Vinyl, Webern & Cecil Taylor

Putting a record on...once an ancient pastime but one that's no longer the sole preserve of us older generations thanks to the vinyl revival. I hear people also buy records and never play them, preferring the MP3, which seems perverse but does demonstrate the allure of the old format and I'm not knocking anyone who does it. Let he who is without sin cast the first stone. I've bought albums before and only played them once or twice but listened to the file many times. We're all aware of the advantages; the ease of skipping tracks and...that's just about the only one I can think of, unless the speakers hooked up to your computer are better than those with the hi-fi.

One advantage with vinyl is that it creates sound away from this screen. The issue most of us have is screen addiction, to the point where all life emanates from them, large or small. So the simple feat of creating another source of entertainment, from another place, feels like a significant change, a break from total slavery to the machine. The sound is also better, a fact that has little to do with vinyl's superiority over digital but simply the weight delivered by my trusty old Wharfedale speakers, which do just as good a job if I'm playing CDs.

I've never been keenly attuned to sound quality variations, unlike those who wage war over the issue whilst no-one appears victorious. As a sound technician once said, vinyl won't sound 'better' if your equipment is not up to scratch. Scratches of another kind are also part of vinyl's appeal to some. I understand the nostalgia of well-worn vinyl, having spent a few years listening to reggae singles played in The Elephant's Head, Camden, their grooves seemed to carry in them the very essence of time, history and for some of us, memory. 

Dirt on one side of the Webern box pictured above stopped the needle in its tracks twice. This was remedied by finding the grime and holding my fingernail over it as the record spun. I now have very old dirt under my nail and should really give it a scrub, but since I'm already infected with a virus, it hardly seems worth worrying about.

The dirt, grime, dust, smears, fingerprints, creases and tears of the old music carriers are also pleasing to me. I can't help but ponder the history of the Webern box, where it's been since 1978...how many homes? Perhaps only one. Did the owner die, or simply change over to CDs? How did it end up in the Kentish Town charity shop? Webern's history regarding the Hitler regime is not a noble one. As cited in Alex Ross' The Rest Is Noise, when Germany invaded Norway and Denmark he declared:  'Each day becomes more exciting. I see such a good future.'  Well, it is anyone's right to refuse the music of the politically suspect, but I choose not to do so.

On the subject of sound in various forms Cecil Taylor, in the 1965 Downbeat interview used as sleeve notes for this album, suggested that the way 'high fidelity is used falsifies by compensating for the weaker musicians'. He said this whilst discussing pianist Bill Evans and bassist Scott LaFaro whose playing, he believed, was enhanced, or 'falsified', by recording techniques. Ouch. So accusations that weak artists are compensated for by studio engineering are nothing new. The difference being that Taylor was taking a swipe at extremely accomplished musicians rather than the industry-built boy bands or naturally incompetent singers of today.

If not exactly generous in spirit, Taylor's music just keeps on giving and Nefertiti, the Beautiful One Has Come remains one of my favourite albums, not least because it is an album, double vinyl from 1976. It's very material existence means something though what, exactly, I'm not sure. But every time I pull it from the shelf I feel the kind of satisfaction merely clicking a mouse cannot compete with. It's as if the actual cardboard and vinyl render it...sacred? As an artifact? It's not rare or expensive to buy. No, the otherness of vinyl in the age when I play far more files than records perfectly mirrors the otherness of the music...this rampant, spider-scuttling-over-the-keys, squiggly, contorted Bop in free form...a Jazz branch cut loose to fall where it will and grow into something else, in this case, Cecil Taylor music, a one man genre.    

Here is one of the record centres. That tear could represent the great rip in Jazz around 1960...as if the obliterated print is history although, conversely, the readable part may be history, the definite, clearly definable, whilst the white space is freedom...the imaginary, imaginable universe of sound opened up by the likes of Ornette Coleman and Cecil Taylor in their own ways.

Anton Webern was, as you probably know, a disciple of Schoenberg, therefore a revolutionary composer in his time. In his and Taylor's recordings we hear new possibilities for music, from the studied, intellectual 'freedom' of early-20th century atonality to the open-ended joy of piano keys as a canvas for countless points of colour/sound.  

