cyberinsekt

Via BoingBoing comes U900, a hand-knitted ukelele duo version of Gorillaz. It is, of course, too cute for words and only a heartless churl could dislike it. I may be said churl, but their version of the Penguin Café Orchestra's Walk Don't Run is terribly charming, even if they do smooth down the original's liquid ecstasy in favour of childlike simplicity. Pretty vacant, but still pretty.

U900 - Walk Don't Run (Isogabamaware)
(alternate download)

The Italian futurist composer Luigi Russolo is one of the most influential figures in 20th century music. His work remains seldom heard, yet the debt that virtually all modern music owes to him is enormous. Russolo was the author of the 1913 manifesto The Art of Noises, and his goal was to free music from the confine of instruments. For him, all sound could be musical sound. Declaring himself bored of Beethoven and Wagner, he called for a new music made from wheels and pistons and valves, metal shutters and doors, mechanical saws, the hubbub of crowds, from the comforting din of industry.

With his collection of Intonarumori ("noise machines"), Russolo performed several concerts throughout the '10s and early '20s. He didn't completely eschew conventional instrumentation, as Macchina Tipografica demonstrates. A rush of wind, the human voice and a stressed and overworked piano combine to make this splendid paean to the printing press.

Actually, I'm not entirely convinced this is one of Russolo's works. It can be found UbuWeb's Russolo page, but most other sources seem to credit it to his fellow futurist Giacomo Balla. Oh, sod it. Whatever the origin, it's a real thrill.

Luigi Russolo (or Giacomo Balla) - Macchina Tipografica
(alternate download)

They've had a number one hit in Germany and are loved worldwide. So I should really hate Amadou & Mariam. I really should. But I just can't find it in my heart to do so. Even though this blind Malian duo's material has proven commercial appeal, it is so full of the joy of music that I find it impossible to dislike. On the gutsy r'n'b-influenced Pauvre Type from their 1999 album Sou ni Tilé, Amadou Bagayoko takes lead vocal duties. His gruff voice is met, call and response style, by his partner's in this terrific bit of west African blues.

Amadou & Mariam - Pauvre Type
(alternate download)

In 2007, fans of the band Negativland found what they'd been looking for. Many of them never knew that it was missing until it arrived. It was obvious, really: what use was listening to a bunch of audio collage pranksters if you couldn't also hear their songs interpreted in a doo-wop a cappella style? Here's the full showbiz cheese of the inscrutable Seat Bee Sate. For maximum pleasure, track down the entire 180 D'Gs To The Future album. Sheer demented genius.

The 180 Gs - Seat Bee Sate
(alternate download)

You probably think that the flute is not a cool instrument. Sure, there's lots of classical Hindustani music that gets played on the flute, but there's also a metric fuckton of dippy folk and dodgy prog. But consider the outer limits of the flute world. At one end, as everyone knows, there is the piccolo. I don't think you can get a woodwind instrument that plays any higher than the piccolo. Human fingers would be too large for the keys. The other end is far more mysterious: a solitary example of an instrument known as the hyperbass flute, 8 metres of tubing with holes so large that they require the palm of the hand to cover them; an instrument that can play below the limit of the human ear.

We're not going quite to those extremes today. Andreas Stahel, another of those odd Swiss composers that I love so much at the moment, plays what I think is a sub contrabass flute, and it is a gnarly beast. Stahel often plays with an almost inhumanly strict tempo. With the addition the extended techniques he uses this can make his music sound both electronically generated and manipulated. Steaming Shapes however, taken from his 2008 release Circular Hocket, is a quiet and meditative meander with the loneliness of Djivan Gasparyan. What's so remarkable about this piece is the intimate breathiness of it: Stahel's instrument buzzes and crackles with the sound of air. A stunning solo performance.

Andreas Stahel - Steaming Shapes
(alternate download)

Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet is a work of legendary stature. Gavin Bryars took a short recording of a tramp singing a simple 13 bar melody, his voice halting and faltering, and looped it. For years I wanted to love it, convinced that it was somehow greater than how I was hearing it. Now, thanks to Singer-Saints, I finally can.

My problem was that I was listening to the 1993 Point Records re-recording of the piece. It is substantially longer than the original, and uses a large orchestra rather than the small ensemble on the 1975 version. Perhaps most damningly, it features a terribly misjudged vocal performance by Tom Waits. I'm normally a great admirer of Waits, but his contribution to Jesus' Blood always struck me as maudlin and unnecessary.

So here's the original, produced by Brian Eno and the first record released on his Obscure label. It's a rather more manageable 26 minutes long, and possessed of a much clearer sound. This is one of the most heartbreaking pieces of music ever made, and the restraint and clarity of this recording serves it well.

The original singer remains unknown. I've wondered about him ever since first hearing this. Did he sing this as a simple hymn, or was there a more tragic motive for his performance? There is an almost child-like innocence in the voice of this broken old man, but he must have known he was singing about the bottle that had ruined his life. Mustn't he?

