[ aquarius records

Massacre has been around since 1981's seminal album Killing Time (which you must seek out if you haven't heard it already). Comprised of guitarist Fred Frith, bassist Bill Laswell, and -- new to the group -- Charles Hayward on drums, Massacre specialize

RealAudio clip: Closing the Circles and Loose End
RealAudio clip: Up For It

Jazz power trio, Mat Maneri (electric violin), Matthew Shipp (piano) and Randy Peterson (drums) convey a dynamism, agility and spontaneity that defines improv. A lovely collection of pieces including originals and Miles Davis compositions.

From the "Now Thing" comp.

THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

SORRY. A new improv trio starring Fred Frith (avant-guitarist extraordinaire!), Larry Ochs (from SF's much-lauded Rova Saxophone Quartet), and Miya Masaoka (the Bay Area's most adventurous improvising koto player--some may remember her performance with a hive of bees not long ago). Three long tracks of careful musical interaction that delves into the quiet and beautiful as well as the difficult and noisy. Anyone who saw this trio perform at SF's Great American Music Hall a few weeks back will know that all the players really delve into their respective bags of tricks: Ochs both blowing lovely melodies and squawking violence, Masaoka both coaxing soothing drones and plucking chaos, Frith both fooling with little noises and grinding out immense ones...a tour de force of improv abilities.

An off-kilter hard-hitting soul masterpiece, Headless Heroes Of The Apocalypse was the cap to a strange topsy turvy career. Starting off in the early sixties with suave soul-pop hits like "A Hundred Pounds of Clay" and "Tower of Strength", McDaniels became more successful as a song-writer than a singer, with his songs taking on a more conscious and political vibe. While he did write the RnB hit, "Feel Like Making Love" for Roberta Flack, he also wrote the heavy groover, "Compared To What" for Les McCann and Eddie Harris which became a hit for the black protest movement. Signing to the Atlantic Label in the seventies, McDaniels' recorded two of the perhaps most uncompromising political soul records, Outlaw in 1970 and Headless Heroes in 1971. Of the two, Headless Heroes is the one we keep coming back to, because what makes it most unique is its unusual form. Combining elements of jazz, funk, and rare groove, with some acid-psych and folk thrown into the mix, the result is a heady and allegorical rallying cry against social injustice through a veil of nightmarish imagery and narcotic sounds. While not a hit upon its initial release, it has grown in influence over the years especially in the nineties, when much of this record was sampled in hip-hop circles. Much tougher in form than similarly themed records by Marvin Gaye and Curtis Mayfield, McDaniels' records were harder to market because of their rather scathing views of powerless humanity on the brink of depravity. This is really what's going on!

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THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

SORRY.

THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

SORRY.

We've heard tracks here and there from Lloyd McNeill, on that New Thing! Soul Jazz compilation, on the Freedom Rhythm & Sound revolutionary jazz comp, but this is the first full length we've heard, and it's magical. Besides being an incredible flutist and composer, McNeill was also a painter, palling around with Picasso in Paris, he ran his own record label, has recorded with Nina Simone, Ron Carter, and lots of others. He's also a music anthropologist, a teacher and a poet. He was involved in the civil rights movement, recorded music for art installations and ballets. But his music, wow, totally breathtaking, Latin and Brazilian flecked spiritual jazz. Nothing skronky or far out, now wild and wooly, or in any way difficult, just incredibly passionate, and personal, lush and melodic, gorgeous and understated real jazz. Originally released on his own label, the Asha Recording Company, a label he ran from the late sixties until the early seventies, Asha is a truly fantastic bit of classic jazz, the songs soar and swell and brood, exploding into flights of fancy, but just as quickly slipping back into deep introspection, the band is tight as hell, shuffling drums, moody understated piano, some Latin percussion here and there, but it's McNeill's flute and piccolo playing that really makes Asha so special, fluttery and breathy one moment, wildly melodic the next, weaving gorgeous melodies over dreamy jazzscapes. The title track might be one of the most perfect jams ever, slightly melancholy, super dynamic, minor key melodies, plenty of tension, so melodic and moody, and downright lovely. The 10+ minute "Warmth Of A Sunny Day" is sun dappled and dreamy, the piano and flute perfectly in sync, playfully sparring over a sunshiny bed of soft focus piano and warm liquid bass. So fantastic. Yet another jazz reissue that is becoming a fast fave.

