It's been 25 years since I last listened to a bit of Charlie Mingus. I rarely get into jazzy jazz. When you start at fake jazz, avant-garde jazz and jazz fusion it's a bit hard to go back. When you want the mental free jazz or the funky jazz funk or the spiritual jazz or the symphonic soundtrack jazz or the fake fake jazz it's hard to do the jazzy jazz. Anyway this is the jazziest jazz I've dug in a long time. I mean it's funky and swinging and down n dirty bluesy jazz but it's also jazzy jazz. You could pop on a beret, smoke a jazz cigarette and click your fingers like a revolting hepcat beat poet turd to this. I think this is as close to Flintstones jazz that I'll ever get. Funnily enough Mingus encompassed so much more than jazz into his musical vocabulary and detested the term jazz.
The Incredible band here are:
CHARLES MINGUS, bass, leader & composer JACKIE McLEAN, alto sax
So if you skip to 9:40 here on the infamous Trinidad Cassette (1982) we have the version we all know and love of Stevie. This tune was written around 1980/81 and was apparently about Stevie Nicks maybe (?). This topmost tune from Brian has never been properly recorded by The Beach Boys or Brian Wilson solo.
I mean it sounds like it could be a demo for That Lucky Old Sun or Sunflower or Pet Sounds for that matter. So I guess it's just timeless classic Brian Wilson. It's incredible to me that he can have such a classic song just lying around gathering dust being neglected.
Stevie - The Beach Boys (1982)
I'm guessing here but I assume somebody has recently just cleaned up The Trinidad Cassette version of the tune but I can't help but think maybe getting rid of some of that noise and reverb it has now lost some of its magic dust. So The Trinidad Cassette is also unfortunately known as The Cocaine Sessions and sometimes also known as The Hamburger Sessions. Dennis Wilson allegedly used to offer burgers and/or cocaine to Brian to motivate him to create music.
Stevie - Saint Etienne (2000)
Of course Bob Stanley would do the most obscure cover possible of a Brian Wilson song for the tribute LP Caroline Now!: The Songs Of Brian Wilson & The Beach Boys (2000). Also included in the song is a touch of My Diane a tune from the much maligned Beach Boys record M.I.U. Album (1978). I'd love to find an interview of Sarah, Bob or Pete discussing this recording because it's kinda genius.
It's so joyous reading the comments sections to Steely Dan tunes because they all realise who the best band ever was. And the comment that exemplifies it all is this: One of the best things about Steely Dan is EVERYTHING!
I'm still a neophyte when it comes to Steely Dan, only converting twelve or thirtyeen years ago. So I still haven't gone back to re-investigate if The Royal Scam is actually any good or got fully on board with Gaucho yet. It's hard to pick between the other five LPs. At this point in time there does seem to be extra special magic permeating on Aja and Countdown To Ecstasy.
I have deliberately avoided the books, magazines, videos and interweb gossip on the group. Sticking with my limited knowledge that Steely Dan were two sardonic upstarts from New York supplanted in LA spreading their acerbic perspective via deliciously idiosyncratic upbeat jazz inflected rock music of the genius variety.
Having said that though, I had read a couple of books by Barney Hoskyns which featured Steely Dan in cameo roles so I do know there was some darkness lurking within their shenanigans when it came to excessive 70s lifestyles. Being commentators on the rock'n'roll/hollywood scene didn't make them immune to its pitfalls.
Walter Becker died a few years back so I'm disappointed that I didn't get it together to organise a trip to the big smoke to see them last time they were in Australia. What a loser I am. I feel like Becker would actually be proud of me for this failing though. I mean would this not be the perfect subject matter for a Steely Dan hit: A forty-something ex-lead singer of band deadbeat with a failed marriage and mental issues is losing his shit in a horrible dusty country town and can't even get it together to buy a plane ticket to go see his favourite band's final tour.
Anyway Countdown To Ecstasy is one of the great singalong (in the wrong octave and out of tune yell-along really) albums for me. The irresistible melodies are just so expansive and exquisite plus you never know quite where Fagen's always surprising vocal phrasing is gonna go, which keeps you on your toes. And that's still occurring after hundreds of listens to this one LP.
Beyond that, what makes Steely Dan still so glittering and seductive in a timeless manner is a mystery. I'm sure if a music teacher explained their methods behind the notes and the performance thereof I'd still be none the wiser and it still wouldn't explain the why?. Suffice to say Donald Fagen and Walter Becker's prestigious charisma had the alchemy of synergy bubbling over within their songwriting partnership, it was just a matter of how perfect they could get their incredible vision out of their heads and onto tape [Yep I do realise Steely Dan don't need my endorsement and that I don't need to be adding to the voluminous discourse on the subject or doing a half-baked summary of why audiences of different generations have been so captivated throughout the 50 years since their inception in one paragraph but er, there it was anyway. Sorry, not sorry]
Sophistication is one thing musically but that would be nothing without the mass appeal of their thrillingly catchy hooks. This is pop music after all.
(A perfectly crafted slice of 6os garage rock. Many tried and many failed but the stars aligned for teen-Texans The Gentleman with this song, its performance and recording. If aliens landed and asked "What is this garage you speak of?" I would have no hesitation in pointing them in the direction of It's A Cryin' Shame for a definitive example of the genre. All the elements are present and accounted for but unlike those who failed they are all in the right place and were enthusiastically activated for peak aesthetic success.)
