John Zorn - Shir Hashirim - (Tzadik USA 2013)

John's last release of the year.

An all female a capella album not unlike the Mycale "Book Of Angels" volume. As the blurb above states, this is a real mix of influences and on first casual listens the atmosphere of Plainchant is obvious, but there is no actual singing on this release. Instead each track is constructed using the voices as if they were musical instruments. It is beautifully done and there are some recognisable melodies from other Zorn music but presented in a different way. It is most impressive, but I find it all starts to sound the same across the whole set, also I have a difficulty of certain resonances created by the combination and pitch of the voices that makes for hard work to listen to. Makes nice background music and is certainly an impressive achievement. Rating 3/5.

John Zorn - In Lambeth—Visions From The Walled Garden Of William Blake (Tzadik USA 2013)

John Zorn's December 2013 Release.

Phew! More Zorn. Zorn's Gnostic Trio recordings are not my favourites, the combination of harp, Vibes/Bells and guitar is too mellow sounding for me although this recording is fleshed out with some subtle electronics from Ikue Mori. Certainly some of Zorn's more accessible music, jazz flavoured and quite laid back, makes good background music though and certainly isn't unpleasant but not one I will revisit a lot. Rating 2.5/5

Painkiller - The Prophecy (Tzadik USA 2013)

Another John Zorn arrival

The second Zorn release from November, a live Painkiller recording from several concerts in europe in 2004-5. Selections edited into one 65 minute long suit of mindblowing proportions. Zorn and Laswell are impressive as usual but the Japanese Drummer is brilliant and his solos are excellent. Not so much of the Hardcore stuff like their first albums but plenty of more atmospheric and dubby improvisations with plenty of great Zorn Sax. A well put together suit and an enjoyable if not taxing listen.Rating 4/5.

John Zorn - On The Torment Of Saints, The Casting Of Spells And The Evocation Of Spirits (Tzadik USA 2013)

The latest John Zorn Arrivals.

Well, Old Zornie has bee a very busy boy of late(isn't he always) with 4 new CDs released over the last couple of months and another 4 releases over the first 3 months of the new year. That as well as just completing his 60th birthday celebrations and the exciting news about the upcoming premiere of another Book of Masada songs. Looking forward to some possible releases from the Birthday celebrations and the possibility of another volume of the Book Of Angles sometime in the near future, it's gonna be a big year for Zorn Music again.

Anyhow, catching up with the latest arrivals in my letter box, starting with this set of classical pieces. I am really not qualified to say too much about this music but I am enjoying these pieces, especially "The Tempest" which starts off with some thunderous percussion and is carried along by some impressive jazz like drumming.  All three pieces are recent compositions with "All Hallow's Eve" being an impressive trio piece that is quite violent in the last movement. The Temptartion of ST. Anthony is for a larger group and like the other compositions, is keeping me interested. I think Zorns "Classical" music is getting better and better and I am enjoying this set a lot. Rating 4/5.

Another Self Portrait - The Bootleg Series volume 10 - Bob Dylan (USA 2013)

Latest Addition to my CD collection.

The Dylan Bootleg series never fails to impress and this deluxe four CD issue of volume 10 impresses even more, especially the great packaging. 

The music sound quality is outstanding and the wonderful stripped down out-takes and unreleased gems that make up the first two discs is of the usual Bootleg series awesome quality. The extra discs with this deluxe addition consist of a live recording from the Isle of white in 1969 and a remastered version of the original "Self Portrait" album, which I hadn't heard before, and think it is a lot better than all the negative reviews in the past suggest. I'm not gonna say too much more about this as reams have already been written by more qualified than me, but I must rate this 5/5 and say it is a must for any serious Dylan fan.

