Bob James Trio - 'Explosions' (Get Back)

The 60s are full of amazing recordings that push music into new directions; this Bob James Trio LP is often overlooked, maybe because James himself had a long career playing more standard jazz afterwards, and he wasn't there for the long haul. Despite the title, this isn't fire music, but an early exploration of electroacoustic improvisation meeting the jazz idiom head-on. It's credited to the trio of James, Barre Phillips and Robert Pozar, but the frequent incursions of tapes and electronics are the work of Gordon Mumma (on opening track, 'Peasant Boy') and Robert Ashley (on 'Untitled Mixes' and 'Wolfman'). The credits make it unclear if Mumma and Ashley are just responsible for the compositions, or maybe the tape material was supplied by Mumma but not actually, technically 'played' by him on this recording. It's a stunner, though - opening with a bumpy, centreless improvisation between James's piano, Phillips's bass and Pozar's drumkit, it soon withers to almost nothing and the players do an Art Ensemble-esque exploration of space. A few plucked strings, something scraped, a few tonally confusing notes - and this is when Mumma's sounds come in. Sounding like only tapes can sound, you can hear the squleching and squirming movement push the musicians to redefine their approach to colour and mood. This segues perfectly into 'Untitled Mixes', where Ashley's somewhat more present electronics are in place, but it feels like a seamless transition, just a handoff of tapes. The band continues their spacious interplay, with enough emptyness at the core that the surface noise is often alone (or the echo of the studio if your hi-fi equipment is good enough). Slowly, the musicians come back together, and it's harmoniously disharmonious, if that makes any sense. James's 'Explosions' closes the first half, a curiously named piece for something so quiet and spare. Phillips's bowing take centre stage and it sneaks around sonorities not unreminiscent of baroque European composition, eventually puttering to halt which is a false ending, before a few plucked strings resonate to the run-out grooves. Side two begins with Phillips's composition 'An On', which starts with a carnivalesque whirring of some sort of motor and a tin whistle, until the trio comes in and teases out a plodding theme. While neither Mumma nor Ashley are credited here, there's a heavy presence of tape loops, garbling and spinning slowly enough to interplay with the tonalities of the piano and bass quite beautifully, if you find this sort of thing beautiful (I do!). The piece utterly refuses to gel into a recognisable jazz form; that's saved for 'Wolfman'. This closer is the weirdest moment, simple because it sounds like Ashley's 'Wolfman' work (radios and voices) played overtop of a standard post-bop Bob James Trio jazz recording. It's a nice wall of sound, I guess, but there's no interplay, and it just comes off as a failed experiment, albeit not a terrible thing to sit through. The rest of the album is so curiously, cautiously groundbreaking that it fits because of the way it doesn't fit, and Ashley's work is pretty interesting on its own. I never really hear this record talked about much, which is a shame, because it's phenomenal, and tonally it's unlike anything else from the era that I've heard.

Fennesz - 'Endless Summer' (Mego)

This felt like a groundbreaking record when it came out, and probably represents my peak interest in whatever this genre was. I see it's been reissued since as a deluxe double LP edition so clearly it has some sort of place in history. By 2001 I had seen Christian Fennesz live a few times, and for a guy bent over a laptop he had the most performative presence I've still probably ever seen in, well, whatever this genre was. Endless Summer, as its title indicates, has a warmth and organic quality that doesn't jar with the 'glitches' and electronic crackle, but rather works with the qualities of that sound to complement the language of laptop-experimentalism. From the get-go, 'Made in Hongkong', Fennesz throws the listener into wet, warm tonalities with a burning digital ebb and flow. The achievement of Endless Summer is not the fact that it's trying to capture the same feeling as the Beach Boys or surf music, but rather that it is such a cohesive, expressive statement. The acoustic guitar strums on 'A Year in a Minute' have the languid quality of some of the Jeweled Antler pop bands or Dylan's more stoned moments, and it's remarkable that they achieve such a harmony with the gargling, folding-in-upon-itself undertow that is constantly fighting for air here. This type of wet electronic comfort (which I often associate with the Leaf label -- see the Eardrum review) can easily create a bath of thick mid-rangey tones, which can feel easy at times, like ear candy This doesn't hide it's digital manipulations - the pulsing of 'Before I Leave' is relentless, even annoying at times, and maybe the one track that feels out of place. But Fennesz is seeking new feelings, combining the familiar with the other, and this occasionally produces an exotica vibe ('Shisheido'), as if Les Baxter was being updated for the digital age. Repetition is present, nearly to the point of insanity on the lengthy closer 'Happy Audio', and this type of minimalism feels strangely maximal. Around the turn of the millennium we were lucky to find a lot of (mostly European) electronic artists trying to move away from the beats that characterise dance tracks, instead finding an affinity with post-rock by focusing on textures, colour, etc. I don't know how people more knowledgeable about this genre would feel about me lumping Fennesz in with Pole, Gas, or Oval, but to a young rocker seeking new musical languages, this stuff was magical. It's faded from my memory even though there's no shortage of great music being made today that picks up from where this left off. These descendants may be the proof of the eternity promised by the title of Endless Summer.

