falling river *music*

- as in, i finally got the chance to listen to it properly... actually as i type this sentence, the hour mark is coming up on the clock though this is a slow-hourglass night, and we still have nine minutes to go...

it is new music

- as in, when i said before that this was genuine cutting edge stuff, it was more by way of an article of faith than born from experiential conviction; now i can confirm (if there's been any doubt) that actual, authentic unexplored territories are being navigated here. falling river music is not, in itself, brand new; the name was put in circulation at around the same time that diamond curtain wall music was first mentioned, and all the while, the composer's head was still principally occupied with working out all the various components of the ghost trance music meta-system. but reports of live performances are - well, hang on, i was gonna say "rare" and i've just realised i don't recall ever hearing of more than one (see third para) until now. the only release that i am aware of, and certainly the only one i have heard, which contains any frm is ABCD (itself yet another example of that aristocratic sub-species, the reed-bass duets session - there will be more on this topic next month *1), recorded over two days in july 2003. and that was far from a whole album of it. so, you know, almost a decade ago and the concept itself simply had to take a back seat to every other dam' thing  which was goin' down ;-)  (*2)

heard properly, without environmental distractions, this grips loose-tightly (*3) from the off because, like at järvenpää (and unlike some other great meetings which required warm-up), the "sound-mesh" is in place right from the first attacks (*), and throughout its lengthy, variegated and subdivisible playing-time there is never any doubt that we are hearing one piece, one territory. there is a cohesion to it that quite simply seems to come down to the experience of hearing one fibrous, endlessly unwinding and infinitely curious tendril push and twist its way from left to right (and very possibly back again) through the strangest, most unimagined of landscapes. there is real tensility to this unbroken line and the piece is knitted together around it, and the result, astonishingly, is that which has not been heard before, even though a cross section taken at any time would very likely reveal the leader, thb and mary h at least seemingly play what they already know. yet the shape of that cross-section, again, irrespective of its component layers, is still unrecognised from previous long-range exploratory structures. what this shares in common with dcw or gtm is that it's never predictable and always resteless, continuously shape-shifting into something-other-than-itself; but it doesn't remind me of listening to, inhabiting those musical-energetic strategies at all. no, this really does feel different... and hey music fans, it's very listenable too for the most part! [ok... admitedly my tolerance levels for unusual sounds and structures in music are way higher than most people's. i really couldn't tell you how easy the recent ulrichsberg outing would be to penetrate for a neophyte.]

the name which is missing from the para above is that of ingrid laubrock. this german expat moved to london a few (action-packed!) years ago and quickly found herself immersed in the city's nice-middle-class jazz scene, that is to say the socially acceptable face of young british "upwardly mobile" jazz players as typified by the f-ire collective, julian siegel, &c et al... so, something she certainly didn't do much in that company was any high-end free improv - and the young saxophonist's compositions had never (yet) struck me as having outgrown that perpetually-callow scene by much (if at all *); hence, i was surprised when her name appeared on a list of coming events over at new tcf central a while back; this was not just any event either, coming under the auspices of "Energies, Ideas, Intuitions" - which itself was received terribly gratefully by me even though i couldn't go, since it was not long earlier that b. had told me that he had no bookings on the horizon at all (that was a dark day which received that news, let me tell you *4) - and two things immediately leapt to meet the eye, namely that falling river music was to be played, among many other (mainly new) things; and that the maestro had finally gone the whole way (ish) and formed an all-female ensemble; (ish) because he still took part in it / steered, guided it himself. but we know that our guy has long maintained it's crucial to introduce more women to the creative music scene, among other fields of activity, and in this i wholeheartedly agree with him (immediately and on purely spiritual grounds, without even pausing to consider any ethical/socio-political concerns). so, if occasionally there might appear (to the cynical eye) to be a faint touch of affirmative action in the maestro's choice of personnel for this or that project, the results do rather tend to bear him out. [anyone actually heard a bad braxton show? answers on a postcard...] part of this may be the "rahsaan effect" by which a great and inspired leader raises the level of his crew by example (and with good-enough parenting, so to speak), but some of it will have been brought to the date by (some/all of) the various participants.