Sometimes you just go to have your 60s garage at its most primitive and raw. This neanderthal sneer is delivered with next level hostility then at 1:22 it gets even more malicious with the ugliest, most primal blown out lead break ever. A spiteful scuzz-fest of the highest order.
A fun and fascinating tune that's got the lot. Starts out the gate with organ and fuzz followed by very vigorous drummage. Then we get great deadpan vocals in the style that would later be much utilised by new wave artists. Next we get beautifully fluid psych lead breaks meeting insane spooky chanting. A classic psych curiosity.
Peak 66 right here folks. Pretty sure this is perfection. Coz You Don't Love Me is in that sweet intersection of snarly and stompy blended with swirly toe tapping jangles and supreme melodic lead and backing vocals. The way it effortlessly flows along with that irresistible beat... so good.
I can never put my finger on what this reminds me of... something that came later in the art rock or new wave... maybe Pere Ubu or Boys Next Door circa Door Door or something like that. I guess it's not that dissimilar to 1967's greatest band Love either. A tense and ominous feeling like no other is conjured here. A creepy vibe of bewilderment and urban malaise.
A primo slice of Michigan garage into psych. Sweet Cherry were another one and done group. They did this 7" single on Stop Records which I'm assuming was their label as this was the only ever release on the imprint. A splendid noise.
*Note: This didn't turn up on 60s garage compilations until the 1990s.
It's a bit hard to think about anything else with regard to music after seeing Paul McCartney on Saturday night in Melbourne. Performance and energy-wise the fact that he isn't a 40 year old bloke but indeed an 81 year old is quite astonishing. He was in fine voice and agile on his instruments throughout, putting on a memorable show.
I saw Paul McCartney do Helter Skelter and it was the best.
Anyway here's a tune of his that I love. I never studied music beyond year seven in high school but I have been told by the Mrs that all my favourite 60s tunes have minor chords/keys/whatever in them so I'm guessing Things We Said Today does too. Paul didn't play this on Satdee but I think it used to be in his set a few years back and it was integral to The Beatles 1964 setlist .
It's the mood here that resonates. It's gloomy, haunting and perhaps slightly sinister. The moodiness in the music is reiterated in the subject matter of the lyrics. In this autobiographical tune about his relationship with Jane Asher, Paul describes lovers being torn apart by distance and also perhaps realising this could well be the peak of their love as Paul feels he will one day be nostalgic for this present moment of which he sings. Probably because he felt this was a doomed love affair which as it turned out, it was.
The Beatles - Wild Honey Pie (1968)
Another Paul favourite of mine. He didn't play this either surprisingly. Not only did he invent heavy metal but also batshit crazy avant rock ie. this is a blueprint for The Residents. I am ever so grateful for this contribution to rock and its left field future.
The Beatles - She Came In Through The Bathroom Window (1969)
So this was a major highlight of the live show. We did not know this was coming at all. We knew other Abbey Road bits were usually part of the set like Something, You Never Give Me Your Money and the last three bits of the Abbey Road Medley: Golden Slumbers, Carry That Weight and The End. However She Came In Through The Bathroom Window was a recent addition to the set which was a delightful surprise even though it was extracted from the other Paul written bits of the medley and placed among miscellaneous Beatles classics in the set. It was actually a bit weird hearing it out of context from the other tunes in the medley. I mean if I was Paul I'd just do the John parts too ie. Sun King, Mean Mr Mustard and Polythene Pam so the medley wasn't split up. We all love it. We all want it. So just do the entire thing mate. Anyway I feel lucky to have heard Paul play all of his parts of the Abbey Road medley to me personally. Thank Paul! Legend.
The Beatles - Abbey Road Side 2 Medley (1969)
The still astounding final suite from Abbey Road is a staggering swan song for a group at the peak of their powers.
Have you heard about The Beatles?
Don't try and tell me Abbey Road isn't the best masterpiece!
My initial thoughts on Mystery the LP it came from: How is this not a city pop album from 80s Japan? The lovely plaintive vocals remind me a bit of Sarah from St Etienne. How have I not heard or even heard of this before? Perhaps they never made it to the pages of Australian Smash Hits.
I feel like this is the kind of record Bob Stanley has probably written about in the past. Nightwind is one of the outstanding tracks from Mystery. This post-disco pop is impeccably put together. Wait for the very excellent 4.04 moment when it swells up and breaks down to the wind and synth moment. Atmospheric synth bliss ensues for two minutes before the chorus returns. Nice. There seems to be a video game theme tune within this song as well which is a neat bonus. The timeless vibe here was possibly even nostalgic at the time of release.
*Turns out the mastermind behind RAH Band, Richard Hewson, had his hand in arranging and producing hundreds of pop releases since the mid-60s. From The Beatles, Bee Gees, Nick Drake and Diana Ross to Pilot, Fleetwood Mac, Supertramp, Cliff, Shakin' Stevens and Toyah.
I totally missed this when it got a revival and a reissue. It wasn't on my radar in the 90s or early 00s so I'm guessing it got dug up and rediscovered after I was no longer paying attention. Once Comus, Trees, Fresh Maggots, Dr Strangely Strange, Cam Am Des Puig, Mark Fry etc. had entered my life I thought that was the lot for the unknown 70s psych-folk from Britain. But nah there always seems to be more and ten or eleventy years ago voilà this turned up.
Tony, Caro and John are more on the accessible fun pop side of psych-folk-rock with their well honed whimsical bedroom crafted pop and delightful girl/boy vocals. These middle class hippies sure have some kind of special knack for creating warm and catchy tunes.
