Reup: Best of Cymande

Amazon review: Short-lived but legendary, Cymande is oft-compiled on funk assemblages, but this CD of their first two LPs is altogether necessary, even if the music moves away from tight beats into Rasta-folk toward the end. Cymande's reputation has grown considerably over the last twenty years. Featuring a multi-national crew with a strong Caribbean influence, the band produced a few hits in the early seventies, then disappeared. But the epochal "Brothers On the Side," and the ingeniously structured "Fug" contain a subtlety and tension lacking in all but the best bands of the era.

Funky 16 Corners: Their music was a sophisticated mixture of American soul and funk, African pop, Latin sounds, rock and all of the various and sundry intersections of those sounds. A close listen to their first LP is like a drive through Harlem in the early 70’s with your car windows down, letting snatches of Curtis Mayfield, Jimi Hendrix, Miles Davis, Stevie Wonder, Santana and a thousand lesser groups (woven securely into the fabric, but essentially lost to the ages) drift through the windows and into your ears. There are elements of early-70’s prog-cum-stoner rock guitar, hard drums, jazzy bass and horns as well as a bedrock of polyrhythmic percussion.

AMG bio


Cymande (1973)
320kbps, 180mb on megaupload
1. The Message
2. Brothers On The Slide
3. Dove
4. Bra
5. Fug
6. For Baby Woh
7. Rickshaw
8. Equitorial Forest
9. Listen
10. Getting It Back
11. Anthracite
12. Willy's Headache
13. Genevieve
14. Pon De Dungle
15. Rastafarian Folk Song
16. One More
17. Zion I

PS My bad, Willy's Headache in the archive is corrupted. Here's the good file: http://sharebee.com/4fb2fa67

John Huie and the Clear Wind Band - Shanghai Jazz 2

Another excellent disc from John Huie with the Clear Wind Band, the first one is here. Great swing jazz with some chinese folk instruments. A few of the tunes appeared on this blog before: The Pretender and Waiting For You to Come Back (AKA Waiting 4 U) were on the Shanghai Lounge Divas comp, and That Rhythm Man is better known as Reefer Man, and found here.

All thanks go to the original uploader, Shean Chin!


John Huie and the Clear Wind Band - Shanghai Jazz 2
REUP 11/11/14: High VBR, 110mb on zippyshare or uloz.to
1. Shan Hai Yao Bai - The Shanghai Shuffle
2. Kan Zhe Wo - Look At Me
3. Ni De Ta - Your Man
4. Jia Zheng Jing - Pretender
5. Nao Ren De Ye Yu - Rain Song
6. Qie Ting Wo Shuo - Listen to Me
7. Na Zou Jie Pai De Ren - That Rhythm Man
8. Deng Zhe Ni Hui Lai - Waiting for You to Come Back
9. Shang Hai LIL - Shanghai LIL
10. Mei Gui Mei Gui Wo Ai Ni - Mei Gui Mei Gui Wo Ai Ni
11. Zai Na Yao Yuan De Di Fang - Far in the Distance
12. Lao Cha Guan - The Old Tea House
13. Gei Wo Yi Ge Wen - Give Me A Kiss
14. Qing Ren De Yan Lei - Lovers' Tears

Una mas

FM Einheit jammin' with Django



Millie Small - My Boy Lollipop
Just a good song...



The common theme here would be Finland... The Millie Small clip is off Finnish TV, and the band in the first clip are finns.

I got a vote for more youtube

...so here's another one:
Sweet Emma Barrett at Preservation Hall, I Ain't Gonna Give Nobody None Of My Jellyroll, 1959



via Badger

Arthur Doyle

My son tipped over one of my CD racks the other day. As I was cleaning up the mess, in the pile of "downtown" stuff along with the obligatory Zorn, Ribot, numerous Laswell projects, etc. I found two CDs with Arthur Doyle and Rudolph Grey. I remember buying them on eBay some eight years ago, but why?
Next day I was surfing the 'nets, and accidentally bumped into an album that features early Doyle playing:
For unrelenting screaming banshee saxophone, the septet includes tenor player Arthur Doyle. As the original album's liner notes have it, in words that can't be bettered, Doyle is "propelled throughout by an almost incoherent rage, a chaotic and murderous sound." This is written about Noah Howard's Black Ark, available at The Changing Same; great album, great blog, BTW.
So I figured the coincidence is an indication that I should share these.

These two LPs by Doyle are the missing link between the late 60's free jazz and NYC's No Wave scene of the late 70's (I never knew there was a link, let alone that it was missing). His collaborator on both of these releases, guitarist Rudolph Grey, is the person who introduced him to rock audience and booked their shows on the same bill as Glenn Branca, DNA, Mars, and other skronk-mongerers.

