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Bester Quartet - Metamorphoses (2012)


Bester Quartet  jest swego rodzaju fenomenem na światowym rynku muzycznym. Grupę tworzą czterej wybitni instrumentaliści, wykształceni muzycy klasyczni. Charakterystyczną cechą zespołu jest wykonawstwo muzyki o szerokim przekroju stylistycznym, w którym zasymilowane zostały wybrane elementy muzyki klasycznej, jazzowej, awangardowej oraz dokonania współczesnej kameralistyki gdzie fundamentem do budowania niepowtarzalnych form instrumentalnych jest improwizacja.

Formacja ta jest nowym obliczem legendarnego The Cracow Klezmer Band, który powstał w 1997 roku w Krakowie z inicjatywy muzyka młodego pokolenia, kompozytora i akordeonisty Jarosława Bestera.

Za sprawą wypracowania oryginalnego, odważnego artystycznie repertuaru, opartego głównie na kompozycjach własnych lub też przygotowanych specjalnie dla tego składu instrumentalnego, zespół nieustannie zdobywa uznanie krytyki muzycznej, jak i publiczności na całym świecie.

Bester Quartet dokonał niezliczonej ilości nagrań dla stacji telewizyjnych i radiowych, a także współpracował w wieloma wybitnymi artystami szeroko rozumianej muzyki jazzowej, klezmerskiej i awangardowej: John Zorn, Tomasz Stańko, Grażyna Auguścik, John McLean, Don Byron, Frank London, Jorgos Skolias, Aaron Alexander, Ireneusz Socha i inni.

Zespół koncertował w wielu prestiżowych salach oraz klubach muzycznych, m.in. w Polsce, USA, Wielkiej Brytanii, Tajwanie, Czechach, Finlandii, Włoszech, Estonii, Francji, Ukrainie, Węgrzech, Szwecji, Szwajcarii, Austrii, Belgii, Holandii, Niemczech oraz Kanadzie. (ethnojazz)


Bester Quartet is a new development of The Cracow Klezmer Band that was formed in 1997 in Krakow, Poland as an initiative of Jaroslaw Bester – a young musician, composer and accordionist. The group is made up of four instrumentalists, classically trained musicians. The quartet performs a vast stylistic range that borrows from classical, jazz and vanguard music, including contemporary chamber music where improvisation constitutes a foundation to build on some unique instrumental forms. 
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Alexey Tegin - "Gyer - Sacred Tibetan Music of Bön Tradition" (2002)


Solowa płyta lidera zespołu Phurpa (oto ich płyta) zawierająca, jak to u nich, muzykę związaną z tybetańską religią Bön, datującą się (religią, nie muzyką) jeszcze z czasów przedbuddyjskich. Wyznawcy Bön twierdzili kiedyś, że Budda sporo od nich ściągnął, po jakimś czasie niekoniecznie pokojowej koegzystencji się to trochę zmiksowało i obecnie mówi się nawet o buddyzmie Bön, którego polski związek wpisany jest do rejestru związków wyznaniowych pod zaskakującym numerem 100.

A solo record from the leader of Moscow's Phurpa, containing music of the Tibetan pre-Buddhist Bön religion. For fans of Justin Timberlake, obviously.

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Andrzej Przybielski, Marcin Oleś, Bartłomiej Brat Oleś - Abstract (2005)




Album, który trzymacie Państwo w rękach powstał w 2003 roku, a okazją do jego stworzenia byto kilka lipcowych dni, które spędziliśmy wspólnie w studio podczas nagrywania muzyki do spektaklu Teatru Telewizji (Pasożyt, reż. Marcin Wrona).

Będąc od dawna szczerymi fanami muzyki Andrzeja Przybielskiego i mając za sobą kilka lat współpracy z nim, pozostajemy pod nieustającym wrażeniem jego metod pracy i sposobu patrzenia na życie przez pryzmat improwizacji. Jednocześnie uważamy, że jego muzyka nigdy nie została w pełni zaprezentowana. Ośmieliliśmy się więc zostać producentami tego krążka oraz muzykami, którzy towarzyszyli mu podczas rejestracji nagrań.

Większość muzyki nagranej na tej płycie powstała bez wcześniejszych prób, przygotowań i ustaleń, co odzwierciedla metody pracy Andrzeja, a także jego głębokie przekonanie, iż prawdziwa muzyka nie wymaga omówień i jeśli ma powstać, powstanie i bez nich, stąd pozostawione niekiedy komentarze i uwagi dawane athoc w studio przed zarejestrowaniem kolejnych utworów. (Marcin & Bartłomiej Brat Oleś)

***
The album you are holding was recorded in 2003 and its origins go back to a couple of days in July we spent together recording the soundtrack for the TV Theater show (Parasite, directed by Marcin Wrona).

As long-time devoted fans of Andizej Przybielski's music, after having collaborated with him for a number of years, we remain constantly impressed by his working methods and the way he views life through the prism of improvisation. At the same time, we believe his music has never been fully presented. That is why we dared produce this disk and be his accompanying musicians during the recording sessions.

Most of the music recorded here has been made with no previous rehearsals, preparations or agreements, which reflects Andrzej's working methodology as well as his firm conviction that real music does not require declarations and if it is to come into being, it will do so without them - hence the comments made ad hoc in the studio right before recording a given track.

In order to underline the rawness of this music we decided to record it using only three microphones, so that each instrument could fill the same portion of space and therefore be equally important as the other two. (Marcin & Bartłomiej Brat Oleś)
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Jeff Airson Dune



In the early 90's (I was in my twenties), I was the singer & guitarist in a band called Mushroom, we were playing garage noise core with psychedelic influences . You can find a few tracks & live/TV videos on you tube .We did a lot of concerts & some guest parts for Jon Spencer Blues Explosion , Buzzcocks ...we also participated in some compilations noise grunge.

In 1994 , the band split as we were going to release an album & then I was involved in the beginning of the french free tekno movement , especially with the Spiral Tribe expelled from England by Thatcher. Early 2000's, I came back to the classical form of rock , I played as guitarist for a little time with Courge (the band of Mattt Konture, a notorious underground comics designer) . Ok ... but I don't think it's helpful to talk about it !

Jeff Airson Dune : in 2006 , I recorded at home (Montpellier) a first solo record, very ethereal psych, dreamlike & it was released as a self-product in a very limited edition cd in 2007 .

2009, I recorded another album "2" in the countryside with very cheap equipment ; this is very experimental and most titles are based on Castaneda's experiences & teaching of Don Juan .

2012/2013 : comeback to my favorite rock era , the psychedelic sixties ! I recorded all myself with some help from a friend (lead guitar) on 2 tracks. This is 'Psyché de poche", released on Bandcamp April 2013. The long song "Lumière blanche, trou noir" (White light, black hole) is the continuing story of Major Tom , the astronaut from Bowie 'Space oddity' lost in space !

Right now I'm working on an upcoming album to be released in September or October maybe on an official Label ?Here's a personal code for you to download for free the full album "Psyché de poche" including the cover, back cover & lyrics . You can put a free download on your blog for your readers, I agree with that, but please, also put the direct link to my site on Bancamp.

I hope you like it and thank you ! http://jeffairsondune.bandcamp.com/
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Eddie "One String" Jones & Edward Hazelton - One-String Blues (1993)


It's not hard to imagine how important this album must have seemed when it, or most of it, first appeared on LP in 1964.  Not only was it a field recording of two unknown street musicians, playing the purest rural blues apparently in splendid isolation from the mainstream; it was also evidence that the blues was, as the enthusiasts were (and are) wont to assume, essentially African in origin.  The cover of the first LP issue - reproduced on the CD inlay - went so far as to state unequivocally that Eddie Jones accompanied himself 'on a home-made African derived Zither-Monochord'.  Clearly, such an instrument could only be one of those features that were to become known as 'African retentions' in American music.

John Crosby's short note (the only new commentary, apart from a bizarre endorsement by Captain Beefheart, reprinted from 'Mojo' magazine) makes the agenda clear.  'At the time ? musicologists were actively attempting to classify all the various traits & styles of African-American music by strongly emphasising the African roots of the blues.' He goes on, quite rightly, to say that 'Jones' improvised instrument & music overwhelmingly bear testament to the kind of personal resourcefulness and performance skills any talented individual inevitably brings to the folk process'.  Hear, hear!  The Africanist approach, far from being a proper acknowledgement, surely tends to underestimate the achievement of black American musicians, in creating a range of musical forms that have come to dominate the popular music of the global village - including Africa.

Eddie 'One String' Jones had nothing so say about his music's origins - nor about his own, for that matter.  His name may or may not have been Eddie Jones.  It may or may not have been Jessie Marshall.  Those with an ear for regional accents and styles will have a fine time deciding where he came from.  One day in 1960, he approached Frederick Usher in the skid row section of Los Angeles.  He was carrying a rough piece of timber, with a single broom wire stretched along it, and a tin can mounted over one end.  He played it by sliding a half-pint bottle along the wire with his left hand, while striking it near the resonating can with a little whittled stick in his right hand.

As a beggar, he no doubt relied heavily on the novelty value of his instrument, and he was happy to allow listeners to assume that it was his very own invention.  He boasted of a daughter who could play as he did, but gave no other indication that the instrument and technique were anything but peculiar to himself.  Nor would he countenance the notion that his device was in any sense a substitute for a guitar (like the home-made contraptions recalled from childhood by many a professional bluesman); he was proud to demonstrate 'the onliest music that can't be captured by six strings'.