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1971 set from sax & trumpet player Joe McPhee & his group. Bad ass to say the least.

1973 "blues inflected out-soul" date from saxophonist Joe McPhee and his trio (piano, drums), reissued for the first time, and with much improved sound from the original LP, we're told. Albert Ayler-dedicated jazz wildness.

Another fine Atavistic "Unheard Music Series" re-issue, this of the super-rare 1969 debut LP from freedom jazz trumpeter/saxophonist Joe McPhee who was last mentioned here thanks to his recent collaboration with Canadian dada noiseniks the

The super-popular jazz organ trio get remixed by The Automator, Bill Laswell (of course), Guru, Yuka Honda (Cibo Matto), and a couple others.

This new improvisational group of extremely prolific downtown NY musicians just happen to all be women, and is being marketed as "one of the first all women supergroups" by Tzadik. Combining the amazing percussive work of the young Susie Ibarra, the post-drum

RealAudio clip: Black Widow

Attention Masayuki Takayanagi fans! Actually, attention all '70s Japanese free jazz fans!! Heck, attention everybody!!! (Well, everybody who likes crazy creative freeform improv skronkiness.) Doubtmusic brings us this compact disc reissue of a 1976 album by Japanese improvising cellist/bassist Keiki Midorikawa playing with several heavy friends, nicely packaged of course, in a miniature LP style sleeve. Actually, it's more than a reissue, as this double cd edition has been expanded twofold to include previously unissued music. The original LP documented Midorikawa's duo with legendary guitarist Takayanagi on one side, and his duo with pianist Masahiko Sato on the other side, about 20 minutes each. But at the same concert, Midorikawa had also performed a duo with percussionist Mashaiko Togashi, the 40 minute recording of which appears here for the first time, as disc one of what's now a two disc set, which is why it's now considered "Complete". Additionally, it's been remastered, and includes both the liner notes from the original vinyl release as well as new liners penned by Taku Sugimoto. Perhaps they explain why all the titles are given in what appears to be German, we don't know though, we haven't read 'em yet. Since we came to this primarily as Takayanagi fans, naturally we jumped right to disc two to hear his contribution to this set. The Midorikawa/Takayanagi duo, entitled "An die Prinzessin die aus dem Maulbeerbaum geboren wurde", is crammed with plinking and plonking, scrabble and scrape, silences and even some (vocal) screams, the busy fingers of both men rustling up some (mostly quiet) noise. It's the Derek Bailey-ish side of Takayanagi on display here. Following it on the same disc, Midorikawa's duo with Sato, "Der Todeskampf am Maderospatch" is rather more dramatic, sounding melodically lovely (jazzy) in parts, but also building to loud, rumbling crescendos. Quite satisfying for our free jazz cravings. But actually, turning to disc one, we soon discovered that Midorikawa's lengthy duo with Togashi, "Dichorragia nesimachus", is probably our favorite piece here. It's both wonderfully moody, Midorikawa caressing his strings in "classical" mode, melodically droning away amidst beautiful bells and gentle shimmer, which gives way on the percussive side of the equation to more martial drum beats, a physical pounding that then elicits a sawing, shuddering response from Midorikawa's cello, both players coming together for rapidfire percussive skitter-scatter... of course, it's a long piece, and that only describes a portion of it. Nice to have it rescued from the vault!