   

He Loves It When She Quotes Cecil Taylor!

For all you Cecil Taylor fans out there...

Charles Cohen - The Middle Distance (Morphine Records)

'Sequencer, pulser, preamplifier, envelope detector and balanced modulator; oscillators, gates, envelope generators and filters; facilities for mixing, monitoring and reverberating'...what am I talking about? The Buchla Music Easel, of course, a rare instrument owned by Charles Cohen. He also 'owns' it in the modern sense of the word, as this album proves. The language of synth technology is pure gobbledygook to me and I suspect I'm not alone in that. As with amazing magic tricks, though, I'd rather not know how it's done. That and the fact that I'm lazy when it come to studying anything.

In 1982 the Affinity label released a Cecil Taylor album called Student Studies. One track's called Amplitude, a piece of music that has never ceased to amaze me since I bought it back then. Amplitude is a word that crops up in the language of the synthesizer. Cecil Taylor is a name that crops up in the Wikipedia entry for Charles Cohen. Apparently he's influenced Cohen, which makes sense when you know that Charles has spent many years improvising 'live' on the Buchla.

But don't let Cohen's Improv background fool you into thinking that The Middle Distance consists of 'difficult', tortuous knob-twiddling (OK,you may not be adverse to that). Personally, I enjoy hearing a machine being driven to it's limits and have travelled to Atlantis with Sun Ra on more than one occasion. I suspect Charles Cohen has too. Here, his excursions on a wobbly rail, to use a Cecil Taylor title, are frequently tempered by a Pop sensibility. That's Pop as in micro melodies stripped to the bone and driven by the bubbling energy of a Buchla in good hands.

Camera Dance, for instance, played for a 1983 Performance Art piece by Jeff Cain, is so catchy it could have been a Pop hit in a parallel universe back when synths crashed the charts. Cohen reshapes and rebuilds whilst dicing and slicing, dropping to the bare bones of a beat before fleshing the whole thing out again. Like the old Rave formula of tease and release - feel the rush! - but in a far more refined manner, designed for sophisticated cosmopolitan clubbers, on Saturn.

UTEP 1 and 2 are both studio pieces from 1980. They sound more pared down that most things here, but that's no criticism. Less, in this instance, allows the purity and warmth of the Buchla sound to shine through. They remind me of an earlier age, when synths were all the rage as joyful toys for remaking Pop hits or a conjuring up a Classical gas.

'Multiple correlations between a performer’s actions and the Music Easel’s responses are readily implemented, enabling a degree of expressive articulation heretofore impossible with electronic instrumentation.' (My italics). So says the Buchla site. The cold mechanics act of Krafwerk's man machine act are one thing, but Cohen's music is expressive and articulate, just as the Buchla allows it to be. OK, if you don't like synths and feel that true musical expression can only exist on, say, a sax, guitar or piano, you'll find that difficult to believe (and I don't know what you're doing reading this blog). A closer listen (headphones are a must) to this music, however, reveals that articulation.

The opener, Club Revival Performance, is a fine example of Cohen's feel for the machine. Like mechanical Gamelan (?) via Ganymede, the piece unfolds, its rhythmic layers luring us in with patterns that prance and dance delightfully. In contrast, the earliest piece, Dance of the Spirit Catchers (1979), sounds more raw, almost post-Punk by comparison. The insistent hook worms it's way into your brain, whipped on by tinny percussive whacks and wrapped in warped bubbles and squeaks. By the end it sounds as if the machine said 'I'll take it from here' before running on of it's own accord.

As you'll hear on the next release in the planned trilogy, Group Motion, Cohen is capable of taking sound deeper than most of what's on offer here. Not that this material isn't satisfying; it's brought nothing but pure pleasure to these ears over the last week. However, we get a hint of things to come on two tracks. Sonomama's Koto-style passages are brilliantly arranged on a piece that shifts gears in an East-meets-West fusion somewhere in space, with an occasional dramatic undertones. It won 2nd place when entered for the Roland Synthesizer Competition in 1981, which makes me wonder what the winner sounds like because it must be one hell of a masterpiece to beat this.