Gavin Bryars - Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet

Born in Iraq and now based in Egypt, Naseer Shamma is, so I am informed, one of the great modern innovators of the oud, the Arabic lute. This live recording of Illumination is taken from his recent album, Le Luth de Baghdad. It's completely great: Shamma takes some insanely long melodic lines and plays with them in a manner which would put most western raga-folk guitarists to shame. This is fascinating music, complex and ever-changing, almost entirely devoid of repeated phrases. Not only that, he gets the entire audience to clap along off the beat, making the whole affair sound as if it's some distant cousin of qawwali. It would be all too easy to listen to the surface sounds of Illumination and categorise it as some familiar middle-eastern manifestation of "the other". But make no mistakes, this is not comfortable listening: it is deep, challenging and rewarding.

Naseer Shamma - Illumination
(alternate download)

It's been months since I last put one of my own tracks up on the blog, so here's another. 4'05" is a happy piece of nonsense made entirely out of sine waves and clicks. I remain rather fond of the way everything seems just that bit too fast, and all the notes seem to tumble over each other in their rush to get out. It's structurally flawed and entirely trivial, but this still makes me smile whenever I play it back.

Dktr - 4'05"
(alternate download)

It's been nearly 50 years since Ornette Coleman's Free Jazz was released, and the name has stuck. You know what you're getting with free jazz: a mainly improvised music free from restrictions of tempo and tonality, yet something that is still recognisably jazz. It makes me wonder why the term "free rock" has never been so eagerly adopted. It seems like it should be a useful descriptor. Surely there's music out there that fits the bill?

There is, and The Rail Gun Ensemble play it. I'd never heard of them until a few days ago, but they've been performing since 1998. They are not pretty and they are not fashionably underground. They are simply unknown. Shadowfaxmachine is taken from their upcoming tenth album, 10. That's pretty astounding of itself: 10 albums and virtually no recognition. There's only one thing that keeps a band going though that: the music. It's all about the music. Shadowfaxmachine is terrific stuff, with its spirit of '76 chromatic guitar and its brooding menace. It's some of the most exciting new music I've heard in ages, and it is, without a shadow of a doubt, free rock.

The Rail Gun Ensemble - Shadowfaxmachine
(alternate download)

The sounds that Charlemagne Palestine makes on Timbral Assault, from his 1998 album Godbear, could be considered impossible. Palestine himself considered them to be so. That was until he was introduced to the Imperiale Grand Bösendorfer piano, and with it whole new possibilities of swirling overtones became available.

Timbral Assault, at only 9 minutes long, could rightly be described as one of the classics of 20th century minimalism. It's a multicoloured sonic tapestry, a rainbow of sound. Not to put too fine a point on it, it's one hell of a headfuck.

Charlemagne Palestine - Timbral Assault
(alternate download)

There was a time when if you wanted faux naive passive-aggressive petulance, then you wanted Buzzcocks. It was that simple. Nothing else would quite fit the bill. By the time their third album rolled along, the 1979 release A Different Kind of Tension, things were starting to get a little more complicated. Songs were getting more ambitious, and musically the dual songwriters of Steve Diggle and Pete Shelley were starting to pull in different directions.

I Believe was one of Shelley's songs: wordy, perhaps slightly pretentious, but occasionally brilliant. "It's the aim of existence to offer resistance to the flow of time," he sings, as he jettisons beliefs and baggage before balefully chanting "There is no love in this world any more" for three whole minutes as things build to an emotional climax. It's a great piece of artifice. It's also worth noting the performance of John Maher, one of the most underrated rock drummers of all time. He might be low in the mix, but his contribution is fantastic, especially when bassist Steve Garvey starts playing in double time. But Shelley is the star here; as evidenced by he way he makes the final section such a compelling ride. Magic stuff.

Buzzcocks - I Believe
(alternate download)

File this one under Damned Things. There's no way should Passage to Hades should exist. Jah Wobble and Evan Parker playing together? Really? Yet on the title track from their 2001 album they mine a rich free jazz groove that works amazingly well. Wobble takes his dub-influenced bass riff and sits back on it, laying down a rock steady foundation for Parker and various assorted guests to build the music. Parker's long, searing, warbling sax lines cut through, crossing the beat in ever changing ways with subtle textural modulations. Add some harmonica and bagpipes into the mix, and what could have been an almighty mess of musical novelties turns out to have deep, deep, deeply satisfying results.

Jah Wobble & Evan Parker - Passage to Hades

Drop dead tired tonight, so just a quick thing for you. It's another trip into the microtonal world of Syzygys. You know how there's a tendency to intellectualise about microtonality? I somehow don't think Syzygys did that. They may be using the devil's own intervals, but there's a happy, almost easy listening vibe about them. Harimao Hunters is their take on Celtic fiddle music, and while there's a terrible cheesy break near the end of it, the rest of this is exultant and lovely. But what were they thinking? Oh, taste and decency be damned, I like this anyway.

Syzygys - Harimao Hunters
(alternate download)

Okay, imagine there's a septet including players such as Freddie Hubbard, Bill Evans, Roy Haynes and Eric Dolphy. Sounds great, yeah? And then suppose that they combine to play one of the most beautiful tracks ever recorded. Too good to be true, surely? If it really exists, why haven't you heard of it?¹ It might just be because you're unfamiliar with Oliver Nelson.

