Yes - Time And A Word 1970

Yes' second (and least successful) album was a transitional effort; the group trying for a more produced and sophisticated sound through the use of an orchestra. Even so, the results weren't conventional, because the group didn't tone down or turn down its sound. Much of Time and a Word relies on bold, highly animated performances by Bill Bruford, Chris Squire, and Tony Kaye. Additionally, by this time the group was developing a much tauter ensemble than was evident on their first LP, so there's no lack of visceral excitement. "No Opportunity Necessary, No Experience Needed" was a bold opening, a highly amplified, frenzied adaptation of the Richie Havens song, melded with Jerome Moross' title music from the movie The Big Country. Somewhat more successful musically is "Then," which keeps the orchestral accompaniment to a minimum and allows Kaye and Banks to stretch out on organ and guitar. "Everydays" is highlighted by Anderson's ethereal vocals and Kaye's dueting with the orchestra. A surprising amount of the material here seems rather tuneless, but the group was solidifying its sound and, in the process, forcing Banks out of the lineup, despite some beautiful moments for him (and Tony Kaye) on the prettiest parts of "The Prophet," a piece that also contains fragments of music that anticipate Yes' work right up through Tales from Topographic Oceans. "Astral Traveller," as a title, anticipates the themes of future group work, though they still don't have the dexterity to pull off the tempo changes they're trying for. By the time the record was completed, Banks was out of the band, which is why Steve Howe, his successor, ended up pictured on the cover of most editions. AMG.

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Wayne Shorter - Adam's Apple 1966

With the possible exception of its song, "Footprints," which would become a jazz standard, Adam's Apple received quite a bit less attention upon its release than some of the preceding albums in Wayne Shorter's catalog. That is a shame because it really does rank with the best of his output from this incredibly fertile period. From the first moments when Shorter's sax soars out in the eponymous opening track, with its warmth and roundness and power, it is hard not to like this album. It might not be turning as sharp of a corner stylistically as some of his earlier works, like Speak No Evil, but its impact is only dulled by the fact that Shorter has already arrived at the peak of his powers. Taken in isolation, this is one of the great works of mid-'60s jazz, but when Shorter has already achieved a unique performance style, compositional excellence, and a perfectly balanced relationship with his sidemen, it is hard to be impressed by the fact that he manages to continue to do these things album after album. But Shorter does shine here, while allowing strong players like Herbie Hancock to also have their place in the sun. Especially hypnotic are two very different songs, the ballad "Teru" and Shorter's tribute to John Coltrane, "Chief Crazy Horse," both of which also allow Hancock a chance to show what he could do. AMG.

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Dan Penn - Nobody's Fool 1973

On first listen, it's not unreasonable to think that writer/producer Dan Penn's 1973 solo debut, Nobody's Fool, is a bit schlocky. The songs are there, but amidst all the studio bombast it's difficult to suss out the deft touch that Penn brought to soul classics like "I'm Your Puppet" and "The Dark End of the Street." To give up too soon, though, would be to neglect what is an ambitious, impassioned attempt to encompass the entire Southern musical tradition into a single musical statement. Penn sounds not unlike "Suspicious Minds"-era Elvis on orchestrated R&B tracks like "Time" and "Ain't No Love," and while "Prayer for Peace" sounds like an interlude from a Southern-gothic rock opera, it's clear that Penn means every word of his plea. With the exception of a CCR cover, Penn wrote (or co-wrote) and produced the entire album, and is backed by a crew of Memphis' finest. As is often the case with albums by those who became famous working behind the scenes, Nobody's Fool suffers a bit from excess, as if every idea in Penn's head had to be put to tape immediately. But the man's love of music (all of it: rock, pop, country, gospel, blues, soul, etc.) is so genuine and so blind to categories, one can't help being taken in by this quiet masterpiece. AMG.

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David Axelrod - Song of Innocence 1968

Producer, arranger, and engineer David Axelrod made his mark with Cannonball Adderley, Lou Rawls, and the Electric Prunes. He created recording dates -- both live and in the studio -- with crisp innovative production, forward-looking arrangements, and killer sound effects (the Prunes' weird "Mass in F Minor" is a case in point). No one, however, expected him to make his own records. Nonetheless, in 1968 his first concept work was issued under the EMI imprint. His inspiration was Songs of Innocence, English poet William Blake's watershed collection of poems; Axelrod set seven of them to music using a bevy of studio musicians and a lot of clout at the label. Using a rock orchestra, Axelrod created a suite that blended pop, rock, jazz, theater music, and R&B that has withstood the test of time, and has been revisited and sampled by electronica pioneers such as DJ Shadow and DJ Cam. Perhaps the best-known tune of this mystical mixture is the jazzed-out, the slow groove of "Holy Thursday," with its bluesy bop piano lines and huger than huge string section playing a vamp from a Count Basie tune. Meanwhile, the rhythm section floats a steady, swinging rhythm to the guitars and brass who answer with dramatic harmonics centered around a complex yet elegant melodic, and the guitar itself screams overhead. It's a jazz boogaloo with classical overtones. And yes, it, and the rest of the album, sound as if it would be excessive and awful. This was visionary work in 1968, and, to commit heresy, withstands the test of time better than the Beatles Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album allegedly inspired it. Axelrod's psychedelia is implied; its compositional form and feeling drive him to celebrate the wildness and folly of youth with celebration and verve. And as a result, the music here sounds fresh, free of cynicism and hipper-than-thou posturing, remaining new each time it is heard. Song of Innocence made critics turn their heads in its day, regarding it as a visionary curiosity piece; today it's simply a great, timeless work of pop art that continues to inspire over three decades after its initial release. AMG.