The Middle Distance track stands out for being far darker than anything else. Exploiting space as the best acousmatic exponents do, it leaves everything to the imagination and is enhanced by Jeff Cain's piano-playing. It may have been conceived for one of his performance pieces but stands alone superbly and creates a similar mood to those made by modern exponents of dark spatial soundscapes such as Raime.

Coincidentally, Don Buchla's first instrument was created 50 years ago, so it's fitting that Morphine boss Rabih Beaini should be releasing this music now. If Charles Cohen's time has come with regards to greater exposure it's certainly better late than never. An essential purchase.

Morphine Records

Take Your Mind - Mixcloud

Last mix of the year. Thanks for listening.

Take Your Mind by Timewriter on Mixcloud

Cecil Taylor/Niklaus Troxler Poster

Finding this poster for a 1989 Cecil Taylor gig naturally inspired me to reach for Taylor's music and I chose Nefertiti, The Beautiful One Has Come, on vinyl, which has a partially ripped label (see below), and this makes me love it even more, lending as it does an exaggerated air of time-worn nostalgia to the artefact. I love to put the needle to a side of this double album, and proceed not to listen. Not to listen consciously, but allow it to seep in subconsciously, as it inevitably does. Yes, I know we all put on music then don't listen, but the nature of Taylor's music is such that is both challenging and easy, ambient (played quietly), yet persistent when it comes to worming its way into your brain. The concert has since been released on CD with bonus tracks, which is now rather pricey, but you can always listen hear to an earlier version.

The poster was designed by Niklaus Troxler who, along with his brother, started running Jazz gigs from their Swiss home in the mid-60s. You can view more of his amazing work here. 

School's Out - Student Studies With Cecil Taylor

The closest I’ve ever been to attending a university: Cecil Taylor’s ‘Student Studies’ album on Affinity (vinyl, double, in perfect nick, still).
   Whilst at secondary school I studied girls, music, clothes, football, and nothing much else.
   What course would my life have taken if I’d passed my 11-plus and gone to the Latin school next door (the irony - placing The Achievers next to The Losers!)? A career is one thing, but what about culture?
   Class and culture were bound up back then. Today, less so, I suspect. As a kiddo from a council house I had to love soul, reggae and even rock. The posh kids were on another track, long ones, consisting of tales of topographic oceans and King Arthur to the sounds of intricate fretwork and Wagnerian synthesizers, probably. How do I know? Well, what are the chances they were moon stomping to Toots & The Maytals or shuffling their loafers to Motown tunes?
   If I’d been with the posh kids, would I have dropped Kool & The Gang for King Crimson? We weren’t into Prog, or educational progress.
   I may have smoked dope instead of downing pints of snakebite, and lived in flared jeans rather than adopting the shifting styles of the street.
   ‘Cecil Taylor is very educational!’ declare the Jazz Elite, who like to think they’ve studied a subject that is profound, and beyond most people. Perhaps they’re right; I may have said as much myself in the past. If CT is a ‘subject’, he’s akin to Latin, or double Dutch, to most ears. ‘Jazz Is The Teacher, Funk Is The Preacher’, sang James Blood Ulmer in 1980. Right there he summed up the extent of both my learning, and my religious experience.
   What does Jazz teach anyone? You tell me.
   What can we learn from ‘Student Studies’? That CT was a musical maverick, unique visionary, genre of one, sonic explorer of the eighty-eights – yes.
   ‘What goes into an improvisation is what goes into one’s preparation,’ he once said, ‘then allowing the prepared senses to execute at the highest level devoid of psychological or logical interference.’ Devoid of those, we listeners may also benefit when it comes to listening to CT. Free your mind and pleasure will follow.
   From Slade in the 70s to CT a decade later, I took a long, strange musical journey. If the earlier phase was logical, what came later also had its logic (from Funk to Jazz-Funk then Jazz). Then I learnt to abandon preconceived notions of what music ‘should’ be by listening to the likes of CT, Archie Shepp, Pharaoh Sanders, Ornette Coleman and the rest.
   Most music comes pre-packaged with a logical mindset relating dancing, dreaming, crying, whatever; this music does too, if you heed the scare stories about ‘Free Jazz’ (labels can be shackles, can’t they?). But whilst wall of noise wailing by the tenor titans frightens off most people, CT’s piano-playing may be more approachable, dare I say, as long as you forget notions of logic, harmony, etc.
   Yet there is a kind of logic to this music, the illogical kind, or the kind that CT creates as he constructs and executes the music. Listening again, I now adopt a Zen-like approach, I let go, and let it go. Here are four men (CT, Jimmy Lyons on alto sax, Alan Silva on bass, and Andrew Cyrille on drums), making music, making sounds. That’s it. I keep the volume down and let them get on with it.
   The record as time capsule delivers them to me all the way from Paris in 1966. It strikes me as a fantastic thing that this is possible. Equally fantastic is the fact that nothing they do sounds that old, and neither is it contemporary. It’s beyond time.
   CT’s debut album in ’56 was called ‘Jazz Advance’, and he did advance Jazz, beyond recognition. It was a warning, but no-one could know at the time. He would continue to advance through many lean periods, but finally reach the point where, today, he’s regarded as a kind of institution, a member of the Intellectual Musical Appreciation Society’s hall of fame.
   You don’t need to be ‘educated’ to listen to Cecil Taylor. I’ve learnt that much.

