Monthly Archives: May 2002

Well done Senegal.

In the world of music, I haven’t had time to review anything, but heard two nice pieces of news today from a musical taste friend.

First, there are two new Lee Hazlewood releases coming up – a compilation of unreleased tracks, and a tribute album. There’s a great track-by-track interview with Lee on the City Slang site.

Secondly, there are two new Morricone releases coming this year. ‘Mondo Morricone Tre’ and ‘More Morricone RMX’. I’m more excited about the first of these, but am very much looking forward to both.

World cup fever is taking hold.

Hmm, sorry for the silence. I’m not dead, although I feel pretty dead today. Saturday night was a fun Smiths/Morrissey event at Cinema Classics in NYC. I sang ‘Stop me..’ among others. At some point in the near future there will be an avalanche of reviews on this site, as I’m planning on adding my complete collection of CDs and records. I’ll add skeletal detail at first (which I’ll probably hide), but it should speed up my progress in reviewing the albums.

It’s cold, dark, and wet outside. Today is a day to listen to records.

Caterina Valente: 'The Intimate Valente' (LP; London; 1964)
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A nice early bossa nova record. I only ever had one Caterina record I didn't like. That one was 'sweet beat', a late 60s effort. Here Caterina sings bossa versions of 'Moon River', 'People', 'Just one of those things' and 'Watch what happens', as well as Bossa nova standards, 'voce a eu', 'o ganso' and 'the girl from Ipanema. The songs are short and sweet, with catchy scat vocals on many tracks. Nice album. Accompaniments are by Heinz Kiessling and his orchestra.

Christopher Scott: 'Switched on Bacharach' (LP; Decca; 1969)
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I wanted this record for a long time before I found it. This seems to be a record that you normally find in completely trashed condition, since I saw about 5 copies before the mint one I eventually bought. It's a good record, but somehow not poppy enough for me most of the time. My favorite track (and in fact, my favorite Bacharach track overall) is 'Walk on By'.

Les Baxter: 'Wild in the Streets' (LP; Tower; 1968)
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I bought this album for the Les Baxter connection (he wrote the score), and the tracks that he contributes are the best, including 'Psychedelic Senate', a funky blues number with hippy crowd scene noises. Much of the rest is slightly jarring vocal pop.

Oscar Peterson: 'Motions and Emotions' (LP; MPS; 1968)
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I'm just listening to this, one of my favorite albums ever. Lots of what you read about jazz tends to look down on anything recorded in the late 60s featuring more pop tunes than standards. Still, this is often my favorite stuff.

I like this album so much because the song choices are excellent, the performances superb, and the arrangement and conducting are by Claus Ogerman, the German genius who was behind much of the great production on the records of Jobim and others in the 60s. His sweeping strings are incredibly beautiful. For a track that exemplifies this, check out Astrud Gilberto's 'Funny World' from 1966's 'The Shadow of your Smile' (to make it even more perfect, this is a Morricone composition).

Anyway, I digress. The album opens with the superb Mancini composition 'Sally's Tomato', from 'Breakfast at Tiffany's'. Like the whole album, this is a breezy, light bossa number. A great bouncy version of 'Sunny' follows, wiht 60s standards 'By the time I get to Phoenix', 'This guy's in Love with you', and 'Wave' also appearing. Some of the string and piano introductions are truly breathtaking.

There's another Mancini track (dreamsville), and 2 Beatles numbers (Yesterday and a divine Eleanor Rigby) before the LP closes on an upbeat, funky note with 'Ode to Billy Joe', a song I'm getting to really love. A superb, underrated LP. I think there is a CD available of this as well, although it could be out of print. I recommend tracking it down one way or another.

Pat Williams: 'Shades of Today' (LP; Verve; 1968)
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This album has a great cover of a room full of 60s models hanging out. It's a nice upbeat big band jazz-pop record, featuring some Brazliian standards, Beatles, Bacharach and other hits of the era. It's consistent and upbeat without being remarkable.

Ronnie Aldrich: 'Close to You' (LP; London/Phase 4; 1969)
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Grr. I just wrote a long review of this, and it disappeared! In brief: Ronnie is underrated, and I would like to make a compilation of his very best tracks at some point, because I think this would be excellent. The hightlight of this album is the groovy blend of guitar, piano, strings and surprisingly funky beats on 'make it with you'. The album is pleasant all the way through, but that's the highlight.