so, anyway, there i was, ingrid laubrock soon to be playing braxton in an important series of happenings, and i talked before of how this was an eyebrow-raiser, and elsewhere herr spring day pointed out (as always, with exquisite courtesy) that ms/fraulein laubrock was pretty well-regarded these days and had been getting about a bit. well, good for her like i say, and it's interesting that she should have taken so well to the role, going out on the road with it, taking (bringing) the news (back) to europe. one thing's for sure, no-one enjoyed the bienniale gtm happening more than ingrid laubrock. [this is - honestly - coming soon btw!] and in this piece - getting back to the matter in hand, the ulrichsberg 2012 "barnstormer" - she could almost not be there, one thinks, for much of the first half; one hears the other three constantly, continually. from about halfway on, then, the tenor player asserts her presence in the soundscape more and more confidently, and this amps up the power a notch, inevitably. (this isn't really about power, though.) leading up to the 42-min mark and beyond, laubrock is just blowing air, barely even troubling the mouthpiece with it but completely owning the portion of the soundscape she inhabits, and (more to the point) supporting the contributions of her colleagues magnificently in the process, indeed completely transforming what might otherwise sound like "routine" (*5) utterances, from three thoroughly-travelled players, into something entirely fresh and unfamiliar. as i said above, this is above all a new musical experience... and laubrock's role on tenor may in fact have been similar all along to the one played so successfully by george lewis (in the '82 pisa trio with bailey, &c). the glue, the glue... the sticky sound-mesh which holds the rest together, binds it and gives it continuous form amidst literally constant flux. the lady takes right and proper ownership of this role, as i say, and in doing so may even be the crucial secret ingredient which allows the mix to work its new, new magic/k. highly recommended, to say the least. spread the word :))

[this bit will be replace in due course by a d/l link. at some point, though, i would expect this to turn up as a monthly nbh release so the link won't be kept alive forever anyway. meantime, watch this space... and until then, for about the next three weeks you can still "here" the group's encore c/o the jazz on 3 team. kudos to them for getting this stuff out there, even though as usual jez nelson tried his best to ruin it for me - never even came close;-)  ]

***

thanks to the artist formerly known as king kennytone for providing me with the opportunity to do what i couldn't on the night of the broadcast - listen to the music properly! and he also nudged me belatedly about this, which has been up for over a year: braxton all-stars at the contemporary, chicago,1978

- check it out! the sound is laughably compromised when you first hear it, yet bringing your attention openly to it is instantly rewarded, and anyone with a listener's heart and ears will enjoy the shit outta this, which in truth is not really exploration as such, just "let's blow some serious free jazz and take it in turns to burn the place down with our red-hot solos" - even though the pieces "are" all braxton originals; but, y'know, even serious-as-your-life aacm-ers deserve some time away from the coalface once in a while... - i've listened to the whole thing, both sets (in one sitting no less) and can confirm that the players' relaxation will = your educated enjoyment :)))

more on the way...


(*) see second comment

 * see third comment

* see fourth comment

this will be replaced by an opus number just as soon as i find where i put it..! 
(i'm sure i've seen it somewhere)

(backwards) listening diary (inst.3 pt. 2)

saturday 19th jan - evening session

playlist 1, trs 3-8 (end)

- go on, just take a look back at that list and tell me "what's not to like"... there's not much coming up in the way of news, though a few things are worth mentioning for sure:

a. comp. 159 is seriously complex and (therefore) really satisfying if one wrestles with it, as i have done quite a bit now. it seems (here) to hinge on the playful, yet near-maddeningly obsessive echo and pre-echo between the repetitive birdcalls of the sax and the piano, pinging the message back at each other over and over again while the two "rhythm" players don't so much provide a foundation here, as do their level best to demolish the environs completely, or so it seems. but in a good way! (as i so often find myself saying these days.) - this piece can or could drive one insane, the way that obsessive line is tossed back and forth between the leader and the lady, the boiling maelstrom that underwrites it, the sheer length of it: not much change out of thirteen minutes each time you play it, but an attentive listener feels rewarded for the struggle, you bet. (i had this one first off the album for some reason (*1) and played it several times on breaks at work, either when playing pool (nope, that didn't work too well) or just hanging out... it's not an easy ride. but when was it supposed to be easy? this is the ambitious side of the quartet, or an aspect of it.

- "little melonae" has been mentioned before, briefly (and i can't remember when i'm afraid). for those not familiar with this piece, it's a jackie mclean number much admired by fellow explorers of the reed family; the jazz doctors even opened an album with it (love frank lowe. love, love frank lowe) - where the deceptively tricky, childlike melody (or shd that be "melodae"?) works perfectly for the violin as well as the sax; b. of course plays it on sopranino, fast and hard, running his fingers down those jagged contours faultlessly, setting himself up a cooking solo and leaving plenty of momentum for kevin o'neil to work with (*2). this number is pushing quarter of an hour in length, but i've played it eight or nine times recently and it never palls. i normally struggle with b's standards, let's be open and clear about this (it hasn't come up much recently). 'nuff said.

