Steve Lacy ‎- 'Solo - Théâtre Du Chêne Noir' (Emanem)

This solo sax LP, recorded live in concert as the title indicates, opens with 'The Breath' which was the closing cut on the previous record under review here, Moon. Stripped of the Franco-Italo-Swiss band, the composition is barely recognisable, though it is much more clearly a 'tune' in this form. Emanem is a label I associate with Derek Bailey and the most idiom-destroying musicians of the 1970s, so it's somewhat interesting how much of this LP stays around a compositional frame. But then again, that's Lacy - free as hell on Moon (and after all, he played on Cecil Taylor's Jazz Advance way back in '55) but ultimately one who was looking to extend jazz through composition and experimentation. Solo is thus a tight concert; while not exactly traditional standards, it's only on side two opener 'Josephine' that Lacy gets into some extreme techniques. There's a part of that piece where he's squeezing the sax to the point of no return, asymptotically approaching silence but leaving the faintest escape route for his breath. It's man vs. very small machine and the machine almost wins, and you could hear a pin drop in the room as he does it. Actually, for a live record of solo sax this is recorded well, exceptionally so in a genre that usually is well-recorded to begin with. It was a (certainly hot) August night in 1972 and that tense room energy is felt as you often hear on live records, in the echo and reverb through the room behind each breath. But there's nary a shuffle or peep from this crowd, as they were edited out (assuming there was anyone there to applaud in the first place), apart from the briefest moment at the end before a quick fadeout. The compositions start to blur together but Lacy brings out a honking assonance in a few places that made me question if this was all soprano, such was the grit behind it. Other segments are sinewy and untouchable, darting around like an angry insect fleeing a structural flyswatter. Technical mastery, sure, you know already he established that a decade prior, so now it's about hearing him unadorned. The closer, 'The Wool', seems to be the most complete piece, a modal tune that drops into extended breakdowns and keeps coming back to itself.  'Stations' employs a radio in the most John Cage-like fashion and it's a suitable improvisatory foil for Lacy; 'Cloudy' keeps the static running which integrates well into the blowsier parts of the sax playing. The liner notes are clear, explaining who they are dedicated to (Roswell Rudd, Gil Evans, etc.), and there's a concluding paragraph about the nature of solo sax concerts, crediting Anthony Braxton in particular with 'open[ing] the way', and even claiming that they are 'easy'. Nothing sounds easy to me but that's because I once tried to play a soprano sax and struggled to get any sound to come out of it. Like all the other solo sax records in this accumulation, I don't think to pull this out much, but there's something remarkable about the way this was played, recorded and presented.

King Crimson - 'Starless and Bible Black' (Polydor)

Where did the time go? 2018 is not looking like it will match 2017 in terms of Underbite posting productivity. Sorry about that. So, skipping ahead a few, we're into the good Crimson shit now. The lineup has almost completely changed; Greg Lake is out, John Wetton is the new vocalist, and David Cross (no, not the Mr. Show guy) takes care of the non-power trio instruments (viola/violin and keyboards). Bill Bruford is a hell of an upgrade on Michael Giles, and the overall vibe is darker, more cutting, and fierce. Even when singing about ice-cream cones and the devil, it never gets silly as progressive rock often does, and this is progressive rock to a tee. Fripp's guitar tone is sharp, metallic and buzzing, and flashy without being clichéd - he genuinely doesn't sound like any other guitar player I can think of. Even when he rips into a searing, chorus-laden lead line (such as in 'The Night Watch') it feels like it can only be compared to Fripp's other work as it attains a fluidity that I don't remember Yes, ELP, etc having in their sound. Bruford, like all good prog drummers, has clearly studied jazz, and he's an anchor who grounds everything, occasionally poking his way to the foreground but not in a 'solo' way. He's mixed up high enough to be an audible centre when the rest of the band starts to focus on circular, instrumental aggression (such as the end of 'Lament'); they show that collectively, they can just as easily shift into the sneaky improvisations hinted at towards the end of their first album. If later period King Crimson has a reputation of being joyless, they're still having fun here, and the ren-faire trappings have been shaken off. There's still a dedicated lyricist as there was from the beginning, a decision that seems almost admirable. Listening to this now, I keep thinking of the time-signature obsessed wave of indie post-rock in the 90s, following in the wake of Slint and Bitch Magnet and those types of bands. Those bands would have never had vocals like this, but many of the harder surfaces on Starless must have inspired some of them. Fripp's guitar sometimes does the two-hand tap thing, while sometimes is just like a grinding machine (listen to the opening cut, 'The Great Deceiver', for immediate evidence of that), which could be a Don Caballero texture. But there's a tendency towards pure beauty here, which is an admirable one, even if one may not feel that they attain it. Moments of Starless are utterly gorgeous, like the shimmering percussive sheen at the beginning of 'The Night Watch', the way it resolves to silence, and then segues into 'Trio', which is straight and almost neo-classical. The longer pieces on the second side struggle to hold my attentions, but this along with Larks Tongues prove to be the King Crimson records for a 'casual' fan; if only I can remember to listen to it more often.

