Monthly Archives: October 2020

“I first came into contact with records at probably 5 or 6. My dad had his small collection of Merengue records in the closet where we kept our winter wear. My parents never played them because they were very much in the home entertainment era of the ’90s, and in typical Latin household fashion they had a drawer with probably 300 + CD’s with salsa, merengue, all types of Latin music which had a profound effect on me and thus on Conclave.”

“Later when I got to high school I fell in love with jazz. I played in the school jazz band and combo and formed a side jazz combo. All I listened to was jazz, but it was in the format of CDs, which I bought or burned. This continued until I got to Berklee College of Music in Boston. I was finally living in a space that wasn’t my parents house for the first time and wanted to make it my own, so I did what a lot of millennial art students in college did at that time: I bought a shitty record player. That started my love affair with the vinyl medium. I finally could buy all of the jazz records I’d been listening to all these years in their original medium and could discover more.

Around the corner from the school was a super dope record store called Looney Tunes (RIP). They had two locations—one by Harvard campus in Cambridge, and lucky for me, another one right by Berklee. The guys that worked there were a couple of super nice older white Boston dudes. They were more into rock and probably were in punk or rock bands in the ’70s and ’80s. The store had an extensive rock selection but funny enough they had a jazz selection that rivaled it (probably because of the proximity to a jazz school).

I would go every week, multiple times a week, and buy jazz records from artists I recognized and sometimes a jazz artist I had just learned about in class that day. I would go home, smoke a lil sum’, and actively listen with friends or alone. One record during this era that flipped my shit and a lot of my friends shit was Sketches of Spain by Miles Davis and Gil Evans. This was a movie in every sense to us and I remember us laying on the ground with our backs on the floor and facing the ceiling and could imagine the scenes that took place in a continent and culture none of us had ever experienced to yet.

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In its mission quest to release records by a variety of contemporary musicians, both solo and in groups, the Thrill Jockey label of Chicago, IL is simply indefatigable. Today, we spotlight seven additions to their catalog, with releases by Matmos, Sam Prekop, Sally Anne Morgan, Sidi Touré, and SUMAC available now, and sets by Black to Comm and Holy Sons out October 30. With the exception of the Matmos and Sidi Touré releases, everything reviewed below is currently available on vinyl.

Matmos, the Baltimore-based partnership of M.C. Schmidt and Drew Daniel, have been with Thrill Jockey since 2012. It’s been a productive relationship that’s allowed the electronic duo to extend their creative ambitiousness, with The Consuming Flame: Open Exercises in Group Form standing as a pinnacle in this regard; it presents a nearly three-hour piece broken into roughly hour-long thirds and offered on three CDs. But the most substantial component in The Consuming Flame’s construction is Matmos’ invitation of 99 contributors from a range of artistic disciplines, mostly music (from New Music to electronics to metal to noise to indie rock) but also writers and even a conceptual artist. The results, intended to be absorbed as an uninterrupted piece (which is how I’ve interacted with it, a half-dozen times since its late August release date), are occasionally rhythmic, just as often fascinatingly abstract, and if rigorous, intermittently peppered with hilarity. A release that’s undeniably time-consuming, but never a chore. A-

Sam Prekop is one of the Thrill Jockey’s long-haulers, with his band The Sea and Cake releasing their self-titled debut for the label in 1994, along with a handful of solo efforts along the way. Comma is his fifth, finding him deeply engaged with beat programming, a new creative wrinkle for him as the album further documents his use of analog synthesizers, an instrument that has, over the last decade or so, become far more common in the musical landscape. With opener “Park Line,” Comma’s rhythmic propulsion suggests a dancy scenario, an approach that intermittently resurfaces throughout the record, though more prominent are sustained tones, swelling beauty cascades, and melodic motifs that establish a sound that reaches back decades but is not explicitly retro. Prekop is too deft a hand for that; I especially like how, by the end of “September Remember,” he’s subtly manipulated the sound of (what sounds like) tape hiss into a recurring pulse in counterpoint to the prettiness of his concurrent synth line. B+

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The list of hard bop trumpeters is extensive and the artistry of its practitioners deep and wide; amongst Miles Davis, Clifford Brown, Art Farmer, Freddie Hubbard, Woody Shaw, Kenny Dorham, Donald Byrd, and Booker Little, Lee Morgan’s achievement stands tall. This does not mean every nook of his ample discography has been given its proper due; backing this up is Warner Music Group’s “The Roulette Sides,” which tucks three tracks from a 1960 session onto 10-inch vinyl. Akin to Warner’s recent John Coltrane reissue program, the results are presented in mono, and it’s altogether a tasty Morgan appetizer.