- and hey, comp. 173 is just fucking mental, man, i'm telling you... i'm not even talking about the barking-mad, brilliant dialogue written into the libretto or even the voice-totemic phonemic modulation which provides so much extra energy in the middle of the long full performance (*3); no, i just mean the relentless pace of the music, almost overwhelming in the opening piece (where attack is piled on attack for long minute on minute until the heaps and piles threaten to blot out the horizon); and much the same in the closing sequence i selected here, the only difference being it's half the length and therefore that much less overwhelming... and it's still crazy. even by our guy's standards... truly a very, very demanding and deeply rewarding musical conception, here encapsulated in one seriously action-packed coda.

[... aha, and timing being the serendipitous thing that is (for me, at the moment), next up from the TCF vaults in february is another one of those kick-ass sax quintets, playing this time... comp. 173. blessed be :))  ]

sunday 20th jan

1. ivo perelman and jay rosen, the hammer, trs. 1-3
- apart from having one of the most unappealing, most targeted-bargain-bin-seeking covers i have ever seen on a music album, this one is pretty good - at least that's how i remembered it from a couple of years back. i do like jay rosen, who is not particularly well known (except to collectors of the CIMP label - he is practically the house drummer there, or was at least a few years ago) and is not to be confused with longtime (now) braxton adept jay rozen, tubist and euphonium player of distinction; rosen-drummer is one of relatively few hard-bitten modern sticksmen from over "this" side who can make me think for half a second that i'm listening to a drummer from "that" side, i.e. extreme metal, so i always think fondly of him. (chris corsano is another one. not too many other names on that list though.) i haven't played this in a while, though - atanase had recommended it to me back in the day, i even held off ripping his copy so i could pick it up next time leo's had a sale..! and i did enjoy it, i did think it worked better than the trio with dominic duval (speaking of CIMP's house pool!), and when i put it on the other day, i really didn't remember it very well. starting almost from scratch, then.

considering its title, the hammer is not by any means flat-out assault and battery, and some of the music may even veer too far (for my liking) the other way, but the first three cuts sound pretty good today and they bring to mind one thing in particular, with stark clarity: the fundamental difference between jazz and free jazz, which is for me this very ability to speak in tongues or otherwise open up dimensional shifts; perelman demonstrates this quality excellently, condensing into his modulated reed sound a whole stratification of layered intelligence, communicating very very precisely yet with great epistemic urgency and forcefulness of spirit. by the end of three tracks i feel as i'm close to speaking the highly educated language in which he is addressing me (*4) ; oops, then the beginning of the fourth cut strays over the line towards (what felt suspiciously like) latin sentimentality, and i bailed, this most definitely not being what the doctor ordered. no, instead i fled towards known safe refuge:

2. victoriaville 1992, trs 1-2

- first two tracks, he says blithely, as if this entailed no more than ten minutes if music (which in the case of this group would be a very long ten minutes anyway); nope, this was more than half an hour of proper, intensive, collaged braxmusick and with me in receptive state, this had quite a bewitching effect on me at times. (in and out of the room, but frequently pulled back in by the music...)

- besides, this is my new best friend comp. 159 kicking things off, which is just home from home right now considering where this post began; this time it's another year later, sixteen months later actually, and the music is being folded back in on itself at a faster rate still, then. crispell, as so often, has recourse to comp. 30 and - well, actually you have me at a slight disadvantage there, because for all its ubiquity in the post-collage phase of opening-up-the-book, i would struggle to identify comp. 147 straight away i think. ok, so it was played at ulrichsberg, the soothing come-down after the franctic, unnerving comp. 169 on that occasion; but back here in canada i wasn't paying close enough attention today to try and unpick exactly who is playing what and when; i did feel immeasurably more "upheld" for spending so much time in the band's company, today. the second piece is not particularly recognised by me at all (comp. 148? restructures only lists it this once) but it still feels great to live inside. i was (semi-)deliberately avoiding any detailed analysis today though; indeed, after saturday's longer-than-expected afternoon session, i am under orders to sort the kitchen out today and have the music cranked in the next room... this works just fine, the music frequently engaging me, like i say, as it churns and progresses... until a bass-solo-including-silence takes over, which i then discover is the beginning of the next cut anyway; good time to switch as now, of course, i can't hear what's going on at all, have totally lost the thread and feel of the music.