There is no good reason to assume that Jones's instrument was of 'African' descent.  The musical bow surely should be considered the archetype of all stringed instruments, and mono-chords of one kind or another can be found everywhere in the world, especially wherever musical accompaniment has to be cheap, highly portable, temporary or improvised.  Ironically, Jones's practise of sounding the string percussively with a stick - which, together with the left-hand sliding, Usher thought to be 'entirely his own' - may well be the most 'African' element in his method.  As for that sliding: for some reason, many people still find the influence of Hawaiian music insufficient explanation for the development of slide guitar techniques but, supposing that black Americans were a separate independent source of the basic slide method, it would be reasonable to assume that a black American discovered it, just as (if we are to believe the established version of the story) a known individual in Hawaii did.

Fortunately, this album need not be justified by any dubious ethnomusicological assertions.  It contains highly creditable performances of blues standards (Rolling and Tumbling, John Henry, Baby Please Don't Go, The Dozens), by a fascinating character at the height of his powers, playing the kind of instrument that most blues fans have only read and wondered about.  Eddie Jones was rightly proud of his ability.  Having recorded for Usher in a back alley, he readily agreed to a couple more sessions, including a performance for a private party, which he openly resented having to share with Usher's other find, Edward Hazelton.  After that, he slipped back into terminal obscurity, leaving behind only these recordings, and one of his instruments (a full blown concert required two of them, apparently).  If this chance encounter had occurred only a couple of years later (or, perhaps, if the recordings had been published sooner after the event), he might well have enjoyed some sort of career on the burgeoning blues scene.

His 'support act' was a very different character.  As introverted and reflective as Jones was flamboyant and assertive, Edward Hazelton, too, was a drifter, originally from South Carolina, who relied for his musical accompaniment on that more familiar vagrant's standby, the harmonica.  Inevitably, there is less to be said about him, unless blues harmonica happens to be your special interest.  Suffice it to say that he sings well, in a high, clear voice, and knows all the usual harmonica tricks.  He provides six of the fourteen performances on the album (any reader who happens to own a copy of the LP will be interested to know that the CD contains three extra tracks by each artist).

The album opens with an interview with Eddie Jones, in which he explains his instrumental method, and the various nicknames it has earned him.  By some unfathomable logic, he is known in some quarters, he claims, as a 'three-quarter banjo picker'.  Usher asks him why that is.  'Cause I don't have but one string,' Jones replies.  Ah, yes, of course ?.  This beginning makes good sense to anyone who is interested, but is pretty offputting to the unsuspecting casual listener.  Try playing this album to anyone who isn't a blues anorak, and watch the eyes glaze even before the music starts.  Serious blues enthusiasts who don't have this CD already will certainly want it, and will certainly enjoy it.  Those who like to play music in the background should certainly avoid it. (David Campbell)
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Arnold Dreyblatt - Animal Magnetism (1995)


Arnold Dreyblatt's compositions have been recorded for such leading avant-garde music labels as Hat Hut, Tzadik and Table of Elements. The New York native studied film and video at SUNY with Woody and Steina Vasulka, and earned his masters from the Institute for Media Studies. In the mid-'70s, he studied composition with Pauline Oliveros and LaMonte Young, then learned from Alvin Lucier until getting his masters in composition in 1982. By that time, Dreyblatt had already been directing his own music ensemble, the Orchestra of Excited Strings, for three years. In 1984, he moved to Europe where, in addition to composing, he began using texts and images in his installations and performances. He has received numerous grants and stipends including the Overbrook Foundation, and the Philip Morris Art Prize. Dreyblatt has been a guest composer at Amsterdam's STEIM, Berlin's Kunstlerhaus Bethanien and more. He has been commissioned by Ars Electronica, Podewil/US Arts Festival, as well as for his production 'Who's Who in Central & East Europe 1933' for Berlin's DAAD-Inventionen '91. He has also created two independent yet interrelated art works in collaboration with the University of Lüneburg's Kulturinformatik Department, entitled "Who's Who in Central & East Europe 1933" and "Memory Arena." As of the late 1990's, Dreyblatt still resided in Berlin.


Arnold Dreyblatt's 1995 Tzadik release, Animal Magnetism, includes many juxtaposed sections of repeating, skip-like structures that come off in a simple, lovely way. It is entirely likable with a lilting, pots-and-pans schizophrenia that insists we hear what normally doesn't work, what normally isn't called art. Embedded with quirk-pop elements, the pieces resemble deconstructed dance tunes reflected in a room full of mirrors. Slightly carnival moments, tweaked ska counter rhythms, percussive foregrounds overlying slide effects backgrounds, barely-contained marching band funk - all these are part of Dreyblatt's musical world. (Joslyn Layne)

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Aleksander Korecki - Świat Aszkwili (2010)




Fani jazzu i radykalnej muzycznej alternatywy doczekali się wielkiego wydarzenia. Nakładem Lion Stage Records ukazał się album Alka Koreckiego - „Świat Aszkwili”. Nad czwartą autorską płytą Koreckiego pracowali także pozostali muzycy projektu „Alek Korecki Quartet” znanego do niedawna jako „Z Całym Szacunkiem Dzika Świnia”.

Alek Korecki, wirtuoz saksofonu i miłośnik solowych wariacji, zwodzi podążających za nim słuchaczy w kompozycjach lekkich i zmąconych, aby we fragmentach melodycznie skrystalizowanych ponownie naprostować muzyczne ścieżki. Bogactwo dźwięków zrodziła różnorodność obserwacji, które inspirowały artystę; tak więc tytułowy „Świat Aszkwili” to impresja na temat współczesnego człowieka, zaś „Kretki” to wynik zadumy nad leśnymi i łąkowymi kretowiskami. „Świat Aszkwili” to wyprawa do świata odmalowanego muzyką Koreckiego, szczególnie zalecana osobom lubiącym swobodne snucie wyobraźni.

Jak twierdzi sam Korecki: „Całość jest wyrazem miłości do życia, czystej natury i boskiej wolności będącej podstawą radości wewnętrznej i spokoju, bez którego zdrowe i szczęśliwe życie nie jest możliwe.”

Na płycie obok nowych kompozycji znalazły się starsze utwory, m.in. „Linia Zwykła”, czy „Rekonceptualizacja” pochodząca z czasów stanu wojennego, kiedy to wykonywał ją zespół „Strajk 80”.   (serpent)
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Joseph Jarman & Anthony Braxton - Together Alone (1974)


It's a matter of fact that the late 60s and early 70s was a time of great artistic experimentation and achievement for creative improvised music. Paris, in particular, lured some of the AACM's most important musicians from Chicago (Art Ensemble of Chicago. Anthony Braxton. Leroy Jenkins, Leo Smith, Steve McCall, et. al.). where their music faced largely indifferent reception, to participate in a community that truly appreciated discussion, interaction, innovation, adventure, intellect, and raw creativity. Rather than performing their music for a handful of folks as they had at home, they encountered large enthusiastic audiences genuinely interested and appreciative of their work. The great proliferation of recordings on excellent labels like BYG-Actuel, Freedom, and America offers testimonial to the abundant opportunities to have their music not only heard, but recorded as well. Back in the states only Delmark Records and Nessa Records, dedicated but financially limited at the time, had been interested in their music.

The remarkable recording you now possess was a part of the fruit of this fertile period. Recorded in December of 1971, it didn't see release until 1975. an era when interest in this music was quite low. Consequently, it pretty much slipped through the vast cracks that swallow so much music outside the leading movements of the day. Fusion's popularity had long knocked this stuff out of real contention.

Although the purer thrust of issues originally addressed by that AACM as a communal organization had changed through interaction with other musicians —Braxton, for example, was in the midst of working in the landmark group Circle with Chick Corea, Dave Holland, and Barry Altschul— Together Alone, as author Ronald M. Radano suggests in his excellent book on Braxton New Musical Figurations (University of Chicago Press, 1993), "looked back on performance approaches first developed in the AACM. " Braxton and Joseph Jarman, both with the Art Ensemble and on recordings of others (BYG's catalog is rempant with semi-ad hoc configurations that both Braxton and Jarman had participated in), had laid to rest the conscious insularity that made the AACM's deliberate collectivism so effective at its peak, but this album proves they hadn't surrendered the spirit that guided them in Chicago.

The album opens with three Jarman compositions. The title track finds both Braxton and Jarman on alto saxophone spinning long, languid, serene, and melancholy unison lines; the path eventually forks and Braxton takes on a more rugged and jagged trail while Jarman's remains smooth and flowing. Despite the musical separation, the saxophones remain inextricably linked. One of the AACM approaches Radano surely refers to on this recording is the integration of silence and space. At times, the music goes against the grain of time, and other moments it rejects it altogether. Leaving the music strewn with gaps of silence rather than opting for a total sound density, the AACMers were among the first in jazz to exploit space as a compositional tool.


The opening track flows into "Dawn Dance." Braxton moving to piano and Jarman picking up his flute. Oblique, spacious keyboard punctuations-including some compelling inside-the-piano tinkling—provide a bed for Jarman's outpourings which range from gentle, highly lyrical dreamweaving to almost sharp, stuttered jags. The brief "Morning (Including Circles)" leaps from a soothing peal of hand bells into dense cacophony. Amid myriad layers of sound, the static bells become suddenly abrasive, Braxton and Jarman shouting out of sync, while their shrill horns seem to simulate electronic white noise. It's an exhilarating, early ascent into coarse textural exploration.