Due to consistent accessibility and a disdain for stagnation, the appeal of Lee Morgan’s brand of jazz has extended right up to the present. Additionally, his profile has been given a current boost through I Called Him Morgan, Kasper Collin’s 2016 documentary spotlighting the trumpeter’s life and untimely death at age 33 at the hands of common-law wife Helen.

As with any successful mid-20th century modern jazzman, the points of entry into the Morgan’s oeuvre are vast. He recorded a ton as a leader, beginning in 1956 with the double-shot of Indeed! for Blue Note and Introducing Lee Morgan for Savoy, and his discography grows substantially when sideman dates are added; by ’56 he was in Dizzy Gillespie’s big band, but the crown jewels of his ’50s work as accompanist are John Coltrane’s Blue Train (’57), Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers’ Moanin’ (’58), and Jimmy Smith’s The Sermon! (’58), all released by Blue Note.

Moving chronologically through Morgan’s work means it’ll take a while to get to the remarkable combo punch of ’63’s The Sidewinder, which provided an unexpected dalliance with the R&B singles chart through a two-part 45 of its sublimely grooving title-track, and ’64’s Search for the New Land, a disc that captured Morgan at an expansive highpoint (if securely within an advanced bop framework) with the assistance of Shorter, pianist Herbie Hancock, guitarist Grant Green, bassist Reggie Workman, and drummer Billy Higgins.

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PHOTO: JASON BRIDGES | One of the best-named drummers of the original punk wave, Rat Scabies remains busy with a handful of projects these days, including the new one from The Professor and the Madman, Séance, due out November 13 on Fullertone Records. The band combines Alfie Agnew of the Adolescents and Sean Elliott of Mind Over Four (who was also in D.I. with Agnew), with Scabies and a bandmate he had in The Damned on a series of albums, bassist Paul Gray. Scabies, who is also in the instrumental duo The Sinclairs and plays with the psychobilly band 69 Cats and the goth Nosferatu, also makes the occasional solo album.

No longer the shirtless maniac of his youth, the former Christopher John Millar is a more thoughtful but no less passionate player at 65, though he speaks of The Loneliness of the Long Distance Drummer. We spoke to him via Zoom from the attic of his home in the Brentford district of London, and talked about days in The Damned, how perfection is overrated, his work with Joe Strummer and Ginger Baker, and how good things can come out of a Bad Christmas Sweater Party.

With the pandemic shutting everything down, has it been a long time since you’ve played out live?

I haven’t been on a big tour for a long time. The last tour I did was with The Members which was a lot of small bars in Europe and was pretty good. I have to say, touring Europe as opposed to England—where the band that shows up to play that evening is regarded as a pain in the ass and something that makes the stalls life a little more difficult—in Europe, France, Germany and like that, they’re actually quite pleased to see you and make you tea and chocolate when you arrive. You feel much more appreciated. But now nobody’s getting to go on the road at all.

In actual fact, it’s turned into quite a blessing because most of my work is studio-based, so during lockdown, I regard myself incredibly lucky that I can still function and work and make music without being dependent on going on the road, whereas most of my friends have absolutely been killed by the whole thing. It’s tragic. It is what it is, but I just really hope we can get some kind of recovery from it. Everything public, not just this business but football, rugby, cricket.

This album was recorded much the same way with previous albums by Professor and the Madmen. How does that work?

Well, apart from the distances and the problems with work visas, it’s one of those things where actually technology, as much as I am a Luddite—“No the old ways are by far the best!”—works well. I like being able to send the drum takes from the studio and by the time I get home by train they’ve got them in California and they’ve already emailed me to say yeah, these are OK, that’s pretty good. So I have to say I really enjoy that.

And the recording process is generally always been one of laying the drums and then everybody else kind of works around that. Dropping and overdubbing. So the process is actually for me very much the same it’s always been. I guess the thing I really miss is having a band there—people in the background making comments and farting. That kind of thing where you can tell when you walk into a room whether you’ve done a good take or not, whether people are happy.

