IMPROVISATION

some great recordings of favorite post jazz improvisors will be posted in the next few days, months, years. starting with a few samples in the discography of a couple of Japanese masters, Taku Sugimoto and Ottomo Yoshihide. thanks to billybilly, Graspplease, and Kalli for some of these.

Taku Sugimoto - OPPOSITE (HatArt: HatNoir, 1998)

a perfect album of gorgeous guitar tones and licks. everyone needs this.

http://rapidshare.com/files/826675/SugimotoOpposite_pt1.zip
http://rapidshare.com/files/826901/SugimotoOpposite_pt2.zip

Taku Sugimoto and Kevin Drumm - Den (Sonoris, SON-13) (CD) 2000

another one of my all time favorite recordings in this area. (and not just for the funny Platypus drawing on the cover, which, all truth be told, is reason plenty)

Taku Sugimoto: guitar
Kevin Drumm: guitar, electronics

http://rapidshare.com/files/793556/Taku_Sugimoto___Kevin_Drumm.zi p.html


Taku Sugimoto / Otomo Yoshihide / Keith Rowe (all on guitars) - "Ajar"

http://www.sendspace.com/file/hzp5jb


Otomo Yoshihide, Park Je Chun, Mi Yeon - Loose Community

Ottomo playing with friends from Korea, over dubbed and constructed in the studio with improvising work by Günter Müller, Sachiko M, and Tanaka Yumiko. 6 different individuals from different backgrounds building lovely architecture in time.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/vwfz2u

I.S.O. - I.S.O.

the classic live recording in a buddhist temple / rock garden. this is the beautiful and wonderful side of Japanese school of Zen Buddhism.

Otomo Yoshihide , Sachiko M, Yoshimitsu Ichiraku

http://www.sendspace.com/file/3na39a

AB BAARS TRIO - 2X CD

a major recording of music in the tradition of European avant jazz, this band brilliantly navigates the lines separating composition and improvisation. these fine, fine musicians play with rigor, finesse, gusto, humour, poise, dexterity, intellegence and playful glee. there is a wonderful sense of melody and lyricism through out, and the songs are so varied, so rich, and so damned good, that this double disc takes many listens to properly process, and what a treat it is every time.

this is the only thing I own by this group, as far as I can tell (unless I'm missing the correct title of the recording), it is unavailable anywhere. (not real cover)

Ab Baars
Wilbert De Joode
Martin Van Duynhoven

Disc 1 http://www.sendspace.com/file/zmdrcq

Disc 2 http://www.sendspace.com/file/6lno7v

CONFESSIONS RIDDIM

thanks to John Eden and his radio show for introducing me, and to Natty Marcus for the access, to the best, and I mean BEST, new rootsy riddim I EVER heard. gun and sex talk is good when the boom boom mek you wild, but when conscious vibes like these get so heart-wrenchingly deep and funky, sweet and rocking... makes me want to cry, makes me want to fly, and get all KINDS of freaky up in the dancehall... unbelievable.

all artists give memorable, tip top versions; so varied are their performances that this riddim, unlike most others, makes excellent listen all the way through, again and again and again and again.

from all the quality stylings top ranking is tha Sizz on the righteous "Burnin on Weak Heart", Morgan Heritage with the tears soaked, pop/R'n'B tinged "Living Without You", Lady Saw's infectious "Getting Hard", and Unicorn on "Remember", sounding like a Jamaican O.D.B.

boom!

Confessions riddim - the juke box family

01. tok - live it up 04:04
02. morgan heritage - living with out you 04:05
03. chuck fender - light dem 04:05
04. lady saw - getting hard 03:30
05. fanton mojah - dem cant stop the time 03:53
06. anthony cruz - lose dem head 04:05
07. kiprich - tell me 03:24
08. delicious - cant stop calling 03:26
09. junior kelly - get out there 04:05
10. richie spice - lonely 03:33
11. spanner banner - like paradise 03:57
12. juke box production - version 04:03

http://www.megaupload.com/se/?d=O0F115D4

Confessions - More Versions

01. Floyd West-True Confession 03:24 ú±²Û³
02. Sizzla-Burnin on Weak Heart 03:50 ú±²Û³
03. Teflon-Tell Me Why 03:53 ú±²Û³
04. Unicorn-Remember