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Alexis Korner - Get Off My Cloud 1975

The lineup makes this album virtually an offshoot of Korner's participation on B.B. King In London from four years earlier, including Steve Marriott, Peter Frampton etc., with Keith Richards making a guest appearance. Songs include the Rolling Stones title hit, and a cover of the Doors' "The Wasp (Texas Radio)." Nothing to make anyone forget the originals, nor is the new material terribly memorable, but everyone sounds like they're having fun here. AMG.

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Alceu Valença - Saudade de Pernambuco 1979

 

Alceu Valença is a successful Brazilian singer/songwriter and the creator of a distinctive musical style that mixes his northeastern roots (São Bento do Una, in the state of Pernambuco) and contemporary MPB grooves. He is also an energetic, even mesmerizing live performer. His songs have been recorded by several major artists, including Luiz Gonzaga (with whom he wrote "Plano Piloto"), Maria Bethânia, and Elba Ramalho. His life was depicted in Anamelia Maciel's book Alceu Valença em Frente e Verso.

The son of a locally renowned lawyer, Valença always worried his father with his rebellious character. At five he participated in a music contest, singing a song by Capiba. At 11, his mother took ill and his family moved to Recife. During this period, Valença became interested in the acoustic guitar and viola. However, he didn't get one for a few years -- he won an instrument during a song competition when he was 15. In 1965 he began a long period of attending law school in Recife with several interruptions. Three years later he began his musical career with the group Tamarineira Village. He also played with Zé Ramalho and Elba Ramalho during this period. While attending law school, he took part in an essay competition that offered a three-month course at Harvard University as its first prize. Without knowing a word of English, he drafted an essay comparing Marxism to the Catholic Church and pointed poetically at the contradictions of political ideologies in vogue. He won. During his Harvard period, he played his political songs in coffee houses when not studying. He was profiled by the student newspaper, which referred to him as the "Brazilian Bob Dylan." After returning to Brazil, he graduated but never practiced law. + more info AMG.

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Centipede - Septober Energy 1971

The initial tendency is to dismiss this recording as one of those failed experiments from the progressive-rock era, and the opening band on Disc One definitely invites that treatment with what appears to be an almost deliberately provocative aimlessness. parts of Disc Two, which seem buried in noise and masses of sound that don't go anywhere over many minutes, have similar problems. In between, however, are sublimely beautiful virtuoso passages for various soloists and small units within the orchestra. Alan Skidmore, Elton Dean et. al. get some great moments on the core of the first disc, which evolves out of the annoying big-band noodling of the opening into a swinging, big-band progressive-rock sound with elements of bop as well. There are vocal passages on this record, mostly built around Julie Tippett's gloomy, doom-laden Crimson-like words, and they're pretty but they're not a major part of "Septober Energy." Unfortunately, there is also more meandering, and just as it looks like the finale has pulled it together, with a very pretty and understated acoustic piano section featuring Keith Tippett solo, the piece loses it in an extended and very repetitive part for the full orchestra that goes nowhere and takes forever to fade. In fairness, the sound on the CD is excellent, and the second half of Disc One in particular is worth hearing, but there's too much here that isn't -- and too much that also sounds like those crashing sax-based sound explosions that puntuate King Crimson albums like Islands -- for anyone except hardcore fans of Soft Machine et al. AMG.

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Carla Thomas - Memphis Queen 1969

Half recorded in Memphis with the usual stellar Stax crew and half recorded in New York with local session musicians (all overdubbed in Detroit), Memphis Queen finds Thomas and the Stax label in transition. Motown alumnus Don Davis handled production, draping many cuts in large, lush orchestral settings. "I Like What You're Doing (To Me)" was a Top Ten R&B hit, and three other tracks had brief chart runs. In 1997, this was reissued on a single-disc CD that also included her 1971 album Love Means. AMG.