I’m turning into my catchphrase this year: the Loneliness of the Long Distance Drummer. I’ve done a couple of albums like that this year. And it’s kind of weird, because they’re turning me into an engineer. The judgmental call of whether it sounds right, or whether it sounds good, that suddenly all gets thrown on me, when I’m used to being the drunk guy who says, “I’m going to go out for a cigarette while you listen to this and tell me if you want me to do this again.” It’s shifted the whole way I think about what I do.

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Oakland’s Lunchbox is the long-extant partnership of guitarist Tim Brown and bassist Donna McKean; their latest album is After School Special. Fitting for the title, its 11 songs cohere into a teen music fiesta, blending bubblegum, sunshine-pop, power pop, and classic C86-style indie-pop. That’s a lot of pop, but the duo (plus guests) also has a nice grip on ’77-punkish velocity and gnarl (with horns). Furthermore, that cover photo insinuates a hint of unease keeping things from getting too sugary sweet; I do hope that kitten is okay. The record is out October 30 on blue and white marbled vinyl and CD through Slumberland Records.

To elaborate upon Lunchbox’s span of existence, they’ve been at it for roughly a quarter century (with some breaks here and there), releasing a 7-inch and a cassette in 1995 (this is their sixth full-length overall), so while the stylistic tendencies listed above date from the ’60s to the ’80s, they distill them into a sound that’s remains representative of the ’90s indie scene.

That they can resonate like an outfit from the Elephant 6 stable is well-established, but I must say that, upon a blind introductory listen to After School Special, the sound of Ladybug Transistor-esque horns really snuck up on me. Upon checking out the credits thereafter, it was revealed that Gary Olson, he of Ladybug Transistor, plays trumpet, alongside Jeremy Goody.

Don’t go thinking After School Special is as opulent as the Transistor’s The Albemarle Sound, though. Maintained from earlier Lunchbox efforts is energy and forward motion that’s similar to the buoyant psych-pop pf Rob Schneider’s ’90s bands. Except that opener “Dream Parade” goes heavier on the jangle, with McKean’s vocals reminding me of something that might’ve landed a spot in K Records’ International Pop Underground 7-inch series.

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | ArtHyve is pleased to announce the launch of a new series of panel discussions called Record to Record: An overt homage to vinyl audio recordings, especially of musical content, as this is a media format with myriad concomitant subcultures whose significance has long been too readily dismissed due to the misperception of it being of a merely fleeting, often fad-like nature.

​When words/ideas are transmitted through that primordial auditory channel using nonverbal kinds of instrumentalized stuff, it makes language become fully alive — as its unequivocal, intense, and raw emotional qualities are expressed with pitch, tone, stress, intonation, volume, etc. using various inventive vehicles involving organic, analog, digital, etc. media.

This offers a definite sense of a magical and/or religious experience that more readily accesses the mind, body, and spirit; and it is a fervor that has been both addictive and contagious. So much so that the vinyl recording could be considered to have transformed (often reinvented) the very concept of musical expression on every level: creation, selection, organization, presentation, consumption, and preservation.

Other formats, such as cassettes, compact discs, digital download formats (like mp3), and streaming services will easily come and go… yet the vinyl record stubbornly persists. This alone makes it seem vital in many ways. As such, this effort could be considered even more timely and crucial — especially considering how the more traditional, retail-based endeavors like mom-and-pop record stores continue to be fraught with extinction.

As an archive, we often think of the idea of the “record” or what will be “recorded” as an imprint in history, but this program is also about our records that exist as careful and intentional works of sonic art more readily dismissed by conventional institutions of art history and preservation. We often ask the artists we work with in our programs and archive to muse on what albums they were listening to when they created a piece or body of work. We want to recognize inspiration on every sensory level.

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Remembering Jerry Jeff Walker. —Ed.

When it comes to outlaw country, Jerry Jeff Walker is a proud representative who rarely tops anybody’s list. Chiefly noted for writing the ubiquitous “Mr. Bojangles” and for his cover of Ray Wylie Hubbard’s “Up Against the Wall, Redneck Mother,” Jerry generally gets short shrift in comparison to Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, and Townes Van Zandt. But a listen to his 1973 live LP, ¡Viva Terlingua!, demonstrates conclusively that Walker can hold his own with the best of them.

