CDOTD 2/4/2024

 Henry Grime Trio: The Call (ESP)

Purchased from the dollar bin at The Exchange

It's Grammy night, and I almost couldn't care less. I'll admit to having a minor interest in learning who wins in the jazz, classical, and spoken word categories, and I would like to tune in just for the "In Memoriam" presentation. (If they applaud more, is it because the audience missed that person, or is happier they're gone?) I remain bitter that that the committee couldn't spend ten seconds of screen time to acknowledge Karlheinz Stockhausen's passing in the 2008 show. I watched just to see if they would.

I understand they're going to give special recognition in memoriam to Sinead O'Connor, a person who I don't think wanted much to do with any of them.

I'm completely out of it with any new music. I can't recall when I last bought something newly issued, but it's been years. Actually, I take that back, half-way: I bought the live A Love Supreme and a newly issued Thelonious Monk concert when those were released, both in Impulse!. Hardly new music, though.

Since I'm nearly at rant mode, I'll take this opportunity to complain about the music on Saturday Night Live. We stay up specifically to watch Weekend Update, which still makes me laugh (unlike most of the show). That means having to sit through one music guest slot. First of all, I'm sorry but I think it's nearly all garbage. Yes, I sound like an old man complaining about the same things old men have complained about for years. "The music isn't as good as when I was younger." I can pretty much hear my own grandfather's voice in my head saying that. But most of the current music presented is shit. This is the show that at one time presented DEVO, B-52s, Elvis Costello, Sun Ra, Ornette Coleman, Stanley Clarke, and at least once a year Randy Newman. I don't count myself a huge fan of all of those artists, but what great variety!

Most offensive to me is that almost none of the music is 100% live anymore. At a minimum they're using backing tracks, and in many cases the singer is clearly lip-syncing. Jack White and Foo Fighters have been notable exceptions in recent years, and good for them. I can't stand Miley Cyrus' singing, but it looked to me like she was singing live on the most recent anniversary special, so, respect. 

Last night was Jennifer Lopez. Definitely lip-syncing. Last week, Justin Timberlake, the same. Previously Reneè Rapp, at a minimum, backing track. If they're going to do that, just show a music video, don't have the pretense of a "live" performance. It's all choreography and show, no musicianship.

If I could, the one thing I'd impress on Lorne Michaels (who surely must be retiring after the show achieves its 50th season) is: 100% live music only. No backing tracks. No lip-syncing. Don't like it? You don't have to appear. We can always find someone else. Show us what you got. It's Saturday Night Live, people.

----

I'm a person that would spend forever at the shelves of Blockbuster,  mulling over what to to rent, often going home empty-handed. The current equivalent is hunting through menus on Nexflix or Tubi, always searching, not always deciding. So too with my own record/CD collection: what to put on? And am I just putting it on to write about it on my blog? I don't worry about that last point too much, but it does occur to me. 

I wanted something un-Grammy-like. I wasn't in the mood for Stockhausen. I figured Henry didn't get enough love, I'll put this on. Speaking of not enough love, this is a copy I found at the local The Exchange for a dollar, and it's autographed. No respect at all. I would have bought it anyway, but the lead voice here is Perry Robinson on clarinet. Definitely on board. Drummer Tom Price? I don't know the name at all. I regret not going to see Perry play the last time he appeared here, thanks for Manny Theiner. It's the reason I paid out the butt for tickets to see Herbie Hancock in March: see everyone you can at least once, because you and they have a finite time on this planet.

I love the saxophone. But there are times when I regret, just a little, not having devoted myself entirely to the clarinet. It was my first instrument (more or less, that's a story for another time) and I enjoy playing clarinet more than most saxophone doublers, I've found. (Some of them play flute, and I say they can have it. I have consciously decided to never play flute again. No matter how interesting it can sometimes be, I'm bad at it and no amount of practicing will change that.) I don't spend a lot of time practicing, but most of it in recent years has been on bass clarinet. 