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We first heard Lloyd Miller on that amazing Spiritual Jazz compilation we reviewed recently, and while pretty much every track was a killer, Miller's "Gol-E Gandom" definitely stood out, beginning with a santur solo, that sounded like a sea of buzzing sitars, until the jazz kicked in, bopping bass, fluid piano, shuffling rhythms, somehow following the melody laid out by the opening santur solo. So magical. We were smitten and were dying to hear more. Luckily, Jazzman endeavored to put together this amazing collection of Miller's various recordings, which was no small feat, considering that even after a lifetime playing jazz, most of these songs were only available on super limited self released records, which made it into fewer hands, and ears, that would seem right considering the power and originality of Miller's music. He grew up in America, but his father was transferred to Iran, so his family moved there when Miller was 19, and they lived there for 5 years. Then Miller finally moved to Europe, to pursue jazz, after all, Europe was where it was happening, he landed in Germany, later heading to Switzerland, all the while creating these amazing, and mostly unheard pieces, incorporating an incredible array of ethnic instruments with some seriously intense and inspired jazz. While some of the tracks here sound like straight up jazz, flecked with bits of ethnic instrumentation, others are totally far out. "Le Grand Bidou" finds his group riffing on a single chord, while Miller inserts an Indian style tonic drone played on the micro organ, and the result is bizarre, the whole track twists and squirms and heaves, it's an odd fit, but fit it does, we can only imagine how freaked out purists must have been. and frustrated, considering the caliber of playing, but it's these twisted takes on standard jazz that makes this stuff so magical, and the fact that this was the late fifties / early sixties, it's a wonder Miller didn't become a sensation. This stuff is radical, revolutionary, considering how important the incorporation of African music and instruments into jazz became (Don Cherry, Art Ensemble), how is it that this wasn't equally if not more radical? A white kid from Utah, with impeccable jazz chops, playing all sorts of Turkish and Persian instruments, wrapping standard jazz tropes around Indian arrangements, kind of mindblowing even now. The liner notes are super detailed, and Miller's life is fascinating, but it's really about the music, and as much as we dig jazz, and fancy ourselves, if not experts, at least super fans, we had NEVER heard Miller before that comp, and this stuff is so cool, and so unlike ANYTHING we've ever heard, from the instrumentation, to the arrangements, to modal systems, some of the tracks are Indian ragas transformed, others seem to eschew the jazz completely and sound like some mysterious magical world music, but it's where the two elements mesh where things get truly magical, tablas underpinning pianos, strange horns droning over upright bass and shuffling percussion, all woven deftly into a strain of jazz that is wholly unique and original. So fantastic, and so utterly and wholeheartedly recommended. Easily THE jazz reissue of the year, if not the decade!

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A while back we reviewed a collection from unsung jazz legend Lloyd Miller, called A Lifetime In Oriental Jazz, which was a huge hit around here. We had become obsessed with Miller after hearing a track from him on the amazing Spiritual Jazz compilation (the second volume of which is out now, check out the 'in stock not yet reviewed' section of this week's list!), and the collection only furthered that obsession. The songs on that comp represented a sampling of Miller's eclectic and lengthy career, the music a killer fusion of classic jazz, Indian style drones, Eastern melodies, Turkish and Persian folk music, it's heady nearly psychedelic stuff, experimental and far out, but still emotional and grounded in classic jazz. So we were super excited to discover this new record, and were under the impression that it was in fact another collection or some sort of reissue, but is actually a brand new record which finds Miller recording with a UK collective called the Heliocentrics, whose sound seems to be a sort of Sun Ra worshipping psychedelic spiritual jazz, a sound that meshes with Miller's perfectly, so much so, that even listening to this, it wasn't until we read more about the record that we realized it wasn't a collection of vintage recordings. Which definitely speaks to the performances here. A modern production is really the only thing that might mark this as modern, otherwise, Miller and the Heliocentrics unwind longform jazz epics that alternately brood and soar, rife with all manner of unlikely instrumentation, strange melodies surfacing here and there, fluttering flutes, haunting vibes, delicate piano, some incredible drumming, hints of the Eastern musics that so informed Miller's older work abound, with some of the tracks slipping into full on ragas, while others flit from darkly meditative to wild and skronky, a few tracks are redone versions of old Miller tunes, but the originals are just as good. Some seriously beautiful modern spiritual jazz for sure. And apparently the Heliocentrics also made a record with Ethiopian jazz legend Mulatu Astatke, which we're definitely gonna have to track down now!