3. splatter trio and debris (with guests), jump or die, etc, trs 1-2, 4-5 only

- jeez-damn, this is rather good isn't it. have i ever mentioned that?! it's just heart-warmingly, eye-poppingly magnificent to hear how these guys pushed and pushed themselves to co-create some really vibrantly alive,  utterly serious interpretations of the maestro's works, and not necessarily the well-known (ahem) ones either. ok, so i miss out comp. 23d (+108a) today; this is only 'cos time is at a premium, and i heard it the day before already. that leaves a bunch more obscure-ish stuff, for the most part, and don't it just sound fucking great. luckily the back of the kitchen chore has been broken by now, since not much gets done from here on in, too busy marvelling at the richly diverse and totally fresh, unexpected sounds which keep issuing forth from those speakers. boys: over twenty-one years into the past, i declare, well done to you all!! extraordinary stuff - and did any of you actually think "i can die happy now"? ;-)

for all that enthusiasm, i (again) retain very little from this four pieces, beyond (rather appropriately) visual impressions of outlandish landscapes (comps. 48 & 142); the collage of comps. 50 + 53 seems (alas) to have wiped its own feet with great care on leaving my ears because it's gone, gone... and the first cut - the unwieldy-looking but wonderfully-executed monster that is comp. 40e (+40d)/comp. 40p (+69q)/comp. 40(o) (which is how i would list it myself, i think) is familiar to me already, having been devoured on numerous occasions. here it's an indulgence which costs me possibly two pieces at the end, but once again - when the girls do arrive back, four-year old daughter expresses pleasure and interest in the music, and is well chuffed to guess correctly when i ask her whose music is being played :)

phew ... breather for at least a few days i think - ! no, i haven't even touched on the meta-diary materials (i.e. the music i have been playing while i typed all the posts up over the last few days... music which includes playlist 2 and more willisau, as well as more zooid (boom!) and - haha, no, i'm outta here, eleven posts in one month indeed, i ask you...) and i'm not going to. suffice it to say: ears are ringing, ears are ring-ing (*5) with wondrous sound. me, for time being, gone {{{@@@}}}


* see comments

*viewpoint update alert*

right, yeah: like i said recently, i've been listening to the "meta-talisman" which is willisau 91. a lot, ish. actually more managing files on a computer and less listening as such, but... there's been plenty of that too, since a little goes a long way in a sympathetic set of ears, so... the album is either changing me, or bearing witness to change which was happening anyway. (if you know what i'm saying.) i'm now totally clear in my mind that this group, the (truly) great quartet, is my all-time favourite band in this field (whatever that is...). and that, in turn - i've decided this morning - is entirely natural and all "as it shd be", since in my previous misbegotten role as failed-perpetual-apprentice hard bop aficionado i would have said, to anyone foolish enough to ask me the question to begin with, that my fave jazz unit was miles' second great quintet (especially the four all-acoustic studio albums and the plugged nickel sets, etc). one (now-famous; i shan't name-drop him!) former college friend expressed astonishment at that and said "i'd have expected you to be into, y'know, late coltrane or something" - to which i replied, "well, yes - i like that too" but was privately concerned about my friend's lack of (deeper) knowledge, assuming when i mentioned miles davis that i was talking about "kind of blue/sketches of spain dahling" and not understanding how much freedom the second great quintet enjoyed - "time no changes" is one of those weak soundbites i steer clear of, as you know {koff} but here it sort of really was that simple, the leader fully trusting his young geniuses to co-create the most interesting, fertile ground possible for the soloists to explore, navigate and/or clash against;

- and the eventual true heritage from that shows up with this unbelievable anthony braxton quartet, the true great one, the apex of that continuum, c.1985-94 (*1).

now, willisau represents (pretty much, give or take) the triumphant return for a band "on hold" since late 1985; and this is where we get to the "opinion upgrade" because one of the group's apparent aims, this time round, is to represent precisely some sort of apical level with regard to the continuum of "american (free) jazz as such", to show how it's done when all group-members are not just reading from the same sheet, but communicating at the same speed, crucially. hence, in the two studio, each  disc ends with a "braxton jazz staple", b. quietly acknowledging the fact that in a sane and civilised parallel universe comps. 40b & 40m are staple fixtures in modern jazz "songbook" rep. and, well, this is exactly the sort of thing i'd been saying this band, this exultant set of exalted players, really needn't be getting involved with in 2012; in 1991 at least, and '93 as well i think (*2), this was deemed to be a valid way to use the group's resources - so some element of nostalgia might be thought to be acceptable ("friendship closes its eyes" and all that) last year. (and beyond? mmm, think not all the same). and boy, when the music reaches peaks of (complex/evolved/superintelligent) intensity like these numbers did in willisau, this more than justifies the decision to let the band loose on a straightforward (and non-collaged) reading of an old third songbook piece or two, picking natural closers in both cases, and benefiting obviously from the presence of the piano. this in place, and dimensional shifts are accessible to this interplanetary unit which could not really have been more-than-glimpsed by the '74 group, for example. comp. 40m willisau-style is a very slow-building cooker but when it reaches full intensity, it's a blast furnace. or something hotter... a fission or fusion reaction. when lock talked of incredible energy being channelled through/by the tiny and naturally (perhaps) rather diffident ms crispell - when she plays of course, it not being otherwise visible in her at all - this is some of what he had in mind, six years (or five and a half more like) down the line. cooks aint even in it.

