SNEAKY FEELINGS Send You LP Flying Nun FEEL01

Tired of this game? Still wanna play? Cool.. go and get this, then. Or this. Either will do -- and either way it's one of the greatest albums ever released in this country. (New Zealand, I mean.)

Sneaky Feelings - Waiting for Touchdown (2.60 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using the handy little embedded player below)

It's the Sneaky Feelings' debut album Send You, the one which is oft-ignored and underrated and so on, and scarce as all buggery as well. Apparently it was reissued on CD at some point, but.. well.. nearly 20 years of scouring the New Zealand section and the used bins and ain't never seen it.

To be honest I'm not a particular fan of the Sneaky Feelings -- they did well enough, but they were always more Byrds than Bailterspace. They impressed alright, but never excited like a Verlaines or a Gordons or a Doublehappies would excite. "Poise over Noise" (-- M. Bannister.) But be that as it may, this album is special. I don't think it's unreasonable to say that, in 1983, this was some way ahead of it's time. And I don't know if it's a commonly-held opinion, or even one of those things which everyone knows but which must Never. Be. Said. Aloud... or not... but it seems to predict awfully the sound of the much more highly-vaunted Straitjacket Fits -- especially their incarnation about 10 years later, around the time of the Fits' Melt. I'm blowing smoke out my ass? Well, let's see... the guitar sound, the guitar playing, the guitar figures and motifs, the vocal delivery, the harmony vocals, the compositions -- the key changes, modulations, middle-eights -- (and I could go on) are all heavily reminiscent of the Fits in their prime.

Ah.. well.. but so what. That's not important, and only serves to distract. Nothing should take away from the fact that in terms of progressive power-pop perfection, in this country -- or in any country, frankly -- Send You has rarely been bested.

The Body Electric: Dreaming In A Life

If you followed my advice, you'll probably be wanting to have a good close look at this as well. It's more awesomeness from early-80s Wellington electro-pop group The Body Electric. (We talked about The Body Electric here, too.) And pretty rare, as well.

The Body Electric - Dreaming In A Life (2.69 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using the handy little embedded player below)

It's from their 1983 'double-A side' 12" with the almost-as-good Interior Exile as the "AA" side. If Pulsing was the novelty hit in their catalogue, Dreaming In A Life is much more serious. No less catchy, though.

And hurry up, would you -- you've only got until tomorrow.

Bloody pride bloody coming before a bloody fall and all that

So pleased I was, on the weekend, to be availing myself of the presented opportunity to purchase a near-mint copy of New Order's very great -- and arguably best -- 1985 album Low-life at a stall at Aro Street Market for a single dollar. So pleased. Verging on self-congratulatory, actually.

So displeased was I when playing the LP yesterday to be discovering that despite ALL appearances (the jacket, the inner sleeve, the record labels, the run-off groove etchings) being that said LP was the very great (arguably best) 1985 New Order album Low-life, it was in fact a shitty live Roy Harper record. (Probably this one.) (Not hating on Roy Harper, y'dig, I am oh-so-much the Roy Harper fan; well maybe not that much of a fan, ok.. I like a couple of his early albums, 1971's Stormcock, and umm Lifemask. But he's a great guitarist and a good lyricist and a uniquely-styled singer and an interesting guy -- and it's not everyone who can claim to have a song written about them by Led Zeppelin, or appear as a guest vocalist on a Pink Floyd album.) (And thank god I recognised the vocals and the guitar playing and so on, or not knowing what the hell this bloody record was I'd have even less to rant about.)

But it really is quite a shitty live album. You can even hear the crowd giving some less-than-good natured heckle. The sound is shitty. He sounds a bit bored. You wonder why anyone bothered, really. And you especially wonder why they bothered disguising it as a near-mint copy of Low-life on sale in a bin of drek from the 80s at a stall at the Aro Street Market.

Bastards.

Especially since I flicked to Allmusic.com today and what is staring me in the face, dead centre of the screen?

Yup, today Low-life is Allmusic's Album of the Day.

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There's a lot of love for New Order, and Low-life in particular, on the blogosphere, but none say it quite like this guy:

The third album of New Order shone with a new confidence recien adquirida. Tras the unequal Movement and the incomplete Power, Corruption and lies, Low life unified techno pop, dark gotico rock and the first recording of country and techno.Low life established with firmness to New Order like one of the great British bands, entering top 10 and also representing its debut in the classic lists estadounidenses.Aunque was a quite loose year with respect to albumes, was not bad for the musica of Manchester.

