Roland Kirk - 'Introducing' (Argo/Cadet)

The sleeve says Argo and I guess that's just the catalogue number, because this is really Cadet records, but it's actually the same label - it just changed names due to (I guess) anticipation of the Ben Affleck film 50 years before it came out. Despite the title, this is Roland Kirk's second album, as Triple Threat came out in '57. But this was certainly his introduction on the Argo label and maybe it was like a re-introduction to those who may have missed him the first time around. Kirk is an interesting figure to me; as a casual jazz fan who knows little about the culture,  I've always perceived him as a respected outsider, popular but never really part of the main continuum or scene. A bit like Neil Young maybe? Certainly the triple saxophone thing came off as gimmicky to some people, but when he does it here it doesn't overwhelm. The mix is pretty even here between Kirk's saxes, Ira Sullivan's trumpet, a fairly standard cool-style rhythm section of Don Garrett and Sonny Brown, and William Burton's organ. Yes, it's the Don Garrett, years before the Sea Ensemble, and it's nice trivia but there's almost nothing of his playing heard here that stands out from the pack, apart from a little bowing in the opening part of 'The Call' – which is not to say it's bad, certainly competent and responsive. 'The Call', the first track, seems to be missing the subtitle '(and Response)', as it mostly walks through a theme based on interplay between Kirk and Sullivan, after a slow and spacious intro. The record is half Kirk compositions - 'The Call', 'Soul Station' (which has a real 1960s Eurospy soundtrack feel to it) and 'Spirit Girl', maybe the album highlight – and half others. One is by Burton, one's David Rose, and Gershwin's 'Our Love is Here To Stay' rounds it out. Rose's 'Our Waltz' is not in 3/4 time, at least not by my count, and I'm not familiar with the original, so I'm not sure how their take changes things.  I like the Gershwin ballad; the band hangs heavy on the changes and it's sweet and soulful. This is recorded nicely; there's a lot of space between the instruments and the mood is warm and brassy, but without being overly echoey. The tracks with organ give it a very late 50s feel (this was released in '60) but when Burton's on the piano, it sounds more restrained and the trumpet really resonates. Restraint is overall the feeling; even the solos are rather contained within a certain framework. 'Soul Station' feels the liveliest (and has some hootin' and hollerin' in the background) but the band feels stuck in a lower gear, unable to generate enough momentum to really rip things apart. But this is early - and as the title indicates, it's only a hint at what is to come later.

Cheb Khaled & Safy Boutella ‎- 'Kutché' (Zone/EMI)

I don't know much about rai as a genre but thought this would be a good way to find out about it, as Cheb Khaled is one of those names I knew of, even if the actual sound was a mystery to me. And it's not common to find interesting records for sale in Latvia, so why not start investigating a genre with something that promises 100% of it? This is from '88 and you can hear it; the drums and synths are right out of MTV from the era, and the traditional Algerian instruments are sometimes hard to make out, or maybe even synth/MIDI versions. Khaled's voice soars over the songs, and he does this choppy/blocky thing sometimes that I like. The more sunshine-drenched tunes like 'El Lela' stick out a bit, because there's an openness and energy that overcomes the dated (to my ears) sound of the instrumentation. Khaled was the biggest of the big in this scene and I'm reading how he sold out later, but by the 1980s rai had already transmogrified into the modern pop music that this is. 'Chab Rassi' has a nice odd distance - its beat propels along like a ball on a hard floor, but there's a whirling flute line that answers Khaled's vocal line and it adds a nice woody assonance to the track. If there are ballads here, then it's a form of balladry I don't get, fast and bulbous; I don't understand the language anyway so it's hard for me to grasp the intent of any of these tracks. It's secular music, that's for sure, and overall it's slickly produced by Boutella, who gets a co-credit and largely handles arrangements and a bunch of instrumentation. There's some nice drum programming on 'Chebba' and a generally bouncy disposition to the whole record, but I really should investigate the rai from earlier decades, when it was genuinely the music of pariahs and rebels. 'Minuit', the closer, hints at that with some street field recordings of an accordion player bringing in the song before it erupts into the world pop confection that fits with the rest of the album. If rai is traditionally Dionysian music, like punk and rembetika, then by this point it had embraced the system pretty fully, I think. I'm not disappointed - though I rarely play this, it suits a certain summer mood, and listening to this provides some form of a escape, as I'm sure it's the closest that I'll ever get to Western Algeria.