Guru Guru (Brain)

For years I thought this was the first Guru Guru record, but the Internet tells me it's actually the fifth! For guys often lumped in with Kraut heavyweights, you wouldn't think it listening to side one, which is mostly balls-out biker rock. Any intellectual (or at least, progressive) tendencies present in Guru Guru are buried behind the riffs, operating here in power trio mode, and even doing an Eddie Cochran cover as well. I'm not so equipped to rate such things - at parts I feel like I could be listening to Steppenwolf - but when flipped over, this record becomes a winner. That's due to 'Der Elektrolurch', a snaking, funky exploration which starts around some jammy percussion before experimenting with heavily processed guitars and a scary sci-fi voice (though I think most voices sound scary in German). It's almost unrecognisable against the riffage on side one, and it's kosmiche musik at its best - progressive, dark, and invigorating. You could probably argue that it's a bit underwritten, sounding more like a few sketches put in linear fashion than an actual 'song', but that's OK. Closer 'The Story of Life' continues the atmosphere for 12 and a half minutes, and it takes it's time. It's a slow, meandering tune with a plodding bassline, built around the repeated tenor vocals about matters such as 'The story of life' / 'is hello and good-bye'. About 2/3 of the way through we get to some sort of bridge, suggesting we sleep 'until we meet again', and it drifts off to nothing among some gongs - before a distorted guitar comes back in and takes us home via a flying carpet of burning riffage. Guru Guru are second-tier Krautrock for me but this second side can stand up against the best moments by Dzyan or Cosmic Jokers, for sure.

Don Dietrich/Ben Hall - 'Spitfire' (What The--?)

Three blistering tracks of free-skronk fury, allowing Dietrich to rip it up without the Borbetosoup around him (I've seen it live but think this is the only recording I've grokked). Ben Hall plays the drums real well, on the first track actually propelling things melodically and on the flipside being an absolute fury of the racktoms. It's a plundering of Sunny Murray's legacy, but I mean that in a good way - the beat is always falling through the centre, like a cylinder spinning so fast you don't know the bottom drops out (remember that amusement park ride?). Dietrich's tone is absolutely sick; on the second track it starts to mellow slightly, but the side-long second half of Spitfire is firmly in the upper scratch channels. Ayler's the obvious comparison because of the tone and construction, though this surprises me a bit - Dietrich always struck me as one step further away from the jazz tradition, though maybe this is Hall's influence. The tempo never drops, not even for a second, and while I often would cite that as a criticism, in this case I'm quite satisfied with the fury. The recording is just the perfect level of fidelity and I like to think of the three planes on the cover as representing three tracks.