Arthur Doyle bio from AMG


Arthur Doyle Quartet - Live at the Cooler
VBR, 60mb on rapidshare, zshare, badongo, megaupload, depositfiles
1. Spiritual Healing
2. Flue Song
3. Noah Black Ark


AMG on the Blue Humans: The Blue Humans is the unit name given to any performance led by improvisational guitarist Rudolph Grey. (Members have included reedsman Arthur Doyle, guitarist Alan Licht, drummers Beaver Harris and Tom Surgal, and tenor saxophonist Jim Sauter.) Bridging the gap between free jazz and downtown art noise (and with records as likely to be released on a punk label as on a jazz imprint), Grey is far more interested in textures and sound patterns than conventional notes, chords, and melodies, but his improvisatory performances have a structural logic and grace to them that makes them more interesting than some of the aimless Strat splat that gets passed off as experimentation.
The famously taciturn Grey basically refuses to answer any questions about his past and admits to no influences. Grey first appeared on the post-punk New York art scene in the late '70s, forming the short-lived Red Transistor with maniac guitar terrorist Von LMO. Although the duo lasted barely a year, they were an important formative influence on the nascent no wave scene percolating in the East Village. (Grey participated in that short-lived scene by playing briefly in Mars, one of its most extreme practitioners.) Grey then formed the Blue Humans in 1980, initially with Harris, a veteran free jazz drummer, and Doyle. (This lineup was finally documented on disc with 1995's Live NY 1980.) A Blue Humans performance can be anything from a duo to a four-piece, but Grey seems to prefer the trio format above others. The Blue Humans' albums and EPs are primarily live recordings of single extended improvisations such as 1988's Incandescense (recorded during an opening set for Sonic Youth at CBGB) and 1990's To Higher Time, but there's also a studio album produced by Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth, 1993's Clear to Higher Time.

AMG review: This album is the earliest recording of the explosive free improvisation group led by guitarist Rudolph Grey, recorded live in New York with a lineup that featured the power of legendary free jazz drummer Beaver Harris behind Grey's corrosive feedback guitar. Free jazz saxophonist Arthur Doyle also appears through the smoke of guitar feedback, and speaker destruction is provided by Rudolph Grey, whose style is like a more aggressive and abrasive Sonny Sharrock. No wonder this post-punk free improvisation had a profound influence on Sonic Youth and later incarnations of the Blue Humans featured Thurston Moore on second guitar. Live NY 1980 is a quintessential recording of the no wave scene that abridged punk, free jazz, and noise music.



The Blue Humans - Live 1980
VBR, 104mb on depositfiles, badongo, megaupload, zshare, rapidshare
Four untitled tracks

A couple of youtube videos

I was reading a review for Billie Holiday and Lester Young - A Musical Romance the other day; here's a quote:

Like any good newsworthy event of the 20th century, one of the most touching pieces of jazz history happened in front of the television cameras. On 5 December 1957, CBS aired a jazz special, The Sound of Jazz, which brought together many of the living jazz superstars. Billie Holiday was to sing the song "Fine and Mellow" in a casual group setting. Holiday was close to death, though still one of the most attractive women in the world in her ponytail and plaid slacks. She had been courting a serious love affair with heroin for many years. Accompanying Holiday was a myriad of horn-playing legends. Of particular interest was the tenor sax section, which was comprised of Ben Webster, Coleman Hawkins, and Lester Young.
[...]
Prez, who had wrecked his body with alcohol, was in such ill health he couldn't stand for the duration of the six-minute song. Holiday launched into the song and each sax man took a turn. Gerry Mulligan was first and played a solo in double-time. Webster was next, blowing a beautiful, breathy chorus. And then it was time for Prez. When it was Young's turn he wearily stood up, and locked eyes with Holiday as she sang a song with lines like "Love is like a faucet / It turns off and on". As Lady Day sang, Prez hit every note exactly in time with her and they took off like two eagles riding an air current as they rose higher and higher, way out of that studio and those television sets, circling around each other, Prez blowing the notes that sustained her as if he was the body to her soul, and then they came together in mid-air, as mating eagles will, and plummeted hundreds of feet earthward together, before breaking off and flying their separate ways. People in the control booth had tears in their eyes. It was the swan song of a bittersweet affection. After the show, the two had some brief backstage conversation and then they bid goodbye. They each had less than two years to live. Prez would die alone in a New York hotel, his body finally calling it quits. Not long after that, Holiday would be arrested on her deathbed for heroin possession.

A beautiful description, although I suspect the author was writing from memory, and a very embellished one, too. Mulligan's solo is actually fourth, after Prez, and there's maybe one bar in double time out of two choruses. The brass section riffs behind her, but none of this interlocking duo "like mating eagles" ever actually happens. The performance is great, the writing is beautiful, it's a pity they don't quite match...

Billie Holiday - Fine and Mellow (1957)




T-Bone Walker w/ Jazz At The Philharmonic - Live in UK 1966, playing Woman, You Must Be Crazy and Goin' To Chicago Blues
Dizzy Gillespie - t, Clark Terry - t, Coleman Hawkins - ts, Zoot Sims - ts, Jimmy Moody - ts, Benny Carter - as, Teddy Wilson - p, Louis Bellson - d, and Bob Cranshaw - b.
It's Clark Terry taking a solo at 3:10 and he is playing a trumpet mouthpiece.

Chet Baker

Here are some 50's Chet Baker links for the Anonymous.