Having said that Sargasso Sea is the most out there track from their one and only LP All On The First Day.
Tony, Caro and John - Eclipse Of The Moon (1972)
This one is so goddam infectious with the enchanting girl/boy harmonies of Tony & Caro, the handclaps, the tripped out guitar fx, Incredible String Band meets Beatles melodies, jew's harp and mucho reverb. An understated masterpiece, Eclipse Of The Moon surely coulda been a number one hit. This is two track recording at its finest. Nice!
So I ended up here at the music video for this Neptunes production from twenty two years ago performed by forgotten million dollar signing pop R&B star Nivea because I'd just watched a disturbing mini documentary about this charismatic sensation and her stalled career.
Then I started thinking I wonder if all these wonderful Neptunes tracks, that were so beloved at the time from the late 90s and early 00s, still stand up. Are they revered, going to be revered or will they just be tossed in the ephemeral pop culture heap that I imagine every pop, rap and r&b tune released this year will be?
It had me wondering whether this music was the last moment where pop was created with an inbuilt afterlife or did they just miss that boat so as to never enjoy a resurgence of interest ever again. My previous theories and cut-off points of cultural relevance for particular dance genres and hip hop have somewhat shifted so I'm not really sure. Music just by being released in the 21st century does tend to give material a certain unintentional disdained stain. Once upon a time I would have really cared about these ideas and had ready to go arguments but now...
I still stand by my rock theory that no rock group who formed post-1993 are able to be seriously considered for the historic rock era.
Run Away still sounds pretty damn nifty. Not just a wicked hypnotic Neptunes beat but great performances from Pusha T and Nivea.
The Liks - Best U Can (2001)
The beats here coupled with Pharrell's contribution had me flashing back In Search Of... era NERD and surprisingly that was a good thing. As in I wanted to get out my old cobwebby cd that if I recall correctly was really the last cd I owned to get a hammering as it was loved so much by everyone for its party anthem vibes.
Dunno if I recall any other Liks tunes but they might have been worth checking out if this is anything to go by. Apparently members of nu-metal groups Deftones and Linkin Park do cameos in this video.
N.O.R.E. - Grimy (2001)
Now this Neptunes track is fucking insane. Psychedelic, minimal, hard, crisp. intense, seemingly simple and deliciously catchy. I mean the entire beat is the hook innit. This is still irresistible!
Fabolos - Young'n (Holla Back) (2001)
Don't recall this one at all. Pharrell contributes Sympathy For The Devil "WOO HOOS" I wonder if he had to pay Mick Jagger for that? Or were they just generic howls? Then at the 2.50 mark Timbaland enters although he's not credited.
Usher - I Don't Know (2001)
This is still an infectious banger. A precursor to Yeah really.
Ray J feat. Lil Kim - Wait A Minute (2001)
Perhaps we can never forgive Ray J for helping foist the fucking Kardashians upon us by fucking Kim on videotape but his other historic moment is undeniably ace. This is peak Neptunes tuneage pre-Pharrell's face fatigue era. This beat is so good they loved it so much they basically recycled it for Lapdance, one of their own In Search Of... hits. Hindsight's a funny thing, it tells us Wait A Minute was wasted on this tool. Then again who's not a tool in the music industry? So who gives a fuck.
Philly's Most Wanted - Cross The Border (2001)
The latin influenced riddim here is utterly contagious. There is no way you are not bumpin', noddin' and toe tappin' to this genius monster jam despite what you may think of the reprehensible lyrical content. Cross The Border is insistent instantaneous infectious pop. However do you want to rewind? Or are you happy to never hear it again?
Jadakiss feat. Pharrell - Knock Yourself Out (2001)
The sexual "ooh aahs" here are so stupid it would be absurd to think this was meant to actually be sexy but the beat is irrefutably stellar. Peak performance from Jadakiss too. No need for thinking here. Hip-hop to tear the club up doesn't get any better!
Britney Spears - I'm A Slave 4 U (2001)
This may have helped usher in the retarded hyper-sexual pop era. Then again that had been a project started many years prior. I mean my dad thought the back cover to Madonna's Like A Virgin LP was outrageous soft porn not fit for teenagers eyeballs. Who knew that by the 2010s primary school kids would be able to stream the most depraved pornographic videos imaginable and adults would barely even batter an eyelid.
I'm A Slave 4 U is peak Brittney combined with peak Neptunes. She's wearing sexy knickers on the outside of her raunchy rock star leather pants like she's a sexual superhero.
...So the jury's still out for me with regard to The Neptune's legacy. I mean these beats were legendary, cool and innovative at the time and are still fresh and fun now. I can't really gage the perception of significance placed upon them today though. They obviously have their place in the history of rap, r&b and pop because they happened.
The Neptunes were so ubiquitous they absolutely owned the radio and music video shows in 2001/02 particularly. Once their inventive heyday was done by the late 00s was there any value left in these old beats? I mean once the next generation of beat science masters arrived to take the crown what purpose did these beats serve? The over exposure and saturation of The Neptunes aesthetic in the early 00s left people fatigued of such a sound and a massively popular resurgence in interest in these sonic artefacts hasn't really come to pass.
Still that was a very good half hour of tuneage, even if it wasn't as nostalgic as expected. There was a vague sense of of meaninglessness permeating these tunes. That's pop music for ya, however pop music nostalgia probably isn't meant to be the tunes from when you were at the end of your twenties. I can understand that it's much deeper feels when songs are from childhood, teenage years or even your early twenties. Plus for me those eras all happened to be in the historic music era of the 20th century.