The Cure - 'Three Imaginary Boys' (Fiction)

I'm not a huge Cure fan but I love these early records - the evolution from edgy, distant post-punk into lush, romantic goth-pop is interesting to follow, and it's hard to stop enjoying 'Grinding Halt' or '10:15 on a Saturday Night' even after all the times I've heard it played in clubs and bars. There's not any track titles to be found here, but the artwork has great iconography - the domestic, middle-class isolation comes through in the brilliant cover and the collage of oddities on the back. This is really reflected in Robert Smith's voice, which is honest and strained. Listen to his whispers on 'Subway Song', his fingersnaps -- these barely post-adolescent artistic gropes are beautiful in their fragility. They actually can play though - even though the drumming is the weak link, it's there and unwavering, which is all we should ask for. The 'Foxy Lady' cover sees the link between the shard-like guitar of the Cure's peers and the Hendrixian antecedents. And while we're gonna visit most of these songs again immediately because I also have Boys Don't Cry, I'm not dreading it - these are anthems of their era, and they're almost overlooked by the later shadow of the Cure's black-lipstick teenage followers. The guitar playing is absolutely great here, whether slicing ('Accuracy') or chorus-laded ('Three Imaginary Boys') -- it's angled and strident without being too heavy. Actually, the space left between the notes is my favourite thing about early Cure - there's so much hesitation, a reflection of the boredom and frustration that characterised the times, though without resorting to teenage aggro tactics.

Cheveu (Born Bad)

There's strangely pixelated Apple ][ album art, strangely pixellated guitars and drum programming, yet there's nothing digital about this record. Instead we're bathed in analogue ambience, a hiss to envelop us into this soundworld. Cheveu was my favourite album of 2008, which explains why I've been collecting their singles (found on the Ebullient Ventilation page). You can divide most of Cheveu's songs into two categories - furious, frantic verbal diarrhea overtop a relentless guitar/drum attack, or a groove-based, fun jam based around an infectious and vaguely familiar guitar lick. A few of the standouts, like 'Superhero' combine the two forms. 'Jacob's Fight', side 1 track 1, should be all you need to hear to decide if Cheveu is gonna be your bag. 'Clara Venus', the one song recorded in a real studio, sounds no more hi-fi but perhaps a bit more passionate, as the band blasts out around some of Rimbaud's fine words. 'Happiness' also uses a borrowed text, this time from the Todd Solondz film of the same name, and the creepy, perverse language is cast in a goofball aesthetic, but a damn fine one. 'Lola Langusta' opens up side B with a rehash of the version found on one of the singles, but adorned with some trumpets to make it a DJ favourite. Is it thinking man's punk rock, or a punk rocker's dance music, or does it even matter? When I listen I'm filled with images of dirty Paris basements, illegal squats, and what I imagine is a theatrical live show. And I want to jack into an old 4-track and start bashing out my own tunes. This is music of frustration but not without careful attention to detail. 'Hot' has some nicely bending guitar notes as it fades into a rut, and throughout this I'm impressed by textures, textures, textures! Cheveu know how to make a guitar sound great, and they are often layering them and changing the textures on song breaks to liven up what could otherwise sound monotonous. The record jams out on the long 'Unemployment Blues', clearly a live, improvised recording that recalls Alternative TV's 'Alternatives'. A tribute or homage, maybe? It's the most psychedelic, though the delay-pedal vocal manipulations and whirring feedback loops are aggressively amateur, and the rhythm section holds things steady. Though youth oozes from every note of this record, there's a definite awareness of musical precedents, most notably fellow Frenchmen Metal Urbain. I like intense visions to be fun too, and this pulls it off with flying colours. Seek it out!

Captain Beefheart & The Magic Band - 'Ice Cream for Crow' (Virgin/Epic)