Chet Baker with Russ Freeman - Complete Pacific Jazz Live Recordings (1953)
Grey December (1953)
Young Chet (1954-1956)
In Paris Vol.1-4 (1955-1956)
Chet Baker And Crew (1956)
Chet Baker & Art Pepper - Picture of Heath [Playboys] (1956)
Embraceable You (1957)
Stan Meets Chet (1958)
Live in New York (1958)
Chet (1959)
Deep In A Dream - The Ultimate Chet Baker Collection (this one picks from his 1952-1965 recordings)

One LP I would personally recommend would be Chet Baker In Milan, 1959 - obscure italian sidemen, but the music is great. AMG review

VBR, 60mb on mediafire
1. Lady Bird
2. Cheryl Blues
3. Tune Up
4. Line For Lyons
5. Pent Up House
6. Look For The Silver Lining
7. Indian Summer
8. My Old Flame

Updated links:
Complete Chet Baker and Miles Davis with the Lighthouse All-Stars, 1953
Chet Baker - Ensemble, 1953

Gerry Mulligan - Re-Birth Of The Cool [1992]

Lee Konitz on the Miles Davis' "Birth of the Cool":
Miles was the titular leader because he had more of a name, and I suppose he could get the gigs; big deal, so he got one week at the Royal Roost. [...] The (Birth of the Cool) nonet was an arranger's band, because they rehearsed the music. Miles made some suggestions, but very few that I recall; I thought of it as Gerry's [Mulligan] band really. The nonet was a chamber ensemble where the solos were incidental to the writing, which was the most important aspect. - Fifties Jazz Talk: An Oral Retrospective, by Gordon Jack

In the early 1990s Mulligan decided to revisit his work with the Birth of the Cool band; he felt that a lot of the arrangements were done in a haste and wanted to do them justice.
In 1992, Mr. Mulligan revisited the "cool school" that began with the Birth of the Cool recording and assembled the Gerry Mulligan Tentet. The project, entitled "Re-Birth of the Cool" began with a recording for the GRP label with Mulligan, and Wallace Roney in Miles Davis's trumpet chair.
In the summer of 1991, in Rotterdam, Gerry told Miles he was planning to play the music again. Miles was very enthusiastic and said to let him know when it was going to be. Sadly, it was not to be, as Miles passed away.
The Gerry Mulligan Tentet, the Re-Birth of the Cool touring band, featuring Art Farmer on flugelhorn/trumpet and Lee Konitz on alto sax, embarked on a highly successful concert tour. - Bio

Click to read a good review by Eric Thacker from The Essential Jazz Records: Modernism to postmodernism.


Gerry Mulligan - Re-Birth Of The Cool [1992]
VBR~230, 90mb on rapidshare or megaupload
1. Israel
2. Deception
3. Move
4. Rouge
5. Rocker
6. Godchild
7. Moon Dreams
8. Venus De Milo
9. Budo
10. Boplicity
11. Darn That Dream
12. Jeru

Muddy at Newport 1960

The guests in the order of appearance: Betty Jeannette, Sammy Price, Jimmy Rushing
The band: Francis Clay - Drums; James Cotton - Harmonica; Pat Hare - Guitar; Second Guitar - ?; Otis Spann - Piano; Andrew Stephenson - Bass.
Not sure who the dancing dudes are and who are the fiddle and guitar players sitting in front (and what are they doing there?).

Reader uploads

There's too much good stuff in the comments, I'll put the guest uploads in a separate post - all by the mighty Symbolkid, thanks a lot!


Howlin' Wolf's New Album, 1969
megaupload
The ElectriK Mud Kats Band with Cosey on guitar backs up Wolf. The music is crazy good, but I hate the cover.



The Muhal Richard Abrams Orchestra - Blu Blu Blu, 1990
megaupload


Muhal Richard Abrams - 1-OQA+19, 1976
megaupload


Gerry Mulligan Quartet with Bob Brookmeyer - The Salle Pleyel Concerts, 1954

Vol.1 on rapidshare: pt.1 and pt.2 (via)


Vol.2 on megaupload

Muddy Waters - Electric Mud

I was looking through my Muddy Waters collection and stumbled (long live the search function on foobar!) on "Tom Cat" on a Psychedelic Jazz And Funky Grooves compilation. The song, a hypnotic stomper, really caught my ear. I tried to track down the source, and it turns out it's off the infamous Electric Mud LP with one Pete Cosey on guitar.

Guitarist Pete Cosey has a magic touch: any project he plays on, the critics seem to hate. His most famous achievements are, of course, on the electric Miles albums of the early 70s - Agharta, Pangaea, Get Up With It - the favorites of the lunatic fringe and pet peeves of the "real jazz" connoisseur. However, this one approaches the Miles LPs both in its underground popularity and in its notoriety.

Electric Mud was a brainchild of Marshall Chess, the son of Leonard Chess of the famed Chess Records, recorded and issued on the Chess subsidiary Cadet, which was an outlet for the unusual and experimental music. Electric Mud is an attempt to update the trademark Muddy Waters sound for the yound crowd by backing him with "the hottest, most avant garde rock guys in Chicago". Those "updating" attempts are not always successful, but they are often interesting. This one is nothing like the other Muddy Waters records; but if you appreciate Sonny Sharrock or Bob Quine, you should check it out. Electric Mud is not blues at all; it's a very tight and rocking psychedelic band with obvious avantgarde leanings fronted by Muddy and playing out of Muddy's book. Here's a Perfect Sound Forever review talking about "I Just Want To Make Love To You": The solo on this song is nothing short of phenomenal. The guitar starts playing some distorted melodic notes then morphs into this gigantic screeching feedback riff becoming louder and wilder then continues to morph from a tearing solo until it reaches this intense mind-bending groove that sounds on the brink of collapse.
Muddy himself seemed to have been ambivalent about this experiment at the time, but later he cooled down considerably, even calling it "dog shit" at some point. However, the record had its fans no matter what - most notably the rapper Chuck D, as well as, apparently, Miles Davis.


