VOTD 12/7/2024

 Duck Baker: Duck Baker Plays Monk (Triple)

Purchased at Fungus Books and Records

Okay, I'm snagged. Put a record in front of me titled So-and-so Plays Monk and chances are I'll buy it. Off the top of my head, I own copies Hal Wilner's That's the Way I Feel Now with its large variety of less-than-traditional takes, as well as all-Monk albums by Steve Lacy, Tommy Flanagan, Charlie Rouse, Sphere, Bud Powell, James Spaulding, and probably others. Some are quite good but I'm not sure ever rise to the level of the master himself.

So yes, I'll put down a few bucks for this Duck Baker LP. I noticed Duck's name turning up here and there as far back as the late 90s, probably due to an album he recorded of Herbie Nichols' music. I knew he played guitar, and not much else. Come to think of it, I still don't know much more about him. 

He plays fingerpick-style acoustic guitar, and he's solo in this setting. The program is nine pieces, largely pretty standard works from the Monk book: "Blue Monk" "Off Minor" "Bemsha Swing" "Round Midnight" "Light Blue" "Straight, No Chaser" "Jackie-ing" "In Walked Bud""Misterioso". All pieces I've played, with the possible except of "Jackie-ing". 

A few years back, pre-COVID and then a few, I went to see Sean Jones play Billy Strayhorn's music at the Kelly Strayhorn Theater (named for Gene Kelly and Billy Strayhorn). They announced they would play "Satin Doll" and I rolled my eyes: that's a work I never really need to hear again. But then Sean played it, and it was great. He made it sound like a piece of music again and not just a parody of itself, which I how I usually hear it. Point being, I don't necessarily need to hear another version of "Blue Monk" or "Round Midnight" unless the artist really makes something out of them. 

I think it's fair to say that Duck recognizes the form and changes to each of the pieces without being married to them. Most takes begin with some sort of introduction, presumably improvised (or mostly so) that eventually leads to the melody. He doesn't always stay with the original key of the pieces, choosing more guitar-friendly keys. Roswell Rudd wrote some of the liner notes, pointing out the "Blue Monk" is taken from the original B flat down to E, giving it a Delta blues flavor on solo guitar. 

As a single-line melodic instrumentalist, I marvel at the ability of multiphonic instruments to shape lines and harmonies simultaneously. Being a solo guitarist, Duck doesn't have the sort of resources on hand that a pianist would, but he makes due with what six strings has to offer. He plays crisp lines, supporting himself with harmonies, sometimes not. Occasionally a line will shoot off into atonality, always to come rushing back to the tune. He doesn't go into the so-called extended techniques the way that Eugene Chadbourne does, Duck is all about notes played on strings stopped against frets.

Overall? An entire LP of solo guitar is a lot, but this is one of the better Monk programs I've heard. I wonder how Duck is in an ensemble setting? His time seems to be very good when he's playing more metrically. I might just have to go back to Fungus and get the Herbie Nichols LP, which they also had on hand. 

VOTD 12/6/2024

 Yes: Fragile Outtakes (Atlantic/Rhino)

Purchased new at Eide's

"I can't believe you like that band." -My wife.

For better or worse, we have some affection for some things from our past, whether it's music, films, television programs. Some things that affect you in your youth (say, 12-16 years of age) will vindicate themselves with time. The moment I watched Monty Python's Flying Circus from the first episode I viewed, and that opinion has hardly diminished with time. I watched Monty Python and the Holy Grail for at least the sixth or seventh last week, and loved it. 

On the the hand, the first LP I bought for myself was Kansas' Leftoverture. I listened to it many times and could probably identify every song from it to this day. But do they mean much to me now? Not so much. It was fine when I was 13. 

I was really caught by "Roundabout" when I started listening to FM AOR stations as a teen. AOR is now an antiquated term, Album Oriented Rock, radio programming that's not just based on singles but album cuts. A classic example would be Steely Dan's Aja album; I'm pretty certain I heard every piece on that album broadcast on the radio at some point other another. While "Roundabout" itself was a single that eked its way into the American top twenty (but not the top ten), it's atypical for both content and length. I guess there's a single edit, but the full length piece is over eight minutes in length. Not friendly for AM radio, but worthy of AOR FM stations.

Based on that, not long after Leftoverture I bought a copy of Yes' Close to the Edge. It's an album that continues to impress me. I mean, I see the excesses and silliness of Yes as well as anyone: the flowery, nonsensical lyrics, the pomposity. They were also a snap performing band with pretty incredible vocal harmonies. There was Jon Anderson's boy-soprano lead vocals, but it was bassist Chris Squire who sang the far more difficult harmony vocals. I saw him do it on one of the last tours before he died, and he was still coming up with the goods. 

Despite being the album source of "Roundabout" I never liked Fragile as much as CTTE. It had some strong pieces on it, but the decision to give every band member their own solo-led piece interrupts the album more than gives it a flow. I think most or all of the outtake versions on this vinyl issue have made it onto some big Fragile retrospective collection before, but I don't own that and don't need it. A single LP is fine. 