Braxton's "Composition 21" ("CK7 [GN]") elaborates the textural layering on a grander scale. Flutes, piano, contrabass clarinet, alto sax. whistles, and abstract, sometimes jarring sounds on electronic tape provide an extremely dense sonic collage, yet once one abides by the superficial level of chaos, it becomes obvious that Braxton's sound sculpture is most certainly ordered and well-conceived. Finally. Braxton's lengthy "Composition 20" ("SBN-A-1 66K") constructs a fine tension between lyrical horn lines (his contrabass clarinet and Jarman's soprano saxophone) and an almost static but changing ring of jingling bells. The bells develop in complexity throughout the composition, providing an increasing tension with the horns. Although the bells suggest no melody, their pattern becomes more and more dense harmonically, while the attack of the horns doesn't fluctuate.

Aside from being the only duet recording there is between these two masters. Together Alone is far more than just a curious meeting. Elaborating on AACM concepts with lessons learned in Paris, its exciting combination of one-on-one collaboration with through-composed material sounds more vibrant and vital than ever, over two decades since it was recorded. (Peter Margasek)

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The Rationals (1970)


Steve Correll - lead guitar, vocals
Bill Figg - drums
Scott Morgan - guitar, vocals
Terry Trabandt - bass, vocals

The Rationals formed in 1964 and first recorded a single for a local label, A2 Records, in 1965. After scoring a local hit with the tune "Gave My Love", they recorded a cover of Otis Redding's "Respect". This won them a contract for national distribution by Cameo/Parkway, and the single ended up reaching #92 on the Billboard Hot 100. Unfortunately, the record didn't break everywhere in the U.S. at the same time, so it had a tough time making a decent showing on the national charts. Several further singles, including "I Need You" and "Hold On Baby", were successes in Michigan but didn't catch on nationally. Lead singer Scott Morgan was asked to join Blood Sweat and Tears, but he declined the offer. The group's only full-length, a self-titled effort, arrived on Crewe Records at the beginning of 1970, and the group split up soon after; Morgan went on to play with several other Detroit-area groups over the next three decades, including Sonic's Rendezvous Band (with Fred Smith of MC5) and several of his own bands.

The lyrics of Iggy Pop's track "Get Up And Get Out" from his 1980 album "Soldier" are mostly lifted from the band's 1967 single "Leavin' Here," which was included on Goldenlane Records' 2009 compilation, "60s Garage Nuggets."

In 1995, John Sinclair released a live recording of a 1968 Rationals benefit concert entitled Temptation 'bout to Get Me. Sinclair also named his book Guitar Army after the Rationals song of the same name.

The band's cover of The Kinks' I Need You was also featured on the compilation Nuggets: Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era, 1965–1968.

The Big Beat record label released “Think Rational!,” a two-CD anthology of the mid-1960s phase of the Rationals’ career, in July 2009.

In 2010, The Rationals were voted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends online Hall of Fame.

More information about band here.

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Urthona - I Refute It Thus (2008)




Urthona’s first release, I Refute It Thus, contains three long tracks of primitive noise guitar freakouts inspired by the windswept-tor landscape of mighty Dartmoor. I Refute It Thus is a super-intense barrage of maxed-out ampage, coming on like Neil Young and Crazy Horse’s Arc noise collage mangled with a low generation audience recording of My Bloody Valentine at their most mental.

Urthona urge you to take advantage of their incredibly useful feedback-laden West Country psychedelic free-noise garage metal sound.

Play this loud music quiet as hell.
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East New York Ensemble De Music - At the Helm (1974)


Multi-reed player Bilal Abdurrahman was best known for his musical partnership with the trailblazing bassist/oudist (and sideman for Monk and Randy Weston) Abdul Ahmed Malik from the late '50s into the mid-'60s. Their music—which predated better-publicized fusions of ethnic musics and jazz by half a decade—was documented on five LPs for Riverside, RCA, and New Jazz ( East Meets West , Jazz Sahara , The Music of Ahmed Abdul Malik , Eastern Moods , Sounds of Africa ). Several of these have been reissued and are currently on my "must get" list. Unlike those LPs, I never knew this one existed! Released on the not-for-profit Folkways label in 1974, At The Helm is the only surviving document of Abdurahman's own Black Magical Music.

The puckish humor evident in the band's name doesn't so much come across in the music (a la Breuker, Carla Bley, et al.) as it does in their kitchen sink approach to musical eclecticism. The Ensemble is actually a collaboration between Abdurahman and vibraharpist and composer Ameen Nuraldeen. Nuraldeen's compositions deftly mix the somewhat loopy, exotica-derived sounds one might find on Sun Ra's early recordings with an authoritative, groove-oriented, early-'70s Afro-modal jazz sensibility. Prominently odd amongst the more subtly odd moments on At The Helm is the cover of Freddie Hubbard's "Little Sunflower"—a minor hit of sorts amongst '70s jazz fans which daringly opens with an extended improvisation on a bizarre-sounding non-tempered Korean reed instrument (possibly a senap—but I am just guessing). This is not done merely for exotic effect; Abdurahman plays the untamed, unnamed instrument with the same soul and passion he displays on his main axe.


Why he wasn't better known, I will never know—his technique, sound and intonation are distinctive and superb throughout. Nuraldeen is a forceful, percussive player who revels in the vibraphone's bright bell-like tones while eschewing the clanky, clangy sounds that many players of this ilk fall prey to.

The supporting players—all even more obscure than the leaders—provide an organic propulsive rhythmic base throughout. Another pleasant surprise is is the very crisp sound quality—unusual for Folkways recordings.

At The Helm presents us with a convincing fusion of jazz, African, Asian, and Middle Eastern ethnic musics in which the immediacy and power of jazz is never diluted by the ethnic influences, and vice versa. (Dave Wayne)
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The Flamingo Group - This is our Soul (1971)


Marie Rottrova urodziła się 13 listopada 1941 r. w Ostrawie. Pochodzi z muzykującej rodziny: matka była śpiewaczką operową a ojciec organistą. Od młodości uczyła się gry na pianinie – ma za  sobą lata nauki w ostrawskiej szkole muzycznej, śpiewała również w szkolnym chórze. Ukończyła też kurs śpiewaków muzyki popularnej w Ostrawie. W 1960 roku wzięła udział w przeglądzie młodych talentów, gdzie zajęła IV miejsce, i została zauważona przez orkiestrę Gustawa Broma. Wkrótce otrzymała zaproszenie do czechosłowackiej telewizji, gdzie wykonała utwór Jana Hammera (tego samego, który lata później zasłynął tematem do serialu „Miami Vice”) i Jaromira Horcy, „Rozmarne stvoreni”.

Przez znaczną część swojej kariery (aż do połowy lat osiemdziesiątych) Rottrova postanowiła pozostać w rodzinnej Ostrawie i nie przeprowadzała się do Pragi. W swym rodzinnym mieście występowała z zespołem Frantiska Trnky oraz z zespołami Oktet, Samuel i Majestic. Pierwsze nagrania zarejestrowała z zespołem Flamingo (później przemianowanym na Plamenaci, z nimi także rozpoczynała swą karierę Hana Zagorova). Od 1969 miała status stałego członka grupy. Występowała z Petrem Nemcem (wykonując głównie soulowy repertuar) oraz z Haną Zagorovą. Trio Rottrova – Nemec Zagorova zwróciło na siebie uwagę dzięki występowi w praskiej Lucernie w 1968 roku.



Pierwszym dużym przebojem Marie Rottrovej była piosenka „Kun bily”, znana u nas jako „Ballada wagonowa” z repertuaru Maryli Rodowicz. Z repertuaru naszej rodaczki Rottrova zaczerpnęła także utwór „Marketka”, czyli popularną „Małgośkę”. Pierwszy album Marie Rottrovej, nagrany z grupą Flamingo i z towarzyszeniem Petra Nemca, ukazał się na rynku w 1970 roku. Miał tytuł „Flamengo” a w anglojęzycznej wersji eksportowej – „This Is Our Soul”. Wkrótce Marie Rottrova nawiązała współpracę z najlepszymi orkiestrami tamtego okresu, jak również ze znakomitymi autorami tekstów: Jiriną Fikejzovą, Jaroslavem Wykrentem czy znanym także w Polsce Jaromirem Nohavicą.

Marie Rottrova sama komponuje i pisze teksty niektórych swoich utworów. Stworzyła przy okazji swych licznych występów image kobiety atrakcyjnej, pogodnej i pewnej siebie. Wraz z popularnością koncertów artystki wzrosło zainteresowanie nią ze strony telewizji (często występowała w studiu TV Ostrava). W 1981 Marie Rottrova wystąpiła w musicalu „Neberte nám princeznú” wraz z Mariką Gombitową i Miroslavem Zbirką. Płyta ze ścieżką dźwiękową z filmu cieszyła się wielkim powodzeniem. Marie Rottrova doczekała się też własnego programu telewizyjnego „Divadélko pod věží,” (Teatrzyk pod wieżą) – podczas 22 odcinków wyemitowanych w latach 1981-1987 piosenkarka gościła wiele znakomitości ze świata kultury i sztuki, z którymi nierzadko wspólnie występowała. (....) (źródło)



Fabulously funky sounds from the Soviet Bloc. These tracks are mostly cover versions of songs by American artists but there's enough energy and personality here to make this album a very worthwhile listen with some great party starters. And both sides end with a mind-melting instrumental freak-out!