Meg Hut - 28th December 2013

Uncle Roddus tramping diary: Tramp No.140

Meg Hut - 28th December 2013

From the reports I received after we returned home, our location between Xmas and new year was the place to be weather wise, there had been plenty of rain at home with the local river in flood the day before we returned. I had a couple of trips planned while were staying in Cromwell, although I only completed one of them due to the large blisters I now have on the back of my feet due to boot problems.
I had been keen to check out the Pisa Conservation area and especially Meg Hut after it was profiled in "Shelter From The Storm", A book I got for Xmas Last year and the landscape looked pretty interesting.
I left my car at the Roaring Meg power station on the Kawarau Gorge Road about 8:30am on a warm but slightly overcast day and proceeded up the track through the dead pine trees which linked to the Cardrona-Roaring Meg Pack Track, which for the first 3-4 KMs is just and unsealed road which took us to the Roaring Meg Dam. From there the road turns into a nice tramping track which sidles along the true right of the Roaring Meg Stream. The first section of track meanders through a sea of yellow dandelions over the entire side of the hill. After another 3kms I crossed the Meg at planks Crossing where Plank stream joins the Meg and there is a wonderful place to camp and indeed there was a party of a half dozen people packing up their camp as I arrived. From Planks Crossing I then travelled through the beautiful tolling tussock lands below Queensburry Hill before encountering an old two bunk mustering hut perched in a U-bend of the Roaring Meg. From there I climbed to the Touhys Saddle, where the track almost becomes a road again and links with the Meg hut track and the Touhoy track and another track that heads up onto Queensbury Hill and back to the Crown  Range Road. These tracks are used a lot by mountain bikers and indeed I saw several of them on my travel. From the saddle I traveled the last half hour dropping down 200M to the Meg Hut Valley, having taken 4.5 hours to reach the hut.
The hut is an impressive 8 bunk tin shed that had been wonderfully restored next to the original 1860s hut of which some stonework still remains next door. The newer hut was built in 1958. There are still fenced paddocks in the valley from when it was a sheep run. There is a seven hour route out over the Pisa tops back to Lowburn near Cromwell, which I will do next time but for this trip it was straight out the same way I came in, arriving back at thee car around 5:30PM. The last section down the unsealed road was particularly hard going as my feet were in particular distress by this time. An Excellent hut and a great track.

The Track up through the dead pine from the carpark.

This dude was a bit confused as he was coming towards me until he finally figured out he was supposed to run away.

A sea of Dandelions.

Looking Back towards the Kawarau gorge.

The Roaring Meg Stream.

Still Heading up the Roaring Meg.

The rolling Tussock lands after Planks Crossing.

Approaching the old Musters Hut.

The old Musters Hut.

So Barron and so lovely. The patchy clouds were a bonus as the kept things reasonably cool. When the sun did come out it was rather intense.

First view of Meg hut.

A better view of the valley.

Back of meg hut with the stone ruins of the original hut in the foreground.

Meg Hut

Inside.

Uncle Roddus At Meg Hut.

Planks Crossing.

Lake Morgan Via Crooked River 15th-18th November 2013

Uncle Roddus tramping diary: Tramp No. 139

Lake Morgan Via Crooked River 15th-18th November 2013

So another two months pass before I manage to get out tramping again, mainly due to the weather. This trip was one that had been on my to do list for several years now but again weather conditions prevented it from being achieved, but when I saw it was being run by the CTC on the long weekend of show day I knew I'd have to go.