Eardrum - 'Last Light' (Leaf)

Eardrum, a British duo (I assume they are British - you can just tell), put out this double LP in 1999 and  my rhythm-seeking ears were thrilled at the time. This is a work of complex assemblage, made to feel like an organic jam; I'm not sure if it belongs in the 'electronica' genre or if it's dance music or why any of that matters, but people like to classify things. The drum in the name Eardrum is key here, as this is built around percussion. This appealed to me because Eardrum avoided harsh, dance-like club beats and used acoustic recordings; the multilayered psychedelic quilt that results is invigorating, light, and functions as both deep-listening and good-time music. Polyrhythmic syncopation is just the base; the various textures are the real joy here, and they are built from howling echo effects, wispy flutes, and other accents. 'Swamp Doctor' opens up side two with a lighter pitter-patter, suggesting equatorial music, but it somehow escapes any stereotypes, even that of eclectic hybrid forms. I also like O.Rang, who I'm reminded of by this; such invigorating exotica is not everyday fare for me, but it's hard to find fault. When the beats get more rapid, as on 'Nightcrawler', it's never overwhelming; there's enough counterpoint and development over the course of each piece to keep things moving. Tension is immediately released, and when occasional digital artefacts are audible, they feel more like phase/flange effects than glitch-core. It's an achievement to make music that is clearly constructed from samples, edits and very finicky details yet still manages to feel so loose. The four sides of this go by quickly, mastered loud on 180-gram vinyl that has strangely sharp edges to it. It a melting pot, clearly sampled from worldwide sources, but darting in and out of various regions. 'From the Nucleus' starts to take on a rainforest feel, with sonorities not a million miles from Gamelan music, but doesn't commit. Perhaps this is true contemporary music, a grey-washing that aims for the middle of all metrics and somehow doesn't  feel blanched. Reading back over this post, I realise that almost every sentence asserts something about Eardrum and then gives a qualifying "but..." so maybe this balance is even evident when listening. Active balance, perhaps?

George Crumb - 'Music for a Summer Evening (Makrokosmos III)' (Nonesuch)

Crumb's composition is for two amplified pianos and percussion, and it sounds very much like the stretched night sky, with twinkles of light and the occasional meteor. The structure, as Crumb writes on the cover, is five-part; 1, 3 and 5 are the main themes and the interludes (separated by instrument-type) are dream interventions. So taken as a whole, we get a grand sense of wonder - a journeyman captivated by the natural environment, and fulfilling the greatest promise of electro-acoustic music. The pianos sound like pianos, mostly, and the energy of electricity coursing through them really does "amplify" the decay and fluctuations of the notes. There's trills, dips, and dots; the integration with the various percussive tools hits it's peak on track 3, 'The Advent'. There's actually a great deal of percussion in Crumb's battery, according to the liner notes, all played by the duo of Raymond DesRoches and Richard Fitz. "Metal thunder-sheet" is clearly the screaming that comes across the sky here, but there's also some kalimbas, alto recorder, slide-whistles, and the "jawbone of an ass" (really!). So as focused as this sounds on wax, Crumb is actually drawing from a lot of different sources. It's hard to know how structured the playing is - certainly the closing 'Music of the Starry Night' with it's waves of chop-chop piano glass is tight, but 'The Advent' is fluid and improvised. Crumb does explicitly thank the performer for their "critically important role ... in the evolution of any new musical language". I've always loved electroacoustic composition from this era (this is 1975) because of the critical balance between technological know-how and pure exploratory wonder. The imagery of the night sky is surely universal, and maybe a bit easy compared to postmodern symphonic works that are inspired by rutabegas, artificial intelligence research or clam chowder -- but that universality stirs an easy soup in my soul. I remember find this record over a decade ago in a very low-quality secondhand shop that was all CDs downstairs and forgotten, mostly worthless vinyl upstairs. I spent a hot summer afternoon combing through the entire room and found this and only this to reward me, but for $1.99 it was truly a bargain.