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=T19UJLRD

TITINA CANTA B.LEZA - MUSICA DE CABO VERDE

now let us take a break, maybe much needed for some of you, from all the anti-septic super modern robot music made by men and their laptops.

a rare, out of print, much saught after album, if you like Caesaria Evora this is for you. from the first few seconds your heart will melt; Titina's voice is not as deep but her style may be even more refined. warm, joyous, and filled with light.

http://rapidshare.com/files/798178/Titina_canta_B.LEZA.zip.html

ROBAG WRUHME - WUZZELBUD

OK. all this nerd-techno is great and all, but at some point you gotta throw on some booty-slammin 4 to tha floor funk bass. (but still like, all cut up weird noises n' shit)

note: first track is a bit of a half assed break thing, the real deal begins with track 2

http://rapidshare.com/files/845966/robag_wruhme_-_wuzzelbud__kk___2004___mk_cd_001_.zip.html

3 from Raster - Modul, Coh. and Frank Bretschneider

modul - isol

top-notch click-bass with beautiful wave-prisms. one of the more affecting of Raster releases. thanks to billybilly for this gem.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/brx5o8

Coh - Enter Tinnitus

the classic album on Raster Music back when everything was packed in those electro-static bags.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/gzrfpv

Frank Bretschneider - Curve

sparse, dubby, simple, gentle, serene, unassuming, friendly, non-demanding, and enjoyable.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/mea4zy

Brinkmann and Ikeda

a few more contemporary electronic things before switching gears for a minute:

Thomas Brinkmann - Rosa

a colossal record of Teutonic ingenuity, this collects the legendary 12 inches named after girls. first couple of tracks are very abstract, the energy builds steadily toward the end, where it gets crazy intense. a highlight is number 4 - an extraordinary bio-kinetic machine in the shape of a lotus slowly blooming.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/gazyhy

Ryoji Ikeda - Mort Aux Vasches

Ryoji in steady rocking mode - 2 long tracks of beautiful sine-tones, precision laser cut gray-scale noise, massive bass slabs, and powerful, shifting beat structures. sickness.

atleast one of these tracks I've seen used in a Dumb-Type performance. not to be missed if they ever show up in your city.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/eombvb

Ryoji Ikeda - 1000 Fragments

Ryoji in classic cut up and drone modes. this I believe is one of the records which jump started his career in sound sculpture. fascinating through out, hyper dense decibal crunch, samples and beats give way to pristine wave forms in the later part, a complex and remarkable work.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/69yfyz

electronic minimalism - 4 more

of the most serious, artful and abstract end of contemporary electronica, I have listened to each of these records countless times and they continue to reward.

Stewart Walker - Stabiles

essential. the repetition and monotony in a case like this serve a purpose, and as a device is used to amazing effect - resonant sound modules build and collapse in mesmerising processions as the off-kilter yet stoic rhythms become much more interesting and complex than they initially appear.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/nefh4v


Plasticman - Concept1 (Thomas Brinkmann remix)

this recording may actually be called "Concept Variation" - whatever the name, it is the entire Plastikman Concept 1 album reconstructed, extended, and dubbed out by Thomas Brinkmann. about as far removed from the dance-floor as you possibly can get and still able to retain the techno label... like mutant machines unpredictably growing and evolving under the influence of some alien code in an underground sci-fi short, this is a mindboggling exploration of complexity.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/i8x5hx


Pub - Summer.zip

"Summer" by Pub as remixed by Vladislav Delay (2 versions), Arovane, and Nick Rapaccioli - not sounding like the same track at all. the original is a 16 minute lush electronic rainforest, but the other artists take it to different and interesting places... the Rapaccioli version is some serious shit.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/95zn7t


Various Artists - Decay Product (Chain Reaction)

classic deep, dubby, subterranean gloomy 4/4 drenched in a thick fog. what some have termed "standing-outside-of-the-club-techno". a unique muffled take on a genre traditionally insistent on super clean production - an ambient echo chamber rich with sonic detritus.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/gj6w0s

Rod Poole - The Death Adder (solo guitar in Just Intonation) - NEW LINK APRIL 2012

I've tried to keep the content on this blog limited to the best of the best in any genre. (with the occasional arguable slips - I do not consider "For Christian Wolff" to be the strongest work by Feldman, for instance)

there has also been a few gems of such rare brilliance that they out-shine the (relatively) mere excellent, the garden-variety of amazing... this post is one of these.