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Chain - Toward The Blues 1971

Formed from the remnants of Perth band the Beaten Tracks in 1968, the Chain were named by singer Wendy Saddington after the classic soul track "Chain of Fools." Saddington soon left and the band released one of Australia's first progressive blues singles, "Show Me Home," in 1969. Soon after, the Chain shortened their moniker to Chain. In June 1970, Chain recorded the classic live album, Live Chain, at Caesar's Palace discotheque, and along with other Australian acts like Billy Thorpe and the Aztecs, Carson, and the Adderley Smith Blues Band, were considered at the forefront of the Australian blues movement.

In 1971 the new Chain (already by now, "Mk 7"!) attracted the attention of the aggressive young entrepreneur Michael Gudinski, who was by then in the throes of putting together the enduring Mushroom indie record label. Gudinski, who also became the group's manager soon afterward, has subsequently acknowledged that Mushroom was conceived and built upon Chain's reputation, and he in turn enthusiastically helped foster their career during those heady times.

During the same year, the band continued to grow in stature as a must-see drawcard around the Melbourne blues haunts, as well as being a popular staple at the various outdoor festivals common to the era. An appearance at the Odyssey Festival at Ourimbah in January was captured on the double-LP set History Of Chain, cementing the group's greatness for posterity. Other festival appearances, such as at Myponga outside Adelaide and Wallacia near Sydney (each featuring a roster of the cream of OzRock's best) had a similar effect, and Chain by now was regarded as among the premier of Australia's progressive blues units. The "classic" line-up of Chain enjoyed a national top ten hit in May with its debut Infinity single, "Black And Blue" (working title: "We're Groaning"), backed with Taylor's ambitious but solidly-delivered and decidedly progressive "Lightning Ground". The A-side recalled the traditional Afro-American "work-song" motif and heralded the solid, blues wailing body of songs featured on Toward The Blues, Chain's first album for Festival's "progressive" Infinity imprint, which was released to great (and enduring) critical acclaim in September.
At a climactic concert on 13 June 1971 at the Melbourne Town Hall, where a number of the scene's pre-eminent bands assembled (headliners Billy Thorpe and the Aztecs released an LP of their stunning performance there), a self-deprecating Chain were awarded a silver disc plaque (at that time a coveted accolade) for selling 25,000 copies of the "Black 'n' Blue" single, a record that went on to become one of mainstream rock radio's most-played and most oft-requested staples. Thanks to Rockasteria.

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Walter Davis Company - Blues Walk 1979

An often remarkable and inventive bebop and hard bop pianist, Walter Davis Jr. once left the music world to be a tailor, but returned. A solid soloist, bandleader, and accompanist, he amassed a good body of work while never becoming a high-profile name even within the jazz community. Davis played with Babs Gonzales' Three Bips & a Bop as a teen, then moved from Richmond to New York in the early '50s. He played with Max Roach and Charlie Parker, recording with Roach in 1953. He joined Dizzy Gillespie's band in 1956, and toured the Middle East and South America. He also played in Paris with Donald Byrd in 1958 and with Art Blakey & the Jazz Messengers in 1959. After retiring from music for a while to run his tailor shop, Davis returned in the '60s, producing records and writing arrangements for a local New Jersey group. He studied music in India in 1969, and played with Sonny Rollins in the early '70s. Davis had another stint with the Jazz Messengers in 1975, then led his own group in New York. Davis recorded for AMG.

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J.J. Cale - Really 1973)

J.J. Cale's guitar work manages to be both understated and intense here. The same is true of his seemingly offhand singing, which finds him drawling lines like "You get your gun, I'll get mine" with disarming casualness. But he has trouble coming up with original material as strong as that on his debut, and for some, his approach will be too casual; there are many times when the band is percolating along and Cale is muttering into the microphone, that the music seems to be all background and no foreground. You may find yourself waiting for a payoff that never comes. AMG.

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Sly & The Family Stone - Life 1968

Just a matter of months after Dance to the Music, Sly & the Family Stone turned around and delivered Life, a record that leapfrogged over its predecessor in terms of accomplishment and achievement. The most noteworthy difference is the heavier reliance on psychedelics and fuzz guitars, plus a sharpening of songcraft that extends to even throwaways like "Chicken." As it turned out, Life didn't have any hits -- the double A-sided single "Life"/"M'Lady" barely cracked the Top 100 -- yet this feels considerably more song-oriented than its predecessor, as each track is a concise slice of tightly wound dance-funk. All the more impressive is that the group is able to strut their stuff within this context, trading off vocals and blending into an unstoppable force where it's impossible to separate the instruments, even as they solo. The songwriting might still be perfunctory or derivative in spots -- listen to how they appropriate "Eleanor Rigby" on "Plastic Jim" -- but what's impressive is how even the borrowed or recycled moments sound fresh in context. And then there are the cuts that work on their own, whether it's the aforementioned double-sided single, "Fun," "Dynamite!," or several other cuts here -- these are brilliant, intoxicating slices of funk-pop that get by as much on sound as song, and they're hard to resist. AMG.

