Soundcloud

I've recently found a fantastic channel hosted by a Canadian woman, Danica Boyce. It's a very interesting folk music radio show, where fascinating insights into the songs' origins are provided between tracks. Quality.

https://soundcloud.com/fairfolkcast

Rarer Carols: https://soundcloud.com/fairfolkcast /rarer-carols

Saints And Demons Of December:
https://soundcloud.com/fairfolkcast /saints-demons-of-december

Sergey Kuryokhin - Music From The Snow Melts:
https://soundcloud.com/uno-moralez/sergey_kuryokhin Beautiful piano music

Sergey Kuryokhin - Minimalist Tragedy:
https://soundcloud.com/nothin2manifest/sergey-kuryokhin-minimalist

CD

Peter Howell and John Ferdinando - Alice Through The Looking Glass
A-Sitting On A Gate:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHrzYX6DFlg

Youtube

Loads of Gong and Daevid Allen tracks...

Gong with Daevid Allen - Blues For Findlay, Vocal Version 1971
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6Rx0wLcHy4

Daevid Allen - Afraid
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KnIw0RqwL4s

Daevid Allen on 'Au Risque De Vous Plaire', 1968
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpPfn2Dmcrw

Gong - I Never Glid Before, live 1973
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iiy5K81qvbg

John Lennon - Imagine
John Lennon & Yoko Ono - Sometime In New York City

George Harrison - All Things Must Pass

ABBA - Super Trouper
ABBA - The Visitors

Pink Floyd - The Early Years: Cambridge St/ation
Pink Floyd - The Early Years: Germin/ation

Simon Joyner - Songs For The New Year

Tchaikovsky - The Nutcracker

The Beach Boys - Holland
The Beach Boys - In Concert

Jan Dukes De Grey - Sorcerers
Jan Dukes De Grey - Mice & Rats In The Loft

Ron Geesin - Ghost Story OST

Elton John - 21 At 33
Elton John - The Fox

Kate Bush - Before The Dawn
Kate Bush - 50 Words For Snow

Broadcast & The Focus Group - Investigate Witch Cults Of The Radio Age

Aphrodite's Child - End Of The World

Quite a proggy start to the new year for me:

Yes - Going For The One
Yes - Close To The Edge (An album adored by my younger teenage self then loathed once I reached about 18 and thought I knew more than I did. I then grew up and learnt that I love it as there is nothing else ever that sounds quite like it, the epitome of prog really)

The Enid - In The Region Of The Summer Stars

The Neal Morse Band - The Similitude Of A Dream (I have found myself recently starting to did some modern prog, something I couldn't imagine happening previously. Despite being a born again christian, Neal Morse is one talented chap and I have been getting in to this)

Transatlantic - The Whirlwind
Transatlantic - Bridge Across Forever (See above, a modern prog supergroup which I decided to check out recently. Everything about it I would have hated until just recently but I guess it got to me when I was just in the right mood. A superb group and these two albums are ace)

Vangelis - Albedo 0.39
Vangelis - Spiral
Vangelis - China

Porcupine Tree - Metanoia

Marillion - Brave (Decided to give this a spin for the first time in years, not as good as I remember it being bit it still hits the spot when in a certain mood)

Gnidrolog - Lady Lake

Jethro Tull - Thick As A Brick

Genesis - Foxtrot

Opeth - Sorceress (Last year's effort, it didn't do much for me initially but has since grown and now I rather dig it)

Dream Theater - Images And Words
Dream Theater - Awake
Dream Theater - Falling Into Infinity
Dream Theater - Metropolis Pt 2: Scenes From A Memory (A band liked by my classical music loving girlfriend who I had tried to listen to previously to no effect. However this week they really started to do it for me, how about that!?)

Bolzer - Hero (A great slice of weird blackened death metal from last year, a bit psychedelic as well)

Deathspell Omega - The Synarchy Of Molten Bones (I hadn't bothered with these lot since about 2007 but on a whim decided to check out their latest. At only just shy of the 30 minute mark this is a very short album but the sound of pure chaos, really dark. Great stuff and the perfect length actually)

Steve Reich - Music For 18 Musicians (This really is one of the most uplifting pieces of music ever written, every time I listen I feel like I am levitating)

Amon Duul II - Tanz Der Lemminge

I have a slightly sad but seasonably resolute intention to this year hear every surviving note that Beethoven wrote. So to that end, I played this week:

Piano Trio, Op.1 no.1 (Kempff/Menuhin/Fournier)
Piano Trio, Op.1 no.2 (Beaux Arts Trio)
Piano Trio, Op.1 no.3 (Stern/Istomin/Rose)
Piano Sonata, Op.2 no.1 (Wilhelm Backhaus)
Piano Sonata, Op.2 no.2 (Wilhelm Kempff - his stereo recording)
Piano Sonata, Op.2 no.3 (Vladimir Ashkenazy)
String Trio, Op.3 (Mutter/Rostropovich/Giuranna)
String Quintet, Op.4 (Suk Quartet)
Cello Sonata, Op.5 no.1 (Fournier/Gulda)
Cello Sonata, Op.5 no.2 (Casals/Horsowski)
Sonata for Piano 4 Hands, Op.6 and Three Marches, Op.45 (Demus/Shetler)
Piano Sonata, Op.7 (Daniel Barenboim)

All pretty wonderful stuff, I have to say - and not always easy to find: there haven't been many recordings of Op.4 or Op.6, for example. The opening of the latter is a clear indicator to the later Fifth Symphony (Op.67), by the way!

Otherwise, I've had an ECM-dominated week, playing:

Wolfgang Dauner 'Output' (very early and obscure ECM LP, featuring some seriously kosmische ring modulator abuse, and Eberhard Weber on bass. Much more (kraut)rock in feel than jazz. Might give this a full Unsung review if I can find the time)
Don Cherry & Ed Blackwell 'El Corazon'
Gary Peacock 'Voice From The Past - Paradigm'
John Abercrombie 'Arcade'
OM 'Kirikuki'
Herbert Joos 'The Philosophy of the Fluegelhorn'
Keith Jarrett 'A Multitude of Angels' (four solo concerts from Italy in 1996, featuring some inspired improvisations but marred more than usual by Jarrett's annoying grunts and vocalising)

Also played:

Dave Brubeck Quartet 'Angel Eyes'
Man 'Call Down The Moon'
Elbow 'Leaders Of The Free World'
Peter Hammill 'As Close As This'
Schubert: Fantasia in C, D 943 (Isabelle Faust & Alexander Melnikov)

Have a good week, all.

Alfie - If You Happy With You Need Do Nothing / Do You Imagine Things?

Daevid Allen - Good Morning / Seven Drones

American Music Club - San Fransisco

Amon Duul - Paradieswartz Duul

David Bowie - Space Oddity / The Man Who Sold The World / Buddha Of Surburbia / liveandwell.com / Lazarus

Shirley Collins - Lodestar

The Comets Of Fire - Avator

The Cure - Disintegration

The Flaming Lips - The Terror

The Fraternity Order Of The All - Greetings From Planet Love

King Crimson - USA

Morgan Delt - Phase Zero

Mahavishnu Orchestra - The Inner Mounting Flame

Magic Carpet - S/t

Malachi - Holy Music

Mother Earth - The Desired Effect

Nektar - Journey To The Centre Of The Eye

Michele O'Molley - Saturn Rings

Mike Oldfield - Hargest Ridge

One - Come

The Onyx - Kaleidoscope Of Colours

Parson Sound - S/t

Penguin Cafe Orchestra - Music From The ...

Pentangle - Reflection / Solomon's Seal

Pink Floyd - The Massed Gadgets Of Auximines (studio reconstruction) / Zabraskie Point (reconstruction)

Procol Harum - S/t

Rainbow Ffolly - Sallies Fforth

Six Organs Of Admittance - School Of The Flower

Swans - Filth/Body To Body, Job To Job

V/A
Amorphous Androgynous: A Monstrous Psychedelic Bubble Vol 3 - Pagan Love Vibrations

Beyond Saturn (Mojo/ Paul Weller)

Electric Sound Show 1 - We All Live On Candy Green

Get Smarter

Psychmagik - Ritual Chants / Magik Sunrise

Roaring Blue

Main replays this week (still working on 2014):

Manic Street Preachers - Futurology
This had a pretty favourable reception, but I reckon that was as much to do with the return to Empires and Dance typeface as anything. It's okay. Between The Clock And The Bed (with Green Gartside) would be my pick from it.
https://youtu.be/-ziNStMle7E

The Pains of Being Pure At Heart - Days of Abandon
They still sound like The Wake's (Sarah era) second cousins, which in itself is no criticism, but this one suffers a bit from being both weedy and overly upbeat (imagine). Still, there's a jangliness to their sound that I still pine from the late 80s/early 90s.
https://youtu.be/IBdbbBDOwv4

New Model Army - Between Wine & Blood
Essentially offcuts from the previous Between Dog and Wolf, there are a couple of crackers on this one, which also has a lovely set of artwork from Joolz Denby.
https://youtu.be/PoIB2Tti7NU