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Here's one I remember reading about in one of them rare-ass record collector books and thinking, wow, I'd like to hear that. A 1970 jazz-rock improv trio from Norway, featuring the young guitarist Terje Rypdal (later an ECM staple), balanced somewhere between psych-rock and Impulse-inspired energy jazz. Well at last it's been reissued on cd (first time ever legit reish we're told) and it is indeed damn good. Rypdal makes a good claim here to being Norway's answer to Sonny Sharrock or Ray Russell, and rips it up on some soprano sax as well as electric guitar. The six tracks here range from sheer freakout implosions to calmer, groovier stuff, with bassist Bjornar Andresen's Mingus-meets-Cream composition "Champagne of Course" being a monster highlight. Definitely a jazz record more than a rock one, but quite intense and heavy and experimental and sometimes beautiful too. And it's another NWW-list entry by the way. Recommended.

MPEG stream: I Cried A Million Tears Last Night
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Wow, when reissue label Superior Viaduct decided to get into the jazz game, they weren't playing around. First Alice Coltrane, now Charles Mingus! Yeah, they're bringing out the heavy hitters (thanks, it would seem, to an arrangement with the Impulse! label). These two Mingus reissues are certainly nice to have, heck 1963's The Black Saint And The Sinner Lady has long been considered one of the jazz bassist, composer, and bandleader's all time masterpieces, forever appearing on all sorts of best jazz albums ever lists, 5 stars from the All Music Guide, recipient of a literally orgasmic review from legendary rock critic Lester Bangs, etc., etc. And we highly recommend it too, even if our own thumbs up is somewhat superfluous, we know! A powerful post-bop, partly free jazz 'ballet' orchestrated for an 11-piece ensemble (featuring among others Charlie Mariano on alto sax), with elements of drawn from Ellington and flamenco, and apparently one of the first jazz recordings to utilize of overdubs due to its ambitious complexity, there's no argument it's a true classic. And then, while not as high up in the Mingus pantheon as Black Saint (but still garnering 4 stars from the AMG), Mingus Plays Piano, also from '63, is pretty great, too - and very different, being a solo set of both standards (like "Body And Soul") and pure improvisations, beautifully performed by Mingus on an instrument that's not the one he's best known for playing (but is what he mostly used for composition). Intimate and revealing. Both albums are remastered from the original master tapes, and packaged in gatefold jackets.

