Globe Unity - 'Improvisations' (Japo)

I made a typo on the first draft of this and actually called the band "Glove Unity", which is a nice concept, indeed. This is a good test of the new turntable - so far I've noticed that jazz sounds far better than rock, as thicker mixes struggle a bit for clarity, but the turntable (which I got secondhand) has a pretty old cartridge/stylus on it, which I really should replace. I remembered this being nothing more than a giant ball of noise, but I'm confusing it with another Globe Unity album I have on CD. This has its moments of ball-like fury, as anything with 15 musicians playing at once will, but it's actually a lot more delicate and spacious than I remembered. Side one starts off very slowly, with everyone feeling each other out. The instrumentation is cryptically referred to with two-letter abbreviations and I think it's clear to me (ss = soprano sax, fl = flugelhorn --  or is it flute?, etc.) but it's not always clear who is what. For example, both Peter Brötzmann and Michael Pilz are credited to bass clarinet, though it's the third of three instruments for Brötzmann, so you're left to guess who is what. At the beginning there's a nice soft little lick played on that instrument, left to echo into the beautiful air-space that this vinyl pressing really clearly captures, and I'm guessing it's Pilz because it doesn't sound like a rocket launcher firing. But who knows? There's two of just about everything - well, not exactly - but only one drummer here, Paul Lovens, and he's content to sit back for long passages, just adding some cymbals or other percussion. And Alex von Schlippenbach, the leader of the whole thing is absent for long stretches. It's not until the end of side 1, when this group finally explodes in the manner I spent the whole side waiting for, that his piano really starts chopping through everything. The group interplay is fantastic, and even at its thickest, there is a remarkable balance between the different forces. It's at times tentative, and at times confrontational, but you don't feel like these musicians are battling in a way to establish dominance. I love European free jazz, because it seems to avoid any ego driven basis of much American soloing and focus on a group mentality; plus, later Dutch efforts start to reincorporate traditional swing elements and melody in a way that's really remarkable. There's no Dixieland flavours here, but as any record with both Derek Bailey and Evan Parker, a hell of a lot of boundary pushing. The end of the record is all strings, where the cello by Tristan Honsinger interplays with the bassists (Buschi Niebergall and the great unsung Peter Kowald, who I think is the Robert Horry of Euro free jazz); something is done to the bass, maybe the way its recorded, that makes it sound like some space age synth affect. I'm not sure if they actually used any effects or if it's just an accident of studio sonorities (or dust on my stylus??) but it feels like a spiritual connection to out-there European NWW list music like Heldon or Mahogany Brain, if only for a minute. Though I've pointed out the few musicians I can clearly identify (due to their instrumentation being unique), this isn't really a showcase for any one player, but rather one of the few examples of 15 people coming together to make something great together. I don't know if freely improvised music has moved very far beyond this record (recorded in September, 1977) but that's also not the point - the point is the lineup, for these musicians sound distinctly like these musicians when in this combination. And a joyous sound it is.

Galactic Supermarket (Kozmiche Musik)

Strictly speaking, this isn't credited to the Cosmic Jokers but I file it as the second of their "albums", though (as we have already discussed) these are just recordings released by an evil svengali trying to make a buck off the name of Ash Ra Tempel, etc. Galactic Supermarket is a somewhat more eclectic and interesting record that Cosmic Jokers. 'Kinder des Alls' is less horizontal than anything on the first album, bringing in some delay-affected small sounds - it's more like a collage of quieter subjams where maybe not all of the members are playing at once. Guitars are less dominant; I hear some ivories being twinkled and far more effects and processing than the first album. Someone's girlfriend sings a little bit again, her voice manipulated in a Brainticket-like manner. It's definitely more NWW-list style psychedelia than before, though things still coalesce into group crescendos. I have a vague suspicion that some post-party overdubbing may be at play. The liner notes indicate (in English, strangely) that this is a quadrophonic recording and I can only imagine how great it would sound were I in a similar state of mind and placed equidistant between a quartet of speakers. The title track, on side two, is also erratic in structure but also lurches into loud jammy freakouts more. There's a really strong sense of improvisation on the quieter bits, and all of these musicians know how to let each other breathe. Occasionally there are rock guitar riffs but they never dominate, usually melting into a noisy sound ball. The synths are full-on too, sounding like various teleportation chambers bringing musicians in and out of the party. I don't know if these jams were from the same session that produced the first album, but they certainly are a 'development'. The cover artwork is like a technicolour version of the early Blue Oyster Cult album covers, and the pseudo-Timothy Leary associations are appropriate. This, really, is the winner of the two and I've always avoided the later releases which I've been told are barrel-bottom-scraping.