*This is just a nine track selection of The Neptunes output for 2001. These tunes are probably not even 15% of what they produced in this incredibly prolific year.
Laraaji - Meditations 1 & 2 (slowed and stretched)
As if Laraaji wasn't awesome enough! Who knew you could make his recordings even better?
So this guy on youtube has, using the Paulstretch app, stretched the last two tracks from 1980's Ambient 3: Day Of Radiance to levels of absolute serenity. Twenty six minutes of music has now been stretched and expanded to three hours here. This stretching has the effect of smoothing the sound events and noticeable musical note playing into just a remaining ethereal drone. Most people familiar with the original track probably wouldn't even recognise this as Meditations. I can't really detect the zither at all, it's all just a lovely glowing eternal resonance.
This shit is just pure peak funk. The rhythm track here is off the fucking chain. The whole band is on fire though. Proper deep in the funk block party goodness.
It doesn't get better than this.
Lunar Funk - Space Monster (1972)
The Counts did a coupla 7" singles under the pseudonym Lunar Funk. This is smokin' supreme funk of the deepest variety. There is no way you are not gonna get down to this peak party rhythm.
Then sometimes you find yourself listening to black ambient cassettes from the 90s at five in the morning. This is a whole lotta fun with all sorts of demented and murky vibes. It's folk. it's ambient, It's dark, it's slowcore, It's black metal, it's lo-fi, it's atmospheric, it's psychedelic, it's post-rock, it's even pop and it's good times.
Is it the French Cookie Monster in a forest wrestling a dark-psych-folk El Kabong?
The last three and a half minutes is a sublime post-rock hypnogogic slowcore jam or something. It's definitely something!
Could you get any more 80s soundtrack-y? How could this not be in a movie! Also very moving or as the kids say all the feels.
Toshifumi Hinata - Colored Air (1986)
More ace eighties soundtrack ambience, this time with even more bells! Plus it's called Colored Air!
Toshifumi Hinata - A Moment (1986) Eighties soundtrack ambient with backwards bits. Toshifumi could have done this for an hour and I would have been enthralled.
*Actually I've just realised Reality In Love might not even be a soundtrack. I just always assumed it was due to its soundtrack-y-ness. However I think this record was before he got gigs doing scores. Doesn't really matter whatever it is...
Celtic harp played by a French bloke with strings and chorus from the seminal 1971 LP Renaissance De La Harpe Celtique. An all round ambient proto-new age ethereal vibe then check out the trip-hop beats that enter at 2:05. Pretty visionary and captivating. Nice.
Opening tune from Renaissance De La Harpe Celtique. Waves and harp then halfway through strings, flute, double bass and er... tablas are added. Nice.
Natural Snow Buildings - Satanic Demona Part I (2009)
I was just poking around the internet looking to clear up some things in my head. I kept getting confused I saw this album by Mount Eerie and thought I'd heard it before but then I was thinking maybe that was Mount Kimbie and who exactly are Panthu De Prince and The Microphones. And are...Natural Snow Building who I've been mixing up with slow Buildings, no some post-punk revival band Life Before Buildings for twenty years? And is James Blake the guy I've been thinking is some other guy for a long time maybe this other guy Dean Blunt? Is this Eluviam guy from Mount Kimbie the same guy from Portland who does ambient records? All these people and more have been conflated and confused in my brain for a long time. At the same time I don't wanna check out stuff I already decided was bollocks years ago but how will I know? Maybe I need to make lists of all the music I've checked out and disliked...anyway...
So I decided to look into Natural Snow Buildings. Turns out they are French and not who I thought they are or were. I may have investigated them in the past but I don't remember. Some people out there think they are really good and say their 2009 five cassette set Daughter Of Darkness was the best music of that year. I'm getting through disc two and I gotta say it's pretty enjoyable black as night psych-folk-drone of the highest order so far, so that appears promising. Some of these tracks of apocalyptic strumming & sustain are over forty minutes long! I don't know if they're cool or dorks or poseurs or earnest or revolting hipsters or have a moronic political agenda or what and I don't really care. This shit was old hat then as it is now but it seems to be quite a likeable, seductive and enchanting hat so... thou shalt enter the darkness.
Natural Snow Buildings - Daughters Of Darkness (2009)
Undeniably exquisite drone-y psych-folk: Night Trippin' in all the colours of the dark.
The Beach Boys - Child Is Father Of The Man (1966) [Released 2018]
I haven't been paying attention to Beach Boys related reissues since the 00s when they re-released one of the holy grails: Dennis Wilson's solo album. People who read this blog probably don't even realise that I'm a Beach Boys obsessive. Aside from krautrock The 90s and early 00s were all about only one old band from the English speaking world and that was The Beach Boys. The Good Vibrations Box, The Pet Sounds Session Box and the cd original album remasters were some of the great reissue excavations of the 90s. On any given drunken night there was a high likelihood of The Beach Boys Greatest Hits getting a hiding. If I recall correctly I Get Around was best for dancing while Barbara Ann was best for singing at the top of your lungs to surely annoy the neighbours. Anyway the nostalgia spiral continues. It turns out five years back they unearthed an original 1966 mix of this here tune. A pieced together reconstruction had appeared on 2011's Smile Sessions Box.