Some recommended, unusual improv here. We were quite surprised at what a pleasant and compelling listen this is, considering the definite weirdness and occasional wackiness of it, which comes mainly from the "Two Voices" referred to in the title. Those two voices - belonging to Phil Minton and Audrey Chen (who also have a duo-only all-voice disc out on Sub Rosa, released simultaneously with this, that we'll be listing soon too) - specialize in mostly nonverbal, nonsensical "singing" - not really what most folks would call singing, but freely improvised sound-making with lips, teeth, tongue, throat, lungs... And what they do is really taken to extremes here - quiet extremes as there's not really any screaming or shouting. Lots of moaning muttering mumbling whining wailing whispering whistling burbling babbling blubbering hissing and humming, however. Pretty much almost any noise you could imagine being able to make with your mouth and some others that you can't! And while without meaning linguistically, you can't say it's not meaningful on some other level, more primal and emotive. Sometimes there's a silliness to it, Minton and Chen sounding like Muppety monsters with gastric disorders, but sometimes it can be downright disturbing, harrowing stuff like a chorus of damned souls; either way we're enjoying it and we think fans of, like, Mike Patton's various vocal experiments and a lot of the singing of Eye from the Boredoms would really dig this too. Obviously that also goes for anyone already into UK voice improv vet Phil Minton - or similar "sound poet" Jaap Blonk of Holland. On the face of it what we've just described might seem to be outside of a lot of folks' usual musical comfort zone, but for those with open ears, we feel that this comes off as being intriguing and entrancing rather than in any way annoying, also in part perhaps because of the other elements on here, the "Four Instruments" portion of this quintet (as well as singing, Chen plays cello, Segers is on electric bass, Jacquemyn on double bass, and Verbruggen plays drums), which provide the perfect environment of gently improvised "chamber orchestra" music for these eccentric voices to inhabit. The instruments and voices really mesh well, the musicians laying down delicate drones, skittery percussion, scraping strings... all of which mimic or is mimicked at times by the human voices themselves, achieving an atmospheric synthesis, so you can't always tell what's voice and what's instrument, not to mention how many there are. It's soothingly bass-heavy, as you might imagine from the instrumentation, and also as we said rather gentle and oddly pleasant, with quiet blissed-out stretches, despite its textural density and potential disturbance factor. Even when Minton, on the fourth track, gets into some rapid fire glossolalic mumbo-jumbo like an auctioneer with Tourette's, it's actually somewhat hypnotic (or amusing). By the way, he's the only person on here with whom were were previously familiar (and we haven't reviewed much by him, just a couple albums he's been on with folks like Bob Ostertag and Tom Cora), most of the other folks are presumably from the Belgian improv scene since this was recorded in Brussels and released on Sub Rosa. Again, like we said, a bit of a surprise, but we've been listening to this A LOT, even when going to sleep at night. Strange dreams...

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It's been well over a decade since our ears have been assaulted by a -new- recording from intense Swiss industrial-jazz juggernaut 16-17, though thankfully in recent years there's been a couple crucial reissues via the Savage Land label, including one, of 1994's Gyatso, that we made a Record Of The Week not too long ago, in 2008. While 16-17 are long gone, now it's almost as if some of their extreme spirit has been reincarnated in the form of this new band, MIR, whose debut compact disc on Savage Land is in fact produced by 16-17 mastermind Alex Buess. MIR, it turns out, is the project of one-time 16-17 drummer Daniel Buess (who is apparently NOT related to Alex, oddly enough) in a trio with two others. Daniel is credited with drums, metal percussions, and electronics, while the other members of MIR play guitar, bass, organ, and synth, lots of synth. Heavily effected electronics and punishing percussive strikes are definitely the two key elements of MIR's all-instrumental "experimental rock music" sound. They traffic in droning noise, isolationist improv, sludge and skree filled soundscapery, and no wavish punk, MIR synthesizing something both avant garde and physically primal. Among the seven tracks on this not-quite-half-hour album, the most 16-17 sounding one here is probably "Animal Instinct", with the swingin' jackboot precision of its big rhythmic boom-thwap, floor-scraping distorted bass, and dense layers of abstract electronic groan and drone (however there's no sax attack though, which is one way that MIR differs from 16-17). To mention a few other songs, there's also the skittery grooves of "Jimbo", the sinister shimmering drones of "Organ Donor", the uptempo energetic guitar throttling of "Hit", and the sudden attacks and echoed decay of the darkly atmospheric "Terminal Reverb", which sounds like it's part Starfuckers, part Spectre. Also we could also compare MIR to a mix of Supersilent and Shit & Shine, perhaps... along with, of course, 16-17. Very cool, and best played LOUD, if you dare.

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77 minutes of free-improv "psychedelic scorch" put to tape in 1969 by this trio of West Berliners: Norbert Eisbrenner, Werner Goetz, and Sven-Ake Johansson. Johansson (his solo work the subject of a recent Unheard Music Series reissue) played drums on Packaged in a cardboard sleeve, with liner notes only in German.