Muddy Waters - Electric Mud
256kbps, 74mb on 4shared (a ChrisGoesRock rip)
1. I Just Want To Make Love To You
2. I'm Your Hoochie Coochie Man
3. Let's Spend The Night Together
4. She's Alright
5. Mannish Boy
6. Herbert Harper's Free Press News
7. Tom Cat
8. The Same Thing

I would also recommend checking out Blowin Gold, a solo 1969 album by saxophonist John Klemmer, who played with Don Ellis group at the time. It's also on Cadet and with the same Cadet rhythm section as above - Cosey on lead guitar, Phil Upchurch (on bass instead of rhythm guitar), Morris Jennings on drums. Incidentally, not a critical favorite, either. Not as focused nor as exciting as his early '70s sessions, says AMG. I think it's pretty good, some of the noisier jams approach the Stooges in that demented wailing-sax-over-a-monster-riff intensity. Available at the very interesting Ile Oxumare blog.

Art Farmer and Benny Golson (The Jazztet) - Meet the Jazztet

Farmer and Golson's Jazztet - one of the greatest hard bop groups of the 60s. They were easily the equals of the Jazz Messengers. If they ran for half as long as Art Blakey's group, they'd be a household name by now; unfortunately, the Jazztet disbanded only three years and six albums later.
An excellent short overview of the Jazztet and this album. Of the four Golson originals on this disc, three went on to become jazz standards - Killer Joe (learned by every aspiring jazzman), Blues March (covered by Blakey on Moanin LP), and I Remember Clifford (a Clifford Brown memorial).


Art Farmer and Benny Golson (The Jazztet) - Meet the Jazztet [1960]
High VBR, 72mb on 4shared
1. Serenata (Anderson-Parish) 3:30
2. It Ain't Necessarily So (Gershwin) 4:26
3. Avalon (Rose-DeSylva) 3:29
4. I Remember Clifford (Benny Golson) 3:10
5. Blues March (Benny Golson) 5:16
6. That's All Right With Me (Cole Porter) 3:53
7. Park Avenue Petite (Benny Golson) 3:41
8. Mox Nix (Art Farmer) 4:01
9. Easy Living (Rubin-Ranger) 3:33
10. Killer Joe (Benny Golson) 4:57

Art Farmer, trumpet
Benny Golson, tenor sax
Curtis Fuller, trombone
McCoy Tyner, piano
Addison Farmer, bass
Lex Humphries, drums

PS More Jazztet: Big City Sounds (1960) and Another Git Together (1962)
More Benny Golson - see below.

City of Glass: Stan Kenton plays Bob Graettinger

As I was searching for Muhal Richard Abrams' Blu Blu Blu, I came across an interesting discussion of "heavily psychedelic big band jazz albums", whatever that means. Several of their suggestions appeared here before - Ghania with Pharoah Sanders, RRKirk's 3-sided Dream, just recently I posted Electric Bath, so I thought that other suggestions might be worth looking into. So, here's an interesting find: Bob Graettinger, a composer, arranger and sax player, and a bona fide mad genius if there ever was one. They call him the most radical arranger to ever work in jazz @.

An article about Bob Graettinger, Above the Timberline, worth reading in its entirety; and bio at AMG.

AMG review of This Modern World 10" LP:
The tragically short-lived, self-destructive Bob Graettinger could have been a matinee idol had he cared; some people who saw him on a Los Angeles bus one day mistook him for Elvis Presley. Instead, he devoted his last years to writing the most complex, atonal, uncompromising, potentially alienating music that even the iconoclastic Stan Kenton band ever played. This Modern World is Graettinger's reaction to the cold, driven, alien planet on which he lived, a natural sequel to the more famous City of Glass yet even more difficult and inward in expression. Comprised of six movements ("A Horn, Some Saxophones," "A Cello," "A Thought," "A Trumpet," and "An Orchestra"), This Modern World moves even further away from jazz into abstract contemporary classical music; undoubtedly, Mingus must have heard this music but it's almost impossible to name anything from which it derives. A jazz pulse occasionally surfaces but more often instruments drift in atonal clusters past each other in differing meters or blast dissonant fanfares, creating a feeling of unease as they converse quizzically. In our time, British composer Mark-Anthony Turnage's Blood on the Floor has picked up the torch where Graettinger left it upon his death in 1957, but it took 40 years, and it makes Kenton's decision to sponsor Graettinger's work seem all the more gutsy and courageous. The individual movements on this 10" LP can now be found on the City of Glass CD, along with the rest of Graettinger's small output.

On his personal life @ CRUD CRUD:
Born in Southern California, Graettinger played music for a while, before giving it up to write. He was in his early 20s when he gave Kenton some songs. Kenton didn't know if they were brilliant or bullshit, but he recorded them anyway... and then took Graettinger on as staff. Graettinger rarely spoke to anyone besides Kenton. Even when Kenton took him on the road, he sat by himself. His diet consisted of scrambled eggs, vitamin pills, cigarettes, and booze. He hated to sleep, saying he'd have enough time to do that in the grave. He lived by himself in a filthy apartment above a garage, which he rarely left. He was tall and skinny, had caved-in cheeks and was very very very pale. Many described him as "looking like death". He died of cancer at age 34. And he wrote some fascinatingly fucked up music.

More weird details about his life in this Bud Shank interview.