I do recall in that Beautiful Dreamer Brian Wilson Smile doco from 2004, i think, that the young music director guy with the great standy up hair had found some bits of this tune which was very exciting. It took fifteen years to get it on a reissue though. Of course fans know this is a sort of prelude tune and a coda to the big tune that is Surf's Up. There are a stack of versions out there but this is the genuine what would have been on Smile in 1967 version! Anyway I know this is only going to be interesting to Smile minutiae aficionados of which I sort of retired from being but now I'm back baby.
Brian Wilson - Child Is Father Of The Man (2004)
This is the 2004 version of the song by The Brian Wilson Band which is very bright and shiny.
The Beach Boys - Little Bird (1968)
This was their reworking where they rewrote and rerecorded the chorus and renamed it Little Bird for the 1968 LP Friends.
Wikipedia claims that Tune X from 1967 is also a re-recording but they are incorrect (What A fucking surprise) as that is a Carl Wilson penned instrumental that does not reuse any elements from Child Is Father Of The Man, Little Bird or Surf's Up.
I've forgotten how tricky and pernickety all this Smile stuff gets. It's an entire hobby of its own apart from being a music fan.
The Beach Boys - Surf's Up (1971)
This is why it's all worth it. This is spiritual music. Pop music at its most empyrean. Pretty moving. I realise you don't need another person out there to tell you this is the fucking greatest...er...but it is though so there's that.
*See the coda here at the end of Surf's Up is based on Child Is Father To The Man which is also the preceding track on both the Beach Boys and Brian Wilson's version of Smile. I'm pretty sure it was always intended this way. Having said that this version of Surf's Up from the 1971 Surf's Up LP appeared sans the prelude of Child Is Father To The Man.
When I first heard this over twenty years ago I thought it was the proggiest of the prog and only progging for the sake of progging. Me and my mate nearly lost our minds late one evening/early morning when we thought it was just never going to end. Sure we'd taken part in some party-time activities and listened to a whole bunch of prog and this was the final track at the end of a three cd prog compilation binge. Listening to it just now though, I thought, it flew past rather quickly.
Colosseum remain fairly mysterious compared to the big prog acts that have their stories told over and over. In Mike Barnes' book on prog from a few years back they only got a couple of pages. I kinda like that little bit of low key underexposed reputation. The fact they only did a few albums also helps of course. Perhaps they lean a bit too much towards the jazz to be truly orthodox British prog. Is there even such a thing?, I dunno. The Valentyne Suite sounds pretty unique actually and relatively fresh.
In a way I like not being a full expert or patron of prog rock because I just can't help preferring things that lean more towards the space rock, the krautrock, the prog psych-folk, the zhuel, the Cantebury scene, the Swedish prog, the heavy psych etc. end of the spectrum. You see I just fucking hate the Genesis and I fucking can't stand the ELP. I've only just come around to Jethro Tull in the last ten years, Pink Floyd in the last twelve months and I have never once tried to investigate any further, than what I recall from The Kenny Everett Show, The Moody Blues.
The Moody Blues await but don't hold your breath for my conversion to the insufferable Genesis or ELP. The only other artist I'm less likely to get into is probably the fucking utmost intolerable Elvis Costello. I'm more likely to listen to The Clash than any of these and that is never going to happen while I still have control of my faculties. Haha..ha....
Turns out Colosseum's second LP The Valentyne Suite was the first record ever released on the legendary Vertigo label. There you go trivia buffs. They split up in 1971 way ahead of the curve and before the rot had any time to set in.
Khan - Hollow Stone (inc. Escape Of The Space Pilots) - (1972)
I'm totally confused today because this was always the "Space Pirates" song. I'm sure the cd I've got (somewhere) from maybe 98 or 99 had this as The Escape Of The Space Pirates. There seems to be a glitch in my matrix.
Anyway how good is this tune?
Steve Hillage had recorded with the pre-Egg outfit Arzachel on their debut LP in 1969 but Khan was the first band that was his own where he was the main man. The Space Pirates is the epic closing track from Khan's one and only album and it's an ace prog tune with some pretty cool pyrotechnics emanating from Steve's guitar. Actually the entire Space Shanty LP is pretty good little bit of prog that we should all have a listen to.
Steve Hillage - Rainbow Dome Musick (1979)
IN the early 90s we knew Steve Hillage because of his collaborations on records by The Orb and his own ambient house records with System 7. Then the discovery of this classic proto-ambient solo record from 1979 was an absolute revelation. Rainbow Dome Musick had gained a new lease of life as a chill-out room record.
Of course Steve's secret weapon on most of his recordings is his silent partner and mrs, MIquette Giraudy, who plays wonderful fender rhodes, synth and Tibetan bells here. This is where the space rock stops being rock and is just becomes space static: a gorgeously hovering, lush and intricately crafted ambient space where visions of fantastical futuristic idyllic landscapes with shimmering streams and glimmering solar waves are conjured. Eternally serene.
It wasn't until a few years later that I would get around to discovering his earlier fully hairy proggy space rock records which also turned out to be revelatory...and then there were the Gong records he played on...so due to my ignorance he was the gift that kept on giving.
"Oh no Steve Hillage" So Neil was the first person to alert a lot of us to the charms of Steve Hillage although I guess we were probably meant to dismiss Neil's taste in music.
Steve Hillage - Fish Rising (1975)
Always with the aquatic vibes. When Steve's exhilarating guitar along with Mike Howlett's bass get going on The Salmon Song, oh boy what a space rock ride then that aquatic lull bassoon bit from Lindsay Cooper...oh my.
