Music - October 2006

1. "Nomad" Scott Henderson and Tribal Tech
This is still (IMHO) their best release, dating from 1989. At the time Henderson was playing with Joe Zawinul in the Zawinul Syndicate (he has continued to play on and off with Zawinul ever since), and many of the compositions, particularly the title track, show influences of Zawinul's compositional style - simple themes perfectly surrounded and integrated with harmony. I especially like the non-matching guitar loop pattern in the title track. The other feature of this CD is the quality of the percussion playing of Brad Dutz, whose quirky compositional style is showcased here on the track "Robot Immigrants", where his initial intricate vibe solo theme is double and triple-tracked, and then segues into a harmonically more dense section section written by keyboards player David Goldblatt. This CD sounds like one integrated set of high-quality compositions.
2. "Dreamer" Eliane Elias
Eliane Elias (the wife of Randy Brecker) has been flying under the radar for years, quietly assembling an impressive body of work that links New York song sensibilities with the music of her native Brazil. This collection of ballads, lushly (but very tastefully) orchestrated, is a great listen. The tendency is for this type of music to be regarded as wallpaper, but I find that I actually turn up the volume so that I can appreciate all of the subtleties in the composition and playing.
3. "Fourth World Live at Ronnie Scotts" Fourth World
This CD, which I bought in 1994, is a recording of the whole set by Airto Moreira and Flora Purim's first incarnation of Fourth World. Despite the soundscapes that are woven throughout this CD, this is literally a four-piece band, completed by Jose Neto on nylon string guitar with a built-in bass trigger unit, and Gary Meek on keyboards, keyboard bass, flutes and saxophones. The result, especially on tunes like "Step Seven", is beguiling, hypnotic, and a powerful reminder that the best music always appears to be coming from somewhere else. Subsequent incarnations of Fourth World had a larger line-up, but lack the pin-sharp tightness, attention to detail and sheer joy evident in the playing here.
I am biased on this review because I was in the audience for this concert. During the intermission, Ronnie Scott came up on stage to introduce Fourth World, cracked a bad joke, complained to the audience when they didn't laugh enough ("why don't you all hold hands and see if you can contact the living" was his tart response) and then he walked down the aisle and stomped on my girlfriend's foot, giving her a bruise that persisted for several days.

11.1.2006 • Music I'm Currently Listening To • PermalinkPermalink

Music - August 2006

1. Earthworks "Earthworks" 1986
The first CD from the small ensemble put together by Bill Bruford, featuring the quirky compositional skills and playing of Django Bates (keyboards and E flat tenor horn) and Ian Ballamy (saxophones, didgeridoo). Bruford himself shows off his ability as a musician who happens to have decided to play drums, using standard and electronic kits and other more exotic percussion instruments to weave a taseful, melodic percussive backdrop for a collection of sometimes quirky, innovative small-group tunes. The great thing about Earthworks is that, like Weather Report before them, you cannot really pick a category for this music, except perhaps to decide between good and bad.

2. Earthworks "Dig?" 1987
The second Earthworks CD, with the same core line-up, with a change of bass player. More interesting material on this CD, including a reworking of the 1960's pop tune "Downtown". The highlight for me is the pastoral "Pilgrims Way", featuring Bruford playing Continuum wireframe percussion as a backdrop to the main theme played in unison by Ballamy and Bates.

3. Various "Brasil 1" 2002
My first attempt at what I (with hindsight, rather pompously) described as an ILE (Integrated Listening Experience). I did this by book-ending the CD with 2 tracks from the 1974 Santana CD "Borboletta" - the opening and closing tracks, which are in fact Airto Moreira playing some of his percussion and vocalese arsenal. In between I put together a collection of my favorite Brazilian tunes. I leave it to recipients of this collection to be the judge of its effectiveness.

