Eroina & Niente LPs - Gruppo di Improvvisazione Nuova Consonanza - Orgasmo

Orgasmo...

...'scuse me whilst I get carried away - and isn't that what music supposed to make us do? - two absolute belters from G.I.N.C., both from 1971, both loaded with funky drummer free Jazz deviant grooves & atmospherics like no-one else could deliver. Surfacing from the deep Improv pond to smack us in the chops with this shit! Too much. 

You could say words fail me. You could say 'I've got them!', in which case, well done, top marks, have a gold star. I've raved about G.I.N.C. before here and here - well give me one good reason why I shouldn't again.

Ennio's squawking like a cockerel, if cockerels squawk, and I might get to rambling, 'cause that's what I've been told I do quite often - well then...so be it...but this music is so fantastic, it makes me lose my sense of anything - time, place, grammar (which, let's face it, I didn't have much of  anyway) - 

Some slow drag drugged-up jazzy blues haze of sound floats through the speaker...'Bali'...and the thing is...this is the thing: I don't know of another group that managed to absolutely perfect this kind of fusion, aside from Miles, you might say, but in a different manner, of course. 

Sure, there are many treasures yet to be discovered, children, and I say go forth and find them, for me, and if you do, write back from your travels through the forest of files - 'cause I can't believe there's anything to compare with this. Not that you will write, I understand, there's so little time, and none for 'comments' - and what feels like a lifetime ago I did say I'm glad not have loads of comments to deal with because they'd take up more of my precious time, time that could be spent listening to G.I.N.C, or watching telly, 

or rambling  > > > > >

> > > > in the countryside, which I love to do, because it relieves me of the weight of urban existence in the form of traffic, overcrowded transport, & overcrowding generally - people are OK but, you know, in small doses, which is one reason I hate big concerts, or 'gigs', as I believe they're known, because who wants to be amongst thousands of sheeple bleating their appreciation of a Rock/Jazz (exception, if Charlie Parker came back tomorrow & played there would be thousands in attendance, I suppose, and I'd be one of them, but can you imagine Bird playing an arena?! No, neither can I), Dance (urgh), Reggae band - no. 

Perhaps you and me appreciating this music doesn't amount to a hill of beans, but so what? It's our thing, and we wouldn't swap it for all the tea in China or anything by Lana Del Ray, certainly, would we? 

Listen Hear

This is the reissue vinyl version of Niente that The Roundtable label have just produced, and it's gone already since only 500 were pressed.

But you can Listen Hear

Miscellany: blogging tips > mad as hell > comments > photo

.............what made the blog? What was it made of? So he went on / scrutinizing / & thinking > ???!!!!!!%=+&XXX???+*£!!!!!! , (represents thinking)

.........................he was growing tired of the process and thought 'Fuck it!' - then thought: 'No, carry on' >>>

TAKE ADVANTAGE OF YOUR NETWORK

PROMOTE YOUR BLOG’S URL

DON’T IGNORE SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION

All of these tips assume that you’ve already got great awful content — which is easily the number one way to get >no< visitors to your blog. If you don’t have great content, you’re just wasting your time. The visitors will leave just as quickly as the came, and you’ve quite likely lost a chance to get them back. If you do have great content, though, you may not have to do anything >something< else. People will >not< talk and link and promote you themselves.

So focus first on posting stuff >that's< worth>less< reading before you start trying to get people to read it. You won’t be disappointed!

'Priceless advice. I have already used one of your strategies. Everyone can benefit from making them a part of their blogging strategy.'

'Thanks very much! Very helpfull for those of us (me) who are just getting into the world of blogging!'

Please leave your comments here... 

A good snapshot stops a moment from running away...

All My Friends Are Dead / How To Overcome Discouragement

The Black Corridor - Michael Moorcock (Mayflower 1969)

Abtu Anet - Gultskra Artikler (Miasmah)

Music of Gultskra Artikler is a chaos, some village with dusty forgotten things. It’s like a mosaic, fanciful designs on an old trunk. You examine it, draw something and add new elements. They shimmer in the sunlight, you feel its rough edges and specks. - Alexey Devyanin 

Alexey describes his music so well that I don't need to say another word. But I will. I'll say a few more words, although the line 'Writing about music is like dancing about architecture' never felt more appropriate. Only a musician with a grudge about music criticism would come up with that line anyway. And what do musicians know about writing anything other than music? John Cage knew about writing - he knew it could be abstract and make more sense than 'proper' writing. 