Between the break up of Khan and this record Steve had spent time in Gong contributing to their classic run of albums The Radio Gnome Invisible trilogy. By the time Steve, the most likeable man in prog, got around to recording his first solo album proper Fish Rising he had discovered "atmosphere and ambience". He'd also become a master of the glissando guitar which was a trippy technique he'd learnt from Head Gong Daevid Allen. So his post-psychedelic bag of tricks was expanding by the minute.
Surely these are the best sounding guitar shapes in all of prog - sometimes surprisingly heavy, bubbling, weird, echoing, birdlike, aqueous, furious, floating and spaced out - often all within the same song. His guitar is in a constant state of inventive flux. The magic of Hillage on Fish Rising is that he makes prog fun, never pompous or tedious. He makes exciting blissful enjoyment an utmost priority. Now that's rare.
Somewhere between avant-garde drone-y post-minimalism, acid-folk, ethereal neo-medieval and rough around the edges new age. Dorothy Carter, who didn't make a record until she was in her forties, is the queen of the hammered dulcimer. She was also keen and expert on the zither, hurdy gurdy, recorder, flute, psaltery and piano.
Enjoy the enchanted delights of a lost record that will never be reissued. Waillee, Waillee contains some of the most gorgeous dulcimer/zither this side of a Laaraji record. Sometimes the atmospheric all encompassing eternal reverberations become so sublime it's hard not to become overwhelmed. Glorious stuff...as in one of the best albums ever recorded.
Other contributors to this privately pressed LP are sound sculptor and instrument maker Rob Rutman. He plays the bow chime and steel cello. Gail Edwards is the percussionist who plays tamboura, slit drum, bells, shakers and er...harps.
*I don't really know if Dorothy Carter is a cult figure or not, maybe she's not considered cool who knows? There's not exactly an over abundance of information about her on the interwebs but we do know later in the 1990s she had an unlikely chartbusting collaboration with Miranda Sex Garden's Katharine Blake. They co-founded Mediæval Bæbes, a neo-classical ensemble, that had hit records and even went silver in the UK. Perhaps this kind of mainstream success has kept Waillee Waillee out of cult record status contention that other less commercially successful musicians like Vashti Bunyan, Linda Perhacs, Judee Sill etc. now have (bear in mind tastemakers are often clueless dickheads).
**The album in the above video finishes around the forty minute mark. The last six minutes are some kind of a mish mash of repeated bits for some reason.
It's party time people! Ed gets positively upbeat and groovy on this 1988 Smash hit! This is so swinging and yet so so fucking tight it's pop perfection innit. Absolute anthem.
*The fact that this didn't make the top 10 in Australia or even crack the top 40 kinda made me hate Australia back then...well the machinations of the mainstream music scene at least. How fucking clueless! This gave me an insight, at an impressionable age, into how the world works ie. not how it should! Then again if The Go-Betweens' Spring Rain didn't go straight to the top of the charts what did I expect? The goddamn LP When There's This Party came from Everybody's Got To only made it to number 42 (???).
It's Friday night kick out the funky jams time. Here's a dose of Funky rock Spanishish stylee. I could listen to flute accompanied by bass and drums all day long but this has even more with its expansive summer-y harmonies, that organ worming its way around and the fabulous push and pull of that riff-age. Oh my the crazy flute with that infectiously hypnotic beat including mucho cowbell...Nice.
Tim Davis - Baby Won't You Come Out Tonight (1972)
Somehow I've missed hearing this song my entire life until last night. How could this be? Why don't we all know it? Why wasn't it in all our parents collections? Or on the radio when we were small? Or on the golden oldies radio now?
Sweet 70s country soul at its finest.
Thank you Lord!
*Rock, rhythm & blues and yacht rock royalty here with Boz Scaggs on guitar, Steve Miller on organ and to top it off production duties by Glyn Johns. The entire LP Take Me As I Am (Without Silver Without Gold), I can say now say after seven listens, is terrific stuff.
KebneKaise IIis Swedish prog-folk-rock with great grooves, Nordic folk elements and no absurd prog wankery. Superficially not unlike the best ethnological krautrock but when you get in it's deeply psychedelic and steeped in the mystique of Swedish folklore yet also kinda jaunty at times. Kebnekaise II was released in 1973 on the legendary Swedish prog label Silence, home of Bo Hansson, Älgarnas Trädgård, Träd Gräs O Stenar, Anna Själv Tredje etc.
Horgalåten is apparently a traditional Swedish tune rearranged by Kebnekaise. Mesmerising haunted ancient melodies amongst the mantra rock with a toe-tapping beat. Nice.
Kebnekaise - Comanche Spring (1973)
Epic psych jam that closes the album. Sweet mary jane was surely invented for listening to this.
*Greatest back cover ever. All bands should be beautifully drawn up a tree.
If you've not ever heard this one look out. For fans of of avant-garde and acid-folk vocal histrionics à la Comus, Tim Buckley, Yoko, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Peter Hammill et al. at their most outré, I promise this will not disappoint. Aria is the opening song to Sorrenti's debut LP of the same name. It wouldn't surprise me if side 4 of Nick Cave's Ghosteen was influenced by this epic track as there are some uncanny vocal melody parallels.
A few years later Sorrenti strangely enough went on to represent Italy at Eurovision. I can vouch for the quality of the rest of this LP while others also rate the follow up, after that he begins to depart from this aesthetic mission statement.