RealAudio clip: track 3, excerpt 1
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What's the latest obsession of our friends at Japan's weirdest, most wonderful reissues label, EM Records? Last summer, they brought us a special series of sixties surf music soundtracks, and we can thank EM for the essential selection of "singing saw" recordings stocked at Aquarius... as well as much else in the vein of incredibly strange or at least unusual music. Now, EM is excited about...the steel drums! Or, as EM more correctly calls 'em, steel pans. Now, steel pans, to us, aren't quite as thrilling as musical saws, though we'll admit that it's cool that these tuned percussion instruments are made from cast-off 55 gallon oil drums. They've got an interesting history and all, but steel pan and calypso music isn't really our thing... overexposure to the touristy, cheesy use of the instrument doesn't help. What's next, EM celebrates the pan flute? But, at least on the two steel pan oriented albums that EM has recently rescued and reissued, the steel pan sound is pretty sweet, and totally jazzed up. Afro-Caribbean jazz-funk laced with the percussive melodic chiming sound of the steel pan is what you'll hear on this album by the Modern Sound Quintet, recorded in Stockholm, Sweden (of all places) in 1971. But the band wasn't Swedish -- leader Rudy Smith came from Trinidad, birthplace of the steel pan, and the other musicians in the group hailed from Trinidad, Ghana, Barbados, and Surinam. Smith was the pannist in the group, which also featured drum kit, congas, bass and piano. They cook up some funky originals as well as putting their own unique steel pan spin on such standards as Milt Jackson's "Bag's Groove", Joe Zawinul's "Mercy, Mercy, Mercy", and Herbie Mann's "Memphis Underground". Perhaps in this context the steel pan does sound a bit like that more ordinary jazz instrument, the vibes, but of course with more of a tropical island flavor. No doubt there's some grooves here that some crate-digging DJ's would be happy to have unearthed on vinyl, now they'll know to look for this. And while we won't pretend this is the most amazing thing EM has ever released, it's kinda neat if you are at all into obscure jazz-funk exotica. Pretty charming really. This is the one to get, and if you love it then check out EM's other related steel pan release, a reissue of 1984's Still Around by the Rudy Smith Quartet. Oh and of course this boasts EM's usual deluxe gatefold sleeve packaging job, with informative, illustrated liner notes in both Japanese and English.

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Second Rune Grammofon album from this extreme improv duo from Norway! It makes sense that they'd have an exclamation point as part of their name, as their music is indeed punctuated with glitchy outbursts, zaps of loud guitar/drums/electronics. Meanwhile, "MoHa" simply references their names: Morten J. Olsen and Anders Hana, both of whom are members of Ultralyd as well. We compared their first disc of hyperactive skree to some of Mick Barr's stuff, and to the most nutty bits from their labelmates Supersilent. Now we can add that shortly after our first listen to Norwegianism, we put on a classic avant-garde electro-acoustic album from 1970 by Luciano Berio, and after a few minutes got confused and thought we were still listening to MoHa!, when the Berio got into a particularly crinkly and chaotic passage of electronic bleepage. We like it best, though, when MoHa! pace themselves, give the music space to breathe, maybe even settle into some broken-down rhythm for a while (which are the parts that remind us of Supersilent), as on the track "Home Two". We guess they may have titled this album Norwegianism 'cause they recorded it in Geneva and mixed it in Berlin, and felt that they were bringing some Norwegian noise to those locales. Also it could be in recognition of the fact that they get monetary support from the Arts Council Norway -- apparently Norwegian taxpayers are a lot more musically open-minded than the typical US citizen!

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As always (this is their 3rd album), the exclamation point in this Norwegian industrial-skronk duo's name is quite appropriate. They definitely provide some bang for your buck, if you're into this extreme style of choppy, panicked trash-compactor "jazz", wherein sizzling electronics collide with machine-like percussion in a satisfyingly spastic frenzy. Electric guitar, keyboard, drummachine, drums, and something called "supercollider3" (a software program?) are deployed for maximum density and intensity, sounding something like a bunch of John Zorn types trapped in an exploding Radio Shack. The album title One-Way Ticket To Candyland only makes us think that these guys have already splurged on the sugary treats, certainly seeming a bit hyperactively agitated by -something- in their quirky, chaotic music making. Yet the weird thing is, despite their jitters, they have such a knack for getting all the little pulsating puzzle pieces of their only seemingly messy compositions/improvisations to fit together remarkably well, turning this way and that like tiny, precision cogs in a well designed machine. All their herky-jerky blurting turns out to be exactly according to spec. Knowing this, they almost get sassy, in that there's a bit of smartass punkrock 'tude to their (instrumental) song titles, from "The Shitman" to "Oh My God It's Rave". Shades of Don Cab!