Take the famous Sonny Rollins Trio lineup: tenor saxophone, bass, drums, and twist it a little by replacing saxophone with clarinet. I like it. Perry has a meaty sound; not necessarily saxophone-like, something different entirely. I get a sense that he has a looser embouchure, which lets him bend pitches more easily. 

There's a lot of free blowing between melodies. It was ESP and 1965, after all. 

CDOTD 2/1/2024

 Thom Yorke: Suspiria OST (XL Recordings)

Borrowed from the library

Suspiria, the Dario Argento original, is one of my favorite horror films. Perhaps my favorite. Its soundtrack, played by Goblin, is also one of my favorites. 

It was with both interest and trepidation that I went to see Luca Guadagnino's "remake" on theatrical release. I used quotation marks because I don't think it's a remake at all. Oh, it's set in a dance school in Germany, there's a character named Susie Bannion, there's a coven of witches. That's about all in common between the two. Identical setting, divergent results.

I've since streamed the film a second time at home. While I find many things interesting about it, I still haven't decided if I think it's a good film.

One local reviewer declared it one of his favorite films of the year. (My thought, it's not even my favorite film with that title.) A friend told me he didn't like horror films at all, but he absolutely loved this film and considered it a masterpiece.

There's no accounting for taste, is there? That's a positive thing to say about all the music, books, artworks, dance, theater, films in the world: we don't have to agree on what we like and any considered opinion is viable. Most people seemed to enjoy and admire Spike Jonze's Adaptation, a film that thoroughly annoyed me. Alternately, I am often entertained by low-tech, "poorly" made trash. 

The director Joe Dante made the point on one of his podcasts that there's a category of film, dubbed by Michael Weldon, as "psychotronic." Part of its meaning is that there are films that defy conventional standards of quality and still remain entertaining. I'm not going to defend Plan 9 From Outer Space as a great film, but it nonetheless is fun to watch. It's clear on viewing that Ed Wood put everything he could into making it happen. I'll take that over something pompous and boring any day. 

Suspiria (1977) v. Suspiria (2018). The first and most obvious thing is the tonal shift. 1977 is passionately bright and loud. I've read it was the final film made in Europe using the Technicolor process, before all the remaining equipment was sold off to...I think it was to someone in Japan. Technicolor was an expensive process but resulted in rich-hued colors. If you watch old MGM musicals and the volume seems to be punched up on the colors, Technicolor is the reason. 

2018 is almost entirely drained of color. Everything is grey, grey, brown, grey. 1977 seems to be set in current time but is timeless; it's a fairy tale removed from any current events. An interesting twist to 2018 is that it's set in the year 1977, with protests in the streets concerning the Baader-Meinhof group. It's something I admittedly know very little about, but it adds a dimension to the setting of the film. 

Similarly (and here's where I comment on the music) the music in 1977 is a loud, prog rock nightmare. Combined with the visuals, it's an experience. Some time last year or two ago, I saw the current version of Goblin play live to a screening of the film. It wasn't deafening, but it was the most appropriately loud soundtrack music I've experienced. I also saw them play live to Argento's Deep Red a few years previously.

Thom Yorke's score, even at its lushest, is creepier and more subdued. The color has been drained from the visuals, and intensity drained from the music. It's good, though two CDs worth of material wasn't necessary from a strictly listening experience. His voice only appears occasionally, and he has one of the most amazing falsetto ranges of any singer I know. I hear the occasional orchestra (certainly a Radiohead touch), lots of digital synths, and a very slightly out of tune piano. I like the latter. Makes it more...real. 

I'm enjoying it as it plays, but I don't know that I'll remember much of it later. The second disc is particularly less memorable.

I've written about Radiohead elsewhere on this blog. The topic of Radiohead has come up in class as recently as day before yesterday, when I was lecturing about the history of electronic musical instruments and specifically the Ondes Martenot. 