- and apparently also i suck, duuude, cuz on the same album, studio half again, there is a track listed as comp. 23c +32 +105b (+30), where there is quite definitely no appearance of 23c until several minutes have elapsed. so, in other words, it's not up to me which way the composites are titled, it's up to the musicians ;-)  sure enough, late in the mix on this one there does eventually come a fully collaged, smeared-all-over-the-musical-landscape 23c, after it's been played straight. (yeah, so please note: none of this automatically justifies playing it straight and not collaging it on the trio date. ah, shut the fuck up man, enough on this already!) - the real point here is that no, not every piece undertaken by this group had to be linked to the same one identical agenda; it's perfectly fine and fitting for these guys to take on very new and unexplored territories, and also to show at other times that they can treat much-played, supposedly-done-with pieces like the 40 series with the utmost seriousness as repertoire, and so tear the material completely apart and inside-out, refashioning it until it finally fulfills and expresses its own ambitions rather than just establishing its potential. this, in fact, must have been one essential part of what the composer-leader wanted to use the band for at this stage.

does it mean that it's still valid and not just nostalgia-driven, to do in 2012 these pieces, or to take this same approach and not reach those same previous levels, never mind advance the music in any way? (well yes, there was one exception to that as we know... i have to ration myself on that version of comp. 69b from last year so i don't end up risking an aneurysm or something!) i'm really not sure still. it does seem a little perverse... at best. safe at worst, and we're back to dear old nostalgia again. ahhhh, but even that is not what it used to be, alas... and i am rapidly running out of the desire to keep talking about the same album, over and over again (*3). luckily... i don't have to for a bit ;-)

***

- salut f. - & hello to my old mucker, the artist formerly known as king kennytone - thanks! will be in touch soonest  :-D


* see comments

(backwards) listening diary (inst.3 pt. 1)

(started sun 20th)

ahhh... look deeply into the embers embedded in them thar clouds - and try to catch a faint echo of where my ears have been at, since i put the playlists together and devoured the tentet...

... 's weird... what i discovered during the weeks (and months, pretty much) when i wasn't updating the blog and rarely thought about it [ = felt guilty about it] is that people were reading it anyway; the fact that i had "abandoned" it didn't seem to matter and various posts which had been up for a while kept getting new page hits. ok, then having noticed this i had another bout of "blog drought" and that apparently caused a substantial fall in the numbers. caused it? coincided with it, at any rate. finally, i then came back here with renewed enthusiasm (for pretty much everything) and posted eleven times over the next month (18th dec- 18th jan); the previous "fallow period" - nine months comprising the second half of march up till midway through december - had realised a mere nine posts. anyway, at the end of this frantic burst of blogtivity, i had succeeded in getting the page-view count back up to where it was to begin with, i.e. the level it was at when i wasn't posting, but first started taking proper notice. this is a little strange, and i'm not sure what it tells ms, but it doesn't matter. this is because i also (re)discovered something else: that i feel so much better about myself when i am writing this.

alors on continue ... and since i've managed to cram a fair amount of music into the free space in the last thirty-six hours, and since it left me feeling subtly different from before, i thought i'd run back through it.

saturday 19th jan

1. playlist 1, trs 1-2 only: a few minutes snatched when least expected (luckily i had the ipod with me!), but attended very carefully. "birth" seems very long when listened to closely: it's fast-paced and jam-packed with narrative information. but is the narrative supplied by the saxophone, or by the drums, which change their style of attack repeatedly throughout, and end up unaccompanied? was the sax actually just providing accompaniment for the drums? - the jump or die comp. 23d (+108a) was (somewhat) detailed when i first heard it; it seems even more interesting now than it did back then. these guys really knew how to co-create edgy, fertile soundscapes from out of the textures provided in b's music; or at least if they didn't really know before, they figured out how to do it in the studio...

- with some time to myself a little later, i didn't go straight back to the list. instead i dug out a few things i had been meaning to play, starting with this one, naturally enough...

2.  satoko fujii four, when we were there (2006), trs 1-7. "sandstorm" - not surprisingly with so much water under the bridge since i first heard it - is less frenetic than i remembered it, but not by much. it is definitely written and not improvised, though. and yes, it's perfect for both dresser and black, who whip and slap the music along mercilessly. other pieces don't always fully hold my attention today; the title track begins (for me, now) unpromisingly, one of those "haunting" jazzy chord-cycles which (now, always) recall EST - but ms fujii knows what to do with it to keep it listenable, displaces accents regularly and in a manner quite unpredictable, reminding me of andrew hill (who himself was not above skirting the suburbs of sentimentalism, always making sure that his intellectual treatments eschewed the descent into sentimental city full-blown). the album is clever and charming, each piece distinctly different from its predecessors; the playing is top-notch (of course) - and black and dresser do hit it off for sure.