Hüsker Dü - 'New Day Rising' (SST)

This is imperfect perfection, a joyous contradiction. Your surroundings are still a wall of screaming, distorted electric guitar, and the speed is always above average. Yet comparing this to Metal Circus is like comparing adults to kids. Of course, in between came a 70 minute double LP concept album which I don't have a copy of to discuss here (but I wish I did); that may have been a conditioning exercise. On the other side, well, it's a new day. The voices are a hell of a lot higher in the mix here, and it's like all of the screamy angst gets out during the title track. Mould's first song here is 'I Apologize', a great and catchy song that deftly analyses communication breakdowns in a relationship. Such mature territory! I don't like to oversimplify the intention of a pop song, but one of the things I love about music is how it can be so simple and so complex in a four-minute package. And what I love about albums is how they assemble to a narrative, even when not a concept album. This one has a really cohesive first side and then a messy, blocky second side. It starts and ends with almost abstract ragers, the title track a focused, monotonous banger and then 'Plans I Make' at the end, a total jam-mess with guitar that sounds like Lee Ranaldo is playing it, and a false ending too. Hart's songs are more schizo in tone; 'The Girl Who Lives on Heaven Hill' is a perfect minor key pop song while 'Books About UFOs' has a lurching rhythm and even some honky-tonk piano in it. Mould is incorporating more arpeggios and chorus into his guitar sound than the earlier work, and understandable as the pace slows down a tad so there's actually space for it. 'Celebrated Summer' is a slice of gold, weaving together nostalgia and regret into something still uplifting, and with a beautiful acoustic outro. On 'Perfect Example' and '59 Times the Pain' he's mumbling, even moaning, as if Michael Stipe was crossed with a Beluga whale. It's a mid-LP mood slump, a vocal delivery that absolutely suits the songwriting, and by the end he crawls out and screams again to great effect. I've been listening to Mould for so long that I kinda forget how uniquely odd his voice is; his background vocals behind Hart's 'Terms of Psychic Warfare' are the secret ingredient that makes it click. It's amazing to me how far this band progressed in such a short time; I always think they broke up at the end of the 80s, but Warehouse came out in January '87 and they were kaput soon after. This is the first of two great albums in 1985 alone, and that's coming off Zen Arcade. This may be the peak, but it's a tiny peak among a long, high plateau.

Gastr del Sol - 'Upgrade and Afterlife' (Drag City)

This was the one that really did it for me - my first Gastr release, which is a near-masterpiece like all of the records that brought Grubbs and O'Rourke together. That's a pairing that seems to make no sense on paper and ends up being the greater than the sum of two parts. The formula of Crookt, Crackt or Fly isn't deviated from too much except there is maybe less acoustic guitar choppiness and more of a unified sensibility to create some pleasing compositions - works that are about synergy rather than difference. The tracks with vocals are placed in the centre, but the starting and ending cuts are masterfully lyrics despite being instrumental. 'Our Exquisite Replica of Eternity' - what a title, what a track. It's O'Rourke who clearly takes lead here, with his 'new music' composer chops in the forefront, building things around some electroacoustic drones which move and grind slowly as the piece unfolds. It explodes, an O'Rourke trick evident in many of his records, but here recalling George Gershwin heavily, which feels forward thinking in its anachronism. It's all spinning at 45 RPM (this is not a double album but a one-and-a-half record) which gives it a sense of momentum too. The ending track is a John Fahey cover, 'Dry Bones in the Valley' (from 1975's Old Fashioned Love, if you were wondering) and it's done pretty straight, breathing through the space in the acoustic strum and showing these guys as the virtuoso musicians that they are; once Tony Conrad's violin drone comes in, the track takes on a hypnotic and incredibly melancholy tendency that intensifies until the record is over. And these songs in the middle, with Grubbs dropping his Grubbisms everywhere? Great too, for the most part. 'These are shark fins/I believe the tongue propels them' is the most quotable and wonderful-ridiculous Gastr lyric ever, making 'Rebecca Sylvester' the single most iconic Gastr del Sol track. The piano psychosis of Mirror Repair is most evident during 'The Relay', and 'Hello Spiral' brings in the McEntire drumming (after a harsh, aggressive bit of tape work by Ralf Wehowsky, sounding like John Wiese's hand to me) for the indie rock sound (but only a bit). Actually, it's 'Hello Spiral' that sounds precisely like the LP is skipping, just off-kilter enough to make it feel maddening. I obviously love this record, to the point where I read great personal emotional connections into it despite it being relentlessly avant-garde and obtuse. But it's a warm avant-garde, a celebration of art and possibilities (as the famous Roman Signer photo on the cover indicates). and maybe it sounds a bit silly or dated now but you gotta believe this 18 year old was enthralled. Upgrade & Afterlife is a map of possibilities for what music and art can do, slouching towards the cerebral but never quite abandoning the guttural. And the crazy thing is that they followed it up with something even better.