This CD collects his works that Stan Kenton Big Band recorded: suite This Modern World, City of Glass, and shorter pieces. This is from Kenton's period of flirtation with avant-garde, which Mort Sahl summed up with a joke: "A waiter accidentally dropped a tray and three couples got up to dance." @


City of Glass: Stan Kenton plays Bob Graettinger
256kbps, 117mb on 4shared

Thermopylae

Everything Happens to Me

Incident in Jazz

House of Strings

This Modern World, 1st mvt., A Horn

City of Glass, 1st mvt., part 1, Entrance into the City

City of Glass, 1st mvt., part 2, The Structures

City of Glass, 2nd mvt., Dance Before the Mirror

City of Glass, 3rd mvt., Reflections

Modern Opus

This Modern World, 3rd mvt., A Cello

You Go to My Head

This Modern World, 5th mvt., A Trumpet

This Modern World, 6th mvt., An Orchestra

This Modern World, 4th mvt., A Thought

This Modern World, 2nd mvt., Some Saxophones

After Kenton's death, more Graettinger scores were found in the archive; in the 90's a jazz/modern classical big band under Gunther Schuller's guidance named Ebony Band recorded two CDs worth of this material.

And by the way, I never found any Muhal Richard Abrams' recordings, so if anyone is willing to share, I'd appreciate!

I'd also like to remind my readers that...

...heroin is a harsh mistress.

Mid-50s (~25yo)

Mid-80s (~55yo)

Gerry Mulligan Quartets with Chet Baker and Art Farmer

I am listening to a lot of jazz lately.

Gerry Mulligan - baritone saxophonist, arranger and composer, the mastermind behind a good chunk of Miles' Birth of the Cool album. His most well known venture (or second-most, after the Birth of the Cool sessions) was probably his pianoless quartet - a trumpet-sax-bass-and-drums group that he led with changing members throughout the 50s. This highly unusual, minimalistic set-up initially was an accident: a gig opportunity arose to play in a space that did not have a piano. Mulligan decided to take a chance and see how this stripped-down sound would work. [See Mulligan's interview for more info]
It worked beautifully, due to a lucky choice of Chet Baker on trumpet for a second lead voice. Mulligan's cerebral, architectonic approach was yin to Baker's melodic, intuitive yang, and their proverbial telepathic rapport allowed each to anticipate and play off the other's moves. The laconic compositions group recorded were the epitome of cool, with two lead voices weaving countrapunctal lines around the Carson Smith's melodic bass lines and delicately supported by the Chico Hamilton's brush work.


The Best of the Gerry Mulligan Quartet with Chet Baker (1952-1953)
REUP: 320kbps, 115mb on 4shared
1. Bernie's Tune
2. Nights At The Turntable
3. Freeway
4. Soft Shoe
5. Walkin' Shoes
6. Makin' Whoopee
7. Carson City Stage
8. My Old Flame
9. Love Me Or Leave Me
10. Swinghouse
11. Jeru
12. Darn That Dream
13. I'm Beginning To See The Light
14. My Funny Valentine
15. Festive Minor

Unfortunately, this lucky alliance did not last long: in 1953 Mulligan went to the slammer on a narcotic conviction. When he emerged six months later, Baker already moved on to become a crossover solo star, combining his trumpet, good looks, and newly discovered singing talents into an unbeatably commercial combination. Mulligan found a replacement in Art Farmer, a relatively obscure (at the time) trumpet player with a cool, melodic sound. During his time with Mulligan, Farmer also started playing flugelhorn, a trumpet-like instrument with a softer, more mellow sound; he went on to become one of the best-known jazz flugelhorn players. This album is the last Mulligan Quartet LP with Farmer playing flugelhorn exclusively.


The Gerry Mulligan Quartet - What Is There To Say? (1959)
98mb on depositfiles
1. What Is There To Say
2. Just In Time
3. News From Blueport
4. Festive Minor
5. As Catch Can
6. My Funny Valentine
7. Blueport
8. Utter Chaos

PS Also, a great 1959 live set from "The New" Gerry Mulligan Quartet with Art Farmer, titled Americans In Sweden, over at taringa.net.

Don Ellis Orchestra - Electric Bath

An album that made headlines in its day and is virtually forgotten now. It came out in 1967, and truly stood out, even among the torrent of new, exciting, far-out music that was gushing forth in the late 60s. It earned top marks from many critics, a Grammy, and an "Album of the Year" from Down Beat magazine. It won fans both among the older jazzhead hipsters and the young rock crowd; many Amazon reviews start out with "I was fifteen in 1967, when I first heard this album".
Liner notes: Conceive, if you can, an aural collage created by the Beatles, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Ravi Shankar and Leonard Feather's Encyclopedia of Jazz. And then, imagine that creation churning through the high-powered talents of twenty-one young musicians, like a rumble before you open the door of a blast furnace.
The description may seem bloated, but is, in fact, quite true: the album combines many interests of the leader, trumpeter Don Ellis - free improv, indian music, odd time signatures, electronic effects, unusual instrumentation (like, for instance, three bass players and an array of percussion), and high-energy arena-rock-sized playing. All of these elements are fused into a coherent whole and applied to a set of tunes that, despite the avantgarde leanings and all the cerebrailty, retain enough pop edge for the radio. It's got something for everyone. The reviewers uniformly pronounce this album to be the music of the future. Now that the future is here, why is it so obscure? I don't understand.