Cassis Cornuta - '25 jaar de gebraden zwaan zingt' (Ultra Eczema)

The low countries are full of weird obscure electronic musicians whose early experiments have been seeing the light of day in recent times - for more, see the Edmund de Deyster record, when we get there, also on Ultra Eczema. Cassis Cornuta is a synth/electronics goofball who is still active in the Antwerp underground, though these recordings were made in 1985 for a radio show which is still running. Cornuta, whose real name is Daniel de Wereldvermaarde, mines some Anton Bruhin territory though with a significantly less refined approach. There's rhythms made from the difference between turntable needle and dictaphone static, with bursts of space between them to provide a curious momentum. The tracks are all untitled and flow together well - the middle of side one is probably the most feisty bit, where there's various objects bashing together to be heard, and they all are given their own voice. It's a no-style style, a celebration of cheap mass-produced consumer electronics and the pure, childlike experimental approach of shoving fingers and toys between the gears. There's nothing digital about this type of electronic music - it's a pure product of the early 80s, the Pride of the 80s Radio Hut magic. Some of the murky bumps on side two start to resemble a steel drum, though the resemblance to anything human is superficial. It's a good listen - difficult and harsh but not annoyingly so, and Cornuta resists the temptation to mix everything into a thick soup. If anything, this music is very democratising, in that it welcomes the listener to experiment, maybe even generating sounds from the very equipment on which the record is being listened to. This isn't to say Cornuta is an idiot savant or naive; there's a real beauty in what's here - a strong sense of curation, of not just selecting sounds but expressing himself through the tension. I've seen Cornuta live and he was more invested in analogue synths and complicated electronics, but this pause-button madness is much more charming of a clamor.

Cabaret Voltaire - 'Mix-Up' (Rough Trade)

It's nice to transition from the Buzzcocks to Cabaret Voltaire, though I wouldn't normally make any connection between these artists. But it's a good transition: alphabetically from B to C, and geographically from Manchester to Sheffield, but approximately contemporaries, right? And both artists persevered where so many of their brethren hung it up after a few records. Listening to early Cabaret Voltaire, especially after the explosion of the "noise" underground, is a bit revelatory. For one thing, these guys are mostly into hi-fidelity recording, so the dictaphone-recorded basement jams are nonexistent. There's a bit of hiss present from the tapes, but even that's pretty mangeable, and when it layers up against whatever unorthodox recording techniques are being used, it makes a destructive futurescape that feels like it's pulling itself apart. Apart from the jammy live track 'Eyeless Sight', this is a beautiful, strange studio record that worships slow, searing electronics. They take their time to build up slowly in a few places - 'Heaven and Hell' is one such example. And while that's just a sketch as far as traditional songwriting goes, it's a good statement of purpose: electro-acoustic dualism, loaded with attitude and edge, with harsh, dissonant details. There's a lot of rhythm on Mix-Up but it's either synth bursts or tape loops. Chris Watson's loops are the smirking antithesis of Martin Swope, more foundational and less reverb-laden -- even when they're actually quite sparse. 'Photophobia' is one such example, a lengthy spoken piece that holds to a center, accelerates into unsettling territory, and leaves a spooky film. The Seeds cover ('No Escape') shows their roots, unless this was meant as mockery. 'Fourth Shot' has a guitar line that is searing and bright, which is why Cabaret Voltaire have always felt closer to a band like Suicide than to their fellow Sheffieldians, Throbbing Gristle. There's a liberal use of what now sounds to me like Casio beats, such as on 'Expect Nothing', though I'm sure it was sophisticated technology for the time. It actually injects a nice bit of twee into the car crash of audio. These guys play it slow and let things unfold, knowing that's where true horror comes from -- when the drums do become the main focus ('On Every Other Street') it actually get a bit scary. The cover is a blurry Max Headroom/white noise photo that doesn't really indiciate their Dada influence, or is that just in their name? I remembered this as being a patchy record but now, this sounds like a band with a vision.