3 - 4. frank zappa, the yellow shark, selections
   - ensemble modern, greggery peccary and other persuasions, two tracks only
this was really interesting, as it shows me how far my ears have travelled in the last few years. around 2005-6, and to a lesser extent after that, i got back into zappa in a big way, having collected lots of his albums when i was younger. but i could never make much headway with the modern classical stuff, even though i suspected it was important work. moments might stand out for me, but i found the majority of it impenetrable, and it would pass and be gone before i knew it. tonight, things sounded very different.
- most of the pieces which i played on this occasion now struck me as being basically too simple (harmonically if nothing else) to be performed by an orchestra. this is a development in itself, because it's only a few years since i was listening to instrumental such as "dog breath variations" or "g-spot tornado" and marvelling at how difficult they were. and they are, if considered as pieces to be played by rock musicians (actually "...tornado" wasn't composed for musicians at all; it was put together on the synclavier for the jazz from hell album, which contains mainly music thought to be too difficult for humans to play; the ensemble modern amazed zappa during the shark rehearsals by requesting an arrangement of "...tornado", then arriving early each day to work on it *1); most of the same pieces just don't sound complex enough, or ambitious enough to be given to a modern orchestra. this is not the case with all the music, and the one piece i played twice today is an exception: "the girl in the magnesium dress", originally part of the perfect stranger (*2). this is an extremely complex piece, without doubt, so much so that the original version was not one of the compositions played by the ensemble intercontemporain, but reproduced on the synclavier alone. here, played with great care by real musicians, it's probably the only piece which fully holds my attention, and i'm therefore able to measure my own progress as a listener by the fact that i can now penetrate the music and make (some) sense of it. the rest of the tracks i play on the album seem - today at least! - to be almost facile by comparison.

the later album, made years after zappa's death, always did strike me as a bit strange. pieces which were written on the synclavier, intending to get as close as possible (not very!) to the sound of real instruments, are now played by real instruments in such a way as to sound like the synclavier. ok, so that's a generalisation; but that was always the feeling i got from it. the two tracks i played on this occasion didn't do much to dispel that memory... "put a motor in yourself", originally the opening number on civilization phaze III, was the piece i had most looked forward to hearing when the later album came out: out of all the music on phaze III, it always seemed to me to strike the best balance between complexity/ambition and (warped) melodic accessibility; and the stiffness in it, the inherent lack of rhythm was merely an inevitable by-product of the fact that it was (painstakingly!) constructed on a very expensive computer-synthesiser. - but, yep, several years on from when i last heard it, the ensemble's version sounds the way i remember it from before: as if they forgot all about restoring the missing elements and instead impetrated an orchestral arrangement which replicates exactly and precisely the synclavier version, then slavishly worked at reproducing it in the studio. ((as i seem to keep finding) listening to) it is a weird and not entirely pleasant experience.

- "mōggio", the opener on greggery peccary and originally waxed on the (maligned) man from utopia, is an old favourite of mine (from an album which i readily admit is one of fz's worst); but on this revisiting i still find it wanting, if enjoyable. part of what makes the original continue to impress is the listener's knowledge that the young (*3) steve vai is doing things on a guitar that the instrument was never designed for, executing very demanding written lines (of the type that an ambitious composer might give to a clarinetist, or to a player of mallet percussion) at maximum speed with almost complete perfection... obviously, this entire dimension (nb: not aspect) of the listening experience is lost to us in the ensemble's version. without it,  again, we're back to material which is great for a (masochistic) rock band, but nowhere near ambitious enough for a serious orchestra.

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thing about that, by the way, is fz actually wrote plenty of music for serious orchestras, he just didn't get the chance to hear much of it (although supposedly (*4) he did get all of it out of him, before the end). the ensemble, like zappa himself - and, more to the point, like RCA - doubtless had half an eye on making a few quid after all, by actually shifting a bit of product. a whole album full of the stuff that made kent nagano stand up straight at the thought of even looking at it would, presumably, have been expected to vanish arse-first into oblivion ;-)

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5. henry threadgill's zooid, up popped the two lips, trs 1-4

aha, now... my ears weren't spoilt at all by the preceding (basic) disappointment(s), just sharpened up (*5) so that when i find myself listening to something (which i admittedly already know to be) truly intended as all-the-way intelligent art, it blows my head off. in a good way! threadgill's conception is rendered beautifully clear all at once, within a few seconds of opener "tickled pink": each voice is an organism-unto-itself within a small community, and each runs uniquely its own course through a musical territory. having such a concept so effectively realised by such dedicated and super-skilled musicians is a beautiful, beautiful thing and i am very tempted just to sign that one off right there, but