Anthony Braxton/Joseph Jarman - 'Together Alone' (Delmark)

These two giants supposedly only ever recorded this one album together, but it's immense. The Jarman side is first, with three compositions that begin slowly. It's multi-instrumental as you'd expect, but the first half is a very slow awakening. Jarman and Braxton tease each other slowly, trying to pull out a strong direction but then darting away when the other commits. This is the title track, 'Together Alone', and I guess that's an apt description. By the end of the side things are jittery and ecstatic, with tons of chimes and percussion clanging about, like a small furry animal trashing about in a skip full of disaprate metal shards. The voices start to come in while you can still hear saxophones, which means - gasp! - overdubs! 'Morning (Including Circles' is the name of this piece and the awakening metaphor continues, though the psychobabble of speech layers up into an indecipherable tangle of fishing lines. When flipped over, there's Braxton's two compositions to ponder. 'CK7 (GN)-436", dedicated to David Berman, begins with some electroacoustic noises quite alien to the AACM aesthetic. There's a buzzing motor sound and some flanged-out space fuzz over the Jarman/Braxton interplay. Occasionally it explodes into a fingernail-on-chalkboard soup, though processed by the big computer in Giles Goat-Boy. I'm not sure if it's distracting to the saxophone duet at the core of these pieces or if it makes things more interesting. I think a whole record of this would be a bit hard to focus on, but when juxtaposed against the more "traditional" (ha!) duets on side A, it works well. So do we have a meeting of the earth-spirit-soul (Jarman) and the turtleneck-wearing technical innovator (Braxton)? Or are things a bit less definable than this? If we listen carefully to Braxton's sax when Jarman is flauting about (or at least I assume that's the breakdown since individual credits aren't listed), Anthony is totally kicking it warm, open and human. The electronic interjections do make it occasionally sound like a giant speck of dirt has just hit the stylus, but maybe that's what he intended. 'SBN-A-1 66K' is the closer, which is the least improvised and most dirge-like moment here. It's a slow, winding melody that stops to rest every few notes. Braxton and Jarman are in-sync, playing contrapuntal harmonies off each other while a triangle randomly clinks about. There's a dynamic of push and pull at work; the lock-step song over a haphazard triangle, sure - but also you can hear little bursts of air and taps behind it all. It's a strangely unsettling thing to listen to (like all of side B, really) but when the low reed tones kick in, it shakes my esophagus.

Carla Bley / Paul Haines - 'Escalator Over the Hill' (JCOA)