25 Or 6 To 4 is a late sixties recording by Chicago, a band who later became a behemoth of MOR rock, but early on, at least, betrayed their origins in the West Coast psychedelic scene of the late 1960s. It’s of interest here because a recent arrival in the post was a 1971 Czech language version of the song, by Marie Rottrová & Flamingo, under the title Tisíc tváří lásky (A Thousand Faces). It’s a good example of the ways music often crossed the Iron Curtain, despite the heavy censorship of its time – at this stage, long after the 1968 invasion had ended the Prague Spring, and Gustav Husak’s ‘normalisation’ had taken hold: an earlier Flamingo cover version, closer to that initial wave of mid sixties energy, was a sultry take on Aretha Franklin’s Chain Of Fools, sung in English. The other side of the 45 featuring the Chicago song, meanwhile, is Kůň bílý (White Horse), itself a West Coast style song, clearly influenced by developments in the United States and – as noted in the Communist Rock’n'Roll talk in relation to Marta Kubisova‘s late sixties work – politically aligned with student and broadly liberal-leftist ideas circulating in the West at the same moment.

It seems telling that these ideas were dismissed by those in power according to what suited themselves: as ‘anti-American’ and ’quasi-Communist’ in the West, as ’anti-Communist’ and ‘pro-Western’ in the East. The unifying feature was opposition to unaccountable power, and whoever that power was represented by - Nixon or Brezhnev, The Party or Corporate lobbyists and contractors - its operations were generally more comparable than the propaganda on either side of the Iron Curtain cared to admit.

The years after 1968 saw a reassertion of quasi-Stalinist models of control in the Eastern Bloc, running in parallel to a less traumatic, but sometimes comparable political chill in the West, as polarisation and economic contraction led to moves away from the post-war consensus established in 1945 that remain dominant in Anglo-American politics. Few will need reminding that this shift in political gravity has taken us into territory where what was considered far outside the mainstream of political acceptability in the West of 1969 has long been presented to us as ‘the middle ground’. Is it all that surprising, then, that were Richard Nixon to stand as a Republican candidate today on his 1970 platform, he’d outflank Barack Obama on his left by some considerable degree?
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Tie Break (1989)


Tie Break. Gdyby nie ostatnie zdarzenia związane z zespołem niemal udałoby się zapomnieć o tej formacji. A to byłoby bardzo niefortunna sytuacja, bo Tie Break to nie tylko cześć polskiej jazzowej historii, ale jak twierdzi wielu zespół kultowy.

Nawet biorąc poprawkę na to jak bardzo słowo kultowy jest dzisiaj nadużywane do częstochowskiego TIe Breaku pasuje ono jak ulał. Kultowy bowiem to przecież taki, który odcisnął się w świadomości społeczeństwa, popularny, ale i elitarny zarazem. Nie wszystko takim przymiotnikiem nazwać można. Tie Break można, bo z Tie Break już od samego początku był nie tylko kapelą, ale spektakularną emanacją stylu życia, sposobu widzenia świata sztuki i muzyki. W końcu też z Tiebreaku, ale nie tylko z niego, także z innych rewolucyjnych grup lat 80. nazywanych często zbiorczym terminem Young Power, wychodziły kolejne pokolenia muzyków, którzy na własną rękę i zgodnie ze swoimi zapatrywaniami estetycznymi wzbogacali polską muzykę improwizowaną.

Jako kontestatorzy w oczywisty sposób nie zaskarbili sobie sympatii wszystkich. Ówczesny jazzowy establishment wystąpił przeciw nim niemal tak ostro jak oni przeciw establishmentowi. „Z tyłu rok z przodu bzdety” grzmiał Zbigniew Namysłowski. Zaskakujące bo ostatecznie zawsze słynął z nie małej atencji dla młodych muzyków. Ale nie dla takich, którzy, jak był uprzejmy stwierdzić w wywiadzie Romualda Bokuna dla Kuriera Polskiego - „niezależnie od zgrabnych aranżacji grają o siedmiu zbójach”. W Jazz Forum pojawiały się diagnozy o stanie polskiego jazzu i widoków na przyszłość, jakie się malują w kontekście nawałnicy szalonej młodzieży w kolorowych strojach. Stanowisko w tej sprawie i prób diagnozy podejmowali się dziennikarze Tomasz Szachowski i Adam Szulc. Dobrze jednak, że głos w końcu oddany został także samym architektom ówczesnego fermentu estetycznego. Dobrze choć późno, bo ile nie myli mnie pamięć to dopiero na początku roku 1987.

Tie Break istniał już od prawie 10 lat. Pierwszy skład zespołu ukształtował się w 1979 roku. Grupę budował nie żyjący już perkusista Czesław Łęk  oraz gitarzysta Janusz „Yanina” Iwański. Do nich dołączyli wkrótce Krzysztof Majchrzak grający na gitarze basowej oraz Antoni „Ziut” Gralak. Pierwszy duży koncert zagrali w częstochowskim kinie Relax i był on cześcią przeglądu filmów inspirowanych twórczością Marka Hłaski. W rok później już pod nazwą Tie Break pojechali na Jazz Juniors i powrócili z niego z tarczą, wygrywając konkurs dla młodych zespołów, a „Ziut” Gralak zwycięstwo w kategorii indywidualnej. Jeszcze tego samego roku 19 marca 1980r. na zaproszenie Antoniego Krupy, Tie Break dokonał pierwszego nagrania "live". Dla Polskiego Radia – Kraków, z koncertu w tamtejszej Rotundzie.

Takich zwycięstw było zresztą więcej. Co zresztą żadną miarą nie powinno dziwić, bo w rozpalonych głowach ówczesnych 20-latków aż kipiało od pomysłów i chęci zaznaczenia swojej obecności wcale nie w maistreamowym duchu. Mało kto jednak kwapił się, aby podać im pomocną dłoń.  Wyciągnął ją w końcu człowiek, po którym można było się tego spodziewać i który swoją sztuką oraz podejściem do wszystkiego co nowe, zawsze bardzo odstawał od średniej krajowej polskiej sceny jazzowej.

„Z nimi bardzo dobrze się czułem. Dobrze trzymaliśmy się z Ziutem Gralakiem. O nich mówiło się wtedy punk jazz” mówił Tomasz Stańko w swojej autobiografii, a  Janusz „Yanina” Iwański – ojciec współzałożyciel Tie Breaku tak ten gest wspomina „Był naszym guru... Posłuchał nas i powiedział: robicie dobrą robotę, tak trzymać. Umocniliśmy się w przekonaniu, że idziemy dobrą drogą. Mieliśmy po 20 lat, jeździliśmy i wygrywaliśmy festiwale”.


Tie Break jednak, choć zdobywał serca słuchaczy i części krytyki, to jednak okazał się grupą dotkliwie uwierającą, ówczesnych włodarzy naszej „reglamentowanej i koncesjonowanej” jazzowej kultury. Na swoją pierwszą płytę zespół czekać  musiał aż do 1989 roku i o dziwo nie ukazała się wcale nakładem Polish Jazz, co byłoby naturalnym rozwiązaniem, ale siłą wydawniczą Polskich Nagrań. W jakiś niewytłumaczony sposób także i zaproszenia na zagraniczne festiwale, kierowane do Tie Break, nie dochodziły do adresatów. Jak dalece musieli stawać działaczom ością w gardle niech zaświadczy fakt, że o zostaniu finalistą  słynnego jazzowego festiwalu w Leverkusen, członkowie grupy dowiedzieli się nie dość, że miesiąc później to na dodatek magazynu Jazz Forum. Takich historii jest podobno znacznie więcej, ale nie pora dziś o tym pisać.

Tymczasem Tie Break grał. Nieustannie, choć głównie na krajowej scenie i głównie dla młodych, którym uświęcone historycznie stylistyczne podziały w muzyce jakoś nie chciały już wystarczać. Przez kolejne lata zmieniał się jego skład. Z zespołem współpracowali chyba wszyscy początkujący młodzi rewolucjoniści. Bracia Pospieszalscy Marcin, Mateusz i Jan. Ten ostatni na długo zanim porzucił muzykę dla praktyki publicystycznej. Jak meteor przeleciał przez nią natchniony saksofonista Włodzimierz Kiniorski. Grali skrzypek Waldemar Wardyłło, pianiści Wojciech Konikiewicz i Wojtek Puszek ( to z nim w składzie i z nowym brzmieniem grupa zrealizowała projekt muzyczny "Katarsis"), grecki perkusista Sarandis Juwanudis, wokalista Jorgos Skolias i saksofonista Aleksander Korecki.

Ale w grudniu 1983 roku masa krytyczna została przekroczona, po koncercie na festiwalu Jazz Jamboree Tie Break zawiesił działalność. Muzycy rozeszli się w swoje strony na trzy lata. Grywali albo wręcz współtworzyli kilka bardzo ważnych, nie tylko jazzowych zespołów ot takich choćby jak "Free Cooperation", "Śmierć kliniczna", "Sesja", "Young power", "Stan`d art.", "Green revolution" "Voo Voo" albo „Savora” – formacja, w której Yanina, Ziut oraz Mateo i Marcin Pospieszalscy wraz ze Stanisławem Sojką, gitarzystą Andrzejem Urnym i perkusistą Andrzejem Ryszką dali nie dość, że kilka koncertów, w tym także podczas festiwalu w Jarocinie ’84, to jeszcze nagrali dla archiwum Polskiego Radia PR.I  trzy utwory: "Madam schizofrenia", "Co ty na to" oraz "Nikogo".