Poli Styrene Jass Band - Draino In Your Veins (1975)
This was really something. What on earth was it? It's like a blueprint for something that nobody ever bothered to follow up on. I mean you can hear hints of Roxy Music and misc. prog but what is the rest? Psychedelic soul? This is the sort of amalgamation of non-overt influences that also informed Television, Pere Ubu etc. I really think Draino In Your Veins is a forgotten little psych-prog anomaly of a pop song that deserves to be heard.
Poli Styrene Jass Band - Circus Highlights (1975)
This is the flipside to Draino In Your Veins. It's that classic in-between scenes syndrome innit: Too late for 60s psych into prog, not quite fitting mid 70s art rock and way too early for neo-psychedelia of the 80s and 90s. Melodically reverse-reminiscent of early Mercury Rev. If this incarnation had carried on in the maverick vein of this 7 inch they might have become legendary like their contemporaries Pere Ubu and electric eels instead of just a footnote.
Styrene Money - Radial Arm Saws (1977)
Weird for weird's sake maybe but these guys were compelled to make such a record surely that counts for something. Is it a paean to naff novelty faux-psychedelic cash in singles of the late 60s?
Styrene Money - I Saw You (1979)
Sounding almost conventional here, even endearing but I guess not many punk groups had piano led singles. It's actually more psychedelic than anything. This is why genre categories are pointless sometimes. Did the genre people ever use psych-punk as a term for this kind of thing? I Saw You is psychedelic and punk.
Styrene Money - Everything Near Me (1979)
Another sort of likeable slice of music that is at the precise intersection of psychedelic and punk. I guess not unlike some stuff The Homosexuals did.
Styrene Money - Jaguar Ride (1979)
The first Styrenes thing I heard back in the day because it was on an 80s Cleveland compilation. This is supposed to be a cover of the electric eels tune but it barely even resembles that song. It strangely actually sounds closer to Pere Ubu. I wonder if they just played this by memory considering there were no actual recordings of the electric eels version available at the time.
Good bit of hard-punky pub-rock. Narcotic pop at its finest, this was a top 40 hit in Britain. As the guy in the comments said "I'm 52 and still suffering from the teenage depression"
Belgium's Blast are a fun noisey blast of proto: Proto-punk, proto-thrash, proto-Motorhead and proto whatever else. The vocalist keeps it in a pop song realm making it somewhat less harsh than those future genres turned out to be though. I think they did just this one 7" single. Pretty cool.
A spritely piece of funky boogie from Japan. An 80s bass and saxamophone extravaganza. An 80s dancefloor anthem from a parallel world. If you want an entire other 80s of this type it's ready and waiting for you in these Japanese recordings.
"They" can smear MJ all they want but a massive part of the population know he is still the king of pop and all the unkind words in the world will not change their love for him.
After The Jackson 5 left Motown they changed their name to The Jacksons and signed to Philadelphia International. This Gamble & Huff tune is one of the most lushly lovely tunes Michael Jackson ever did. A total nitrous oxide marshmallow: Luxuriant mellifluousness.
Great Teddy Pendergrass vocal backed by MFSB on this 1973 Gamble & Huff tune. The secret architect here is legendary veteran arranger Bobby Martin with superior strings.
We all know their ubiquitous hit Tell Him from 1962 but here's a later one from the same era as their single Blowin Up My Mind that's very fucking cool. This deep cut from the Caviar & Chitlins LP moves along at quite a pace and it's a hell of a satisfying ride. Pop perfection innit. I mean...just press play. Sometimes talking about music is dumb.
The Philly soul sound goodness is so good on this Bobby Eli production. Melodies in the 70s were just way more expansive and forthright weren't they? Conga, string and horn extravaganza!
This is such an inspired weird little jam. I'm pretty lost for words on this one...it just seems so instinctual, like it just came out like this and there was nothing they could do about it. It's fun raw off kilter minimal funky soul with a hint of rock'n'roll or just old school unreconstructed rhythm & blues. Whatever it is, it's pretty bloody infectious. Some absolute magic is captured right here on this platter.
Gwen Owens - Just What You Wanted (And Needed) - (1966)
This on the surface sounds like just another Detroit mid 60s soul-pop number but it's also pretty insane. What is going on with the band? Sometimes it sounds like there are two bands playing and they're coming in and out of phaze. The drums are so unhinged they sound like they've dropped in from outer space or the studio next door or another song entirely. The bass also seems to be quite unruly, it wants to run off and do its own thing. It's all so deliciously spirited, I can't stop playing it. On top of all the crazy is Gwen's incredible voice. Like one of the great soul voices ever. Her timbre coupled with her restraint put her in an outstanding class. She could have been a huge star.
ALL of the Philly soul goodness. I mean this is just perfection innit. THE INTRO: Best ever! The ecstatic keys. Congas, congas, congas! Sweet soul vocal sounds of Bobby Smith. The toe tappin' tempo. That bassline. The ladies doing back-up. The guitar. The brief but brilliant string and horn sequence. The little organ swirls too. Everything. Written and produced by Thom Bell, thank you very much.
The fact that Bell uses all those elements and I'll Be Around sounds uncluttered and deceptively lean is genius.
Ariel Pink's Haunted Grafitti - Menopause Man (2010) I'm deleting instagram. It has become way too toxic particularly in the dysphoric state I'm in. It has to go. Anyway at one stage during the lockdowns I started doing music blog type things on there that never transferred to this here blog, so I thought I'd selvage some things before I obliterate the fucking thing.