08.6.2006 • Music I'm Currently Listening To • PermalinkPermalink

Music - July 2006

CD's
====
1. Pat Metheny Group Companion Volume 2 - 1981/1982
Courtesy of the MAAP folks and via Dime, this 2-CD package contains versions of tunes either unreleased in their original form, or released later. Included is the original version of "Better Days Ahead" from 1982 (the tune did not appear on a released CD until "Letter From Home" in 1989), and the second version of the tune called "Mars", which finally appeared on the first Lyle Mays solo album in 1985. The more I listen to the two earlier PMG versions, the more I realize how clever Lyle's definitive version is - he cuts down on frills and repetitions that add little to the basic tune structure. His version is a lot shorter than the PMG live version, but far more satisfying. Also on the CD is the initial version of "Its's Just Talk"; at least, this is alleged by Metheny to be the original version. I think calling it original version is a misnomer; all that was saved from this version was a two-chord section which functioned as a sort-of-bridge in the first version. This early version is basically a not-very-memorable melody superimposed on a blues chord structure (1-IV-V) with the aforementioned minor-chord section leading back to a repetition of the I-IV-V structure. The final version is so different that calling this the "first version" is a real stretch.
The compilers of this gem have done a great job of the audio restoration; the sound quality is as good as CD quality for the time.

2. Lyle Mays "Lyle Mays"
Lyle's first CD, released in 1985, and still his best overall solo effort. The highlights are the beautiful "Mirror of the Heart", a Debussy-like piece featuring overdubbed piano a la Bill Evans on "Conversations with Myself", the majestic "Alaska Suite-Invocation" and the closer "Close to Home", which is a pared-down version of a tune much performed up to that point with the Pat Metheny Group. Great use of unison guitar and saxophone (Bill Frisell and Billy Drewes respectively).

3. Donald Fagen "Morph The Cat"
This has only just gone in my CD player, so I need to listen to it a few times before I can write about it.

4. Pat Metheny Group "Live in Montreux 1987"
Again courtesy of the good folks at Dime, a radio broadcast remastered to 2 CDs. From the "Still Life" tour. Highlights are an excellent "Chris" (from the Falcon and the Snowman soundtrack), "So May It Secretly Begin", complete with a vibes and piano intro, and an untitled 7 minute improvisation that, on the 1991 tour, morphed into the freeform intro to "Half Life of Absolution".

5. World Sinfonia "Live in London 1994"
I bought this at Al's recent Dallas concert and got him to sign the sleeve...I was present at this concert, where he signed my ticket stub, so I now have 2 artifacts to frame. This is only available at Al's concerts. A pretty good (although short) precis of the excellent World Sinfonia group.

Tracks
======

1. Bernie Leadon "God Ain't Done with me Yet"
From his CD "Mirror", the CD closer. A reflective song about life and the future, with harmony vocals by Emmylou Harris. Very relevant to me at this stage in my life.

2. Prefab Sprout "All The World Loves Lovers"
A great upbeat pop song by one of England's most underrated songwriters, Paddy McAloon. From the CD "Jordan The Comeback", which is a suite of songs mostly about America, and which shows an understanding of the USA that belies McAloon's visitor status.

3. John Martyn "Glorious Fool"
Martyn wrote this brooding song about Ronald Reagan back in 1981 and it became the title track of the CD "Glorious Fool". It seems as relevant now to the current occupant of the White House as it did then. Great shuffle-brush drum kit playing on this by Phil Collins, with drone synths by Max Middleton.

4. Labeques "Savanna Valse"
From the excellent "Love of Colors" CD, which is a collection of tunes written by composers who are more normally known as "jazz composers". This was written by Francois Janneau. A slow, stately evening tune.

6. Beach Boys "Surfs Up"
The title track for their epynonymous 1971 release, built up by the group (Brian Wilson was AWOL at the time) from the original piano-and-vocal demo by Wilson, which was intended for the cancelled (and more recently completed album) "Smile".
Carl Wilson sings lead in his best choirboy voice. The ending is part of another abandoned song from "Smile", "The Child Is Father To The Man". Slow, majestic and stately at the outset, the tune moves through a middle section which transitions to the "Child"...coda. Complex lyrics by Van Dyke Parks, which apparently drove Mike Love nuts during the recording of "Smile" as he vainly interrogated Parks and complained about them.
As usual, the group's vocal harmonies bring tears to your eyes.