Potem jeszcze kilka lat działali razem. I choć wreszcie zaczęli wyjeżdżać na koncerty zagraniczne i dokumentować swoją muzykę na płytach ("Live", "Duch wieje kędy chce" i "Gin Gi Lob")  to tak naprawdę o jakiejś systematyczności i regularności działania chyba mówić już było nie sposób. Drogi muzyków w końcu rozeszły się na dobre, choć tak naprawdę formacja oficjalnie nie przestała istnieć, a tylko zawiesiła swoją działalność.

Ale pamięć o Tie Breaku pozostała, jak się okazuje pomimo upływu lat ciągle żywa. Stąd też, od kiedy zaczęły krążyć pogłoski, że legendarny band tym razem ma szansę wrócić da koncertowego życia na dobre, to serca wszystkich, którzy pamiętają zaczęły bić mocniej. Wyprzedane do ostatniego bilety na dotychczas zagrane w różnych częściach Polski koncerty nie staną się dowodem, na to, że to całkiem spora grupa słuchaczy.

Trzon zespołu, ten jaki od dekad pamiętamy, z Marcinem i Mateuszem Pospielszalskimi, Antonim „Ziutem” Gralakiem i Januszem „Yaniną” Iwańskim, który złączony został nie tylko wspólnotą muzycznej myśli, ale pomimo wszystko także zwyczajną ludzką przyjaźnią, wciąż trzyma się mocno. I to jest dobra wiadomość tym bardziej, że w gronie współpracowników czy może lepiej powiedzieć gości zespołu jest teraz perkusista Frank Parker i przede wszystkim legenda polskiego jazzu Michała Urbaniak. I tylko wypada mieć nadzieję, że nowe czasy już z innymi działaczami, innymi włodarzami i chyba jednak lepszą niż kiedyś atmosferą dla niepokornych talentów, okażą się bardziej dla Tie Break sprzyjające. (Maciej Karłowski)
***
Tie Break is a successful and "significant" Polish jazz rock group, formed in Częstochowa in 1977. The group was formed by guitarist Janusz Iwański and the bassist Krzysztof Majchrzak, and was soon joined by flute player Grzegorz Chmieleck. The current lineup includes Janusz Iwański, Marcin Pospieszalski, Antoni Gralak and Mateusz Pospieszalski. The group has performed at notable venues such as the Jazz Jamboree.
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VA - Allen Toussaint. The Lost Sessions (2011)


Forget Memphis, Muscle Shoals or Detroit: some of the best soul music recorded in the 60's was coming from New Orleans and was essentially due to the genius of one man: Allen Toussaint. When he went out of the military in 1965, he launched several record labels with the help of Marshall Sehorn, Sansu, Dessu and Tou-Sea while still recording for other labels like New York Amy Records. Then at the peak of his inspiration, he penned scorchers and hits for the likes of Aaron Neville (Hercules and its massive bassline), Lee Dorsey (Get Out Of My Life, Woman and its break sampled a thousand times) and less well known acts like Benny Spellman, The Rubaiyats (a band composed of himself and Willie Harper) or Willie West. Allen Toussaint is featured 3 times as well on this compilation with two excellent instrumentals, the Burt Bacarach sound alike Hands Christianderson and Gotta Travel On and with his own a rendition of the biggest hits he made for Lee Dorsey, Working In The Coal Mine. The trouble with The Lost Sessions is that any other music will sound lame once you listened to it. It's probably an after effect effect of the voodoo they put in their music. (zorbalebreak.blogspot)
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Pauline Oliveros, Stuart Dempster & Panaiotis - Deep Listening (1989)


Nawet nie trzeba być wielkim miłośnikiem Ambientu by ta płyta się spodobała...

Dzieło nad wymiar doskonałe, a z pewnością sporą część swojej niesamowitości bierze z racji miejsca w którym powstało.

W 1988 do leżącego w stanie Waszyngton Fortu Worden przyjeżdża grupa niekonwencjonalnych muzyków.

Czego tam szukali, pośród pozostałości wybudowanego w 1907 roku Fortu Artyleryjskiego?

Szukali zbiornika wodnego... 

Oczywiście nie jakiegoś tam zwykłego, ale zbudowanego specjalnie na potrzeby Fortu, częściowo podziemnego zbiornika o średnicy prawie 60 metrów.

To co dla muzyków było najistotniejsze w tej niesamowitej konstrukcji, to naturalny, 45-sekundowy pogłos, jaki powstawał w pustej przestrzeni zbiornika...

Pauline Oliveros, to utalentowana akordeonistka i jednocześnie jedna z kluczowych animatorek Amerykańskiej sceny muzyki eksperymentalnej.

Stuart Dempster, to natomiast znany kompozytor, będący jednocześnie wirtuozem trąbki i Aborygeńskiego Didgeridoo.

Panaiotis ostatecznie, to prawdziwie niekonwencjonalny muzyk, wykorzystujący w twórczości własny głos oraz praktycznie wszystko to, co przypadkiem wpadło mu dosłownie w ręce.

Razem z inżynierem dźwięku i jego pomocnikiem, trójka ta opuściła na dno zbiornika stół mikserski i operując zaledwie trąbką, didgeridoo, akordeonem oraz muszlami morskimi (!) przystąpili do improwizowanej sesji.

W ciągu tych kilku godzin spędzonych w zbiorniku powstał materiał, który dosłownie zwija uszy w okół głowy słuchacza. 

Wydana pod postacią czterech kompozycji płyta CD zatytułowana "Deep Listening", to można śmiało powiedzieć kwintesencja Ambient, jednocześnie porzucająca elektroniczne ramy tego gatunku.

Bowiem to co zadziwia chyba najbardziej podczas odsłuchu, to fakt, że przy realizacji materiału nie użyto zarówno żadnego syntezatora, jak i efektu o źródle elektronicznym. 

Dzięki owemu długiemu pogłosowi, jak i ogólnemu brzmieniu podziemnego zbiornika powstała płyta, która szokuje swoim brzmieniem, gdy jednocześnie dowiadujemy się, że to nie jest elektroniczny wytwór...  (ja.gram)



A deep, sustained drone opens Deep Listening, a collaboration between composer-philosopher Pauline Oliveros, trombonist Stuart Dempster, and vocalist Panaiotis. The drone comes in waves, as if it's the breath of some slumbering beast, slowly accreting layers of sound and then shedding them just as slowly. It's unclear just what produces that drone, and it doesn't much matter; while the album makes use of accordion, voice, conch shell, metal pipes, didgeridoo, trombone, garden hose, and whistling, the sum effect is key here. Each simple musical gesture transforms into one part of an atmospheric soundscape, performed without the aid of electronics. The combined result is meditative, ominous, and completely transfixing.

The sound summoned by Oliveros, Dempster, and Panaiotis on the 25-minute opening track "Lear" seems to emanate from some place deep within the earth. In a way, it did: Deep Listening was recorded in a gigantic underground cistern, built underneath an army base in the ’70s to hold two million gallons of water. True to Oliveros' concept of Deep Listening, a philosophy that links the performer and his surroundings in an active state of musical communion, the environment is just as important as any of the individual instruments on the recording. The cistern’s acoustics extend each sound up to 45 seconds, causing Oliveros’ accordion tones to overlap with the shifting drone of a didgeridoo, rub up against Dempster's elongated trombone melodies, spin around in circles, and then slip away into the ether.

"Suiren" turns Panaiotis' quiet vowels into slow-motion moans. Without a steady drone to accompany it, his voice fills the atmosphere like the ghostly traces of long-dead souls. It’s easily the spookiest track on Deep Listening, just a creaking wood floor away from a horror movie soundtrack, yet it’s absorbing all the same. In contrast, the trombone lines of "Ione" sound triumphant as they jut out of the low drone, like rays from the rising sun peeking their way through the cistern's walls. By subjecting human movements to the transformative power of the natural environment, Deep Listening burrows deep into the nexus of music and sound, nature and humanity. (dailyom)
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Instant Art - Put It On, Darling... (1986) [tape]


Jeżeli traficie na występ zespołu, którego członkowie mają ciała pokryte farbami, jeśli muzyce towarzyszy pokaz slajdów i filmów wideo, a dźwięki docierające do waszych uszu znajdują się na granicy słyszalności i genialności, to z pewnością jest to koncert grupy Instant Art.

"To nie jest koncert, to pokaz" - zaprotestowałby z pewnością Jerzy Caryk, założyciel i lider zespołu, absolwent Wydziału Grafiki warszawskiej ASP. Istotnie, w czasie występów Instant Art, awangardowej formacji rockowej, sztuki wizualne i muzyka nakładają się i uzupełniają. Slajdy rzutowane są na siatki ustawione w ten sposób, by stworzyć wrażenie trójwymiarowości, a współpracująca z Instant Art grupa Aktywna Telewizja emituje enigmatyczne ejakulacje wizyjne.