The 18th Century Corporation: 'Bacharach Baroque' (LP; United Artists; 1968)
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If ever a record was made for me, it was this. It's a really beautiful album of Bacharach covers recorded by German studio musicians in a pseudo-classical baroque style. The instrumentation is guitar, harpshichord, viola d'amore, drums, etc. Some tracks are slightly funky. All are rather swinging and excellent. The track choices are right on. Highlights for me are 'walk on by' and 'casino royale', but it's really all excellent.

1. Do you know the way to San Jose
   
2. This Guy's in Love with You
   
3. Promises, Promises
   
4. I say a little prayer
   
5. Walk on By
   
6. Casino Royale
   
7. Reach out for me
   
8. Wishin’ & Hopin’
   
9. Message to Michael
   
10. Alfie
    
11. Are you there with another girl
    
12. What the World Needs Now is Love
    

Musicians: Siegfried Schwab, Joe Slabyhoudek, Adie Feurstein, Manfred Huebler, Rosy (cool wordless vocals), Winfried Rotzoll, Heinz Niemeyer, Dai Bowen, Heinz Cramer, Juergen Ehlers. Produced by Hans Bradtke. Recorded in Berlin, Germany at Sonopress-Studio.

The Renaissance: 'Bacharach Baroque' (LP; Summit; 1968)
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The better known 'bacharach baroque', this one was produced by Snuff Garrett, and is much more poppy. The arrangements, by Al Capps, are peppy and fast. The vocals are all wordless, and very much at the forefront. It's really a delightful record; standout tracks are 'do you know the way to san jose' and 'close to you' (which I noticed was sampled by Tipsy on the Uh Oh album).

My final WFMU purchase is detailed below. I was pretty restrained this time around.

Those in New York, please stop by The Party this Thursday night. I’ll be DJing alongside the regulars. The drinks are cheap, and it really is a good night out.

Compilation - Golden Boys: 'Golden Boys' (CD; EMI/Copacabana; 1959-1970)
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I picked this up on the basis of the astounding Golden Boys version of 'Berimbau' that is featured on the Blue Brasil volume 2 (or is it volume 3?) CD. That track was an electrifying mix of jerky rhythms, twangy fuzz guitar, morriconian orchestrations and vocal harmonies.

This 2CD set alas turns out to be mostly 50s/60s covers in an early rock'n'roll/doo wop style. Some of the tracks are recast with Portuguese lyrics, which is interesting, but not really what I was looking for.

Among the 28 tracks, 2 really stand out. 'Quero Ihe Dizer Cantando' from 1968 really sounds like it's from the same album from which the aforementioned version of 'Berimbau' was taken. It starts with a twangy, distorted electric guitar, and has the same nice mix of harmonies, strings and good jerky percussion. 'O Cabecao' from 1970 is more ridiculous, but still quite fun. It opens with a cheesy guitar and beat, sounding uncannily like 1990-1991 Soup Dragons or The Farm.

All in all, while it's interesting to hear the influence that early rock'n'roll had in Brazil, I think a compilation with Golden Boys singing exclusively Brazilian material would suit me better.

I wrote a song today. I recorded it. It sounds ok. I will be recording it many, many more times before I let you hear it though. Recording things well is something I struggle with.

Here’s a few more things I bought at the WFMU fair.

Compilation - Golden Boys: 'Golden Boys' (CD; EMI/Copacabana; 1959-1970)
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I picked this up on the basis of the astounding Golden Boys version of 'Berimbau' that is featured on the Blue Brasil volume 2 (or is it volume 3?) CD. That track was an electrifying mix of jerky rhythms, twangy fuzz guitar, morriconian orchestrations and vocal harmonies.

This 2CD set alas turns out to be mostly 50s/60s covers in an early rock'n'roll/doo wop style. Some of the tracks are recast with Portuguese lyrics, which is interesting, but not really what I was looking for.

Among the 28 tracks, 2 really stand out. 'Quero Ihe Dizer Cantando' from 1968 really sounds like it's from the same album from which the aforementioned version of 'Berimbau' was taken. It starts with a twangy, distorted electric guitar, and has the same nice mix of harmonies, strings and good jerky percussion. 'O Cabecao' from 1970 is more ridiculous, but still quite fun. It opens with a cheesy guitar and beat, sounding uncannily like 1990-1991 Soup Dragons or The Farm.