7. XTC "Chalkhills and Children"
In which Andy Partridge's bittersweet lyrics about his dreams being anchored by local hills and his children are placed in a musical soundscape eerily reminiscent of the Beach Boys.

8. Patty Larkin "Johnny Was A Pyro"
The story of a screwed-up immature man getting his woman to cover for him as he slides further into crime. If there was any justice in the world this would be a #1 hit single. As it is, it is a well-kept secret among us Patty Larkin lovers.

9. Pat Metheny Group "Straight On Red"
The version I am listening to is the never-released live version recorded by PMG at a concert in Besancon in France in July 1991. This is a rough mix, presumably for review by the group. Only 1 tune from this concert appeared on the "official" live CD "The Road To You". The sound quality is actually better than my original CD of "The Road To You" - it sounds like a DAT from a studio mixing desk.
Released courtesy of the Metheny Audio Archive Project (MAAP). The entire concert was released on torrent sites as part of MAAP #6 in 2004. This version can be obtained from Dimeadozen.
This version is shorter than the version released on "Travels". A pin-sharp rendition of the tune, featuring a carpet of 3 percussion players (Paul Wertico, Armando Marcal and Pedro Aznar) with the feel of the tune moving perceptibly towards Brazil. Complete with the usual excellent piano solo from Lyle Mays, which includes a genius ascending bass piano line bridging the key change as he moves through the entire tune form during the solo. The tune disappeared from the PMG set after this tour (Metheny jokes that it went to the old tunes retirement home).

10. Earthworks "Pilgrims Way"
From the second Earthworks CD, this is a ballad built around a tuned percussion pattern played by Bill Bruford on a Continuum wireframe percussion rig. Excellent keyboards solo by Django Bates.

11. John Martyn "Ways to Cry"
One of the ultimate late-night listening songs. A slow love song, with great ensemble playing by the late John Stevens on drums and Danny Thompson on double bass. On good speakers, it sounds like the entire band is in the living room.

07.28.2006 • Music I'm Currently Listening To • PermalinkPermalink

Just found an interview with Evelyn Glennie...

Link: http://www.musicstreetjournal.com/eglennieinterview.htm

Marsha and I went to see Evelyn Glennie perform "UFO" by Michael Daugherty at UNT in Denton in 2002.
This was one of the magical concerts that you find yourself at every once in a while. Everything about the concert was different, starting with Evelyn entering the auditorium, dressed in "space suit" clothing, from the rear playing one of her weird self-made instruments, with a long "space delay" treatment. "UFO" is a multi-faceted piece of music that showcases all of her considerable skills on dozens of percussion instruments. Glennie stands only just over 5 feet tall, plays in bare feet (she is "profoundly deaf", meaning that she feels percussion rather than hearing it) and is just a unique, one-of-a-kind artist.

UPDATE - I discovered that Evelyn Glennie was made a DBE (Dame of the British Empire) recently, so she is now entitled to call herself Dame Evelyn Glennie. I always have a problem with that honorific title, since it conjours up an image of an elderly woman in reading glasses sipping tea in a country house, which is about as far removed as one can get from a small, perfectly formed percussion genius from Aberdeen, Scotland.

03.1.2006 • Concerts and Festivals, Artists • PermalinkPermalink

Every so often I find a story that makes me think that all is not lost....

Link: http://www.austin360.com/music/content/music/stories/2006/02/22hummer.html

Read this article, about how even relatively unknown artists are turning down the opportunity to license their material for use in Hummer commercials.
Leadership often entails doing things not because they are convenient or expedient, but because they are right. The bands and musicians in this instance are showing real leadership, especially considering that some of them would earn more from a Hummer advert than they would in several years of touring and recording. These kinds of articles restore my faith in human nature, and show the instinctively altruistic and idealistic side of many musical artists.

02.27.2006 • Music Industry • PermalinkPermalink