Zespół Instant Art zawiązał się jako duet w 1986 roku. Jerzy Caryk i inżynier Krzysztof Żukowski byli już wcześniej (choć nie równocześnie) członkami grupy Radio Warszawa. Ta legendarna formacja uważana jest za polski odpowiednik The Residents.Caryk i inżynier Żukowski na początek postanowili budować swoją tożsamość przez nawiązanie do twórczości grupy This Heat. Ten okres dokumentuje kaseta "Dialogi i Pieśni Masowe". Drugą edycję "Dialogów..." tworzy już trio. Nowym członkiem grupy zostaje elektronik Ryszard Rogocki. W tym składzie Instant Art wyjeżdża w czerwcu 1991 roku na stypendium do Holandii, czego efektem jest studyjna kaseta "The Wormy Love", wideoklip do piosenki "Half Live, Half Love" oraz dwa 20-minutowe filmy wideo emitowane symultanicznie jako część instalacji prezentowanej w Wiedniu we wrześniu 1991 roku.

Sukcesy twórcze nie przekonały jednak melancholijnie nastawionego do rzeczywistości inżyniera Krzysztofa Żukowskiego, który postanowił odejść z zespołu. Ten bolesny cios nie załamał pozostałych członków grupy. Znów jako duo tworzą muzykę do filmu "Pustynia" Marii Poszwińskiej, a Jerzy Caryk jako U-reC wydaje dwie solowe kasety. Druga z tych kaset "Opus Numero Uno" zawiera syntezatorowy pastisz rozmaitych gatunków i stylów muzycznych.

Put It On, Darling wydany przez Obuh Records w 1994 roku to pierwszy, dotąd niepublikowany materiał (1986) warszawskiej grupy powstałej na gruzach legendarnego RADIO WARSZAWA. Niezwykły ciąg kalejdoskopowych utworków - groteska, ironia, duch niezapomnianych The RESIDENTS. Prawdziwie ekscentryczny zacier znad Wisły!

(artykuł Macieja Chmiela z Wyborczej nr 234 z 6.10.93)

Rip znaleziony w sieci. Nie wiem czy pokrywa się z tym na innym znakomitym blogu, który zresztą gorąco polecamy -- Kaseta Stilon Gorzów C-60
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Re: Revolution [OST] (1968)


Of course this soundtrack album might be rated even higher as a relic, if musical considerations are not applied. Like all exploitative commerce based around the trippy era, it has an appealing tackiness. Those eager for a real revolution in the recording industry should look no further than the word "revolution" itself, which has been the title of literally dozens of albums. In this case we have a product that was even connected to a film of the same name, with three fairly famous rock bands of the San Francisco scene providing tracks for the soundtrack. There's Quicksilver Messenger Service, there's the Steve Miller Band, and there's the bluesy Mother Earth. Actually, all the tracks are kind of bluesy one way or another; that influence was never very far from any of the San Francisco psychedelic bands, except now and then when somebody really felt mellow. Most importantly, it should be stated that it is really difficult to knock an album that includes liner notes beginning with the following advice to the reader: "Next time you use the word revolution, you'd better include in your concept a beautiful blonde who went to San Francisco and illegally changed her name from Louise to Today." And these words come from famous scribe Paul Krassner, no less. A few tommorows later, nobody remembers Today Malone, an innocent blonde starlet who was at the center of this film's maelstrom-like scenario. Probably the actress and the film were forgotten moments after the first release. All the tracks can be found on other recordings, but the compilation's concept actually works to the advantage of the groups featured, none of whom sounded that great and all of whom had trouble creating an entirely listenable album. Vocalist Tracy Nelson has no problem dealing with a Percy Mayfield cover, on the other hand, one of the highlights of the set. "Babe I'm Gonna Leave You" is an enjoyable example of what was basically a required number for years in certain types of freaky coffeehouse venues. ~ Eugene Chadbourne, Rovi


U.S. film. Primarily filmed in the Hippie Hill and Panhandle areas of Golden Gate Park, this "60s San Francisco Hippie Scene" documentary features interviews with those who call themselves hippies, or identify with hippies. The counter-culture is revealed in discussions about sex, drugs, philosophy and lifestyle.

Casual sex and marijuana use is the main activity of one group. A nun who has left the order reveals her decisions to join the counterculture. Others decry the dehumanization of the modern industrial world.

Communal living, psychedelic light shows, love-ins and diverse fashion statements accompany the hippies. Discussions about the liberating effects of LSD and being a free spirit. Music by Country Joe & the Fish, Quicksilver Messenger Service, Steve Miller Band, and Mother Earth. Revolution!

Jack O'Connell shot the later interviews with Malone back in 1986 and spoke at the same time to then-Police Chief Frank Jordan, the Rev. Cecil Williams and directors of the Haight Ashbury Free Medical Clinic. For various reasons, most of them stemming from the filmmaker's personal difficulties after a serious car accident, "The Hippie Revolution" wasn't released until this year.

Malone may be O'Connell's star -- she even accompanied "Hippie Revolution" to the Cannes Film Festival -- but she's not Today Malone is featured in 'The Hippie Revolution' both as she appeared in 1968 (above) and today the sole focus of O'Connell's film. We also see The Chronicle's Herb Caen waxing hip and remembering the time he sniffed some marijuana weed with "the fuzz," and we hear the San Francisco Mime Troupe's Ronnie Davis ranting about the need to "destroy the United States."

O'Connell witnesses a summer solstice celebration, which a man with muttonchops describes as "the first hippie national holiday." He also shows a much-younger, beardless Rev. Williams rapping with longhairs on Hippie Hill in Golden Gate Park and talks to a rock-band manager who warns against commercial success. "Are we going to turn them on," he muses, "or are they going to turn us off?"
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John Surman - Westering Home (1972)


Surman jest znakomitym instrumentalistą, gra na saksofonie sopranowym i barytonowym, klarnecie basowym, fletach bambusowych, a także czasami na tenorze i syntezatorach.

Razem z Mikiem Westbrookiem był (1958-62) członkiem grupy Jazz Workshop przy Plymouth Arts Centre i w 1962 r. przybył z nią do Londynu. Surman był studentem London College of Music (1962-65) oraz London University Institute of Education (1966). Wraz z Humphreyem Lytteltonem pracował także w 9-osobowym zespole Ronniego Scotta (The Band).

Surman zdobył uznanie na całym świecie - czytelnicy pisma "Melody Maker" dwukrotnie wybierali go najlepszym saksofonistą barytonowym na świecie, w 1968 r. został uznany za najlepszego instrumentalistę międzynarodowego festiwalu jazzowego w Montreux, także wiele albumów przyniosło mu nagrody i wspaniałe recenzje. W latach 60. zapraszany był do zespołów Grahama Colliera, Mike'a Gibbsa, Dave'a Hollanda, Chrisa McGregora, a nawet orkiestry Franka Bolanda.

W okresie 1968-69 muzyk prowadził własny zespół, w którym centralnymi postaciami byli: Mike Osborne, Harry Miller i Alan Jackson. Surman grał także z New Church Alexisa Kornera, z Johnem McLaughinem (na jego słynnym albumie "Extrapolation"), Johnem Warrenem i Hartym Beckettem.

Z Barre'em Phillipsem i Stu Martinem utworzył grupę Trio (1969-72). Na krótko przed powiększeniem formacji o Alberta Mangelsdorffa (w 1977) i zmianą nazwy na Mumps, Surman współpracował z Terjem Rypdalem ("Morning Glory"). W tym czasie poznał też Jacka DeJohnette'a, który stał się jego regularnym partnerem artystycznym w 1atach 80. i 90.

W 1973 r. Surman wraz z Osbornem i Alanem Skidmorem założył niezwykle interesujące trio (saksofonowe) S.O.S.. Zaczął wówczas eksperymentować także z brzmieniem elektronicznym. Grał w duetach ze Stanem Traceyem (1978) i Karin Krog (1977), w latach 1979-82 pracował z Miroslavem Vitousem i grupą Azymuth. W 1981 r. Surman doprowadził do powstania Brass Project, specyficznej formacji kilkunastu saksofonów i sekcji rytmicznej. Pracował z brytyjską mutacją orkiestry Gila Evansa, z zespołem Paula Bleya i Billa Frisella, a w 1986 r. odbył trasę koncertową z Elvinem Jonesem, Hollandem i Mangelsdorffem.

Surman jest improwizatorem pełnym ekspresji i pomysłowości. Komponuje dla stylistycznie różnych grup jazzowych, ale także chórów i towarzystw tanecznych, zwłaszcza paryskiego Teatru Tańca Carolyn Carlson, z którą pracował w latach 1974-79. (diapazon)



John Surman was one of the very few saxmen in England to find a significant audience in rock during the late '60s, playing gigs regularly at venues like the Marquee Club in London. Also a clarinetist of some renown, and no slouch on keyboards either, the atmospheric sounds that Surman creates on his horns has been a major asset to the ECM label ever since the late '70s; but, before that, he was an extremely prolific artist on Deram, Futura, Dawn, and Island, cutting seven solo albums between 1968 and 1974 on those mainstream pop-oriented labels, as well as recording with Morning Glory on Island. One of England's top jazz players of the past several decades, Surman is particularly strong on the baritone. Surman played in jazz workshops while still in high school. He studied at the London College of Music and London University Institute of Education in the mid-'60s, played with Alexis Korner and Mike Westbrook until the late '60s, and recorded with the latter until the mid-'70s. He was voted best soloist at the 1968 Montreux Festival while heading his band. Surman worked with Graham Collier, Mike Gibbs, Dave Holland, Chris McGregor, and John McLaughlin in the '60s, and toured Europe with the Kenny Clarke/Francy Boland big band in 1970.

