Marta Kubišová: Songy a balady

Although Marta Kubisová will probably always be listed as a singer and performer first, she came to prominence in a more political fashion, as one of the leading voices of protest against the Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. Born in 1942, Kubisová first came to the fore as a member of the legendary Czechoslovak pop group the Golden Kids in the 1960s. During the aforementioned Soviet incursion, Kubisová's song "Modlitba pro Martu" (Prayer for Marta) became one of the de facto anthems of resistance to the aggression of Russia. Blacklisting followed soon after, and once she had signed the anti-Communist Charter 77, Kubisová's career was effectively over. Fortunately, she was able to bear witness to the changes of 1989, when the Soviet power structure fell and the Czech Republic became a sovereign state under its own political and social power. Her first solo album, Songy a Balady, was released in 1969, and was followed -- thanks to the blacklisting -- by her second album, Lampa, in 1990. A handful of albums and singles would follow to round out the 1990s, including a 1996 re-release of her debut, but by this time she was devoting much of her energy and interests to more social causes. In addition to her musical work, Kubisová is also an accomplished actress, appearing numerous times on television and in film both before and after her blacklisting. (AMG)


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Lee Morgan: Search For The New Land

This set  is one of the finest Lee Morgan records. The great trumpeter contributes five challenging compositions ("Search for the New Land," "The Joker," "Mr. Kenyatta," "Melancholee," and "Morgan the Pirate") that deserve to be revived. Morgan, tenor saxophonist Wayne Shorter, guitarist Grant Green, pianist Herbie Hancock, bassist Reggie Workman, and drummer Billy Higgins are all in particularly creative form on the fresh material, and they stretch the boundaries of hard bop (the modern mainstream jazz of the period). The result is a consistently stimulating set that rewards repeated listenings. (AMG)

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Kebnekaise II

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Doris!

The Louvin Brothers: Satan Is Real

Satan Is Real is the Louvin Brothers' best known album, largely because of its bold title and its eccentric cover artwork, in which Charlie and Ira Louvin, surrounded by flames symbolizing Hades, pose in front of a huge, cross-eyed model of the Devil. While more than a few hipsters have found an ironic laugh in the album's over-the-top imagery, one listen to the music confirms that the Louvin Brothers weren't joking in any way, shape or form. Satan Is Real is an album of fierce, plain spoken sincerity in which the Louvins, who started their career singing gospel material, perform songs that deal with the high stakes of sin and redemption, in which Satan truly does have power to rival the Lord. The opening title track sets the tone for the set, in which a man at a church service tells the congregation how he learned that Satan's treachery is every bit as real as God's love, and while not every song is as grim -- "The River of Jordan" and "There's a Higher Power" are positively jaunty -- the temptations of life in a fallen world and the consequences of sin are touched upon in nearly every track. The Louvin Brothers wrote many of the most memorable songs on Satan Is Real, and they rarely sounded as heartfelt as on "The Christian Life," "Are You Afraid to Die" and "The Angels Rejoiced Last Night"; as usual, their harmonies are luminously beautiful, and while Ira's superb mandolin work is missed, the simple arrangements (often incorporating a subdued gospel organ) are perfectly suited to the material. You don't need to share the Louvin Brothers' spiritual beliefs to be moved by the grace, beauty and lack of pretension of this music; Satan Is Real is music crafted by true believers sharing their faith, and its power goes beyond Christian doctrine into something at once deeply personal and truly universal, and the result is the Louvin Brothers' masterpiece. (AMG)

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Miles Davis: Stella By Starlight (Live 1964)

Jungle Brothers: Straight Out The Jungle

The landmark opening salvo from the Jungle Brothers, Straight out the Jungle was also the very first album from the Native Tongues posse, which would utterly transform hip-hop over the next few years. That alone would be enough to make it a groundbreaking release, but Straight out the Jungle also contains the musical seeds for a number of soon to be dominant trends. Their taste for jazzy horn samples helped kickstart the entire jazz-rap movement, and their concurrent James Brown fixation was one of the first to follow Eric B. & Rakim's lead. Plus, the group's groundbreaking collaboration with legendary house producer Todd Terry, "I'll House You," is also here; it paved the way for numerous hip-house hybrids that shot up the dance and pop charts over the next few years. The lyrics were often as cerebral as the music was adventurous and eclectic, appealing to the mind rather than the gut -- and the fact that rap didn't necessarily have to sound as though it were straight off the streets was fairly revelatory at the time. "Black Is Black" and the title cut are some of the first flowerings of Afrocentric hip-hop, but the group isn't always so serious; "I'm Gonna Do You," "Behind the Bush," and the sly, classic "Jimbrowski" are all playfully sexy without descending into misogyny. To modern ears, Straight out the Jungle will likely sound somewhat dated -- the raw, basement-level production is pretty rudimentary even compared to their second album, and makes the jazz-rap innovations a bit difficult to fully comprehend, plus the album ends on several throwaways. But it is possible to hear the roots of hip-hop's intellectual wing, not to mention a sense of fun and positivity that hearkened back to the music's earliest Sugar Hill days -- and that's why Straight out the Jungle ultimately holds up. (AMG)