Don Ellis Orchestra - Electric Bath
192kbps, 70mb on zippyshare or uloz.to
1. Indian Lady
2. Alone
3. Turkish Bath
4. Open Beauty
5. New Horizons
6. Turkish Bath (Single)
7. Indian Lady (Single)

John Surman - John Surman (Anglo-Sax)

A recent discovery: first album by a prominent british baritone saxophonist John Surman. Side B is a three-part suite by Surman and a large ensemble, strongly influenced by free-jazz. The reason I am posting this, though, is Side A, which is completely different: a small combo, with a pan player, is playing jazz covers of calypsos Obeah Wedding (Mighty Sparrow), My Pussin (Lord Kitch), Don't Stop The Carnival (which is here credited to Sonny Rollins, who, indeed, introduced it to jazz, but really is a traditional tune), and what I assume is an original by the piano player Russel Henderson, Good Times Will Come Again. This is calypso-jazz of the highest grade, highly recommended for the fans of caribbean music and for those interested in the jazz-ethno hybrids.
In UK this came out as John Surman, US edition was titled Anglo-Sax.


John Surman - John Surman
REUP: 320kbps, 105mb on 4shared
A1. Obeah Wedding
A2. My Pussin
A3. Good Times Will Come Again
A4. Carnival
B1. Incantation
B2. Episode
B3. Dance

Rhys Chatham retrospective

From An Angel Moves Too Fast To See

Pitchfork review.
Links in comments.

MC Faza Nelly, Tanzania

Les Troubadours Du Roi Baudouin - Missa Luba

Who would've thought there are so many different catholic masses; it just gets weirder and weirder. Here's one I read about in "Can't Find My Way Home" by Martin Torgoff, a book on the history of drugs in America. Timothy Leary speaks: "This is around the time we first started calling it acid. I remember lying flat on our backs for hours. We'd listen to Ravi Shankar and Missa Louba, from Zaire, which is the mass, partly in Latin, done entirely with drums and African chanting. That was one of our favorites, along with the late quartets of Beethoven." I mean, how much more of a recommendation do you need?
A Belgian missionary, father Guido Haazen, came to Congo in the 1950s to preach and teach. He formed a catholic school for boys, and with it a choir of about 45 kids, with percussion section - "The Troubadours of King Baudouin". The present recording is an attempt to reinvent the lithurgy using native music as a basis. Many sections of the mass are latin texts adapted to the folk melodies.
I included liner notes and a couple of articles in the archive, so I'll keep it brief. A reissue LP (1969?) had the mass on one side and some of the original folk songs on the other. The original LP (1963) also had a few more tracks ("children's songs from Baluba") that were omitted from the subsequent reissues, not sure why. I located and included three of these as a bonus; the quality is lower than the rest.


Les Troubadours Du Roi Baudouin - Missa Luba, 1963
320kbps, 76mb on depositfiles
1. Dibwe Diambula Kabanda (Marriage Song)
2. Lutuku & A Bene Kanyoka (Emergence From Grief)
3. Ebu Ewale Kemai (Marriage Ballad)
4. Katunbu [Katumbo] (Dance)
5. Seya Ya Mama Ndalamba (Marital Celebration)
6. Banaha (Soldiers Song)
7. Twai Tshinaminai (Work Song)
8. Missa Luba: Kyrie
9. Missa Luba: Gloria
10. Missa Luba: Credo
11. Missa Luba: Sanctus
12. Missa Luba: Benedictus
13. Missa Luba: Agnus Dei
BONUS:
14. Kamiole [Children's songs from Baluba]
15. Kamuyambi [Children's songs from Baluba]
16. Katende [Children's songs from Baluba]

Alternative artwork

Golden Age Gospel Choirs (1954-1963)

Golden Age Gospel Choirs (1954-1963)
128kbps, 62mb on sharebee
1. The Back Home Choir - He's So Mighty
2. The Back Home Choir - I Trust Him
3. The Back Home Choir - Ride On King Jesus
4. The Back Home Choir - Without God I Can Do Nothing
5. The Back Home Choir - He Knows How Much We Can Bear
6. The Back Home Choir - Climbing High Mountains
7. The Back Home Choir - Come Out The Wilderness
8. The Back Home Choir - Yes I Found Him
9. The Back Home Choir - Jesus
10. The Back Home Choir - Jordan River
11. The Pentecostal Choir Of Detroit - Prayer Wheel Turning Over
12. The Pentecostal Choir Of Detroit - How Glad Am I
13. The Helen Robinson Youth Choir - Sit Down Children
14. The Helen Robinson Youth Choir - Working On The Building
15. The Helen Robinson Youth Choir - Run And Help Us Tell
16. Voices Of Victory - Invocation (The Lord's Prayer)
17. Voices Of Victory - I'm So Glad Jesus Lifted Me
18. Voices Of Victory - The Angels Keep Watching
19. Voices Of Victory - Great Change In Me
20. Voices Of Victory - Lord, Lord, Lord
21. Voices Of Victory - I Am Somebody
22. Voices Of Victory - Blessed Assurance
23. Voices Of Victory - Benediction (The Lord's Prayer)

Benny Golson - Tune In, Turn On to the Hippest Commercials of the Sixties

Not only the commercials, but also movie themes (Magnificent Seven), and contemporary pop music (No Matter What Shape) are given a chamber jazz arrangement by the jazz legend Benny Golson. Good music, I like it.


Benny Golson - Tune In, Turn On to the Hippest Commercials of the Sixties [1967]
192kbps, 46mb on sharebee
1. Music To Watch Girls By
2. Wink
3. The Disadvantages Of You
4. No Matter What Shape (Your Stomach's In)
5. Right Any Time Of The Day
6. Music To Think By
7. The Swinger
8. The Magnificent Seven
9. Cool Whip
10. The Golden Glow
11. Fried Bananas
12. Happiness Is

PS. "No Matter What Shape (Your Stomach's In)", an instrumental piece that Sareceno had lifted from a then-popular Alka-Seltzer TV commercial.
From 1963 the [Magnificent Seven] theme was used in commercials in the USA for Marlboro cigarettes
So I guess all of this music really is from commercials.