Regarding the two films: I adore Jessica Harper as the lead in 1977. Doe-eyed, with a head that seems too large to be held up by that slender body. 2018, Dakota Johnson? Not convinced. She didn't look like a ballet dancer to me. Too....meaty. She has the muscle to be sure, but not lean enough. Jessica was vulnerable, scared, but remained strong. Dakota? I just don't know. There's a hint (maybe more than a hint?) of lesbian attraction between her and Tilda Swinton. Not a problem, also not necessarily followed through. I just wish there was a different lead. I appreciate that the filmmakers found a cameo for Jessica in the 2018 version. 

A story from my past. The Spira family lived near to me, one of the only Jewish families I knew. Joel Spira (the father) was the inventor of the Lutron light dimmer, which you see almost everywhere. His small factory was also close to where I lived in Central Valley, PA. His oldest daughter was named Susan. As in, Sue Spira? Suspiria? This movie came out when we were both in high school. She never heard the end of it.

When the high school put on plays or musicals, you could buy a one-line message in the program. For one production, someone bought a single word: "Suspiria." Reportedly, Joel was incensed, and complained loudly to the administration. (He also happened to be one of the richest men in the district.) From that point on, you could no longer buy those single-line messages in school programs. I can confirm that the messages were eliminated from future programs as long as I was a student there. 

Sue? If you're out there? (She goes by her married name now.) I wish I had your name. Sue Spira/Suspiria. I'd proudly announce it. 

VOTD 1/31/ 2024

 Edvard Lieber: Music to Paintings (White)

Purchased at Jerry's Records

This is a record that made me reconsider my filing system for vinyl. 

Why? Because this is a "new music"/composer-released album. I have many (and undoubtably more on the way) "new music" LPs  with multiple composers, or interesting composer whose name I don't otherwise remember. How do I remember them, particularly in light of the collections on labels such as CRI (Composers Recordings Incorporated)? File the so-called "classical" section on its own, and make a single composer release (such as this) its own thing. How do I remember Edvard Lieber's name? Because he's in the composer section, and not sandwiched between John Lewis (MJQ) and Abbey Lincoln.

The first side of this LP is taken up with Lieber's (who is also the pianist) Twenty-four De Kooning Preludes. How much of it is written down on staff paper? I haven't a clue. Of its 21'24" minutes, no one movement takes up so much as as one and a half minutes. That seems very condensed considered the sometime large size of de Kooning canvases. Some of it has the clustery quality of Cecil Taylor.*

An aside: my wife and I have planned some vacation travels based on art exhibits. We went to Chicago to see a major Monet exhibit, for example. We also went to Washington, DC with our young daughter to see the knock-down, drag out de Kooning exhibit at the National Gallery.

And aside within an aside: we went to the Carnegie Museum here in Pittsburgh years ago. The museum has a small Jackson Pollock painting. We asked our (seven-year-old?), what does it look like to you? She announced in a loud voice, "It looks like CRAP."

When we took her to the de Kooning exhibit in DC, we told her: you're allowed to have your opinion, but do not announce out loud that it looks like crap. She abided, even if she was far less interested in the exhibit than we were.**

The second side of this LP is devoted to works dedicated to Pollock, Franz Kline, Edvin Stautmanis (a name I don't otherwise know), Elaine de Kooning, and Marcelo Bonevardi (another unfamiliar name). The last work is for tape with prepared piano, composed in 1979. 

It's a tricky thing, trying to draw musical inspiration directly from visual artworks. Early in my Water Shed 5tet days, it was something I tried to do. There was "Braque", an attempt to apply Cubism to some elements of the music; also "The Fate of Animals" for Franz Marc (unrecorded, and all the better because of it) and "Excavation" for Willem de Kooning. I could revive the latter. "Braque" was something of the band's signature work. How do you translate imagery into musical actions? There can be suggestions of movement, but there isn't a direct pipeline. 

The opposite can be much simpler: musicians as subject matter for paintings or sculpture. My father is a painter, and musicians are a frequent subject.***

Edvard Lieber. I guess I could do a web search, but: are these published scores? Can anyone with the skill play them? And where are you now?