Ok fine, I admit it, that was obviously via Babelfish, but you get the idea.

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I wanted to play you a track from Low-life, but it was REALLY hard to choose just one. However, I think the closing track Face Up mostly closely fits my mood today, so................

New Order - Face Up (3.61 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using the handy little embedded player below)

Friday Farce of a sort: The Body Electric

This week's Farce (well it's not THAT much of a farce) is this:

The Body Electric - Magic Electronic (3.21 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using the handy little embedded player below)

Yesterday we learnt all about The Body Electric, the early-80s electro-new-wave-synth group from New Zealand, including one or more members who were in (post-)punk groups The Amps and Steroids. I mean kinda -- all I really did was up a track, and much hilarity followed. In the defence of The Body Electric, it's a little unsure whether or not Pulsing was a novelty hit or a serious song -- the rest of their (heh) body of work* is much more moody, serious, and edgy.

According to my sources, Magic Electronic was the A-side of a 7" released in 1984, but no one can be sure that the band that released it was not in fact from Sweden(!). Sounds like it could be the Wellington, New Zealand group, but the release doesn't show in their discography on The Big City (then again, things often don't, so.....). Google isn't much help. So what is the truth, punters?

BTW Mark Thingummy from Club Bizarre rates The Body Electric, too.

* See that, there, how I couldn't resist making a pun? I was going to write ouvre, but why be pretentious when you can make bad punnery instead?

The Body Electric: Pulsing

If you were me, you would be buying this. Because, like, it's an absolute stone classic of early electro. From Wellington. And pretty rare.

Why aren't I buying it? I don't really need four copies, ok?

The Body Electric - Pulsing (3.41 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using the handy little embedded player below)

I'm feeling so magnanimous, you can have the "dub" version from the B side, for nothing.

The Body Electric - Pulsing (Dub) (3.06 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using the handy little embedded player below)

Isn't it cute!!!!

Hymns and Spheres

I love the internet.

There, I said it.

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About ECM Records (Wikipedia):

Founded in Munich by producer Manfred Eicher in 1969, ECM has released more than 1000 albums spanning many idioms. Establishing an early reputation with standard-setting jazz and improvised music albums, ECM began to include contemporary composition in its programme in the late 1970s, and in 1984 a sister label, ECM New Series, was launched. The quality of ECM albums at all levels -- from musicianship, production and engineering to cover art -- has been widely recognised and the label has collected many awards.
[...]
The label has been hailed, by UK newspaper The Independent, as ''the most important imprint in the world for jazz and new music.''

So that's the official word on ECM Records; the unofficial one is that despite the occasional gem of rare beauty and importance, they are the perpetrators of the most vile, offensively-inoffensive easy-listening inconsequentialities in the known universe. Often this "genre" is referred to in disapprobation as "Scandinavian Jazz". See Jan Garbarek, Ralph Towner, Pat Metheny, Arild Andersen, et. al. See for e.g. this review at Amazon of Stephan Micus' Desert Poems:

I imagine that Micus (or at least ECM) is frustrated that his albums are tossed into the New Age section at the record store alongside outright dreck like Enya and Yanni..

(I imagine that Micus -- or at least ECM -- are bloody-well used to it by now.)

It's no stretch to add that in addition to the list above, one of the most (in)famous perpetrators of this awful muck is Keith Jarrett, whose The Koln Concert is in turn one of the finest examples of said muck; a meandering, unfocused, mess of cheesy improvised cheap-TV-soundtrack sentimental piano, accompanied by embarrassing jazz-vocal outbursts. No stretch at all. To the extent that indeed, The Koln Concert can be said to epitomise all that is rotten in the state of Denmark.

(That was a joke. Denmark? "Scandinavian Jazz"? Need I go on?)

It's always good -- actually, it's always fucking awesome -- when something comes along that totally destroys your preconception about how something, somebody, some -- anything -- is. And so it was when Jani Hellen turned me on to Keith Jarrett's Hymns and Spheres album, which is from roughly the same time as the reviled Koln Concert record, but the diametric-opposite to that debacle; primarily, incredible.