Coronarias Dans - 'Visitor' (Inner City)

The leader of Coronarias Dans is clearly Kenneth Knudsen, the keyboardist, who composed all eight of these jazzy fusion/prog jams, and dominates with his vibe-like electric piano. The liner notes tell me that this an exciting chapter in Danish music, but I'm not so sure. This has lingered in my accumlation of vinyl for so long mostly because I forgot about it; does my passion for wonky 70's Scandinavian prog have limits? Visitor really catches fire at the end of each side, when the band starts to rawk; until the we get a lot of noodling, and Peter Friis Nielsen's bass guitar continually poking it's head through the dirt, like a worm. 'Morning' is abstraction at its best, a nice dewdawn despite the aforementioned punchy bass. Some of these guys used to be in Secret Oyster, and also Burnin' Red Ivanhoe, and I guess that's what the Købehavn kids were jamming in the mid-70's when they weren't busy making those Tegn pornos. Actually my entire concept of Denmark in the 1970s comes from porn, but not actual porn as much as that Rodox magazine which I once saw a bunch of photos from, all cropped to be PG-rated, and one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. I feel that same sense of toppling into a mystery here, but only if I strain. I think I grabbed this cause it was on Inner City, which did release some Art Ensemble of Chicago records around the same time, and because I was hoping for something as far-out as Flasker-Brinnet or Arbete/Fritid. Had I noticed the telltale name of Friis I woulda not mistaken this Danish band for being Swedish. This could of course benefit from being further out, though the rocking bit of 'Don't Know' does have a nice burning drone underneath, like a hurdy-gurdy thing on a guitar. On the flipside, the title track has some snappy drumming but the bassist is in total Bill Laswell mode; you wonder how these guys would sound with some Rodoxed vocalist wailing on top of everything. There's one section when the drum solos for a few measures, right before the song sputters out, and it's like a dub track because they've kicked the treble or done something weird. I dunno, but it's kinda cool in a This Heat way. 'Tied Wawes' immediately takes it down a notch; it's the sensitive ballad. (Yawn.) The compositions are actually quite open - there are times when everyone is playing well with each other around nothing at all. 'Which Witch' is the most aggressive tune of the album but it never rips free from it's shackles; it's a bit frustrating overall, Knudsen's compositional style, as it's rooted in its own navel-gazing but without really being willing to say anything. I'm being too harsh on it - the whole LP ends in a bit of Canterbury-esque chordal crashes that are kinda nice in a familiar way. I guess I'm just tough on the Nordics.

Larry Coryell - 'Barefoot Boy' (Flying Dutchman)

I first heard of Coryell because he plays guitar on some late, late Mingus records. Jazz guitar is always a weird one for me; I'm never sure how to put that instrument into a jazz context. Barefoot Boy puts Coryell in a group with Steve Marcus on sax and some more fusion-oriented rhythmic players. It opened with the Gabor Szabo/Santana tune 'Gypsy Queen', which sets a pace the rest of the record never catchs up to. Coryell starts the song with a rapid, muted repetitious figure and lets Marcus blast away on tenor; it's a crazy tone, and the drummer (Roy Haynes) propels things along with a light touch as well. It's really just an intro to the guitar lead, which finally comes in after a few minutes and starts screaming like the severed head of a banshee, occasionally flirting with muddy textures and flange/phase stuff. The liner notes compare him to Hendrix and I guess that's apt, though I hear Sharrock in there. The photos really make Coryell look like a nerd, like someone who shoulda been programming a VAX computer in 1971 instead of busting out ripping, swampy axe licks. I like this record a lot though, even though it mellows a bit. 'The Great Escape' finishes the first side and it's a bit more open and loose as the title might suggest. There's more breathing and still some stunning runs, but it takes on a more romantic tinge at points. Side two is one lengthy 20 minute jam called 'Call to the Higher Consciousness', which despite its name is not a long drone meditation. It's really two parts, separated by a slow, peripatetic Roy Haynes drum solo, with some straight-up rock pyrotechnics at points and the addition of Michael Mandel on piano. At times it feels like the drums and piano are in one calm mentality while Coryell and Marcus are blasting away with speedy, screeching licks. Because they have the same harmonic centre, it works well and starts to actually take on a minimalist monotony after about 15 minutes. It's too all-over-the-place to be the psychedelic call to higher consciousness I'd like, but it's good anyway.