Rod Poole came to Los Angeles from England, and has developed a unique and breathtaking style of solo guitar improvisation. the word may actually be misleading here because this is not what Derek Bailey meant by improvisation - the reinvention of each phrase and line - but rather something much more structured, rhythmically even, and meticulously assembled -- flawless and almost overwhelming due to the grandiose scale of these hour long pieces yet seemingly effortless in its perfectly fluid execution... not much of a stretch to compare this music to such dizzying manifestations of the divine as Islamic architecture.

a must for not only enthusiasts of micro-tonal music, this is the kind of thing that, like Vermeer's 36 paintings, will likely stay almost entirely ignored by the world but will be discovered in a few hundred years time and upheld as the pinnacle of artistic achievement.

NEW MEDIAFIRE LINK APRIL 2012

Pandit Hariprasad Chaurasia - Live In Jaipur

very high quality recording of the accomplished flautist. full of the gorgeous tonal color and dramatic soaring and diving like some fearless sea-bird in sun filled clear blue skies (is this too much? these metaphoric descriptors? feel free to let me know in the comments) one would come to expect from this master of wooden flutes.

I burnt this disc from an original a few years ago -- what is crurious is that just now I could not find a trace of it on the internet - I've tried searching all possible combinations of names of artist, album and song titles. everything about it feels like a major recording, one that should be celebrated world wide... very strange indeed that there is no mention of it anywhere. anyone know why?

oh and I'm going to be switching to mega-upload and maybe try out the new service Mr M. suggested.

cheers

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=HEDJ1ED4

VVV - Endless

Pan Sonic and Suicide main-man Alan Vega collaboration from 1996, loosely revolving around the theme of war. a noble and resolute document of the desolation and sickness of these last days -- last days of American hegemony, last days of petrol fueled economies, last days of the rain forest, ice caps, a warm mediterranean, and perhaps the last days of the human species.

when I first got this I was uninitiated to the greatness of Suicide and did not "get" the vocals. now the combination of Pan Sonic's beats, hums, and bleeps and Vega's sinister narcotic invocations feel just bloody perfect. in this project (even more apparent in the wicked recent album Ressurection River), Pan Sonic sometimes deliver their most straightforward and "accessable" rhythms - un-fucked-with straight 4/4 or skeletal mutant blip-hop breaks - and Vega's menacing drawl like some demonic Elvis back from the dead to raise hell in the American nightmare, flesh torn and soul scorched, to cast his tortured doomsday shadow over this cursed land.

http://rapidshare.de/files/34937268/Endless.zip.html

Senking - Silencer [ working link ]

one of my all time favorite releases (4 track EP). this is up there with the Mika Vanio / ø records from the 90s -- music that, I suspect, will endure long after "electronica" has come and gone as fashionable trend. somber, subtle, minimal yet expansive, the tracks so well sculpted in every way - in terms of sound character, attention to detail, compositional finesse. effective and affecting, forboding and saturated with an ever lasting haunting beauty.

NEW LINK

Jan Jelinek - Loop Finding Jazz Records

Jan Jelinek - loop finding jazz records

another lovely listening (as opposed to dancing) album in the minimal techno vein. an earlier outing of Jan's, the music here is supposedly built from samples of old jazz records (if the broken english title is anything to go by) - but the point is mostly moot because the refined textures and moods within bare almost zero resemblance to their origins - just track after track of unassuming, charasmatic, and often melancholic sound-play.

Label: ~scape
Catalog#: sc 007 cd
Format: CD
Country: Germany
Released: 02 Feb 2001

http://rapidshare.de/files/34609114/Jan_Jelinek.zip.html