This album largely follows the same format as the final issue. Rick Wakeman's solo contribution, "Cans and Brahms" is thankfully not included on this album. I'd argue it's the most unnecessary track on the final album. (Some have said Bill Bruford's "Five Per Cent of Nothing" is a total waste, but I can hardly begrudge its 35 second length. I wonder if he had started composing the jazz fusion pieces that would be the basis of the Bruford band repertoire? Those works wouldn't have fit with Yes particularly well.) Replacing it in the track order is "All Fighters Past" which didn't make the final cut. It's a fairly conventional song. I can hear that the organ line was recycled into CTTE. 

I have mixed feelings about studio outtake albums, despite owning a number. I know for myself, if I've left a performance off an album, it's because I didn't feel it was worthy of release. I do enjoy outtakes when I want insight into process. The various Miles Davis box sets have many partially or completely unused performances and pieces. I find it very interesting to hear what he edited and what he kept. I've written here about some of The Residents' reissues with unreleased tracks, which are occasionally interesting but generally it's easy to see why they didn't make the cut.

Here, the pieces are all in an earlier and rawer state than the final product. There are missing vocal lines, some changes in arrangements, even occasionally lines that would be later removed. It's not an album for anyone who doesn't know the original album, but it might be interesting for the more-than-casual fan. 

Whether Yes or The Residents or Miles, they all got to spend a lot of time in the studio to develop their albums. The process of recording, listening, adjusting, rearranging and replaying influence the results. (I think The Residents built their own studio rather than having to pay for studio time.) The most time I've spent in the studio to record an album was three days, and one of those was basically just to set up. I guess what I'm hearing is the process influence the final results.

VOTD 12/5/2024

 VA: Hoisting the Black Flag (United Dairies)

Purchased at Fungus Books and Records

Side one: Lemon Kittens: Funky 7

Truth Club: To the Nile Sisters

Nurse With Wound: Duelling Benjos

Mental Aardvarks: Bogart Was Three Lemons

Side two: David Cross: Early Dance Music

Paul Hamilton & Joseph Duerte: Dance Music

Whitehouse: Her Entry/Foreplay

Mental Aardvarks: What Have You Done (Pieces of Meat)?

What a strange, strange time. This dates back to 1980, on the Nurse With Wound home base label United Dairies. (I always found the label's name delightfully surreal and/or random.) By the time of this issue, UD had released the first three NWW albums, and also their first albums by other artists: Lemon Kittens (Danielle Dax and Karl Blake) and The Bombay Ducks (the above listed Hamilton and Duerte). 

Nurse With Wound/United Dairies itself began as three people (Steven Stapleton, John Fothergill, and Heman Pathak, brought together by their passion for collecting weird records). Soon it became two (Stapleton, Fothergill) and before long just Stapleton. This record would have been released when John Fothergill would be still be involved. 

I was reading today that the cover image was placed in the wrong orientation (probably upside down, based on the signature) by Fothergill, no doubt to Stapleton's annoyance. Stapleton also complained that releasing The Bombay Ducks' LP was John's idea, and that he found it to be the ramblings of audio technicians and not interesting. Maybe some operations were just meant to have one person in charge. 

An aside: this in turn makes me profess my admiration for truly collaborative relationships that exist over long periods of time. Joel and Ethan Coen come to mind, though Joel has directed one film on his own. I guess they know how to delegate responsibilities. 

This record...what a strange, strange time. There's nothing wrong with releasing what is generally considered strange music. Was this a self-sustaining label? They must have been doing something right, to have released as many records as they did in the 1980s alone. And perhaps, with so few people releasing LPs that sounded like this at the time, they beat others to the punch so to speak. You want weird? Head straight to United Dairies. 

There's little question the centerpiece of this collection is Nurse With Wound's "Duelling Banjos". It's an abrasive, intentionally offputting collage of sampled voices (May & Nichols, Cage, Nihilist Spasm Band, probably among others) repeated for maximum annoyance. There's feedback, sometimes dense background sounds, grungy, punctuated bass. My friend Rich Temple in his college radio days (early 80s) would close every broadcast with this piece, in a blatant attempt to get people to turn their radios off. He was probably successful, for as much as anyone as listening to a 10 watt college radio station on a weekday afternoon. 

I knew I was thoroughly annoyed with it when I heard it originally, though it wouldn't be too long before I started buying their records. It's still "difficult" listening, though now it doesn't seem as interminably long as I once did. I guess repeated exposures, plus having heard more things that are vaguely similar, has blunted its abrasiveness for me. But only a little. It's still hard to take, but I admire the piece for it now. 

Also notable, if not as interesting, is a contribution by David Cross. David five years earlier was playing with King Crimson, nobody's favorite player in the Wetton/Bruford/Fripp quartet. There's also a pair of feedback pieces by Whitehouse, who was headed by William Bennett and friends with Steven at the time. (There's no credit, but I understand William was co-responsible for the NWW track on this.) IT sounds like....screeching feedback with vocals recorded through a long metal ventilation shaft.

Perhaps more interesting is the Lemon Kittens song, if you can call it that, and I wouldn't describe it as funky. Well, you know, given that you can bring up the tracks on Youtube at thi point, I guess I bought this for the collection. But I did want to give "Duelling Banjos" another spin or two, to see how it landed for me.