Henry Kaiser : Requia And Other Improvisations For Guitar Solo (USA Tzadik 2013)

The latest arrival from Tzadik

An experimental improvised solo guitar album from Tzadik, this has some quite interesting and enjoyable moments and covers quite a lot of styles but also has some long and tedious plinkity plinkity bits that don't really inspire me too much, mainly being the 21 minute track 3. A mixed bag  and not the best example of this sort of thing I have heard. Rating 2.5/5.

Sun Ra - Live At The Red Garter 1970 (USA 2013)

SUN RA

This popped up on Nuvoid last week and I knew I had it on the shelf along with quite a lot of the other Transparency releases I procured last year. Nuvoid talks about the historical importance of this recording and the quality of the playing, but he is a muso himself and far more knowing about these things than me. The bugbear here is that this set was mastered from an audience recording and even after mastering for CD still sounds like a Bootleg. Which for me makes it pretty hard to get into the swing of it and makes me wonder why bother when there are so many far superior Ra recordings available, but hey, that's Sun Ra. There is some interesting stuff here amongst the murk and it would have been nice to hear it more clearly. Rating 2/5.

Sun Ra - Lanquidity (USA 1978)

SUN RA

Just arrived.

The late 70s were an interesting time for Sun Ra Fans in that he integrated a lot of the current "Black music styles" in to his recordings and so we have albums influenced by Disco and Funk and this set which leans heavily towards the Jazz/Fusion of the early 70s. This makes for one of the more accessible Ra albums and a good one for those who struggle with his more esoteric stuff. I think it is a great set and the recording quality is one of the best I have heard in the vast Ra discography. Rating 4.5/5.

Casey Hut - 6-7th February 2014

Uncle Roddus tramping diary: Tramp No. 143

Casey Hut 6-7th February 2014.

The best laid plans of Mice & Men. Thursday 6th was a public holiday, the extended forecast for the four days from Thursday to Sunday for the Canterbury High Country was for fine with light winds. I decided to take advantage, take the Friday off work and visit two huts that are on my list. I left home fairly early in anticipation of a longish day. Loaded with a four day pack, I set off from the Andrews Shelter, heading along the Andrews track to Casey hut, which was to be my lateish lunch stop before the big climb up to Ranger Biv, My first nights accommodation. By the end of the first couple of hours walking my boots were starting to give me trouble, oldish boots that had given trouble in the past but  my feet had survived several trips in them with little discomfort over the last couple of years. I had even wet them before leaving home to soften them up a little. After 3 hours I stopped just over Casey Saddle and spent about 40 minutes eating and dealing to the blisters on my feet, using up my last blister blocks and Lectoplast and starting in on the contents of my first aid kit, but  the damage had been done and even with all the padding, things got worse as I approached Casey Hut and by now I had a pretty good idea I wouldn't be too keen to carry on. I limped into Casey Hut after about 5 hours 20 minutes from my car and was so relieved to remove my boots. The pain in my big  toes, where they had been pressing into the front of my boots eased and fortunately showed no physical damage but my heels  both had large blisters. It was only about 2:30PM so I had lunch, scored a bunk in this 16 bunk hut and settled in for the duration, knowing that others would arrive in due course as this is a pretty popular hut. I wasn't at all in the best of moods knowing that my weekend wasn't going at all to plan. To make matters worse, the hut was stifling hot and due to there being only two windows with insect screens and the sandflies outside being ravenous and in plague numbers around the hut, we couldn't really open any other windows. Another 6 trampers arrived over the course of the afternoon, we chatted about the weekends plans, I mumbled about going back out and home in the morning and then I went for a short walk to the Poulter river and tried to stay a bit cooler outside, but the aforementioned sandflies were equally ravenous no matter where I went and seem to develope a very rapid immunity to the insect repellent I was using. Sleeping in the hut was particularly  difficult due to the heat and I seriously considered grabbing my bivvy bag and sleeping outside at one stage but I must have drifted off before I got motivated enough to do this. Things finally did cool down enough in the night to actually allow me to sleep under my sleeping bag instead of on it. The next morning every body slept in till about 9am. After breakfast and packing I attacked my sore feet with what I could scrounge from my first aid kit to try and pad out the sore bits for the trip out. It worked well enough and the first climb out from the hut went fairly well. I made good time in spite of the pain and stopped for lunch just past Hallelujah Flats. The feet were getting sorer as I got to the climb out of the Andrews River and I was finding that my legs were getting more fatigued because I couldn't relax with the pain of walking and the last big down hill part was a killer. I was sooooo relieved to finally arrive at the car but had to make a very quick getaway as I was swamped by more ravenous sandflies. I think I managed to get back out in somewhere between 5 and 51/2 hours. Considering it is only about 14KM from the hut to the car, My legs were quite sore the next day. A combination of the heavy pack and the strain of walking with the pain. Not one of the better tramps I have done. Below are the photos I took on the first day.