The Altman Earworm, Relaxin' With Henry Rollins, and Going Home With Art Pepper

I once had an earworm in the form of the theme from Robert Altman’s ‘The Long Goodbye’. It stayed in my head for days...perhaps even a whole week. The way it recurs in the film, as supermarket muzak, and played by a Mexican marching band, for instance, it’s as if Altman could not get the tune out of his head either.

 To my surprise I find that Henry Rollins has been invited to select tracks from the Blue Note vaults for a 2-CD compilation called ‘Rollins’ Choice’. I’d have thought something far more rowdy than Dexter Gordon would be to his taste; some Last Exit, perhaps, whilst he pumps iron. It just goes to show that you can’t always judge a man by his mouth, muscles or tattoos. Or a woman, for that matter. There’s no Cecil Taylor, but Ornette Coleman’s ‘Airborne’ is included, along with Dolphy’s ‘Out To Lunch’. At least the latter conforms to the stereotypical view I had of him. But I still can’t picture the wild man of post-Punk aggression and poetry-with-attitude relaxing at home on his sofa, perhaps with a glass of wine, to Booker Ervin’s ‘Stolen Moments’. What next? Iggy Pop selects Prestige classics?

I’ve not heard any great new releases over the last couple of days. The fact that I say that proves just how rapidly we consume things now. I do recall a time when I bought one album a week, maximum, and that was plenty. Today I can listen to a dozen new albums in one afternoon, and ‘own’ them on the computer. So instead of the new, last night I blew the dust off the record-player and laid a big black disc on the turntable, transfixed for a minute by the sight of the yellow Contemporary Records label as it spun. Then the music took over and I fell in love once more with Art Pepper’s rendition of ‘You’d Be So Nice To Come Home To’. It seemed fitting in the sense that I was going ‘home’ to a turntable, the place where my love of music was born.

Avant-garde Bullshit

‘Avant-garde is French for bullshit’ said Lennon. Well ho-hum – trouble is, devotees of both The Beatles and philistinism have probably used it a million times to justify their failure to give Picasso a chance – ha!

   I, on the other hand, as opposed to the dear misguided hordes of avant-garde haters, do like a challenge. That’s it, in a nutshell (but I’ve no intention of presenting you with something nutshell-sized, so read on).

   When I listen to Cecil Taylor I do so precisely because I can’t come close to fully comprehending what the hell he’s doing, or why, or where he’ll end up as he travels that wobbly rail which he also laid (now that’s no bullshit). Hail the pioneers, I say, and to hell with the dissenters.

   Take Joyce, as I’m sure you have once or twice, and what a bitter pill he is to swallow with his word trickery and grammatical gymnastics. Yet, despite never having read Finnegan’s Wake (oh yes, another one), I love the fact that it exists. Who wouldn’t? Well, for starters, those who get all hot under the collar about the avant-garde. There are types who not only reject the radical but also start to foam at the mouth at the sight of an example. It stirs some kind of hatred. But why, dear reader? Is it because they see themselves as possessing the bullshit detector which Hemingway suggested all writers should have? Perhaps he was onto something there, but only in the name of saving would-be writers a lot of time and effort in the name of creating what amounts to bullshit, I presume. Then again, as a text-worker who has written a few novels I know that sustaining upwards of 70,000 words’ worth of bullshit is some feat.