I love organs. I love the vast ouvre of Olivier Messiaen. I love Gyorgy Ligeti and I love Romantic organ music. No, not lounge-lizard covers of classic love-songs. Romantic Organ Music -- think Cesar Franck, Franz Liszt, Charles-Marie Widor, Felix Mendelssohn and their crew. Think burst of harsh noise, long drawn out tones, atonal blasts and the gentle gentle drones of soft reeds. Think thunderous recitals on colossal instruments in ancient cathedrals. And I love Hymns and Spheres, Jarrett's album of improvised organ music which was recorded in 1976 on the mighty Trinity Organ at the Benedictine Abbey in Ottobeuren, Germany.

TheGline.com disc-of-the-week review:

Those familiar with Jarrett through the warmth and intimacy of his piano improvisations will be shocked at how positively alien this record sounds, not only because of Jarrett’s atypical playing but the sound of the organ itself. It brings to mind Tangerine Dream’s very early Virgin-era records, which consisted not only of electronic instruments but conventional ones that had been heavily processed with studio effects and tape manipulations.

(According to the original album liner notes: "No overdubs, technical ornamentations or additions were utilized, only the pure sound of the organ in the abbey is heard. Many of the unique effects, although never before used, were accomplished by pulling certain stops part way, while others remain completely open or closed. Amazingly, baroque organs have always had this capability.")



And an Amazon.com review:

..the album contains some of the most transcendent music Keith Jarrett has recorded..

The album is a unique diversion from his earlier works and Jarrett paints an evocative, sad, and poignant landscape of sound (both beautifully harmonic and wonderfully dissonant). Sadly though, the full original release of the album is not available, for bookending the Spheres portion of the album is the Hymn of Rememberance, and the Hymn of Release, two glorious blast of spiritual bliss:

Keith Jarrett - Hymn of release (3.85 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download)

That is, not available on CD. But after reading on Jani's podcast note that "ECM is still selling the double-lp at their web shop" I spent approximately 1 minute and 20 mouse-clicks locating the album, and purchasing it. One week, 27 Euros (incl. the somewhat-steep but not-unacceptable 10 Euro shipping) later, and like the birth of a precious child, to my hands was delivered one copy of the original 1976 pressing of the double LP -- all the way from the other side of the world.

They're still selling copies of the original 1976 pressing of Hymns and Spheres.

This is unprecedented.

Like I said, I love the internet.


UPDATE

What the divine Ms. K said to me, upon arriving home the other night as I was blasting Hymns and Spheres through the whole house:

"Why are you listening to funeral music, hon?"

Love that gal.

Double J & Twice the T 45 x 2

You should probably look quite closely into buying these:

.. being, as they are, absolute freakin' classic artefacts of New Zealand pop culture.

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NP: Ornette Coleman and Pat Metheny - Song X (Allmusic): Don't believe everything you read. It's SERIOUSLY underrated and actually a damn good album; I'd go so far as to say it's a unheralded classic of modern jazz. I recently picked up a near-pristine LP copy on TradeMe for a criminally-low price -- I still pee myself a little when I consider what a bargain I got. And as for Metheny -- the "big-haired king of airbrushed jazz-lite" (Peter Marsh, bbc.co.uk) -- why, it's the only thing of his I'll have in the house.

Song X was re-ished a couple of years ago with a pile of other unreleased material from the same sessions -- and to good reviews. (Actually it appears to have undergone the full revisionist treatment: Nils Jacobson, John Kelman, John Fordham, Robert Christgau, E. "Doc" Smith.)

THE DURUTTI COLUMN - The Return of .. - LP

You should buy this. Go on, you know you want to.... it's only $19.00, and it rules. It really, really does. It's a thing of beauty, an absolute classic.

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NP: the last hour or so's playlist:

Manic Street Preachers - Take the Skinheads Bowling
Camper Van Beethoven - Take the Skinheads Bowling
Riz Ortolani - Do It To Me
Manic Street Preachers - We're All Bourgeoise Now
The Teardrop Explodes - Traison (C'est Juste Une Histoire)
Primal Scream - Shoot Speed/Kill Light
Jazzfinger - Fateful Brass Orb
ESG - The Beat
David Bowie - We Are The Dead
Can - Mother Upduff
The Jesus and Mary Chain - April Skies
Idlewild - Idea Track
The Delgadoes - No Danger
De Rosa - Cathkin Braes
Scars - David
Arab Strap - Don't Ask Me To Dance

(mostly all courtesy Manic Pop Thrills)

Also Alex Cobb's new all-Flying Saucer Attack podcast on Foxy Digitalis: Maximum Nodout: A Flying Saucer Attack Special.

Tim Buckley -- Greetings From L.A.

You should buy this. Go on, you know you want to....



It's only 8 bucks. And it rules.