Les Freres Dejean - L'Univers

I never thought I will say this, but here is an album that's as good as the best of Orchestra Baobab. Must hear!


Les Freres Dejean - L'Univers
320kbps, 111mb on megaupload
1. L'Humanite
2. Conviction
3. Experience
4. Naide
5. Yoyo
6. L'Univers

Golden Age Gospel Quartets Volume Two (1954-1963)

Golden Age Gospel Quartets Volume Two (1954-1963)
128kbps, 70mb on sharebee
1. The Soul Stirrers - He'll Make A Way
2. The Soul Stirrers - Be With Me Jesus
3. The Chosen Gospel Singers - Don't Worry About Me
4. The Chosen Gospel Singers - What A Wonderful Sight
5. The Chosen Gospel Singers - The Lifeboat Is Coming
6. The Pilgrim Travelers - Straight Street
7. The Pilgrim Travelers - After While
8. The Pilgrim Travelers - Did You Stop To Pray This Morning
9. The Pilgrim Jubilee Singers - What Do You Know (About Jesus)
10. The Pilgrim Jubilee Singers - Oh, Lord
11. The Pilgrim Jubilee Singers - Tell Jesus (What You Want)
12. The Pilgrim Jubilee Singers - Yesteryear
13. Original Five Blind Boys Of Alabama - Broken Heart Of Mine
14. Original Five Blind Boys Of Alabama - Goodbye Mother
15. Original Five Blind Boys Of Alabama - I've Been Born Again
16. The Soul Stirrers - Were You There
17. The Soul Stirrers - Sinner To Jesus
18. The Soul Stirrers - Out On A Hill
19. The Gate City Singers - I Thank You Jesus
20. The Gate City Singers - Peace In The Valley
21. The Capitol City Stars - Friends Talk About Me
22. The Capitol City Stars - Jesus, I Love To Call Your Name
23. The Clefs Of Calvary - Trouble Of This World
24. The Clefs Of Calvary - Miracle Temple
25. The Gable Airs - Move Upstairs
26. The Gable Airs - Miracle Temple
27. The Gable Airs - Travelin' Shoes

Golden Age Gospel Quartets Volume One (1947-1954)

Golden Age Gospel Quartets Volume One (1947-1954)
128kbps, 72mb on sharebee
1. The Southern Harmonizers - These Old Bones
2. The Southern Harmonizers - What Are They Doing In Heaven Today
3. The Pilgrim Travelers - The Old Rugged Cross
4. The Pilgrim Travelers - He Will Remember Me
5. The Golden Echoes - Since I Laid My Burden Down (Glory, Glory Hallelujah)
6. The Golden Echoes - Where Shall I Be (When The First Trumpet Sounds)
7. The Paramount Singers - He Means So Much To Me
8. The Paramount Singers - Heaven In My View
9. The Soul Stirrers - Faith And Grace
10. The Soul Stirrers - By And By
11. The Pilgrim Travelers - Jesus Hits Like The Atom Bomb
12. The Pilgrim Travelers - Jesus, I'm Thankful
13. The Detroiters - Let Jesus Lead You
14. The Detroiters - Mother, I Need Your Prayer
15. The Soul Stirrers - Peace In The Valley
16. The Soul Stirrers - Christ Is All
17. The Chosen Gospel Singers - Before This Time Another Year
18. The Chosen Gospel Singers - Leaning On The Lord
19. The Swan Silvertones - I'm Coming Home
20. The Swan Silvertones - He Won't Deny Me
21. The Pilgrim Travelers - Weary Traveler
22. The Pilgrim Travelers - My Old Home
23. Original Five Blind Boys Of Alabama - There Is A Fountain
24. Original Five Blind Boys Of Alabama - Marching Up To Zion
25. The West Coast Jubilees - Since Jesus Came To My Heart (Live)
26. The West Coast Jubilees - He'll Be There (Live)

The Roots of Chicha - Psychedelic Cumbias From Peru

Reviews: one, two, three, interview with the compiler.
Just wanted to bring this to your attention:

here or here
1. Los Mirios - Sonido Amazonico (2:35)
2. Juaneco Y Su Combo - Linda Nena (3:45)
3. Los Hijos Del Sola - Carinito (4:05)
4. Los Destellos - A Patricia (3:14)
5. Los Diablos Rojos - El Guapo (3:04)
6. Juaneco Y Su Combo - Ya Se Ha Muerto Mi Abuelo (4:09)
7. Los Mirios - El Milagro Verde (2:43)
8. Los Destellos - Para Elisa (2:46)
9. Los Hijos Del Sol - Linda Muсequita (4:44)
10. Los Mirios - Muchachita Del Oriente (3:19)
11. Los Destellos - Elisa (3:38)
12. Juaneco Y Su Combo - Vacilando Con Ayahuesca (3:31)
13. Los Diablos Rojos - Sacalo Sacalo (3:23)
14. Esuebio Y Su Banjo - Mi Morena Rebelde (3:21)
15. Los Hijos Del Sol - Si Me Quieres (3:09)
16. Juaneco Y Su Combo - Mi Robaron Mi Runa Mula (3:07)
17. Los Mirios - La Danza De Los Mirios (2:49)


Los Destellos

Moacir Santos - Coisas

This one is probably well-known to anyone who knowns anything at all about brazilian music beyond a "Best Of Bossa" compilation, but to me it came as a wonderful discovery. A samba/jazz album of breathtaking beauty, the most likely contender to my "Discovery of the Year". People who trust my musical taste at all must go and hear it right now.
You can read an excellent overview of this album at The New York Times Essential Library of Jazz: A Critic's Guide to the 100 Most Important Recordings on GoogleBooks; I will also put three scans from the book below.