   Joyce, Burroughs, Beckett, Robbe-Grillet, Stein, BS Johnson, Cage, Stockhausen, Taylor, Ayler, Pollock and other big-hitting bullshitters – take your pick – reject their work, but me, I still applaud their existence alone. I find that, in being challenged I’m finding out something about myself, my limits, preconceptions, abilities etc. And if nothing else, the radicals of culture place the conservatives in context, don’t they? Yes, I know that both ‘radical’ and ‘conservative’ are subjective terms. Didn’t Spector radicalise studio techniques? And we know that what was once thought of as radical can become acceptable according to mainstream taste (I cite jazz, Punk and, hell, even Rock’n’Roll, m’lud).
   Lennon’s quote sprang to mind a few days after I’d dived into Reza Negarestani’s Cyclonopedia and quickly found myself out of my depth (I’m no great swimmer, preferring to be able to feel my feet on the ground, if I’m honest). So the nature of ‘difficult’ works in all areas was something I began to ponder.
   There’s something to be said for not understanding a work of art. And it’s this: the alternative is easily comprehending everything. I don’t know if that’s worth saying. But if some people had their way all music would be reduced to three-minute songs and hummable tunes, all painting to literal representation and all novels to straightforward storytelling. I’ll never forget the SWP member I once dated telling me that her comrades frowned upon abstract art – seriously – as if it contravened their idea of what ‘the people’ wanted/deserved or, more likely, what artists should only produce (ie paintings of smiling farmhands gathering spuds...or miners trudging cheerfully towards the pit). Perhaps they were on to something, after all, the proletariat would not choose to storm the palace to the tune of ‘Free Jazz’, more’s the pity.
   It’s no surprise that from cradle to grave we’re wrapped in the blanket of culture that comforts in some way, even if that comfort takes the form of hellfire Rock’n’Roll. It’s a conspiracy, I tell you, perpetuated by all who control what we see and hear. ‘Nonsense!’, you may reply. Perhaps you’re right...but...the pacified mind makes for a better-behaved citizen, I’m sure. The mind that is not open and enquiring is less likely to challenge the Status Quo.
   When I bought Cyclonopedia I knew I was in for trouble. You might call it an act of pure indulgence in...intellectual ignorance? Of course, there are a million other books on a variety of subjects which I could be sure of never understanding, but this one does flirt with the idea of fiction and apocalyptic vision and I do like a good apocalypse now, and again.

   I can’t begin to describe what the book’s about, so I’ll just quote from the blurb as in: ‘Cyclonopedia meticulously plots the occult matrices of an archaic petrochemical conspiracy’ – and if I could sum it up as well as that perhaps I too would be working for the Chelsea College of Art and Design, as the author does. Instead, I do a fairly mundane job because I didn’t learn a damn thing at school (I prefer to blame the system, the school and the teachers than lay any responsibility at my own door), which is probably why I cannot read Cyclonopedia cover-to-cover, nor did I think I would be able to, and neither does that diminish my admiration for the book in all its theoretical linguistic madness.

   I only have to open a page at random and read a line such as ‘Apocalypticism which fuels and escalates the transgressive impetus of Western war machines, because the Divine and its desert can only be reached through participation.’ to know that it will continue to fascinate me for some time. I may pick it up in years to come and read a paragraph that presents another puzzle. It’s the kind of book which, if you were to transcribe it word-for-word in Word, half the text would be underlined red and need adding to the Microsoft dictionary. The random sentence I chose, by the way, is one of the easier-to-grasp, believe me.

   I think everyone should challenge their preconceptions about what’s called ‘avant-garde’ culture, if only for five minutes’ worth of listening/reading/seeing. Something about testing yourself in this way is, if nothing else, a small act of self-discovery. You find your limits but, hopefully, also expand them a little.



Jazz With That Bacon Sarnie?