Recorded with his Lost Gonzo Band at the Luckenbach Dancehall in 1973, ¡Viva Terlingua! is a masterpiece, featuring a unique mix of “outlaw” rock, blues, and traditional Mexican music styles that makes him one of a kind amongst his outlaw compadres. The album’s wonderful mixture of covers and originals helps—there isn’t a weak cut on the damn thing, from the carefree opening track, “Getting’ By,” a rollicking country tune on which Walker sets down his easy-going philosophy of living. The solos are great, Walker is charmingly insouciant, and if this one doesn’t make you happy, I recommend you look into ECT.

His cover of Guy Clark’s “Desperados Waiting for a Train” is a slow and lovely country lament over an old man who took him under his wing when he was a kid. The desperados turn out to be drifters and domino players, and Walker hits just the right note, avoiding bathos and steering clear of the maudlin, while the band kicks out the jams on the choruses and then kicks into the overdrive at the end, taking the song out, on a rock note.

Walker goes South of the Border on the joyous “Sangria Wine,” a celebration of one great alcoholic beverage. Drinking it with old friends in Texas on a Saturday makes him happy, and it brings out the music, as the song’s cool instrumental passage proves. You’d be hard pressed to find a more joyous celebration of booze than this tune, and if I weren’t a reformed drunk I’d go out and buy me a bottle right this minute. Shit, I might just do it anyway, to make sure Jerry Jeff ain’t exaggerating. “Little Bird” is a great honky tonker, a perky yet sad tune complete with excellent pedal steel by Herb Steiner; there’s a bird on Jerry Jeff’s windowsill and he’s looking out that window and wondering if his reflection on that window pane is clouded by tears or rain. Great tune, a little classic.

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“My parents bought a vinyl player when Sony started doing compact ‘modern’ remakes, it was funny the disc area was minuscule in comparison to the huge speakers that came with it. I still have the photo of it taking up an entire living room wall in our old house.”

“My mum would take me to a record store in Cambridge (that’s unfortunately shut now) and go in the bargain bin area. I always hated that they called it a bin. My earliest memory was her buying Rage Against The Machine’s Sleep Now In The Fire with the huge coin on the front and as a child I never understood the imagery. We took it home and she played it for my sister and I. Some years later I returned to that record to choreograph a dance for my primary school…looking back it was pretty rogue.

As I got older I moved to London in hopes of working as a ‘real’ singer. I spent many an afternoon alone in Soho record stores (before I made any friends here). Sometimes I would look for classics I loved, and sometimes for the cheapest vinyl or weirdest cover I could find. Rough Trade is still round the corner from my flat and the East End has some great vintage markets selling vinyl.

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There was a time when Yanni was the best keyboardist in jazz. “First time I heard him play,” said Thelonious Monk, “I about set fire to my piano.” McCoy Tyner told the music critic Leonard Feather, “John [Coltrane] took me aside one day and said, ‘Frankly, McCoy? If Yanni was available you’d be out of the quartet.’” Even the intergalactic Sun Ra, normally the most peaceful of men, broke into Yanni’s house and pissed on his dog.

Then Yanni had a revelation. Why play small clubs and live off his meager Blue Note royalties when he could play Madison Square Garden, then buy it? All he had to do was align his chakras, buy a copy of The Celestine Prophecy, part the Veil of Maya to reveal the illusory nature of existence, and reinvent himself as a New Age musician.

The result was the man with the magical mustache’s 1984 debut, Optimystique. Recorded in 1980, its release was delayed by Yanni’s refusal to concede to demands by the Parents Music Resource Center that he place a Parental Advisory sticker on the cover. In testimony before a Senate subcommittee, PMRC co-founder Tipper Gore said, “This album is a menace to our children. Do we really want them joining the Rainbow Family of Living Light?”

The objective of New Age music is to lull listeners into a blissful trance, allowing them to forget the everyday problems that make their lives duller than that bearded guy in those Ameritrade commercials. In the October 1991 issue of Psychology Today, the famed clinical psychologist Albert Bandura wrote, “The tedium of a modern life is the cause of much anxiety, and human consciousness has become an unbearable burden. Frankly, most people would prefer to be rhododendrons. And that’s what the music of Yanni affords them–the opportunity to be rhododendrons.”

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