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Taj Mahal - The Real Thing 1971

Taj Mahal followed up Giant Step/De Ole Folks at Home (1969) with another double-LP concert platter whose title pretty much sums up the contents. The Real Thing (1971) is drawn from a mid-February run of shows at the Fillmore East in New York City where he, Spencer Davis, the Chambers Brothers, and Roberta Flack, among others, shared the bill. Mahal is supported by an interesting extended aggregate with a brass section consisting of Joseph Daley (tuba/horn/trombone), Bob Stewart (horn), and a pair of former Charles Mingus bandmembers, Earl McIntyre (horn) and Howard Johnson (horn). While at times they tend to overpower the usually intimate nature of the performances, that is certainly not the case for the majority of the arrangements. The opener, "Fishin' Blues," is a solo with Mahal accompanying himself on banjo. "Ain't Gwine to Whistle Dixie (Any Mo')" is significantly lengthened from the form found on Giant Step (1968) as it stretches nearly nine minutes and allows plenty of room for interaction, offering up a spirited fife interlude from Mahal. In addition to providing an overview from his back catalog, The Real Thing contains a few new compositions. The full ensemble gets a workout on the funky "Sweet Mama Janisse" and the toe-tappin' rural flavor of the instrumental "Tom and Sally Drake" is lightly augmented by a sole tuba -- presumably that of Johnson. Sleepy John Estes' "Diving Duck Blues" arguably submits the most successful incorporation of brass, sporting a driving, full-throttle rhythm, and soulful interpretation. AMG.

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Al Kooper - Naked Songs 1973

Naked Songs represents the other end of Al Kooper's early career from I Stand Alone. Where that first album was recorded very gradually at the outset of his solo career, soon after exiting Blood, Sweat & Tears, Naked Songs was a much more cohesive work (cut in New York and Georgia) from the end of his stay at Columbia Records. Ironically, it was a contractually obligated album, but never one to throw away an opportunity, Kooper embraced soul, gospel, blues, pop, and even country music in the course of filling its two sides. Playing his usual array of instruments, including loud, note-bending blues guitar and gospel-tinged organ on "As the Years Go Passing By," he effortlessly switches gears to the smoother pop-soul sound of "Jolie," then straight country with a blues tinge on "Blind Baby." John Prine's grim and uncompromising "Sam Stone" gets an extraordinary performance, but the real surprise is the presence of Sam Cooke's Soul Stirrers-era gospel classic "Touch the Hem of His Garment" -- the latter is one of a pair of Cooke songs (the other is "A Change Is Gonna Come") that one would not expect any white artist to try and cover, much less do well, but Kooper does it justice and then some, and this track alone is worth the price of the album. The album benefits from the fact that Kooper had spent a good chunk of the prior year working with the Atlanta Rhythm Section (which appears here) as well as discovering Lynyrd Skynyrd. Naked Songs may have been intended mostly to get him out of his Columbia contract, but it proved a highlight of his career as well as his last new recording for four years. Naked Songs was reissued in Japan in 2003 in a mini-LP jacket format in state-of-the-art 24-bit digital audio. AMG.

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Sweet Slag - Tracking with Close Ups 1971

By 1971 the UK rock music scene was undergoing change. The psychedelic era was on the wane as a Syd Barrett-less Pink Floyd departed from the surrealist brilliance of Piper at the Gates of Dawn. Progressive rock, with Peter Gabriel at its helm dressed as a transvestite fox, was getting grander and more conceptual. David Bowie was about to christen himself Ziggy Stardust and Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath were ushering in a new heavier sound with their own reinterpretation of the blues.

With this in mind, it’s difficult to see where Tracking with Close-Ups, the sole album by UK band Sweet Slag, fits into the music scene at the time. Practically nothing is known of the band, except that they were a four-piece outfit from London and cut their solitary album for the President Record label. Sweet Slag’s music is less concerned about creating anthemic popular rock like Zeppelin or Sabbath, and though their sound could be deemed psychedelic or progressive the overall feel of the album is darker with none of the pretense that would be normally found on albums in these genres. In truth Tracking with Close Ups owes much to the free experimentation of Zappa and Beefheart, with references to avant-guard composers such as Karl Heinz Stockhausen.

Each of the seven songs on the album is experimental with the entire band soloing freely and seemingly without direction. The tight drumming of Al Chambers and steady bass of Jack O’Neill just about manage to hold the threads of the ideas together. This freedom of expression can be a bit off-putting for the casual listener, but as in the best avant-guard work of John Coltrane, there are moments when all the ideas and discordant improvisations come together and intricate melodies weave their way out from the maelstrom. Thanks to Therockasteria.

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