Collage...mosaic is as good a word for Devyanin's music. Acoustic guitar, piano, samples, unnameable sounds, folkloric melodies from 78s in an old trunk in the attic...the dusty cosmic drift of time...particles of sound arranged in such a way as to evoke Tarkovsky's Zone, perhaps...the artist as stalker, bringing back alien artefacts. In the locked groove crackle of this music, anything is possible...

He doesn't even have a Wikipedia entry...he's off the map in the modern sense...

This music is unstoppable, by which I mean I literally cannot bring myself to turn it off...because it is not instantly knowable...each track is a Russian doll containing seemingly infinite pieces...all of which can only be extracted by repeated plays. So I play it again. In this age of restless clicking, it's miraculous that this music  not only demands sustained attention but gets it from me. I am, as much as anyone else, a restless listener...playing parts of tracks, skipping some, almost listening to whole pieces before the thought of something else draws me away.

Time seems to change in Devyanin's world, just as it does in Tarkovsky's, and whilst he created visual poetry in 'Stalker', Devyanin achieves something like the sonic equivalent here.

You can listen here. 

My Own Particular Opinions & Fancies inc An Antidote To The Consumer Society Blues

New day.
New post.
New picture for you that I took whilst on holiday. Martin Parr, eat your heart out...

Here's an album...

You can get it if you really want it.


Quote of the week:

For what is all this but my own particular opinions and fancies?

Recent scene in a bar: 

LJ tells a woman that I write a blog. Woman opens her Nokia cell phone and searches for it. 

'What's Slant Azymuth?' She says. 

'Music', I reply. 

She laughs: 'I've never heard of them!'

Well, what a surprise...

Here's a man conducting tape recorders...

Righteous words from Kurt...

Call me old-fashioned, but I believe this to be true. I believe a lot of troubled folk would be more content if they wrote, painted, played music etc. Simply singing in the shower or dancing to the radio (it didn't help Ian Curtis) wouldn't do the trick, though. Tapping into the creative source within is more satisfying than just consuming, feeding the beast that is never satiated. Yes, we all crave material goodies, but since most of us don't achieve the 'dream' life in that sense, self-expression in any art form is a fine antidote to the consumer society blues.

Slant Azymuth - Slant Azymuth

The cult of Pre-Cert gathers pace - it's now liked by 152 people on Facebook which, let's be honest, is the one true measure of popularity in the modern world. Their albums sell out every time - how about that? OK, they only press a handful...400, perhaps, which is one sure way to create a smug sense of satisfaction when your industry is not cottage, but more Wendy House. That's a good thing, isn't it? Small is beautiful. And there's a small amount of music here, about 34mins-worth.
The starter, 'Gray Equidae', could be an outtake from Pierre Henry's Variations Pour Une Porte. Then comes the Grand Guignol horror theatrics of 'Intervision 1', a black metallic beast, all thundering drums and soaring (or sawing) noise. 'Helicial Scan' scrapes out your brain and serves it up for a voodoo ritual during which there's much wailing from a siren of sacrifice, after which you thank them very much and ask for more. 'Intervision 3' has a distinct character to it, being more of an electronic bleep construction featuring the extended growling of a carnivorous robot.

I do hope you get the idea. I'm doing my best under difficult circumstances, namely, being under the spell of a sonic concoction with few, if any, direct comparisons in the music world. They close with 'U-Matic Thrill', which without hearing you might fear is a Nine-Inch Nails tribute, although that's unlikely. A driller killer drone with jack-hammer beats, perhaps? Guess what, it's neither. After the dread of the first five minutes it develops a steady pulse which creates a calming undertow, almost soothing, until you realise that the beat is designed to hypnotise you into walking into that basement...or buying the next Pre-Cert release.