* Another another aside. There's an argument that if you can improvise something that sounds like a fly-shit-on-paper score, why not just improvise it? Each has its merits, but they're not the same in my opinion. I get the point, though. 

** My daughter has grown into a kind, considerate, and generous person. I don't just love her, but I like her. I love her as her father, but I like her because she's a wonderful person.

*** https://johnopie.com/section/512064.html

VOTD 1/30/2024

 Guitar Roberts: In Pittsburgh (St Joan)

Purchased from Susan Langille at a gig

There's a student gallery, The Frame, at the corner of Forbes Avenue and Margaret Morrison St at Carnegie Mellon University. To the best of my recollection, I saw a single concert in that space: Guitar Roberts/Loren Mazzacane (Connors).

The time frame was early 1990s. Considering it's something like thirty years ago, I think I can be forgiven for forgetting some details. Loren was there performing with his wife Susan. I think it was just the two of them. Loren sat in a chair, and played cassettes for accompaniment. Everything was hushed, very quiet. Loren would sometimes hit the play button on his tape player, and he'd let out a crying bend on his guitar. Not a wail; that suggests something entirely too loud. Once in a while, Susan would sing quietly with him. She had no amplification, and none was necessary. The music was all blues/not blues. It was certainly blues-derived, but no blues as I knew it. 

The gallery sits on the bottom floor beneath student apartments. Some point mid-performance, there was a gushing sound coming from the pipes in the side hallway and stairs. It was thunderous compared to the low volume of the concert. I rushed to the stairwell to see if anything could be done; it was probably just someone flushing a toilet on the floor immediately above us. Not much to be done.

The music here, and in concert, sits somewhere between Ry Cooder and Jandek. Jandek is extreme in this case, and determinately doesn't tune his instrument in a traditional manner. Loren isn't precise with his tuning, but is in the neighborhood. Ry lives in a more traditional territory. His music can be similarly low key and beautiful in the way that Loren's is, but Loren seems more unfettered by tradition. He's a little like Albert Ayler on guitar, only .01 times the volume, and coming more directly from the blues rather than Ayler's gospel roots.

May I say I was transfixed? I loved every moment, except for the pipes. 

It's possible I interacted with Loren, but I remember buying this LP from Susan. She might have had several albums, but this one was titled In Pittsburgh.  Of course I would buy it. I can't recall if I asked her the reason for the title. She told me the printed address on the back (New Haven) was incorrect, and I had her pen on their then current address. No, I didn't mind if she wrote directly on the cover. In hindsight, I should have had both of them autograph it. 

CDOTD 1/30/2024

 Rudy Ray Moore: The Human Tornado OST (Traffic)

Borrowed from the library

Let me once again extol how great it is we have a decent public library in Pittsburgh. It is further enhanced by connecting to other regional libraries. The main branch has a highly respectable music collection, augmented in recent years by the instrument loan program. If you don't already know, there's also a table of electronic instruments that you can sit down to play. It's the only Minimoog I've had the chance to play. The instrument loan program gave me the chance to play with a couple of synthesizers I had considered buying, and then decided to save my money for others. Thanks, Carnegie Library!

This disc came directly off the shelves, and I think I've checked it out before. In recent years some renewed attention has been given to Rudy Ray Moore, due to Eddie Murphy's biopic My Name is Dolemite. I liked Murphy's movie and can recommend it. My understanding is that it was a labor of love; when shopping around the script, no movie execs even knew who Rudy Ray Moore was.

How little we know of our own culture! I know I lack the personality to be a movie producer, but if I was, and Eddie came to my door with a Rudy Ray Moore script, I'd say, Dolemite? The Human Tornado? Petey Wheatstraw? Avenging Disco Godfather? Have a seat Eddie, let's talk. 