All in all, while it's interesting to hear the influence that early rock'n'roll had in Brazil, I think a compilation with Golden Boys singing exclusively Brazilian material would suit me better.

Sorry for the silence. I’ve been a bit busy/miserable.

So, today I went to the enormous biennial WFMU record fair in NYC. I couldn’t not go, yet there wasn’t really anything especially I wanted to get. So, it was a funny experience. I remember the first time I went to the WFMU fair. This must have been in November 1997, when I was wide-eyed and pretty new to the city. I remember how utterly elated I was about the whole experience. I came away only $80 poorer, and with armfuls of records I could only have dreamt of owning when I was in Europe. Many of these were bought at $1 to $5, with a handful at nearer $10. I remember sitting down, exhausted, in the corner, drinking beer and eating pizza, surrounded by a warm feeling that in this enormous room full of records, several of them were just waiting for me to find them and make friends.

Well, I’m less idealistic now. I also own thousands more records, and have much wider musical taste. I think that’s why I now find the fair slightly less enjoyable. I went along today hoping to chill out, and maybe find a couple of the 2 dozen or so LPs I have hanging around in my head as ‘wants’. I wouldn’t have minded paying anything up to $40 or $50 for some of these. Anyway, it didn’t really work out that way. The place is huge, but crowded. I was in there for four hours without really going around the stalls more than once; if I’d waited to see everything that looked interesting, I could have been in there the whole day. The main problem, however, was choosing what to buy among all these records. That line that makes a record worth buying becomes really blurry in a place like this, where bargain records abound, and the records you’re truly looking for remain buried in tightly-packed boxes, if they’re there at all.

I think I’ve now faced up to the fact that for me, ebay is better. Searching by keyword or label isn’t possible at record fairs. I left with five albums and a CD, knowing full well that I could just as easily come away with completely different selections. One of these days I’ll probably stop buying records. Still, there were some nice surprises in what I picked up.

Dominic Frontiere: 'Hammersmith is out' (LP; EMI/Capitol; 1972)
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This was an impulse purchase. I'd never heard of the film, but the record is in great condition and had enticing song titles (e.g. 'topless rock', 'snake dance'). From the photos and story of the film on the back, it seems pretty wild, with lots of good party scenes.

The record itself both rewards and disappoints. The main theme, while not without charm (the instrumentation is great, with some cool synth sounds), is rather uninspired. But the 'party' style tracks are pretty cool. The pick of these is 'Kiddo'; 'topless rock' and 'snake dance' are pretty good as well. They're all similar - pretty generic instrumentals with organ, horns and guitars. However, they're all slightly polluted by an overly rocky electric guitar sound. I guess this is a sign of the soundtrack's date, which is at the late end of records I tend to enjoy.

Overall, not a bad record, but one which I have a feeling I'll end up selling.

Les Paul and Mary Ford: 'The New Sound, Vol 2' (LP; EMI/Capitol; 1956)
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This is a 60s or 70s reissue of an earlier LP. I didn't own any Les and Mary on vinyl, but I love them deeply, so picked this up on the strength of 'moon of manakoora, one of my favorite instrumental tracks, and one with which I'd never heard vocals. It's pretty great stuff - Mary's haunting voice is as bewitching as ever, and I'm always a sucker for multitracked guitars.

Paul Horn: 'Paul Horn and the Concert Ensemble' (LP; Ovation; 1970)
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I bought this as an addition to my collection of ridiculous baroque-pop LPs (currently standing at around 15-20). Actually, I don't quite seem to be able to decide if the collection is of cheesy versions of classical songs or baroque/classical pop hybrid versions of pop songs - I have a similar quantity of each type. Whatever, I have definite plans to compile the most jaw-dropping of the former type, and possibly the latter as well.

In spite of a deliciously cheesy cover, with the session musicians all dressed up in old-fashioned outfits, accompanied by a mixture of contemporary and historical instruments, this record isn't all that exciting. The standout tracks are 'Light my fire' and a Horn original, 'Paramahansa'. The others sounded rather inconsequential on first listen. Still, nice to have for my collection, I guess.