Nelson assembled this stellar band for his 1961 album The Blues and the Abstract Truth, a record that was destined for greatness from the very moment it was christened. It opens with the aforementioned Stolen Moments, and believe me, my words aren't going to do this one justice. It's sunlight pouring over a mountain lake. It's your lover's face caught in profile when you're half asleep. It's filling your lungs with air in the chilly dawn.

1. Oh, I know you have heard of it. I was referring to everyone else.

Oliver Nelson - Stolen Moments
(alternate download)

Once you get past the name of today's track, what you'll find is a rather excellent bit of freeform psychedelia, with a strong middle-eastern bent. Don't be lulled into complacency by this track, or you'll be ill prepared for the wake up call part way through. Shalabi launches into one of the most completely mental Acid Mothers Temple-style guitar solos you'll ever hear, and this mother is LOUD. It's taken from his 2008 album Eid.

But I've got to get back to the matter of the name. Why did Shalabi call it Jessica Simpson? Maybe he had a crush, and this was his way of getting her attention. It's as good a guess as any. In my teenage years, I called one of my more experimental electronica pieces Kenny Dalgleish with the sole idea that this would somehow persuade John Peel to play it on his radio show. A rubbish idea, as I never had the bottle to post a copy to him.

Sam Shalabi - Jessica Simpson
(alternate download)

If you're the sort of listener who gets excited about detuned pianos and industrial percussion then you need to turn an ear to the music of composer Annie Gosfield. Here's one of her early works, taken from the 1998 album Burnt Ivory and Loose Wires. Nickolaievski Soldat is a musical assault, full of fury and sorrow. Where it sits in the western classical tradition I couldn't say. It's certainly closer to that than to anything else, yet she seems to owe some sort of debt to the more experimental side of post-punk. Whatever you choose to make of this, it's exciting stuff.

Annie Gosfield - Nickolaievski Soldat
(alternate download)

Here's what I know about R. D. Laing:

• He was a infamous Scottish psychiatrist and cultural icon
  
• He was on telly a fair bit when I was a kid and had a great voice
  
• He believed that much mental illness was not biological in nature
  
• (and thus probably believed it shouldn't be called mental "illness" at all)
  
• He could turn his hand to cocktail piano when the mood struck

It's that last point that brings us this extraordinary oddity, Laing performing a solo instrumental version of It's a Long Way to Tipperary, as featured on the seminal compilation album Miniatures. A bit of quick research indicates this is not his only recording. There's an entire album out there called Life Before Death where he reads his poetry to a musical accompaniment. Needless to say, I would love it if anyone could point me in the direction of a recording of what sounds like a sublime curiosity. Meanwhile, let this whet all our appetites.

R. D. Laing - Tipperary
(alternate download)

When you listen to HEALTH, you know why they need the CAPITALS. HEALTH make LOUD NOISE. HEALTH ride the twin mounts of ASYMMETRY and SQUALL headlong into an ELECTRONIC STORM CLOUD and come out the other side WASTED and GRINNING. The industrial math/noise rock of In Heat is the opening track from their 2009 album Get Color and it is, as they say, A REAL BLAST.

HEALTH - In Heat
(alternate download)

Let's get one thing out of the way first: this is more Swiss music. There, I've said it. You can go away now if you want. It seems Swiss music isn't for everyone. Some people are scared of it. It's only fair to let those weak-bellied souls leave for less threatening websites before we get down to the business of listening to Débile Menthol.

Much RIO - that's Rock In Opposition, the label often applied to bands such as Henry Cow and Univers Zéro - can be rather austere, forbidding stuff. Spacio-Cib is not like that. Spacio-Cib is like a kitten careering about the room, rebounding off surfaces and making sudden turns. For all of its density and dissonance, it is playful and rather madcap. Wholeheartedly avant-garde it may be, but it is decidedly accessible and even lovable stuff. It's taken from the band's debut album, the 1981 release Emile au jardin patrologique, which was the first record released on the excellent RecRec label. Top stuff.

Débile Menthol - Spacio-Cib
(alternate download)

Didn't I promised you some crumhorn a week or so ago? It's time to make good on that.

It's been years since I last heard Gryphon's 1974 prog-folk-medieval opus Midnight Mushrumps. Not my usual sort of indulgence, these days. Not really my sort of indulgence even when I used to listen to it more often. But if you can put aside minor quibbles like taste and decency, I have to say: it really does sound rather splendid. You've got pipe organ, recorder, bassoon, timpani and yes, a crumhorn all joining the fray for a vast, overblown and undeniably epic piece of mid-'70s silliness. I mean, come on, they wore velvet and brocade on the album covers, and looked like a bunch of wizards: you can't pretend that this isn't ludicrousness of the highest water. But you know what? It's magnificent. It's a rich sonic tapestry, dynamic and startlingly coherent. I think I shall have to listen to it again.

Gryphon - Midnight Mushrumps