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Dolly Parton: Jolene

Of the three 2007 Dolly Parton reissues from Sony, Jolene is the most absorbing musically and the most problematic lyrically. A sparkling production creates a rich backdrop for both "Jolene" and "When Someone Wants to Leave" (both Parton originals), mixing acoustic guitar, country instruments (steel guitar, dobro), and light percussion. This tasteful mix, nicely spread across the stereo spectrum with Parton front and center, is a joy to listen to. Lyrically, however, these songs are a long way from Loretta Lynn's "You Ain't Woman Enough to Take My Man." Parton's female protagonists are downright pitiful, adrift in a world where a more attractive woman might take their man, where a woman cannot let go of a man who no longer loves her, and where a man is the "highlight" of her life ("Highlight of My Life.") Jolene, originally released in 1974, feels like a shot across the bow of the feminist movement, a reaffirmation that many women still liked the men to wear the pants (women, presumably, who listened to old-fashioned country music). This seems somewhat peculiar now, in that no one -- looking at her long, distinguished career and commanding stage presence -- would accuse Parton of being a weak-kneed songbird. Still, the music and Parton's vocal prowess are in top form on Jolene, and "I Will Always Love You" is one of her best performances (which is saying a lot). Like it or loath it, Jolene offers a fascinating snapshot of an era in transition, and captures Parton at the top of her game. (AMG)

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Soft Machine: Fourth

The Soft Machine's collective skill is hyper-complex and refined, as they are extremely literate in all fields of musical study. Fourth is the band's free purging of all of that knowledge, woven into noisy, smoky structures of sound. Their arcane rhythms have a stop-and-go mentality of their own that sounds incredibly fresh even though it is sonically steeped in soft and warm tones. Obviously there is a lot of skillful playing going on, as the mix of free jazz, straight-ahead jazz, and Gong-like psychedelia coalesces into a skronky plateau. Robert Wyatt's drumming is impeccable -- so perfect that it at times becomes an unnoticeable map upon which the band takes their instinctive direction. Mike Ratledge's keys are warm throughout, maintaining an earthy quality that keeps its eye on the space between the ground and the heavens that the Soft Machine attempt to inhabit. Elton Dean's saxophone work screams out the most inventive cadence, and since it's hardly rhythmic, it takes front and center, spitting out a crazy language. Certainly the band is the preface to a good portion of Chicago's post-rock output, as they undoubtedly give a nod to Miles Davis' Bitches Brew experiments, which were going on in the U.S. at the same time. (AMG)

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Keith Jarrett: Treasure Island

Treasure Island, released in early 1974, was the second of two albums pianist and composer Keith Jarrett recorded for Impulse Records -- the first was Fort Yawuh, issued a year earlier. Cut at Generation Sound Studios in New York City, the band consisted of Jarrett on piano and soprano saxophone, Dewey Redman on tenor, bassist Charlie Haden, and drummer Paul Motian. And though he would more than likely disagree, this was the best band he ever led. In addition to the quartet, guitarist Sam Brown contributes to a pair of cuts here as Guilherme Franco and Danny Johnson add percussion to the mix. The set kicks off with the beautiful "The Rich (And the Poor)," a folkish melody of the type Jarrett was exploring on ECM at the time, with some stellar African undertones -- it's easy to hear the majesty of Abdullah Ibrahim's South African musical sphere in this mix, and earthy deep, sparer work by Redman and Haden. The brief "Blue Streak," by contrast, is full-on and busy with melody and interplay between Redman and Motian. More speculative group improvisation occurs on "Fullsuvollivus," which travels decidedly outside, and the title cut with Sam Jones on electric guitar in place of Redman is a lithe, elegant, midtempo ballad that showcases Jarrett's truly magnificent melodic work in front of this enlarged rhythm section. The hardest groover on this set is their killer "Le Mistral," with some gorgeous interplay between Haden and Motian, and some extended solo work by Redman. "Angles (Without Edges)" is a dense construction that involves some taut counterpoint between Redman and Jarrett, even as the rhythm section tries to push them both inside toward one another -- Redman slips out of the frame a few times to excellent effect. Haden's solo is also particularly noteworthy. Brown returns on the closer "Sister Fortune," a track with almost rockist overtones. Jarrett had perhaps heard some records in his day, particularly from the Atlantic catalog, and he put that spin on this melody, which incorporates groove, repetitive and circular rhythm, and a songlike melodic structure with minimal improvisation -- though his own fills are quite stunning and deep in the pulse pocket. This is a terrific sendoff to a very fertile, creative period and begs the question as to what else may have happened had this band been able to explore their unique, fully communal sound together for more than a pair of albums. (AMG)