I watched Murphy's movie with my wife, and then immediately looked up Dolemite to stream. Her comment: "That was bad." And in many ways, yes, it's a shitty film. Cheap (that doesn't bother me), poorly paced, beyond cardboard acting, a kung fu-fighting leading man who clearly can't kung fu. But Moore captured a moment, and gave the people (specifically African Americans) what they wanted. He helped create the so-called "blaxpoitation" film. (I like Roger Corman's preferred term, "Black action films.") I read that Murphy's biopic is pretty close to the facts of Rudy making Dolemite, which makes it an even more impressive accomplishment. 

One particular liberty Eddie Murphy took: there's a scene where Dolemite is being filmed in bed with a woman, and the crew is violently shaking the bed, the props, the scenery. That scene actually happened in The Human Tornado, Moore's followup to Dolemite. It's a forgivable stretching of facts. I've seen both, and could hardly tell you what happened in one film versus the other. 

Both Dolemite and The Human Tornado have original soundtrack music. Whatever the highs and lows of such films, I think that is also impressive. The music here is clearly quickly produced, production raw. The drums kind of sound like garbage, the mix so-so. Nonetheless it remains highly listenable. Give me some 70s funky grooves, throw in some Minimoog and wah-wah guitar, and I'm pretty much there. I'll take this over overly-sterile digital & MIDI production. I see no credits beyond Rudys name on the CD. 

Like many soundtrack albums, it's a complete document of the music cues, and a lot of it is throwaway when you're listening to it separately from the film. If you took the best music music from all of Rudy's films, you'd have a low-tech, grungy but great collection of music.

I'll share a tangential memory. This happened during an in service day at CAPA High School. For the arts faculty, that didn't mean very much, no students and just get your things in order. I had a VHS player in my room, which I could project on a screen. I had on hand my copy of Afros, Macks, and Zodiacs to watch. It's a two hour(!) collection of blaxploitation trailers, with Mr. Dolemite himself occasionally breaking and and telling his old dirty jokes. It's SO busy, it's headache-inducing. 

A group of us were watching this tape in amazement, one of whom was an African American custodian. He mentioned how he had seen the tape on my desk and had wanted to take it home. After we broke things up at the end of the scheduled day, I tracked him down with tape in hand and said, "Here. Just return it whenever." Which he did. Righteous!

To quote Rudy in this movie, I imagine him looking me in the eye and saying, "You rat soup-eating motherfucker!" 

VOTD 1/26/2024

 Werkbund: Skagerrak (Walter Ulbricht Schallfolien)

Purchased at RRRecords in Lowell, MA

This record brings several things to mind, and I'm sure at least one or two I've written on here before.

I was once at the Electric Banana with Richard Schnap. The Banana was a legendary club, an early "punk" club, though I think that had as much to do with them not caring who played there. My first time there, it wasn't as scuzzy as I imagined it might be, but it wasn't exactly upscale. 

Richard was a friend who I both cared for deeply, and also drove me crazy sometimes. He sadly died a few years ago, entirely too young. He was incredibly intelligent, possibly one of the smartest people I knew, but as a layman I'd guess he had some serious issues with depression. I'm sorry he's gone.

Anyway, we were having an enthusiastic conversation about that future; this would have been sometime in the early 80s. The gist of it was, didn't the 1970s suck? Isn't it better now, won't the 80s be so much better?

Let's call that both the hubris and naivety of youth. 

In retrospect, the 1970s seems pretty interesting (though there are some severely dark things in that history) and the 1980s seemed shallow, dominated by the figure of Ronald Reagan. I wasn't part of a scene that generally dealt directly with HIV/AIDS, which would cast an even darker memory for those who did.

What I was enthusiastic about though, was the boom in artist-released music. Independent music was booming. There were big indies, small artist run labels, and even microlabels of low-run cassettes. If you wanted to read up on such things, there were only a few magazines you had to follow. Op was one, which later lead to Option (the more commercial magazine) and Sound Choice (the more determinately independent, and shorter-lived publication). 

In that respect, it really was an interesting time. I was excited to buy severely low-run albums, take chances on artists I only knew by reputation.