John Zorn - Filmworks II - Music For An Untitled Film by Walter Hill. (USA 1996)

And the latest Zorn Arrival.

And the first Zorn CD of the year recently arrived. One of the early filmworks and I have decided this year to see if I can obtain all of his Filmworks catalogue. This set consists of 36 relatively short soundscapes which cover quite a bit of ground as Zorn does, plenty of weirdness and interesting sounds and all quite enjoyable.Rating 3.5/5.

Sun Ra - My Brother The Wind - Volume Two (USA 1971)

The Sun Ra Discography.

So the first Sun Ra CD of the new year arrived this week as I embark of another season of growing my Ra collection. Got around 80 releases so far so I might be over half way now although there are quite a number that haven't been released on CD so I have had to download those ones. "My Brother The Wind" is a cool album title and consists of two separate recording sessions, as do many Ra Releases. The first 6 tracks on this set are from 1969 and at first you'd think you had accidentally picked up a Jimmy Smith CD. All Ra compositions but in a fairly straight up Jazz style with Ra doing the Jimmy Smith on the Organ. All very good stuff with some nice Ra touches and of course some June Tyson vocals on two tracks and some nice solos to keep it interesting. It is far less challenging listening that most Sun Ra. Track 6 gets a lot weirder and primes us up for the rest of the tracks, which were recorded in 1970 and consist of Ra getting quite experimental on his Moog. So lots of weird electronic sounds probably improvised during recording and is a part of Ra's repertoire that is difficult but rewarding and interesting. Rating 3.5/5.

Eagles Of Death Metal - Peace Love Death Metal (USA 2004)

A Band With a Cool Name.

I was chatting to a mate the other day while on a tramp and this band was mentioned, so I dusted off my copy of their debut album and had another listen. I originally bought this because it is a spin off band of Queens of The Stoneage and I was right into them at the time. So this album will probably appeal to QOTSA fans. It is a cool groovy blend of grungy stoner rock and will not at all satisfy Death Metal fans. I wouldn't say this is an outstanding album, it is a set  of very competent songs from some quality musos but kinda sounds all the same on casual listening. The other day I struggled to connect with it but am enjoying it more tonight on the headphones. Some good guitar riffing going down. Rating 3/5.

Public Image Limited - Flowers Of Romance (UK 1981)

Classic Albums from My Past.

PIL's third studio album and with out Jah Wobble it is quite an anomaly in the PIL discography. Percussion heavy and quite stark bordering on avant-garde, it took me by surprise back in the day but it certainly is a very cool album and you'll not find many others like it. "Banging the Door" and "Go Back" are the most accessible songs and are classic examples of the fertile Post-Punk scene in the UK in the early 80s. The album has held up well across the years and I appreciate it's weirdness more now than I did in my youth. Rating 4/5. 

Various Artists - Pebbles Volumes 1-10 (USA 1960s)

New Arrivals

Sixties Garage Rock bliss with the first 10 volumes of the legendary Pebbles compilations arriving in the post last week. I have mentioned before that the first two volumes I had on vinyl way back in my younger days and they were important collections for me and my peer group. Chocked full of what are now for me classics, it is wall to wall bliss listening to those first volumes again now, with volume one kicking things off with my all time favourite Garage Rock track, the mighty "Action Woman" by The Litter. After all the garage comps I have heard since, this song has never  been topped. The Pebbles series extended to around 20 volumes with over a hundred related compilations but the first 10 are enough for me and as I said you'd be hard pressed to top the first volumes. The other eight volumes I have are new to my ears but with repeated exposure I am sure that many more classics will be introduced to my ears from what I have heard so far. For classic 60s teen Rock N' Roll you can't beat Pebbles.Rating Vol. 1&2 5/5 the rest to be determined.