Actually, you know, Escalator Over the Hill is my favorite chronotransduction ever. Why can't avant-garde jazz have their own Jesus Christ Superstar? As notorious as this is for being an overblown pretentious pile of art-wank, if you actually listen to it you'll find a pretty good time. There's only a few triple LPs that I think are deserving of the length, and this is one of them. A Lot of People Would Like to See Armand Schaubroeck ... Dead is another, but it'll be years til we get to it. Sandanista is not, and something about that forthcoming Joanna Newsom triple gives me a bad, bad feeling. But let's get to Escalator - the lineup is amazingly great, and I could fill this post naming the luminaries who blow 'n pluck on these six sides: Bley and Mantler, of course, and then Charlie Haden, Don Cherry, Gato Barbieri, Jack Bruce, Don Preston, John McLaughlin, Linda Ronstandt (!), Roswell Rudd, Michael Snow (!), Jimmy Lyons, Enrico Rava, Leroy Jenkins, Dewey Redman .... and that's not counting the unsung heroes like Paul Motian (who drives the drumkit throughout). I am a sucker for Bley's style of brainy big-band deconstructions; I love Tropical Appetites and a lot of the songs here follow a similar pattern, though with Paul Haines' perplexing lyrics. There's a lot of great, soulful movements here; the whole set opens with Roswell Rudd's trombone aching in pain. This Hotel Lobby Band comes back and forth like a Greek chorus, with other smaller breakout groups driving forward the story and the band returning - used to great effect at the end of 'Holiday in Risk'. I'm not going to be a literary critic here, so you won't get any comments on the themes present in the lyrics (mutation, India, conflict, the body, etc.). But as one who enjoys delicate, female-driven songwriting, big-band swing, and weird electro-acoustic sound fuckery -- this has everything for me. It's amazing how incredibly consistent it is over two+ hours. I guess this took a few years to assemble so Bley really could take her time to keep the wheat from the chaff, you know? But while "it's all good", there's still highlights. Linda Ronstadt really has a shit-hot voice, and whenever she takes a tune, it slays ... check 'Why?' on side 2 if you don't believe me. I wonder what this stage production looked like? I can only imagine actors dealing with sounds like the ring-modulated piano or the calliope bits. Jack's Traveling Band (which is McLaughlin, Bley, Bruce and Motian) rip it up in rock-fusion fury on side 3-- to the point where you can only dream of an offshoot LP. It resembles Tony Williams' Lifetime on more than a surface level, though contained into a five minute "rock song" and somehow fitting in place with the rest of this. They come back in 'Rawalpindi Blues' and get a bit more room to explore, when McLaughling busts this nutty guitar line that is super staccato repeated notes. The piece goes into this weird chanted "What will we ever do with you?" vocal part over what sounds like AMM or something, and then the theme is taken up by the other recurring band in Escalator Over the Hill -- the Desert band. They actually appear earlier on side 5 to introduce the Eastern section of the story. This is where Jenkins shines, though it's also copiloted by Don Cherry's ethnoclouds of trumpet (and later his vocal glossolalia). The cello (played by Calo Scott) has a tambura/Bharat vibe, and these sections feel like a slice of curry-flavoured gristle in the middle of wedding cake. Overall, cause it's been a few years since I last listened to this, I'm kinda blown away by how good it is. I could probably go to this at any point during the last ten years and found something in there to reflect on my current interests. When I was into jammy, spacey rock explorations I would have enjoyed the Jack's Traveling Band sections; when I was interested in oblique songwriting, well, pretty much all of the parts with singing would apply. Free jazz? Of course, and more restrained improvisations are all over this, too. Outsider, NWW-listy sounds? Sure, they're the glue that holds this together really. There's also a few tunes where the voice drifts over the instrumentation in the same way that outsider/free folk does, which I can't explain any better. 'Oh Say Can You Do?' on side four (which is voice and calliope) is what I'm talking about. Ethnic free explorations: see the Desert band, above. Complicated art-rock ideas: the whole thing. Right now what I take from this the most is the idea of composition as a means of liberation, not control. This is a pretty tightly knit triple LP, probably the most tightly knit 3xLP I can think of except for maybe that one Vitamin B12 release. But at the same time, it invites exploration across a shitload of different genres, and can probably be studied to the point of microscopic detail.

Astral Blessing (Mad Monk)

Some Sunburned Hand guys are in this band, I think; Astral Blessing is a free rock guitar-based ensemble. Two side-long improvisations with guitar squeals galore and swirling messes of fuzz, avoiding crunchy Sabbathy riffs in favor of flowery, organic soundrings. Side one is almost hilariously lo-fi, not distorted but just thin. It begins with echoing guitars that ring out a lot before the rhythm section kicks in, and it builds up to something nice but there's altogether no focus. But that's the idea, right? Side two is a bit better sounding and follows a similar pattern, and at some point you realise that it's not hard to listen to and it's actually pretty good, like listening to an anti-jam band jamming. There's a short track at the end, a nice coda to what we've heard before; it's intensely nervous, a buildup to some release that never comes. And it kinda reminds me of 90s guitar indie bands like Come or Crain or something, though I'm sure they weren't going for that. I'm not sure how this ended up in my collection and it's not something I ever have the desire to listen to, but as another vinyl byproduct of the free-folk/psych thing that was big a few years ago, I guess it's a nicely electrified version of it.