Otherwise:

Charlie Patton - The Definitive

David Bowie - The Man Who Sold The World

V/A - The Fruit Of The Original Sin
The Wake - Harmony
The Durutti Column - Short Stories For Pauline
New Order - Power, Corruption & Lies
The Durutti Column - Without Mercy
Blaine L Reininger - Instrumentals
New Model Army - Small Town England
The Smiths - The Smiths
The Smiths - The World Won't Listen
The The - Mindbomb

The Durutti Column - Obey The Time
Inspiral Carpets - "This Is How It Feels"; "She Comes In The Fall"; Island Head EP CD singles
The The - Dusk
Roger Eno - The Flatlands
Ryuichi Sakamoto - BTTB

Modest Mouse - We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank

Pixies - Indie Cindy
V/A - Nightingale Variations
David Bowie - Blackstar

Oh and this one, which I've watched fifty times this week. I loved its pathos as a youngster and still do, it seems. The video is fantastic in its own right (except I have to cover my eyes when the zoo animals appear as it's too distressing), but made even better due to the bad quality: the bit right at the end looks very 3D and trippy!
Neil Innes - How Sweet To Be An Idiot
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZ9EWcaS7II

Smile (2011 cd release) – Beach Boys

With The Beatles (1963) – The Beatles

Beneath Discordant Skies (2015) - Blurt

Scary Monsters (1980) – David Bowie
Blackstar (2016) – David Bowie

Movin' & Changin':Best Of...(Compilation) – Brass Construction

The Curse Of Love (2014) – The Coral

EP (2016 re-issue) – Death & Vanilla

Out There (2016) – Dr Robert

Taking Tiger Mountain (1974) - Eno

Life Is People (2012) - Bill Fay

Ones & Sixes (2015) – Low

Years Of Refusal (2009) - Morrissey

Lady From Shanghai (2013) – Pere Ubu

The Race For Space (2015) – Public Service Broadcasting

A Moon Shaped Pool (2016) - Radiohead

Beers Steers & Queers (1990) – Revolting Cocks

Blue & Lonesome (2016) – Rolling Stones

Disconnect From Desire (2010) - School Of Seven Bells

Ty Rex (2015 issue) – Ty Segall

The Slider (1972) – T.Rex

Systems Of Romance (1978) – Ultravox

Super Ape (1976) – The Upsetters
Return Of The Super Ape (1978) - The Upsetters

Sundays & Cybele – Chaos & Systems. First new album of the year. Competent Kraut/psych from Japanese crew, starts strong, but a bit lightweight overall.

Running On Air – s/t. Still enjoying this homage to the 90s IDM scene.

Hawkwind Zoo – Demo. Heard these tracks individually at various times, but not together before. ‘Hurry On Sundown’ is still very busker-y here, ‘Cymbaline’ is a robust enough cover, and ‘Kiss Of The Velvet Whip’ is pretty atypical compared to what they would go on to do, but is actually rather good in a psychy VU-esque way.

VA – Heavy Nuggets 4. MOJO freebie to accompany their Sabbath cover feature (which is worth a read). Previous volumes have been drawn from the past, but the songs here are mainly from the past few years. Not bad, though am I the only person immune to the charms of Charles Bradley’s cover of ‘Changes’? Track by The Skull (ex-Trouble members) is particularly good, reminds me a bit of early QOTSA: https://the-skull.bandcamp.com/track/the-door And seeing as we’ve been talking about them, the Elephant9 track is also cool in the vein of Atomic Rooster: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwPzX2-IjDc

Listen With Father:

Stealing Sheep – Not Real. Thought I’d play them a more recent example of a girl group, which went down pretty well. Love this track, the lazy Scouse drawl works a treat… https://soundcloud.com/heavenlyrecordings/greed

Siouxsie & The Banshees – The Best Of… I reckon at least one of them will be a teenage goth at this rate.

Queen – Greatest Hits. Blimey, they love this.

A is for…

So, bit of a cheat, as I didn’t listen to a whole album, but have been revisiting arty 90s indie sounds this week, some of which begin with an A:

The Auteurs – ‘Unsolved Child Murder’. Macabre Beatles pastiche from Mr Haines: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0A4EAjPUZQM

A.R. Kane – ‘Sea Like A Child (Underwater)’. From their final album, cool oceanic pop: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSbp94y87cY

AMP – ‘Soft Stone Soul’. Stalwarts of the Bristol post-rock scene, love the ecclesiastical vocs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4CTNWG8yHs

Arturo – ‘Former’. The guitar hook is pretty irresistible: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OL3hSpymLxg