Don's so earnest on the cover photo, as if he knew this would be his last record. There is some feeling of things winding down here, perhaps most evident in 'Evening Bell' and it's internal headbutting. It's a dismantling of 15 years of music, which in retrospect, doesn't feel very long at all given the journeys taken. 'Ice Cream for Crow' had a great video that MTV rejected for being 'too weird' although it's relatively standard for 1982 rock video - the band playing in the Mojave desert, a place that infects Ice Cream for Crow throughout. Go find it on YouTube if you haven't seen it. I don't think the Captain was looking for any more mainstream success after his flirtation with accessibility in the mid-70s; that video just looks like fun. Ice Cream for Crow is a fun album despite the ticking clock. The band's different yet again, with a few holdovers from Doc and Gary Lucas staying on, but sadly no John French. New drummer Cliff R. Martinez holds things down well and this one is produced well again. DVV's inspired too -- listen to 'Hey Garland, I Dig Your Tweed Coat' which has a melting mudsicle of his best imagery, touching back to the inspirations from the days of the dust blowing forward n' back, but without being in retrograde orbit. The lyrics sheets lays it all down, including the purely prosaic '"81" Poop Hatch". I can't help but feel like DVV had fallen into some sort of gently avuncular role by this point (as the video testifies to, too). Maybe Uncle Beefheart's wisdom by this point is what makes this such a nice departure point - with moments allegorical ('The Thousand and Tenth Day of the Human Totem Pole'), rhythmic ('Ink Mathematics') and strangely wistful/wistfully strange ('Cardboard Cutout Sundown'). Many have mourned the departure of Captain Beefheart from the world of music but I'm happy with what he left us.

Bardo Pond - 'Lapsed' (Matador)

It was my freshman year of college and this merging of my two big interests -- Matador-label indie rock and minimalist drone -- seemed irresistable. I remember going to the record store after class and buying this for $8 or maybe $9, which is how much new LPs cost back in 1997. When I got home I discovered a strange, weird smear on side 2- and the shrinkwrap meant it was a factory defect, not the sign of a curious record store owner -- so I emailed Matador. At the time their website was a weird web address like www.matador.recs.com -- actually, that address still works which is pretty weird -- and their customer service rep apologised and offered me a new copy if I would send the old one back. I thought that was pretty nice of them but I never got around to mailing it back. The thing about Lapsed is that I never really got past the first track, so some aberrations on side two were forgivable. Sure, there's some other great jams on here - 'Pick My Brain' has a nice sunny strum-bake;;; 'Anandomiche' is Bardo's great take on 'Til the Morning Comes'. Not to mention the super long closing jam 'Aldrin' which is in some ways the perfect Bardo Pond song, as equally momentous as their big long 'Amen' track on Bufo Alvarius. But it's the opening track here, 'Tommy Gun Angel', that I've worn out on this LP. Not that you can really tell since everything is so murky and fuzzy anyway. Even though I gave this LP the usual once-over with the anti-static brush before playing (and it looked clean), after each side the stylus had scraped a big ball of dust out of the grooves. What a perfect metaphor. Is that a metaphor? But yeah, 'Tommy Gun Angel'. To say this is my favorite Bardo Pond song is an understatement. It actually is the only Bardo Pond song that matters. I used to have Amanita and Bufo Alvarious and some later stuff I think, but I ended up selling them all during some money-hungry purge, because when it came down to it I just wanted to listen to 'Tommy Gun Angel' over and over. This song is huge and thundering, yet concise. It's actually catchy, meaning you are caught in a net you can't escape from; the indistinct, moaning vocals are the perfect counterpart to the snaking guitar riff. It meanders along as probably the world's laziest hook. This is both a pop song and a testament to everything that can be illegible in the world. Maybe they have bettered or bested it, but I have little desire to hear anything else (and that is not a slight upon this band in any way). I saw them live a year or two after this came out and I fidgeted through the whole set waiting to hear 'Tommy Gun Angel'. The sound was terrible (being in some college auditorium) and everything was out of balance, almost like a dub reggae mix. They played it, but it was disappointing. Maybe that was when I sold the other stuff. I saw them a few years later and it was better but by that point I figured I should get over this song. So it's lingered for some years, unplayed until now, and I find that despite my technical appreciation of 'Aldrin's brilliance I'm still hung up on the side-1-track-1. It's nice to know that I can approach art-rock (or artistic rock music at least) with the same attitude of a spoiled Top-40 radio fan, just wanting to hear the hit song. But stop reading this and go hear it yourself.