Don Cherry/Krzysztof Penderecki - 'Humus - the Life Exploring Force/Actions (For Free Jazz Orchestra)' (Everest)

This odd pairing isn't really the unified synthesis of Polish avant-garde composition and free jazz pulse that it would suggest. Really, this is the product of the New Eternal Rhythm Orchestra, a free jazz big band populated by some of the giants of European free music. Manfred Schoof, Kenny Wheeler, Paul Rutherford, Peter Brötzmann, Wilem Breuker, Han Bennink, Terje Rypdal, Gunter Hampel and others -- such a collection of titans has rarely been assembled before! Cherry and Penderecki, two giants in different but occasionally overlapping worlds, probably don't share the stage at all on this recording. Side 1 is Cherry leading the band through his piece and side 2 is Penderecki, with Cherry absent. The labels are applied to the wrong sides on my copy, so I began by listening to side 2, which is the final 5 minutes of Cherry's 'Humus' and then Penderecki's composition, 'Actions'. 'Actions' is well-suited for this group - the many trumpets and saxes combine at both the beginning and the end to create a deep, throbbing drone that's both beautiful and malevolent. The chaotic parts remind me of the Globe Unity Orchestra recordings from around the same time period, no doubt due to some personnel overlap. But I file this under C for Cherry, because it's 'Humus' that is the more interesting piece. The orchestra, accentuated by Cherry, Loes Macgillycutty on vocals, and Mocqui Cherry on tambura, reads Cherry's melodies quite straight, giving a marching-band punch that I've never heard before in any of Cherry's music. Loes' singing is pretty much the icing on the cake (I like icing); she's fluttery and brash, but doesn't overdo it, sitting out long sections. The different movements of 'Humus' are broken down on the sleeve and the entire band stays to the script. But this is a script that allows a lot of improvisation. I think I can recognize Brötzmann in a few points, and Macgillycutty manages to punch her voice along with the instruments quite seamlessly. The coda, on side 2, brings back some of the Sanskrit chants heard on the last few records, with Cherry speaking to the crowd and trying to lead a complicated count on the 1, 5 and 13 beats. He almost talks more than he plays here, but it's a nice reprise of what's now a familiar theme ('Sa-re-ga-ma-pa-dha-mi'). Everything explodes in blast of cacophonous jazz blowing, and then we're out. (Well, actually this is where the Penderecki piece starts, but I'm trying to assess this in the proper order. Kinda like when my friend went to see Matrix 2, and the cinema screwed up and started showing the middle of the film first, and then the beginning came at the end.) I feel like I would be missing an opportunity if I finish this writeup without making some joke about 'hummus' but, well, there ya go.

Burning Star Core - 'Three Sisters who Share an Eye' (No Fun)

Three Sisters is a somewhat less grandiose approach to art and packaging - coming from the minimalist paste-on style like the West Coast live LP. For all voice and electronics, Three Sisters is also a minimalist approach. Both sides begin with throaty, reverby sounds that coalesce into some thick, ecstatic drones. Side A's is dirty and low-level, while side B's is more deep-listening and mellow. Both drift into the ambient distance, but not without recalling thick caterwauls of machine-driven forcefield exoticism, tender pulses, emphatic murmurs and gestures galore; it's a recollection of potential futures and ad-hoc journeys. When you pick up the LP and tilt it, the grooves are uniformly spaced - an encouragement to feel, rather than to hear. Fuzz on stylus or uncomfortable crop-dusting? This is a humongous sound flattened between two slices of all-grain bread. It's not ever going to be the Burning Star Core records that jumps in my mind as "definitive", and after the schizophrenia of our last review this one feels also intentionally focused. But while album-length, this may always be relegated to 'sketch' territory for me.