rashied Ali duos with Frank Lowe and Leroy Jenkins that the guy released his very own Survival label.

EGWU-ANWU sure warms the cockles of my heart, especially during them moments such as when Jarman and Moye engage in a vibes/marimba duet that surprisingly enough manages to calms the ol' nervous system especially after being shaken up quite a bit by the free play. Great for those Sunday PMs when there's nothing else fabulous goin' on, though you might wanna take it in pieces 'cause it does have the tendency to overwhelm in one sitting.

Oh 'n by the way, have any of you that copy of Lester Bangs' review of (I believe) this very effort (or maybe it was Roscoe Mitchell's NONAAH?) that popped up in THE VILLAGE VOICE, the one where he not only registered his dislike of the entire AACM's reason for existence but mentioned the time he attended some (I believe) Moye performance snickering throughout while getting the stink eye from a few patrons in the process? Dunno if that is exactly what 'app'd (ain't read the thing in soooooo long) but still if anyone can direct me to where I can find it, t'would appreciate it! And if you do send it, send just the article and not the entire paper --- it's not like I want to read about any left-handed Hopi/Latinix lesbian film festivals!

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Hawkwind-BICKERSHAW '72 CD-r burn

The quality's what some early-eighties tape trader'd call "C-" (and even then he'd have the audacity to sell a chrome cassette of it for a whopping ten bucks!), but did that ever stop us from appreciating the music our fave groups laid forth, no matter how muddled they may sound? 

This bit of blur captures Hawkwind just as they were breaking into the upper strata as well as in their best setting, the outdoor rock festival. Their early-seventies repertoire gets the live workover with "Silver Machine" naturally turning up, and as usual the hand-held cassette quality gives the music an added oomph that I don't think any of those eighties-era "half-mastered" albums coulda matched. Heck, I get the idea this is how the addled audience heard the entire festival given the mind-expanding chemicals I'm sure most of 'em were high on!

It's on Youtube and for a price way cheaper'n any of those people hawking these recordings in the classifieds of TROUSER PRESS were chargin'. So burn yourself a copy because if you're man enough to read my blog you're man enough to experience Hawkwind at their aural roughest!

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The Revolutionary Ensemble-LUPE KINO COLOGNE 77 CD-r burn

Got nada idea where this 'un originates from (discogs.com doesn't even mention it!) but it sure sounds like whatcha'd call a professional, flesh and blood Revolutionary Ensemble album one could have easily picked up at a specialty record shop way back when. The cover sure looks authentic as well. Big mystery here.

Whaddevah, this '77 show from right about when this kinda/sorta legendary in outer-reaches jazz circles trio decided to part ways presents the Ensemble as they usually were --- new music with a whole load of that AACM-influenced angular kinetic feeling which could go in any whichway direction depending on the natural flow. Leroy Jenkins beats all of the other free jazz violinists I've heard, Ornette and Billy Bang included, while Norris "Sirone" Jones on trombone has it all over Roswell Rudd and hands down at that (his bass playing ain't no slouch either). Percussionist Jerome Cooper holds everything together rather snattily, and his impressive forays into balafon (and classical piano!) add a typically multi-influential dimension that recalls similar efforts by everyone from Oliver Lake to the Art Ensemble of Chicago themselves. The overall mesh of angular sound and a gnarly kineticism leads me to believe that the three were just born to perform with each other 'n perhaps NO ONE ELSE!!! Spiritual Siamese triplets if you can imagine that. 

Like just about each and every other Revolutionary Ensemble recording this sways from jazz to new classical and maybe even has a tinge of r&b to it, all done up with what they used to call an "avant garde" mindset which thankfully doesn't get all brainiac on you! Too bad all three are no longer with us, since they could have given us a whole lot had they only stuck around to crank a few more out. 

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Just another perhaps not-so-friendly reminder that there are plenty of BLACK TO COMM back issues  still looking for a home, waiting to be adopted (for a fee, of course) by some rock 'n roll music maniac just full of love and compassion. Love of music that is, and compassion for this doof who couldn't unload these magazines if I were givin' 'em away with gold bars attached. I'm sure you're the type of guy who swims against the tide when it comes to music or else you wouldn't be reading this blog in the first place now, eh?  BLACK TO COMM might not be as enticing or as stomach-turning slick as some of the other rags now up and about but that only adds to the CHARM of it all, eh?