Burning Star Core - 'Challenger' (Plastic)

Another Burning Star Core LP, another label, another sound. This is one that is so incredibly precise in its vision that many consider Challenger to be the pick of the BxC litter. Certainly from a sound-quality point of view, this is the ultimate of intimate outer-awesomeness, permanently perched just over your shoulder when listening on headphones and fantastically in opposition with the rest of the world when heard on speakers. In my case there's a chainsaw audible outside my window which is just amazingly in-sync with Trevor Tremaine's guitar solo on 'Mezzo Forte'. Internally (meaning, inside the sleeve) we get some flatlined graphical scores, perhaps rough approximations of the soundforms on these eight tracks. And that's a fun thing to map out - the firecracker/percussion sounds on 'No Memories, No Plans' are certainly there, though it's the screaming voices in the background that make this track so compelling. This feels like a "fun" album, a party record, though the recordings are often somber -- reverb chambers and slowly rising and falling synthesizer/electronics parts make this anything but danceable, yet the consistency and track lengths solidify the proceedings. It's anything but filler here. There are moments of ur-drone concentration like ('Hopelessly Devoted') but they're sequenced just right, so when the drone breaks and 'Mysteries of the Organ' begins with it's melting, wispy organ pumping, it's a magically awesome trip. And 'Un Couer en Hiver' maximises the range of vinyl - processed industrial sounds of trebly, echoing field recordings - cut in and out around the windy, feather-like core. When they cut out it's practically shocking - a testament to the mastering and pressing process. And when they come back in, it's a giant boost, and a brilliant ending track. Great closers are ones that let the brakes off a little, but suggest/imply more than they show. 'Un Couer' is a gesture, beckoning towards possible worlds, perhaps a sonic transformation of the beautiful cover artwork. It's these tracks that cement the 'classic' status of albums -- for some reason what jumps to mind is 'Soon' by My Bloody Valentine, which the more I think of it, is not that far-off a comparison.

David Bowie - 'Low' (RCA)

The late '70s Bowie records are enduring favorites among art-rock scholars, Britheads who wear weird sunglasses and people who spend a lot of money on shoes. It's funny when listening to Low now because I don't really know where to place it. I don't think it's an amazing experimental depature but it is definitely cold and alienated. It's a tale of two sides though, positively Lorcalike in it's distinction. The 'rock' side, A, feels pointedly futurist, with a weird (yet Eno-driven) band. The instrumentals at the beginning and end are a little too polished for me; Eno's crazy synths (which are detailed in the notes for each track) recall the early Roxy stuff, but much more serious, much more pessimistic even. Though there are some searing guitar bits and occasional stadium-rock flourishes ('Sound and Vision', right??) I generally feel like I'm driving around some shithole Northern European city staring at concrete 90' angles through a dirty backseat window. I know it's probably side 2 that people get excited about, but 7 times out of 10 I'm gonna go for the pop stuff. The second side, well, it's bleak and intense and thick with synths. I think 'Warszawa' sets the tone pretty well, and you can probably argue there's a pretty good Eno/Bowie balance here. 'Weeping Wall' is the solo Bowie track, a rare example of pure experimentation, and the xylophone surely shows the influence of West Coast minimalism. Well, that and the dense, horizontal sound walls. This is a record that has a place in rock history I've never quite felt was something I could get behind; I must say I like party Bowie, so gimme Hunky Dory or Diamond Dogs any day. But I don't own those records; I own this and Lodger which is *not* me trying to show off my art-rock cards (I have enough other examples of that) but purely circumstance: I only got into Bowie in my late 20s (because as a kid I saw a horrible Tin Machine performance on Saturday Night Live and swore him off forever), and thus passed up all the classic glam-pop albums a million times in my record hunting days, only coming across these late in life at flea markets. This was made around the same time as The Idiot and Lust for Life by Iggy Pop and it carries that same hard, dark side of the 70s Eurotrash vibe that I learned to love about those albums. I assume this could grow to be a favourite, but Lodger goes just a bit further and maybe that's why I warmed to that more quickly. This is on the same shitty vinyl as all other RCA releases in the 70s so maybe it would sound better if I heard a decent pressing.