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Carla Bley: Funnybird Song

Bo Hansson: Lord Of The Rings

The best of Bo Hansson's albums, and one of the few progressive rock instrumental recordings that still holds up on repeated listening. J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy provide the inspiration for a series of strange, other-worldly tracks that transcend their source material. Hansson's keyboard playing is quite unlike the work of such rivals as Keith Emerson or Rick Wakeman, less heavy and "gothic" and more oriented toward jazz. His guitar work as is flashy and aggressive as his keyboards ("The Black Riders/Flight to the Ford" is a great showcase for both), and the backing by sax, flute, and drums creates an overall rich sonic palette. (AMG)

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Bill Evans Trio: Explorations

When this album was recorded in February of 1961, it had been more than year since the Portrait in Jazz was issued, the disc that won the critics over. By the time of this issue, Evans had released four albums in six years, a pace unheard of during that time. Most musicians were issuing two, three, and even four records a year during the same era. Many speculate on Evans' personal problems at the time, but the truth of the matter lies in the recordings themselves, and Explorations proves that the artist was worth waiting for no matter what else was going on out there. Evans, with Paul Motian and Scott LaFaro, was onto something as a trio, exploring the undersides of melodic and rhythmic constructions that had never been considered by most. For one thing, Evans resurrects a number of tunes that had been considered hopelessly played out, and literally reinvents them -- "How Deep Is the Ocean" and "Sweet and Lovely." His harmonic richness that extends the melodic and color palette of these numbers literally revived them from obscurity and brought them back into the canon. He also introduced "Haunted Heart" into the jazz repertoire, with a wonderfully impressionistic melodic structure, offered space, and depth by the understatement of Motian and extension by LaFaro's canny use of intervals. Also noteworthy is Miles Davis' "Nardis," which Evans first played on a Cannonball Adderley set a couple of years before. The rhythmic workout by the Motian and LaFaro places Evans' own playing in a new context, with shorter lines, chopping up the meter, and a series of arpeggios that open the ground for revelatory solo in counterpoint by LaFaro. Explorations is an extraordinary example of the reach and breadth of this trio at its peak. (AMG)

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The Welcome Wagon: Welcome To The Welcome Wagon

Although the Welcome Wagon roll their wheels over familiar territory, the band's debut is still somewhat bewildering. At their root, these songs flaunt little more than homespun melodies and basic chord progressions, featuring 12 gospel-influenced narratives in the folk tradition. Such minimalism forms the basis of the Welcome Wagon, whose two members -- the husband-and-wife duo of Rev. Vito Aiuto and Monique Aiuto -- are content to keep things short and simple. On the other hand, collaborator/producer Sufjan Stevens rarely abides by those rules; instead, he designs towering buildings out of the Aiutos' simple structures, adding flourishes to all the surfaces and strengthening the foundation with layers of horns, choirs, and pianos. At its most ornate, Welcome to the Welcome Wagon simply sounds like Stevens' own record, leaving the Aiutos with little identity of their own. This is especially evident on "Sold! To the Nice Rich Man," a knockout song that nevertheless sounds like a reheated leftover from the Illinoise sessions. Full of minor-key soul and brassy trumpets, it's one of the most appetizing songs here -- yet it's also indicative of the producer's authority, which doesn't quite augment the Welcome Wagon's sound as much as commandeer it. That's not to say that Stevens always occupies the spotlight; on tracks like "He Never Said a Mumblin' Word" and "Deep Were His Wounds, and Red," the Aiutos regain control with an emphasis on stark, gospel-gothic lyrics. These are songs of crucifixion, of loss, of Christianity's melancholic side, and they sound worlds apart from the orchestral, summery numbers conducted by the producer. So while Welcome to the Welcome Wagon admittedly sounds its best when peppered with swelling strings and choir crescendos, the Aiutos' heart seems to rest in the simpler numbers, creating an album that's often strong but nevertheless conflicted.(AMG)

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Deutsche Elektronische Musik – Experimental German Rock & Electronic Music 1972 to 1983

A much-needed look at the incredible German music scene of the 70s – a sprawling landscape of prog, fusion, electronics, and more – all put together beautifully here with the usual completeness we've come to expect from Soul Jazz! Many of the names are familiar – the sorts you've either passed by in the record racks, or seen priced up high in the collectible imports up on display – and if you've never dipped into these grooves, this set is a perfect way to start – as the folks at Soul Jazz have really tuned their ears well, to pick out key tracks that really resonate strongly with music of the 21st Century – a good deal of which was influenced by these groundbreaking acts. Some cuts are long, but never too overindulgent – and the instrumentation and production techniques are really mindblowing – extremely creative, and often presented here in their most open, honest form. (Dusty Groove)