"2010: The last official year of hypnagogia. What a finale. The last great year in music? You can argue amongst yourselves whether these albums belong here or not.
Hypnagogia was a fairly amorphous term. It encompassed radio pop, tv noise, psych, industrial gunk, cosmic synth, obsolete genres like goth, new age, glam, dubby post-punk, electro-pop, ethnological forgeries & quirky one hit wonder new wave, Lo-fi tape hiss, ambient, woozy disco, 80s Soundtracks, pop culture detritus & a whole lot more sonic debris so long as it was all shrouded in a trippy sonic hypnagogic fog.
These aren’t ranked except for the first one as it was a game changer. Almighty leader Ariel Pink burnt off the hypnagogic fog & went spectacularly hi-fi to reveal massive glorious pop anthems worthy of FM radio’s airwaves.
1. Ariel Pink - Before Today 2. Rangers - Suburban Tours 3. Sun Araw - On Patrol 4. James Ferraro -Nightdolls With Hairspray 5. Outer Limits Recordings - Foxy Baby 6. Oneohtrix Point Never - Returnal 7. Emeralds - Does It Look Like I’m Here 8. Dylan Ettinger - New Age Outlaws 9. LA Vampires & Zola Jesus - Meet 10. Motion Sickness Of Time Travel - Seeping Through The Veil Of The Unconscious"
[timspacedebris Instagram - 13/7/20]
*I know, is this worth saving? Hardly...but hey instagram was all about the pictures of the album covers and I guess that's still an exceptional lil' list of good recordings though.
**Listening back to Before Today it really wasn't spectacularly Hi-Fi like I claimed, more like just a notch above his usual lo-fi. But it's th0se 4AD sessions videos that sounded most epic sound-wise. I think there was another four tunes in the set but they seem to have been scrubbed from the net...surprise surprise.
Outer Limits Recordings - Smoke Opera (2010)
This is classic hypnogogia. Hypnotic lo-fi woozy glam synth fuzz smeared with trademark haze & fog. Sadly Outer Limits Recordings aka Sam Meringue died a few years back when he was only 31 years old.
Oneohtrix Point Never - Returnal (2010)
I forgot how much I loved this at the time. This is more on the neo cosmic drone tip rather than the pop hypnogogic of the the likes of Ferraro's Night Dolls With Hairspray. It was like there was a glimmer of hope for music and society back then. Sure Returnal was in the tradition of great 60s, 70s & 90s innovative music but you felt that at some point they might go beyond the exquisite retro-pastiche motifs of Returnal and Rifts. However OPN kinda annoyed me with their following records so I dunno if they ever got there. Perhaps don't start with the uncharacteristic noise track that opens the album, skip to track 4 which is the title track but hey it's all good.
*I might come back to the other records in the top ten tomorrow...
Hearing this on Ash Wednesday's compilation from 2012 I thought hey that sounds familiar. It turns out it was. Apparently she mimed Cold Cafe on Countdown in 1981 but the video footage remains elusive, which is a shame. Probably heard it on Melbourne community radio over the years too. Anyway this is still really insidious pop perfection all these years later.
*All these history revisionists with their coldwaves and minimal waves and oz waves and minimal synths and blah blah, it's like they come in and take over this music and possess it and wear it like an identity and pretty soon music from your childhood and entire life doesn't feel like it belongs to you anymore. They are the arbiters of the waves and they're going to tell you about it and yet they often have it so wrong. The only wave this was in 1981 was new wave. As a ten year old it wasn't even that. It was just pop music. This has made me realise how history is very quickly removed from the objective reality of its actual time and rearranged inaccurately. How many inaccurate increments does it take until you're reading fiction?
Dystopian electro from Arizona in the early 80s. The synth tone they set here is very good. Perfectly recorded analogue synthetic goodness containing a good fun rhythmic sensibility.
Tone Set - Cal's Ranch (1982)
The tape the above tune came from. Cal's Ranch mainly consists of synths, drum machines and reel to reel tapes of radio and telly dialogue. Who made better home recordings in 1982?
*The Mutant Sounds Blog really changed our lives (well mine at least). A lot of stuff we'd only mythologically heard of finally got to be heard. And stuff we'd also never heard of. It all happened in a very short space of time and our computers and minds were at full capacity. In their peak year 2007 they uploaded two thousand files of seminal and hard to find records. I mean they were the reason I ever bought a hard drive. There are blogs out there now pretending they have awesome collections of tapes and records but we all know they're just re-uploading Mutant Sounds files. And even vinyl on demand based the catalogue of their entire absurd rip off of a reissue record label on Mutant Sounds posts.
Speaking of the early and mid 90s what I love about Kuepper here is that he really is untethered to any international or local trend. He riffs on a Bo Diddley riff and salutes Blue Cheer here but it is in no way retro vomit. He's creating innovative music and this is a peak in an astounding purple patch of creativity.
I'm pretty sure this is some kind of new music that somehow became beloved by Australian radio and public alike in 1991. I mean what actually is going on here? How is this mammoth atmosphere achieved. What is propelling this drone? I always assumed there was some kind of cello or string instrument making that all encompassing reverberation. Ex-Laughing Clowns and Necks keyboardist Chris Abrahams is in the band for this record and I'd say he's probably responsible for the surreal air on this tune. He's credited as contributing piano and organ. But I'm still none the wiser as to what the origins of that mysterious chugging ambient sound are or am I just bad at identifying instruments.