Surman toured and recorded with Barre Phillips and Stu Martin in the late '60s and early '70s, and again in the late '70s, adding Albert Mangelsdorff to the group. They called themselves the Trio, then Mumps. Surman played with Mike Osborne and Alan Skidmore in the sax trio S.O.S. in the mid-'70s. He also collaborated with the Carolyn Carlson dance company at the Paris Opera through the mid- and late '70s. Surman recorded with Stan Tracey and Karin Krog, while working with Miroslav Vitous and Azimuth. He led the Brass Project in the early '80s, and played in Collier's big band and Gil Evans' British orchestra. Surman toured with Evans again in the late '80s. He began recording as a leader for Pye in the early '70s, and did sessions for Ogun and ECM. Surman continued recording in the '80s, mostly for ECM. He worked with Terje Rypdal, Jack DeJohnette, Pierre Favre, Bengt Hallberg, Archie Shepp, Warne Marsh, and Red Mitchell, among others. Surman has made many recordings for ECM, spanning from free form to mood music, and he remains one of the label's most consistently stimulating artists. (Bruce Eder)
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Psych-Out [OST] (1968)


Akcja filmu toczy się w latach sześćdziesiątych w środowisku hipisów. Dzieci-kwiaty zrywają z wszelkimi obowiązującymi normami, nawołują do pokoju. W oparach LSD przeżywają "odjazd", oddając się swym marzeniom o miłości. Do środowiska hipisów trafia przypadkowo Jenny. Skromna i naiwna dziewczyna z prowincji czuje się zagubiona w obcym mieście. Jest głucha, a słowa rozumie czytając je z ruchu warg. Okazuje się, że poszukuje ona brata bliźniaka... (filmweb)


Psych-Out (1968) is a feature film about hippies, psychedelic music, and recreational drugs, produced and released by American International Pictures. Originally scripted as The Love Children, the title when tested caused people to think it was about bastards, so Samuel Z. Arkoff came up with the ultimate title based on a recent successful reissue of Psycho.

Director Richard Rush's cut came in at 101 minutes and was edited to 82 minutes by the producers. This version is the one released on DVD. For some reason, when HBO Video released the film on VHS, they used the 101-minute director's cut, probably unknowingly, as they did not mention it on the packaging. The majority of the songs in the movie and on the original soundtrack album were performed by the Storybook. This credit is never mentioned on movie posters and articles. They were a local band from the San Fernando Valley.

Jenny (played by Susan Strasberg) is a deaf runaway who arrives in San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury district, searching for her brother Steve. She encounters the aptly named Stoney (Jack Nicholson) and his hippie band "Mumblin' Jim" in a coffee shop. The boys are sympathetic, especially when they discover that she is deaf and can only understand others through lip reading. They hide her from the police and help her look for her brother. He has left his apartment with no forwarding address; she has only a postcard from him which reads "Jess Saes: God is alive and well and living in a sugar cube". Meanwhile, the boys are trying hard to improve their music and get more visibility, and are approached by a promoter who says he can arrange for them to perform at "the Ballroom", clearly the Avalon Ballroom or the Fillmore West.

The group discovers an artist friend, Warren (Henry Jaglom), the man who designs the psychedelic posters advertising the band, freaking out badly in his gallery, apparently on STP. He sees everyone, including himself, as walking dead and tries to cut off his own (to him festering) hand with a circular saw. While they help him, Jenny notices a large sculpture resembling abstract flames in a corner and recognizes it as her brother's work. The gallery owner says the artist is known as "The Seeker", a kind of itinerant preacher. He suggests that they ask ex-band member Dave (Dean Stockwell) about The Seeker's current whereabouts.

Dave lives in the attic of a downtown warehouse. He is less than thrilled to see Stoney, but sympathetic to Jenny. The audience learns that Dave left the band because he felt they were too concerned with worldly success and "games", rather than serious focus on music for its own sake.


Dave's information leads the gang to a junkyard, where the mystery of "Jess Saes" is revealed; it is a sign reading "Jesus Saves", with some letters missing. The "sugar cube" slogan is painted on the side of a car which Jenny recognizes as her brother's. However, a group of thugs who frequent the junkyard accost the group and reveal that they have it in for The Seeker, for reasons that are never fully explained except that they dislike his street preaching and his themes of love and peace (perhaps they are Vietnam War veterans). They threaten to rape Jenny. Violence ensues, and the group barely escape with their lives.
Stoney (Jack Nicholson) and Jenny (Susan Strasberg)

Jenny's friendship with Stoney has become sexual (she does not know that he has a reputation for one-night stands and a refusal to commit to or care about any woman). She attends a mock funeral staged by a large group of hippies, with background music by The Seeds; the theme of their play is that death is not the end, and that love and a refusal to hurt others are what keep us alive. She stays with Stoney in a crowded old house, and finds that everyday hippie life is less than ideal. The residents are all involved in contemplation (with or without drugs), sex, sleeping, dancing, or decorating the place, but nobody cares enough to do any actual cleaning or maintenance. When Jenny tries to wash the mountain of dishes in the kitchen, she finds that the plumbing is broken, but everybody just continues dancing. Frustrated, she interrupts Stoney's band practice to inform him she is going to take a walk. He answers angrily that he has no leash on her. Dave, sitting quietly in the next room, overhears this, and is clearly distressed at the way Stoney treats Jenny. Later, Stoney goes out too, concerned in spite of himself. He ends up at the art gallery, where he hears breaking glass and slips inside to see what is happening.

The Seeker (Bruce Dern) has returned to the art gallery to pick up his sculpture. Challenged by Stoney, he pleads that the work should not be touched; it is actually not meant to be art, but a shrine. He believes that God spoke to him and asked him to create the piece. Told that Jenny is looking for him, he is glad, but he feels it would be best not to see her yet; he is on drugs and wants to be sober when they meet. He further explains that Jenny's deafness is pathological; their mother was cruelly abusive, and burned Jenny's beloved toys. Jenny was violently traumatized and apparently had a stroke; she was deaf from that moment.



The performance at the Ballroom is a success; Mumblin' Jim play, along with the Strawberry Alarm Clock. Steve the Seeker shows up, hoping to see Jenny, but the junkyard thugs are also present (????) and chase him back to his home. Steve runs right behind Jenny without her noticing, since she hears nothing. The group throws a party after the show. Dave appears and remonstrates Stoney over his ambition for commercial success, as well as his cavalier treatment of Jenny. When Stoney saunters off with another woman, Dave stays with Jenny to console her. She sees him put some STP in his fruit juice. He offers himself to her, but Stoney charges in and angrily shouts at Jenny, calling her a "bitch". Heartbroken, Jenny accepts Dave's glass of fruit juice and drinks nearly all of it.

She tells Dave she was only trying to find her brother, and Dave pulls a note from his pocket: "God is in the flame," and an address. Jenny runs out and takes a streetcar in hopes of meeting Steve. Later, Stoney looks for Jenny, and he rouses Dave, who is tripping on STP, to help find her. Half out of his mind, the Seeker attempts to enter his house, but the junkyard thugs pursue him; he eludes them and arrives in his room, where he lights a fire inside his shrine. Soon the entire house is ablaze. Jenny arrives to find a crowd gathering near the house; she runs in just in time to see him standing in the middle of the flames, absorbed in prayer; she calls to him and he sees her, but merely smiles and waves.

In her grief and confusion, she runs up to the roof, hallucinating wildly of flames and explosions. She apparently jumps into a reservoir. The screen changes to a scene with fire bombs heading towards Jenny barely missing her. Now, Jenny is suddenly standing in the middle of the Golden Gate Bridge, cars coming at her from both directions with their horns blaring. She has her hands over her ears, indicating perhaps that she has regained her hearing, although this is never explicitly stated. Dave and Stoney find her, and Dave, confused and impulsive from the potent psychedelic, runs onto the highway; he shoves her out of the way of an oncoming car and is struck and killed. As he dies, he murmurs that he hopes this, too, will be a good trip. Sickened and angry, Jenny tries to leave, but Stoney grabs her and pulls her into an embrace. The film ends with the two holding each other and crying, while an image of the mock funeral reappears.
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German Oak - Nibelungenlied (1972-1976)


In the strange Olympic summer of 1972, the Dusseldorf instrumental group German Oak entered the Luftschutzbunker, or Air Raid Shelter, in order to record their eponymous first LP. Following in the footsteps of the percussive and organic Organisation and the remarkable Dom, German Oak had every reason to believe that this 3rd LP to be recorded by a Dusseldorf band would be warmly received. Unfortunately, German Oak were not only wrong in their assumptions that locals would embrace their music, but even local record shops rejected all the group's attempts to sell the albums in city outlets. Such was their lack of success that 202 of the original 213 copies were stored in the basement of the group's organist until the mid-1980s, when a thirst for undiscovered Krautrock finally brought German Oak back from the dead.

But what is the sound of a group that was so rejected during its time of recording? Well, imagine a brutally recorded, brazen and ultra-skeletal industrial white funk played with all the claw-handed crowbar technique of the Red Crayola recording their famous "Hurricane Fighter Plane," over which is superimposed the what-instrument-could-that-be rumblings of Gunther Schickert's G.A.M. meeting the Electronic Meditation incarnation of early-T. Dream. That is the sound of German Oak. Imagine Faust's reverb-y schoolroom in Wumme being party to a jam between Riot-period Sly Stone on itchy-scratchy bass and the pre-Kraftwerk ensemble Organisation (specifically "Milk Rock"), without their being formally introduced, and with all the hang-ups that this would entail. Again, this is the sound of German Oak.