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Camel: Moonmadness

Moonmadness is an album released in March 1976 by English progressive rock band Camel. It was their 4th album and the last to feature the original line-up (Latimer, Bardens, Ferguson, Ward). After the success of the tightly structured, instrumental The Snow Goose in 1975, the band added vocals to their music again. Fans are tightly divided over which album they consider to be Camel's greatest, although most see the two as being companion pieces. The sound of Moonmadness has often been compared to that of Pink Floyd, and indeed the vocals do somewhat resemble that of Floyd's Gilmour, and the mellow songs and Latimer's guitar (not to mention the "moon" theme running through the tracks) add to the similarities. The album has an overall theme, just as their previous one did, but doesn't follow a storyline since it's mostly based on the band members themselves. As written in the CD Booklet: Overall, the tracks comprising the album were conceived as a loose concept based on the individual personalities that made up Camel; "Air Born" about Andrew Latimer, "Lunar Sea" about Andy Ward, "Chord Change" about Peter Bardens and "Another Night" about Doug Ferguson. The cover was designed by Field.
The last song on the album, "Lunar Sea", ends with a minute-long wind-blowing effect. When played on an LP, the record arm would skip during the end of this part and naturally return to the beginning of the effect, playing it endlessly.
In the Q & Mojo Classic Special Edition Pink Floyd & The Story of Prog Rock, the album came number 23 in its list of "40 Cosmic Rock Albums." (Wikipedia)

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Bossa Nova And The Rise Of Brazilian Music In The 1960s

A treasure trove of 60s Bossa Nova – beautiful recordings, many from the heart of the 60s, all of which capture the sounds and styles of the era and rank among the most massively influential Brazilian music of the period – featuring Elis Regina, Jorge Ben, Tamba Trio, Edu Lobo, Baden Powell & Vinicius De Moraes, Elizete Cardoso and many more! Soul Jazz Records and compiler Stuart Baker set out to make this a definitive bossa compilation and they pretty much nail it! Made as the listening counterpart to the stellar book of album cover art, compiled by Baker and Gilles Peterson. As essential of a compilation as ever released by our friends at Soul Jazz, which is really saying something, because they always raise the bar! (Dusty Groove)

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Rodriguez: Cold Fact

It's one of the lost classics of the 60s, a psychedelic masterpiece drenched in colour and inspired by life, love, poverty, rebellion, and, of course, jumpers, coke, sweet mary jane . The album is Cold Fact, and what s more intriguing is that its maker a shadowy figure known as Rodriguez was, for many years, lost too. A decade ago, he was rediscovered working on a Detroit building site, unaware that his defining album had become not only a cult classic, but for the people of South Africa, a beacon of revolution. Sixto Diaz Rodriguez was born in 1942 to Mexican immigrant parents in Detroit, Michigan. He recorded Cold Fact his debut album in 1969, and released it in March 1970. It s crushingly good stuff, filled with tales of bad drugs, lost love, and itchy-footed songs about life in late 60s inner-city America. Gun sales are soaring/Housewives find life boring/Divorce the only answer/Smoking causes cancer, says the Dylan-esque Establishment Blues. But the album sank without trace, thanks, in part, to some of Rodriguez s more idiosyncratic behavior, like performing at an industry showcase with his back to the audience throughout. As his music career became a memory, Rodriguez s legend was growing on the other side of the world. In South Africa and, to a lesser extent, Rhodesia, Australia and New Zealand, Cold Fact had become a major word of mouth success, particularly among young people in the South African armed forces, who identified with its counter-cultural bent. But Rodriguez was an enigma not even the label knew where to find him and his demise became the subject of debate and conjecture. Some rumors said he d died of a heroin overdose or burned to death on stage. But the tide began to turn in 1996, when journalist Craig Bartholemew set out to get to the bottom of the mystery. After many dead ends, he found Rodriguez alive, well, free and perfectly sane in Detroit, ending years of speculation. Rodriguez himself had no idea about his fame in South Africa (the album had gone multi-platinum, Rodriguez has received not so much as a Rand in royalties), and embarked on a triumphant South African tour followed, filling 5,000 capacity venues across the country. Rodriguez was still largely unknown in the northern hemisphere until 2002, when Sugar Man, the album s extra-terrestrially wonderful lead track, was picked up by David Holmes. The DJ discovered the album in a New York record store, and included it on his Come Get It, I Got It compilation, re-recording the song with Rodriguez for his Free Association project a year later. Now, Light In The Attic is set to commit Cold Fact to CD for audiences in the UK and America, who can finally find out why halfway across the world Rodriguez is spoken of in the same reverent tones as The Doors, Love and Jimi Hendrix. (Amazon)

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