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       - i just can't (yet?) bring myself to do it ;-)

 - but no, there's a couple of other things actually. after all, this was the first zooid album (the last make a move recording so far, everybody's mouth a book, was released around the same time), and the project went on to become the composer-arranger's (*6) main obsession for the next few years, yielding several more albums (and live performances) - all of which (studio) recordings i've heard, just not this one until now; and of course the difference is that for the first time i'm hearing this sextet, one more in the strings than the next two albums and a configuration never quite revisited even for the most recent outing. i don't know whether slimming down one was ultimately just a pragmatic "road necessity" in this day and age, but (it's inevitable that) i do notice, in the midst of moving-and-marvelling my way around the room, that the oud has the least to contribute and is ultimately logical dispensable voice.

the other thing... well, it would be fair to say that mr threadgill tends to make rather samey albums, at least as often as not. this is because he tends to take particular ideas and work through them extensively and deeply, tilting them through various vertical and horizontal permutations in the course of examining and exploring them, before moving onto something else. and, er, who the fuck doesn't? ;-)

5. parker, guy, lytton and crispell, natives and aliens tr. 6-11

again, fired up as i now am, this sounds terrific from the split-second laser hits disc... it's the one i ended up paying least attention to - partly because i expected the girls back any minute and kept thinking each track would be my last - but i still patched in and out of phase with it every 10-45 secs and it just sounded fucken ace. perhaps inevitably because of where i came in (*7), parker almost sounds superfluous to what's going on here, the interplay between marilyn crispell and barry guy being that deep and intense. still kicks bottom though :)

[within minutes of playing this, i was online reading about marilyn c. and discovered the existence of this difficult-to-find-without-getting-burned gem; few more seconds, located said item for non-larcenous price on eBay, secured purchase of same ;-)  ... still haven't had a chance to play the damn thing yet mind...!]    (**)

***

inst. 3 pt. 2 follows imminently!


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i can't stop posting

there's so much to post about, all of a sudden...

i bid thee wintry greetings, reader, from snowy south wales: yes, you reader, since people do still read this blog on a daily basis, even if they have long since got out of the habit of letting me know about it. well, that's ok; i've long ago (obviously) accepted this as part and parcel of what i'm doing here, hence it's no imposition to continue it -

- but, as i said recently, i have been feeling a general thawing/conscious shedding of defensive cynicism towards my fellow humans (triggered off just before xmas in my own "scrooge experience"! *1); and i felt it was really high time i got over myself and signed up to the tcf monthly download thing. so much music is on there already, it's scary really, but beyond (for a minute) the ordinary (for us) business of collecting music recordings, there is the greater and more important matter of contributing to creative art which is, with no irony at all, good for the soul and spirit. of all concerned... good for everybody. it has felt weird to be out in the cold for so long. (fer sum reason i jes hadda do it.) definitely time to warm up a bit.

so here i am still listening to the month's free download:

and hoho yes, all very mind-blowing that is too. (i shit you not.) i have also got there in time to grab last month's, the carnegie hall solo recital fragment from 1972 (a pretty barren year). which is nice. oh, and a quick glance at the "sampler" persuaded me to strap that one on as well. not bad for an evening's work really ;-)

(this has been going on for the last month now, pretty much. in the buildup to xmas i bought some stuff in the leo's sale, much of it braxton of course (yes... and believe it or not there is still some which i haven't got), and saw that arrive just in time for the end-of-the-world-which-didn't-happen; the next few days saw me trying to get through those (still only partially successful!). i then spent some of the money i'd been given before the 24th online, and continued a few days later after a muse and ponder about what i really wanted to buy with it. guess what i bought with it? mainly more anthony braxton cds. (a couple of months off, and then a complete binge):

järvenpää '88 - as later raved over

duets with larner - as ditto

victoriaville 1992 (great quartet)

john shiurba's 5 x 5 thing (inc. greg kelley, g. robair... and b!)

7 comp's trio '89 (which is a seriously impressive album)

the trio album on tzadik of course

old dogs 2007 (YES!)

comp. 192 with goddess newton (shiver)

- this in addition to those i had already snaffled in the sale. (some special stuff in there too.) so, yeah, rather than just stack those up and then get depressed about how little time i was gonna get to lissen to 'em, i just started squeezing 'em in however and whenever i could. (still haven't finished old dogs, mind you. or some of the double leos.) and then, well, xmas went, new year came and went, and as cds arrived i was playing them, and then i decided to explode (for some (set of) reason(s)) into the most fertile month this blog has enjoyed since march '08. that was mainly guided day-in-day-out by this meta-talisman of an album, or (to be precise) a few parts of the first disc thereof. but, y'know, that's powerful stuff and will unlock doors (apparently!).