Lake Morgan and the Crooked River are two areas that don't get a great deal of visitors. With three days up our sleeves, the intention was to spend day one heading to the Top Crooked hut, day two up to Lake Morgan and Morgan Hut and day three along the tops and bush bash back to the cars. Or so we thought.
Thursday Night, 5 of the party converged on the club hut at Arthurs Pass where we were regaled by many a tramping story buy several other parties taking advantage of the holiday weekend and rudely awakening us at 5AM while they left on their particular  journeys. We met the trip leader and an additional team member at the old Jacksons pub, at the agreed time of 9AM, ready to set off on our intrepid adventure. The day was warm with patchy cloud and little wind as we set off up the well maintained track along the Crooked river up to Jacko Flats Hut. Apart from the occasional wind fall the track is well marked and easy to follow although some of the track is washed out near Jacko Flats Hut. We arrived at the six bunk Jacko Flats hut in just over 5 hours and after a couple of out team took a dip in the Crooked River. Although the track up to the Top Crooked hut is now non maintained, it is still in very good condition and caused no problems getting us to that aforementioned hut in another 3 hours. Total time from the Car, 8.5 hours. With only four bunks available, 3 members tented out as the seven of us tried to cook in the cramped small hut. A perusal of the 22 year old hut book revealed very few names that we knew and lots of wish-fill thinking was partaken in regards to the possibility of the morrows weather forecast being wrong.
Saturday dawned as forecasted, low cloud and light rain, we were not going to get to see much of the spectacular beauty of the lake Morgan tops that had drawn us to this place. The track up through the bush is also non maintained but  had been recut in 2009 and was still in excellent condition. It was pretty steep and so got up up high fairly quickly. Unfortunately, it was quite slippery and rocky and one of the team slipped and knocked out one of his front teeth, not much blood to be seen though. Soon after reaching the top of the scrub line we lost sight of the marker poles in the clag and had to start navigating our way via map, compass and GPS. This generally worked well and kept us heading in the right direction of a straight line directly north west to the lake, unfortunately this wasn't quite the route we were suppose to take and late in the day we found ourselves following a stream that some of us thought may lead us to lake Morgan until suspicions set in and a GPS check found us starting to head back down the Crooked River. After course correction and quite a bit of re climbing, we finally crested a saddle and descended  in the direction of what we hoped was the lake. After descending about 150M the lake finally emerged into view from the fog, much to the relief of 7 very wet and tired trampers. Of course the rain stopped after we reached Lake Morgan Hut. A 6 hour day had extended to over 8 hours due to the foggy and wet conditions. The floor of the 6 bunk hut was soon swimming in water as seven sodden blokes got out of their wet cloths and boots and settled in for the evening.This hut book went back 30 years and this time we found some familiar names in it.
Sunday, the rain had cleared and some patches of blue were visible as we set off early so we could get home at a reasonable time. The views were somewhat improved from the previous day but still not at their peak. We set off following the poled route up Mt O' Shannessy, before veering off to the west and over the top of the Morgan river, we had some nice views down the Morgan River valley before the rain and clag set back in, this wasn't in the forecast. After the previous days efforts we were more assiduous with our navigating with frequent stops to check position and direction. This slowed our progress along the tops considerably and it was already into the afternoon by the time we got to the drop off point where we were to bush bash our way down to the cars. Although the weather had cleared a bit and visibility was better, after we entered the bush, things started to go slightly wrong. As tends to happen on bush bashes, one tends to get pushed into certain directions buy the path of least resistance and although the leader tried to keep us in the right direction, with different people leading the group at different times we somehow managed to end up more west of where we should have been but thought we were too far east or something like that and so ended up sidling along the opposite direction away from where we needed to be, at least I think that is what happened. The day was slipping away and we were not making any progress in the downward direction due to the steep drop offs we kept encountering. By about 6am after 10 hours of travel we started to climb back up to see if we could find some way round a gut but the group were becoming very tired and it was time to admit defeat for the day and find somewhere to sleep. Finding that somewhere in the bush on a hill proved difficult and challenging and made for a very uncomfortable nights sleep, if indeed any one got any sleep.
Monday morning as we all should have been rising to start our new week at work, we awoke still stuck on the side of this hill. Thankfully, the weather had improved greatly after some light rain in the night but with little food and water left we were keen to get the hell out.Very fortunately we had cell phone coverage on this hill ans so were able to let those at home know of out fate. A new day sometimes brings clarity to one predicaments and we were soon heading back to where we should have gone down the hill and after a slow and deliberate bash through the bush we finally made the bottom of the hill by early afternoon after managing to find some water and sparingly consuming our food, of which most of us still had some left at the end of the trip. Another trip to go down in the annals of Club legend.

All packed up and ready to go.

The lower gorgy bit of Crooked River.

Some classic West Coast bush.

Strolling up the river bed.

Further up river.

A nice swim hole.

The opproach to Jacko Flats Hut.

Jacko Flats hut.

Uncle Roddus at Top Crooked Hut.

Jump to Sunday morning at Lake Morgan hut

Lake Morgan hut

Uncle Roddus at Lake Morgan hut

The tops.

The Morgan river Valley.