As I've written before, what punk rock was to some, early industrial music was for me. And it couldn't have been more the opposite to what I was doing in my studies: first a saxophone performance major, later earning my degree in music education. Very studied and formal. Industrial music was primitive and requiring little to no musical ability at all. 

I should probably broaden the term though, because I don't mean just the likes of Throbbing Gristle, Cabaret Voltaire, or Hunting Lodge. I mean independent "experimental" music artists, which would include Nurse With Wound, Organum, Asmus Tietchens, and even more abrasive power electronics noisemakers. 

At its best, it was a music of ideas, and of sound that stretched beyond the standards of standard instrumental technique. The was an embracement of noise, or all sound really. Maybe that's part of the appeal to me. 

I noticed this record on my shelf, when considering what to put on. I was a regular customer of RRRecords through mail order. I always sent cash, and he (Ron) always sent my package very quickly. Ron even included a track by Morphic Resonance, an improvisation group I was once in, on a tape compilation. I've visited RRRecords in person a single time, and it would have been 1987 (the cover confirms this). Ron liked this, suggested it, said that Asmus Tietchens was involved (something Asmus himself has denied). It's a numbered edition of 1000; my copy is 598. Ron's comment was, "Limited edition? I never press any more copies than that."

So part of what I'm thinking when I listen to this is, does it hold up? It's an overused word, but there's an abstractness to this that lends itself to sounding timeless. It's sounds and textures, sometimes sounding deep, sometimes thin, often echoic and distant. There's apparently some maritime inspiration for this music. It's a bit too active for me to describe it was ambient, it's not melodic, noisy without being abrasive.

The recording doesn't sound dated. For all its sometime noisiness, the production sounds clear or at least appropriate. I can't always tell what the sound sources are, and I like that mystery. Some of it evokes the rolling of waves, and there's some distant percussion, and the sound of what seems like a mechanical heartbeat.

At the end of the first side, a field recording of a military song is mixed in. Is it German? Possibly but it's difficult to be certain. What could be the reason? When I think of Germany and militarism, it's not a leap to think that this is possibly a comment on Nazism. But is it? If there are clues here, they elude me. 

VOTD 1/19/2024

 Olivier Messiaen: Vingt Regards sur 'Enfant-Jésus (Argo)

Purchased at Jerry's Records from the Duquesne University collection

So it's back to Messiaen this morning. If you hunt through the history of this blog, you'd find that during the pandemic lockdown I bought a 32-CD collection of his music, and made blog postings for each disc (two for Turnagalîla, if memory serves). I could have pulled out a CD copy, but thought I'd spin the vinyl issue. It's spread over four LP sides.

I guess I've planted my flag in the pro-Messiaen camp, though I fully understand the criticisms of him. It's my understanding that in France, you're picking a fight if you are critical of him. I don't care for that, if true.

As someone who's involved more with "jazz" practice than anything else, I feel like Messiaen is an excellent person to study. I suggest other jazz musicians and composers study the 4 Ms: Miles, Monk, Mingus, Messiaen. It's a simple alliteration, but it holds up. Messiaen's ideas about rhythm and modes should be considered by any serious jazz composer. 

It's not as though there's a hint of jazz in his music, though. Heck, even his wind ensemble works don't include any saxophones, much to my disappointment. Messiaen never entirely loses the idea of melody, which may be one reason I enjoy his music as much as I do. Sometimes in particular movements of this piece, I just don't know where he's coming from or where he's going (not necessarily a bad thing); at other times, the writing is exquisitely beautiful. 

Someone added a newspaper clipping about Messiaen in this box. I assume it's from the New York Times. Under his picture, there's the line: "His is essentially the music of meditation". Well, I suppose that's true, and more obviously true of his keyboard music than his orchestral. Much of this is agitated and active though, not what most people would consider to be meditative. I think my definition of what "meditative" means might be a bit different than the writer's. I consider it to mean intensely focused concentration, which is hardly the same as relaxation and quietude. I try to achieve a kind of meditation when improvising.

In this way, isn't all music some form of meditation?