So I goes into this food joint called Pod and they’re playing jazz; not just the usual kind these places air in the name of appearing ‘cool’, but some deep stuff featuring an alto player well into his improvisational flight – which makes a change from Blue Note or bossa.

   And once I’d ordered my breakfast I tried to figure out who was playing. Bird? No, the sound was too clear. Art Pepper? Possibly. Could have been Konitz...

   And I got a little frustrated at not recognising either the tune or the player. But then, the solo lasted most of the duration so...you know...there was no tune to recognise.

   Anyway, waiting for the grub I contemplated striking up a micro-chat with the young black girl behind the counter who, naturally, looked bored. I was going to ask her if she enjoyed or simply tolerated this kind of music. But, you know, in all my years of shocking shop assistants with sudden outbursts of communication that go beyond those required for simply purchasing anything I’ve learnt that they can sometimes, well, quite frequently, be so surprised that it renders them speechless.

   Suppose I’m kind of sociable like that. Never angling for a favour, just a quick link with humanity.

   Well, I kept quiet, carried on trying to ID the player, failed, and felt a bit pissed off because, hell, I’ve written a damn book on this music, haven’t I? Still, as I’ve said many times, I’m a fan, not an expert (as you’ll know if you’ve read the book).

   I’m guessing it was music policy rather than workers’ choice, that Jazz. Let’s face it, the chances of anyone in there opting for Jazz is remote. Nobody under 40 likes Jazz. In fact, from my thorough research into the matter, I’ve only found a handful of people who do like it. Although, to increase my circle of friends I am thinking of joining the Lady Gaga fan club. Members of which I do not want to know.

   I wonder what those with no interest in Jazz think of walking in to buy food and being treated to several minutes of improvisation? I really wonder what goes through their minds...’What a racket!’? Or ‘Christ, I hope she hurries up with that roll’. More likely than ‘This is fantastic!’. Of course.

   If there is a form of logical progression in this strange phenomenon I expect to walk into one of these places in, say, a couple of years, and hear Cecil Taylor. A stupid idea, I know...

The Beat That My Heart Skipped

When Thomas Seyr enters the hall for his big audition in Jacques Audiard’s ‘The Beat That My Heart Skipped’ someone on stage is playing what sounds like Gunther Schuller’s fusion of jazz and classical music. Amazingly, in light of the fact that I had just been listening to Cecil Taylor, it sounds like him crossed with Bach.
I’m flabbergasted by the coincidence.
Then I realise that the Cecil Taylor album I had been listening to on the computer minutes earlier had resumed playing, thus merging with the film.
On the DVD case the FT quote calls it ‘A raging gangster film’ although it isn’t that at all. The producers no doubt thought that would attract a lot more (male) buyers than: ‘A film about the one man’s struggle to reconcile his artistic ambition with the lure of life as a morally dubious property dealer’.
Romain Duris is terrific as the troubled soul seeking to put his bruised knuckles to better use as a concert pianist rather than busting squatters’ heads. He’s full of nervous energy; wired into techno when he’s not studying Bach as he walks the fine line between integrity and corruption.
There’s no neat conclusion to this. Seyr enters the auditorium in the final scene splattered in blood; as if no matter how hard he tries his past will always stain his future.

Cecil Taylor - Dream/Reality

Last night I went into a small bar where Cecil Taylor was playing, not with a band, but a rhythm section backing track. He was crammed into a corner, corn-roll hair, staring at the wall, almost anonymous. I was obsessed with what he was doing, but most others in the room seemed more intent on getting a drink and chatting.
I couldn’t see all of his face...the room was dimly-lit...just a weak spotlight throwing a pale yellow circle of light onto his head. I could see no piano. It was as if he was conjuring notes out of the air, out of the darkness in that corner...
The dream made me crave his music when I woke so I clipped ‘Jazz Advance’ into the Walkman and listened to ‘Bemsha Swing’. Was the urge to listen so strong because I wanted to verify the fact that Cecil exists in reality, as opposed to only the dream world? But Cecil’s music is one long dream...of endless intricate possible routes created by notes and chords which, like dreams, warp time and space, and as I listened the sun broke through grey clouds as if to illuminate my moment of confirmation...