It is a strangely skin-of-your-teeth genius. It is a toe-curlingly heartfelt method acting of the most in-your-face kind. In places it's a sort of gormless Gong, even a moronic Magma - a Teutonic tribe standing in the ruins of some Roman temple, playing barbarian riffs on classical instruments too sizes too small. Aerosmith's Joe Perry once said: "When all you've got is a hammer, everything looks like a nail." He must have been listening to German Oak.



With German Oak, what seems, after two minutes, to be a simplistic and worryingly trite riff, becomes, after 8 minutes, to be the only real-honest-riff-in-town. Like the legendary death-blues of Josephus' (also 16-minutes-plus) epic "Dead Man", this is music which does not hit you instantly in the face, but is an accumulative groove, building and building on the endless repetition of some bog-standard soul-type "Please Please Please" bass line or rhythm guitar sequence.

There is a remarkable space within German Oak's music, which may have been caused by their ultra-rudimentary playing, or may have been because they just listened ultra-attentively to each other as each player struggled for the notes. But, whatever the reason, German Oak conjured up a mythical sound in the grand Krautrock tradition. And as a quintet without a lead singer, they were a rare five-piece who never got in each other's way. Throughout the music of German Oak, the bass and the lead guitar are frequently mistakable for each other, until the fuzzy lead will slowly claw itself out of the sonic mire of sound and drag itself arduously and inelegantly to the top of the heap. The drumming is often furious and even overplayed, yet it is often the single constant of the group.

Perhaps German Oak hit the nail on the head when they credited group members as the "Crew" and refused to give full names. Such was their sense of space that they often sounded like a trio and actually never like five people. Perhaps, like Can, they worked in pairs and recorded in parallel as opposed to one live performance. But somehow I doubt it. The recording quality and attention to sound separation is far too slack and haphazard. No, I'm sure the reason that the characterless "crew" credit sums up German Oak's attitude best, is because it conspires to make them all sound like the dwarves whose job it was to hold up the four corners of the Viking world-view. Separately they were nothing - together they were everything.

Wolfgang Franz Czaika, here known only as Caesar, is credited with "Lead- & Rhythmguitar". The busy flourishes of insistent drumming are by Ullrich Kallweit, here known only as Ulli "Drums/Percussion". His brother Harry Kallweit, just known as Harry, contributes "Electric bass/voice". This leaves the tail-gunners' places to be filled by the wonderfully-named Manfred Uhr AKA Warlock on "Organ/fuzz-organ/voice" and Norbert Luckas AKA Nobbi on "Guitar/A77/Noises". And, like the simple Amon Duul 1 credits, the friendly nick-names make the group appear even more mysterious and out-of-reach. [...] (source)
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VA - Spiritual Jazz. Volume 3 - Europe (2012)



At the end of the ‘50s, Miles Davis’ Kind of Blue heralded the revelatory arrival of modal jazz. As the vibrations of these giant steps resonated across the world, European jazz musicians reassessed their bearings and began to steer a new course. Across the continent they sent roots down into the rich soil of the European folk and Christian liturgical traditions, extended their music along ancient routes of communication and trade to the Middle East, and reached across the crumbling ramparts of the European empires to the music of Asia Africa and Latin America.

The music collected here follows the richly tangled threads of meditative, modal and religious European jazz. Picking up where Spiritual Jazz 2: Europe left off, with volume 3 continuing our excavation of private releases, underrepresented artists and visionary one-offs that stud the European jazz landscape like standing stones. Just as it had waxed, so the cult of American jazz waned, and these recordings are the compelling documents of a musical world in imaginative transition and virtuoso transformation – a second trail of determined footprints on the pathways of European jazz.

Sublime choral jazz in an ecclesiastical setting, revolutionary sounds deep within the USSR, radical modal experiments inspired by excursions to the Asian continent and Latin America, advances in rhythm and sound where modern jazz combines with Balkan and Scandinavian folk traditions. This is Spiritual Jazz – European style. (jazzmanrecords)
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Larry Coryell (1969)

Larry Coryell : Guitar , vocals , piano
Bernaed Purdie : Drums
Albert Stinson : Bass
Ron Carter : Bass
Chuck Rainry : Guitar , bass
Mike Mandel : Organ , piano , guitar

Coryell zaczynał swoją przygodę z muzyką w 1958 r. w zespole rockandrollowym utworzonym wraz z pianistą Michelem Mandelem. Po przeprowadzce do Nowego Jorku, w 1965 r. dołączył do grupy Chico Hamiltona, grywając na zmianę z legendarnym gitarzystą Gaborem Szaborem. W 1966 r. utworzył wraz z tenorzystą Jimem Pepperem zespół Free Spirits. W latach 1967-68 r. należał do zespołu Gary'ego Burtona, a w 1968 r. wziął udział w nagraniu słynnej płyty Herbiego Manna "Memphis Underground".

W tym samym roku nagrywał także z Jazz Composers Orchestra Mike'a Mantlera, gdzie fascynował elektrycznym brzmieniem spod znaku Jimiego Hendriksa i Erica Claptona. Na firmowanych przez niego płytach wspierali go m.in. Elvin Jones i Jimmy Garrison ("Lady Coryell") oraz John McLaughlin i Billy Cobham ("Spaces"). Z kolei płyta "Fairyland" jest zapisem jego koncertu na festiwalu w Montreux z 1971 r., na którym wystąpił w triu z weteranami soulu - kontrabasistą Chuckiem Raineyem i perkusistą Bernardem "Pretty" Purdiem. Uwagę zwraca także płyta "Barefoot Boy" nagrana w Electric Lady Studios (zbudowanych przez Jimiego Hendrixa), na której łączy w zaskakujący sposób pełne elektrycznej wrzawy i sprzężeń efekty z brzmieniem mistrza akustycznego jazzu, perkusisty Roya Haynesa.

W grupie Eleventh House, w której ponownie spotkał się z Mandelem, odszedł od eksperymentów w stronę bardziej komunikatywnej, wirtuozerskiej muzyki opartej na solidnej funkowej bazie. Zaczął także występować w akustycznych duetach, z innymi gitarzystami, jak Philip Catherine, John McLaughlin, Paco De Lucia i John Scofield. Duże uznanie przyniosła mu współpraca z Charliem Mingusem (m.in. "Three Or Four Shades Of Blue").

W połowie lat 80. wrócił do elektrycznej muzyki w towarzystwie Bunny'ego Brunela i Alphonse'a Mouzona. Mimo swojej niepospolitej techniki i wielu obiecującym, oryginalnym wcześniejszym nagraniom, Coryellowi nie udało się właściwie stworzyć w pełni własnej muzyki, jednakże dzięki swojej doskonałej technice oraz umiejętności dopasowania się do różnych muzycznych kontekstów znacząco przyczynił się do sukcesu wielu innych wykonawców Gdy w latach 70. rodził się fusion Milesa Davisa, zdolny gitarzysta natychmiast dołączył do elity tej muzyki. To wtedy wspólnie nagrywa i koncertuje z J. McLaughlinem, M. Vitousem, B. Cobhamem, C. Coreą. Święci triumfy z własnym zespołem Eleventh House (wraz z R. Breckerem i A. Mouzonem).

Bliższa stylistyce Larry'ego Coryella jest jednak akustyczna, jazzowo subtelna gitara. Może właśnie dlatego powstają albumy z udziałem M. Vitousa, P. Catherine'a, wspaniałe duety: Larry Coryell & John McLaughlin, Larry Coryell & Paco De Lucia. To właśnie wraz z J. McLaughlinem i P. De Lucią koncertuje w ramach legendarnej trasy koncertowej "Friday Night", zastępując Ala Di Meolę. Rozległa dyskografia Coryella obejmuje albumy nagrane zarówno z Ch. Mingusem, S. Grappellim, S. Rollinsem, G. Burtonem, R. Carterem, jak i wspaniałe płyty zrealizowane wraz z M. Urbaniakiem, E. Gomezem oraz entuzjastycznie przez krytyków przyjęte nagrania z Johnem Scofieldem. (diapazon)



Still obscure and unappreciated, this sensational guitarist had a strong outing on this late-'60s release. Rhythmic, melodic, and even lyrical at times, his masterful playing is especially impressive compared to his ill-advised singing. But he's not deluding himself, and most of the tracks are instrumentals. The highlight is the fearsomely funky "The Jam With Albert." Coryell later issued some wonderful acoustic albums, but this one is electric in a way many guitarists could not imagine, let alone realize. --- Mark Allan

Coryell was born in Galveston, Texas on April 2, 1943. After graduating from Richland High School in eastern Washington, he moved to Seattle to attend the University of Washington. In 1965, Coryell moved to New York City where he became part of Chico Hamilton's quintet, replacing Gabor Szabo. In 1967 and 1968, he recorded with Gary Burton and Jim Pepper. His music during the late-1960s and early-1970s combined the influences of rock , jazz and eastern music. He formed his own group, The Eleventh House, in 1973. Following the break-up of this band, Coryell played mainly acoustic guitar, but returned to electric guitar later in the 1980s. In 1979, Coryell formed "The Guitar Trio" with jazz fusion guitarist John McLaughlin and flamenco guitarist Paco de Lucia. The group toured Europe briefly, eventually releasing a video recorded at Royal Albert Hall in London entitled "Meeting of Spirits". In early-1980, Coryell was replaced by Al Di Meola, due to drug addiction.
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