- now i arrive at another collection-point, evidently, and have downloaded the above-mentioned recordings from tcf. that tentet, wow - worth it just for the incredible trap drum display given by kevin norton during the forty-ninth minute (i.e. from 48.00ish onwards). worth it for that, but replete with so, so much more.

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i also find myself playlisting again, for the the first time really since 2008, again:

- and, ah:

- well, i enjoyed that anyway ;-)

[as you can see, i classify any of b's own music under the category braxton, for (several) obvious reasons. in the second playlist, james carter's version of comp. 40q is "jazz" because he (young carter) is himself choosing to make that statement about it, reclaim it as rep or songbook. if anyone's really interested in querying any others then drop me an email or something :) ]

if i have anything useful to report on any of this then i'll be back. meanwhile, like i say... two months with scarcely a flicker of braxton and one jam-packed with him. yin, yang, we can work with that... go check out the 2001 tentet!! remarkable sounds from the (notionally) reed-heavy group; kevin o'neil plays a blinder too as usual. (i will try and remember one day to repost my corrected rip of another concert by this band.)

c x


[hello to alex hawkins - nice to correspond with you again, get that album of covers on the go i reckon! start thinking of collaborators..!]

falling river quartet

right, so for those of you who missed it... mmm. apparently i seem destined always to start these posts in red, so let's go with that. the anthony braxton falling river music broadcast courtesy of (bbc/jez nelson's) jazz on 3 last night - wow, yes, i sat up and listened live for the first time in ages - is still available for a week. get on it people. 

i did listen to it... ish: the low volume levels, and the fact i was having to listen to it late in a family house with no headphones (or soundproofing) meant that i could barely hear some of it, so in the end i gave up trying after a while and got back to the writing instead. it worked surprisingly well as background music, though, and i was frequently very impressed by something or other - i am looking forward to hearing the recording at a proper volume some time. in the meantime - daresay i say it again - this is more genuine cutting-edge music here, folks, what are you you waiting for?

[i saw the page hits  die off completely after eleven o'clock last night. i was hoping that meant everyone had gone away to listen intently to the broadcast :))  ]

 time for a break now - if you have thoughts, let me know what you think - ! feel free to leave a comment!

cent x 

(the trio's) composition 116

(what it is... and isn't)

it's not a headlong, full-tilt fast line extension or anything quite like it. i've sort of cleared that up already (for a very patient and ruminative reader!) - but i haven't said what it really is like, in terms of a braxtothonesque image... it reminds me of a large and undeniably possessed kitchen table, containing numerous fragile household objects and counterbalanced by six-to-eight legs of uneven length and a charmingly unpredictable degree of relative stability, attempting to negotiate its way as fast as possible down a cobbled hill. but in a good way! above all it's marilyn crispell's very own version of comp. 23f and of course comp. 40q - a descending spiral down a broken flight of stairs. and yes, this was one of a slew of pieces written especially for the pianist. gerry hemingway would already have been firmly in ownership of the drum chair, too. mark dresser would not, yet, have been anywhere near the picture. john lindberg was - in hindsight - getting ready to be dumped out of the band. [i still don't know why btw. not that it's a particularly pressing issue.]

anyway, the piece does rely on propulsive forward momentum, it's just that it's both continuously (broken accent time in the drums) and continually (bass) harrowed and interrupted momentum. joyous, really, in the event! (basically looks like a fairly happy table.) the piece does also really offer crispell plenty of chance to shine - and spring, and sparkle even amidst all the spikes and sparks being flung back up the busted-up terrain the group is traversing... and if this is how they want to open the album, i certainly don't have a quarrel with that at all. you see, this one is fine as it is, not quite reaching any transcendent realms but not being required to do so - it's an opener. it's a great opener! one knows (or hopes at least) that the richest meat will be elsewhere in the album. (and it is, there's just not as much as had been hoped for, perhaps.) and because it is reliant on forward speed and flexibility, who knows, maybe there was a conscious (or half-remembered) knowledge of dresser's having previous form on fast openers, playing with satoko fujii and making his bass leak smoke. after all, in case anyone saw the link i posted before and assumed that dresser sort of ended up playing on it, this is absolutely not the case. (*1) no, comp. 116 wasn't written with him in mind, but he was in the post for it, and all these other pieces. he really breathed fresh life into some of that material, probably. (*2) why not leap at the idea of rushing out of the gate with this piece, with this band?

***


speaking of comp. 40q... ahaha, i had to cut-and-paste out an image i came up with for that number, so long ago that i would now hate to have to admit it. 'cos of course that's coming up next, right? ahahahahahahahhhhhhhaahahh)


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