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Ultra intense, precision electric guitar / drums / electronics improv from this noisy Norwegian duo, appropriately recorded at some place called "Athletic Sound". The exclamation point that's part of their name is also quite apt! This is crazed stuff, on the jazz side perhaps owing something to pioneer skronk guitarists like Sharrock and Takayanagi, but sounding not so much like jazz, or even guitar (it sounds more like a malfunctioning raygun). All this abstract glitchy distortion, processed percussion, and scrabbling, shredding skree really reminds us a lot of the likes of Phantomsmasher or (especially) Mick Barr's Orthrelm. Or maybe their countrymen Supersilent having a violent seizure? To some, this is will be utter earhole punishment, but we also know a lot of you will love it!

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**SALE **SALE* *SALE** Originally released in 1965, Monk featured Charlie Rouse on tenor sax, Larry Gales on bass and Ben Riley on drums, along with Monk himself tickling the ivories of course. Beautiful ballads and blues here, both originals and standards. Includes "April In Paris", "Teo", and "Panonnica". Jaunty, classic stuff. This version also appends 3 extra bonus tracks to the album, and comes complete with new liner notes.

Long lost in the Library Of Congress, now out on cd! As archival jazz releases go, this is a big deal. And you can see why if you just go look at who the artists are.

This vinyl-only reissue from the eccentric Mr. Moondog gets a guest review here from our pal Dave Katznelson of Birdman Records: Originally released on Epic in 1953, this long-playing EP is one of the greatest artifacts of the blind New York percussionist available. On par with the excellent Prestige years, with a similar vibe. However, there is something darker here, with an almost acid edge...and the sounds come ripping off the well-mastered vinyl ever so thickly. This classically packaged ten inch boasts an instrumental round that is the precursor to the great All Is Loneliness To Me, "Rim Shot" which is reminiscent of Tyrannosaurus Rex's "Ruminy Soup", and two suites that brilliantly use lush strings behind the signature Moondog hypnotizing percussion. "Be a hobo and go with me," Moondog sings...and why not join him?

We couldn't be more excited that this has become available once again. We were blown away by this collection when it was first released a few years back but it became impossible to restock, until now! We finally have enough to share our love of the lesser known yet equally dazzling music Moondog made in the later years of his life. We recently listed the reissues of his early LP's from the '50s, and how remarkable that this man could have crafted such amazing creative music back then and continue to do so all the way up to his passing, four decades later!!! The German Years documents the last two decades of Moondog's amazing and eccentric life when he was living in Germany, taken in by a family who supported him so he could devote all his time to creating music. An incredible collection of songs composed for pipe organ, string quartet, voice, chamber ensemble, piano, saxophone and more. Completely other worldly and what we would want a holy church devoted to the purity and sanctity of music to sound like. The second disc is a recording of his last ever live performance recorded in France in 1999, just five months before he would pass away. Centered mostly on his piano pieces, the show is majestic and totally moving. The cds are packaged in a gorgeous hard cardboard package and includes a 44 page booklet of notes, photos, lyrics, interviews, essays, etc. Essential for Moondog fans, and when we really think about it if you just have a deep love of music chances are you either already love Moondog or you have yet to hear his music and once you do you will for sure be blown away!

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More music from the wonderful Ikue Mori and her drum machines--with some other great downtown NYC performers on board: Anthony Coleman, Zeena Parkins, Erik Friedlander, and others.

Her first collection of all-drum machine (+ effects and bamboo) compositions. Beautiful electronic beat-scapes.

[ aquarius records — Jazz ]