Wyatters delights (what are you listening to?)

[theallgolden]

just a few snapshots of music to which i listened with delight:

donald fagen - morph the cat

the streets - the hardest way to make an easy living

andrew morgan - adventures in radiology

el perro del mar - selftitled

dresden dolls - yes, virginia!

[Max_Gate]

Mark Hollis: Eponymous - This is closer to Morton Feldman than it is to early Talk Talk. Listening to it is like looking at the world through a rain-spattered windscreen; everything is mysterious yet pristine.

The Hal McKusick Quartet: The Complete Barry Galbraith, Milt Hinton and Osie Johnson Recordings (Lone Hill Jazz LHJ10176). These pieces were recorded in New York over 1955-56. They're an instance of the pianoless quartet that Gerry Mulligan pioneered. Ideal listening as you cruise through the house in winterweight pyjamas.

[Max_Gate]

Savoy Brown: 'Blue Matter' - A lumbering wonder from the brutal Simmonds and the bowler-hatted Youlden. No delicacy, only the forward motion of an articulated lorry downhill.

Morphine: 'The Best of' - Grungy sax over bass; a rocking outfit with no lead guitarist. Such a glorious contradiction. It sounds as if Madness was in a smoky club, had sniffed some cocaine backstage, and was now attempting to play John Mayall standards.

[theallgolden]

old singles.

since  i heard that sad, sad news about the death of grant mclennan of the go-betweens iam upset and sad. the go-betweens meaned a much to me in the eighties and after they reunited in 2000 the recorded three wonderful albums. confused about the death of grant mclennan, that great songwriter,  i had reminders of the past and i decided to have a look at my old singles box. among a lot of fine singles and forgotten bands i found those two beautiful ones which i immediately played:

nikki sudden  & dave kusworth shame for the angels ep

and

the go betweens - i think i need two heads

nikki and grant, your music will always be in my heart. rest in peace.

[Max_Gate]

I seem determined to turn this weekend into a time warp with a series of retrospective double CDs: Traffic, 'Smiling Phases: Best Of 1967-1974'; Wishbone Ash, 'Time Was'; Yes, 'Yesstory'. The best of these is the second disc of the Traffic set, which is of its period but all the more charming for it. Wishbone Ash still delight with their twin-guitar attack, although those vocals are sooo tedious....Not as tedious as Jon Anderson's falsetto histrionics however: Yes are generally the sonic equivalent of wedding-cake icing yet 'Roundabout' is sweet without being sickly.

[theallgolden]

bob dylan day. i listened to his planet waves and at this moment nashville skyline is rotating. both have 'hits and misses'. i love side two of both albums more than their a - sides.

after the passing of grant mclennan of the go-betweens i was very sad and i listened a lot of their stuff. also mr. mclennan's solo-stuff. but none of his  solo-lp's have the greatness of the go-betweens albums. robert forster and grant mclennan were at their best when they worked together. so sad that this could not happen again.

and max, thanks for yr. traffic reminder. their first albums are wondeful.  i should listen do them again.

[Max_Gate]

Yes, Traffic are perennials in this wintry household. So cold is it that I've been cheering myself by playing 'The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society'. It's difficult to shiver with anything but laughter at lyrics as beautifully loopy as:

We are the Village Green Preservation Society
God save Donald Duck, vaudeville and variety

We are the Desperate Dan Appreciation Society
God save strawberry jam and all the different varieties

Preserving the old ways from being abused
Protecting the new ways for me and for you
What more can we do

We are the Draught Beer Preservation Society
God save Mrs. Mopp and good old Mother Riley

We are the Custard Pie Appreciation Consortium
God save the George Cross and all those who were awarded them

We are the Sherlock Holmes English Speaking Vernacular
Help save Fu Manchu, Moriarty and Dracula

We are the Office Block Persecution Affinity
God save little shops, china cups and virginity

We are the Skyscraper Condemnation Affiliate
God save Tudor houses, antique tables and billiards

Preserving the old ways from being abused
Protecting the new ways for me and for you
What more can we do

God save the village green.


- Amongst the rollicking chiming we get the perfect absurdity of vernacular/Dracula set to a Flopsy, Mopsy & Cottontail of a melody that hops across the airwaves.

[Max_Gate]

It is longer than I care to remember since I fell in love - and it is even longer than that since I fell in love with an album. But the minor miracle has happened with Christian Fennesz's 'Venice' (Touch TO:53, 2004).

The cover features a battered blue rowboat of the kind that feature in coffee-table guides to either travel or home decor. Playing this album is the equivalent of lying back in that boat as the waters move you this way and that, occasionally threatening to topple you out.

If I say that David Sylvian contributes lyrics and a vocal to one track then you will imagine a calmer album than this really is. There are discordant eddies, passages of static - yet the overall sense is of a charged calm. If metallers liked ambient music then this is the album they'd play. Think Lou Reed's 'Metal Machine Music' meets a Mahler adagio.

I'm grateful to have found it and to have found myself in it.

[Max_Gate]

Tom McRae - 'Just Like Blood' : The album works more as a suite than as a collection of discrete numbers; this brings tonal consistency and gives the listener the sense that he or she is moving around an issue rather than being shunted from one issue to another. I suspect that's why some reviewers find 'Just Like Blood' repetitive. It's been knocked for its grim lyricism; to me that's rather like condemning Leonard Cohen for his carnal despair. Songs like 'Mermaid Blues' and 'Ghost of a Shark' are gorgeous explorations of the shadow.

[Jaakko]

...mainly Popol Vuh, Ashra tempel and Rush
at the moment.

j.

[uncle_wolfgang]

Killing Joke - Hosannas from the basements of hell
Holger Czukay - On the way to the peak of normal
Scott Walker - The drift

[Max_Gate]

A Dutch pressing on Decca of Brahms' German Requiem, Opus 45: George Solti conducts the Chicago Symphony & Chorus, with Kiri Te Kanawa and Bernd Weikl attempting the commemorative confessional that marks the long arches (but never the arch longueurs) of Brahms' phrasing. Rather than recovery from mourning this work is a monumental example of recovery THROUGH mourning. Glorious; a pillar of sunlight between the sea and infinity.

[theallgolden]

listened to orange juice postcards works and to josef k.
but since i have discovered john fahey i fell so much in love with his 'american primitive guitar' i spend the most time listen to his music.  especially that 'america' - record is simply marvellous.

[Jaakko]

György Ligeti died 12.6. and

he was one of those Original Guys!

Sony did a marvellous job releasing that complete works
series (but not without help from that mysterious
millioinare fan, I've heard.)

Today's soundtrack: Le Grande Macabre

http://www.gyoergy-ligeti.de/

j.

[Max_Gate]

This weekend the house, where I usually wake alone to birdsong, has been filled with visitors - which means that it has also been filled with music, specifically:

Fennesz - Venice
Mark Hollis - Mark Hollis
Tom McRae - Just Like Blood
Múm - Summer Make Good
Four Tet - Rounds

These combine to make a soundtrack to another life, one I've yet to live. That's why the pieces fill me with longing.
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