Moacir Santos - Coisas, 1965
REUP 11/11/14: zippyshare or uloz.to
1. Coisa n° 4 (Nanã)
2. Coisa n° 10
3. Coisa n° 5
4. Coisa n° 3
5. Coisa n° 2
6. Coisa n° 9
7. Coisa n° 6
8. Coisa n° 7 (Quem é Que Não Chora)
9. Coisa n° 1
10. Coisa n° 8 (Navegação)

Rahsaan Roland Kirk - The Case of the Three-Sided Dream in Audio Color [1975]

Jazz musicians count a lot of freaks in their ranks. The most eccentric of them all might be Roland Kirk, and this could be his most far-out recording.
Three-Sided Dream is a concept album, the only true jazz concept album. In jazz, there were many album-length suites (eg. Duke's late 50's LPs) and thematic song collections (eg. Sinatra's "Songs for Swingin' Lovers"), but this is a concept album in a rock sense - united on many different levels, from the artwork and album presentation to the aural snippets joining the songs.
It is well-known that Kirk was very receptive to ideas that came to him in dreams; the most famous one is his trademark ability to play three horns at once. This LP is Kirk's tribute to his source of inspiration - his dreams. There are attempts to represent his dreams "in audio color", as the title would have it - surrealistic conversation bits, musique concrete snippets etc.
The physical presentation of the album is also a part of the concept: Three-Sided Dream is a double LP, but only three sides have music on them, the fourth is a blank 12-minute track with ~30 seconds of conversation at the very end. Each of the three sides is bookended with "Dreams". Unfortunately, digital presentation does not preserve these things.
There are two different versions for each of the tunes, The Entertainer even bearing it in the title ("done in the style of..."). I guess this is an attempt to represent transformations of the familiar pieces in dreams. BTW, Freaks For The Festival is a reworking of Kirk's signature piece "Three for the Festival", named so for the three-horns-at-once theme.
Many of the things Kirk does here would be considered gimmicks by the "real jazzmen" - like tampering with the physical format of the record. So, the aesthetic sensibility is more rock than jazz. But the music itself is pure jazz - electrified and funky, but still real jazz, not fusion or 70s-Miles-style avantgarde.
Highly recommended!


Rahsaan Roland Kirk - The Case of the Three-Sided Dream in Audio Color, 1975
95mb on megaupload or badongo
1. Conversation
2. Bye Bye Blackbird
3. Horses
4. High Heel Sneakers
5. Dream
6. Echoes Of Primitive Ohio And Chili Dogs
7. The Entertainer (Done In The Style Of The Blues)
8. Freaks For The Festival
9. Dream
10. Portrait Of Those Beautiful Ladies
11. Dream
12. The Entertainer
13. Dream
14. Dream
15. Portrait Of Those Beautiful Ladies
16. Dream
17. Freaks For The Festival
18. sesroH
19. Bye Bye Blackbird
20. Conversation

The Carl Stalling Project, Vol.1+2: Music from Warner Bros. Cartoons 1936-1958

The Carl Stalling Project, Vol.1: Music from Warner Bros. Cartoons 1936-1958

Amazon review: For fans of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, et al., this is the essential cartoon soundtrack as well as a monument to surrealism. During his 22 years as a composer for Warner Bros. animated shorts, Stalling invented the musical vocabulary of cartoons. Producer Hal Willner has lovingly assembled a sonic collage that showcases Stalling's compositional genius and uncanny ability to borrow a tune. It's a whirling collection of random moments, chock full of music you never knew you knew, from Bugs Bunny's theme from "Rabbit Fire" to Raymond Scott's "Powerhouse" to Stalling's own "Woo! Woo!" Also included in the mix: outtakes from recording sessions, and several complete scores.

AMG review: The first volume in The Carl Stalling Project series is a revelation; more than just an essential part of a Warner Bros. staff that generated some of the finest and most inspired productions in the history of animation, Stalling was a visionary whose work deserves consideration among the finest American avant-garde music ever recorded. As these 15 selections from WB cartoons dating between 1936 and 1958 attest, his cut and paste style — a singular collision between jazz, classical, pop, and virtually everything else in between — was unprecedented in its utter disregard for notions of time, rhythm, and compositional development; Stalling didn't just break the rules, he made them irrelevant. That in the process he created music beloved by succeeding generations of children is more impressive still — perhaps even unwittingly, Stalling introduced the avant-garde into the mainstream, and as popular music continues to diversify and hybridize, his stature as a pioneer rightfully continues to grow.

Mediafire:
Vol.1 - 192kbps, 107mb
Vol.2 - 320kbps, 174mb

Lord Creator - Jamaica Time

Lord Creator - Jamaica Time
160kbps, 45mb at sharebee
1. Jamaica Farewell (Original)
2. Archie
3. Bad Lucky
4. Blowing In The Wind
5. Don't Go Away
6. End Of The World
7. Independent Jamaica
8. Sweet Jamaica
9. Island Woman
10. Yellow Bird
11. Queen's Canary
12. Ma And Pa