More nostalgia - Fairport Convention

Fairport Convention is one of my all-time favourite bands. They still perform although their early album with Sandy Denny Liege and Lief remains my favourite. Denny died tragically in 1978 after skipping through a number of groups. Liege and Lief is monumental folk-rock music:

'To rouse the spirit of the earth and move the rolling sky'.

Try: Come All Ye. The Deserter. Reynardine. Matty Groves. Tam Lin...... fantastic performances.

A beautiful later piece by Denny and this and this. Same incredible voice.

The rhythms of Tam Lin move me 40 years back through time - acrid, smoke-filled rooms, cheap, red wine and earnest discussions about the Vietnam War and conscription. But enjoying FC now in real time with a 1988 Balgownie Estate - Cabernet Savignon - made by the legendary vigneron Stuart Anderson. Great old wine with great music!

Nostalgia - Norman Gunston & Frank Zappa

I had forgotten how good both of them were. Here goes Zappa on the Illinois Enema Bandit. And a totally disgusting version (with Captain Beefheart) of Willie the Pimp.  We miss you Frankie.

Shutting down Detroit

John Rich on Shutting Down Detroit. Its a great YouTube - the music is at about 2'50".  The Anthem of the US Recession is discussed and the lyrics to the song provided..

Bud Petal

This is experimental folk music with some class. Good lyrics, listen! Interesting stuff. I also liked this view of the talking chimp.

Thanks Bernd

Eddi Reader

In terms of contemporary music I have to agree I am out-of-touch.  This is of course a disadvantage but pleasant surprises often present themselves as a consequence. The other night on ABC TV I saw a talented, female singer performing at The Basement in Sydney - Eddi Reader.  She is Scottish and that's about all I know about her. The next day, selecting at random, I bought an early recording of hers - its just called Eddi Reader - and I have been listening to it this evening.   It is distinctive contempory, uncompromising folk-rock (occasionally bluesy) music.

I can't find any poached versions of music from this album of Eddi on the net but there is plenty of other stuff. Try this YouTube for a sample - or this or this or this.  She obviously shines in concert!

Sting: A bitter post

I have an unfortunate, rather negative approach to rock musicians like Sting. They have no obvious musical talents or intelligence and travel the world in their personal jets telling us all how to be environmentally friendly. It is accurate to describe them as hypocrites.

And look at Sting's taste in women. Look at Rita Sting's charming, unpretentious natural smile and the elegant décolletage. Note the way the cleavage neatly bunches over her high waist band-cum-broach. Was it air-touched?

They deserve each other but, surely, the world does not deserve them.

HT: the Currency Lad.

Joni Mitchell

I’ve been busy working over recent days but I after finally receiving a few early Joni Mitchell CDs from Amazon.com I got to listen to them last night. After a few minutes I abandoned all thoughts of anything other than this music.

For some reason I’d forgotten just how good she is. I started with the more recent Court and Spark – mature voiced Joni - the title track is close to perfection. Also enjoyed her second album Clouds (including Both Sides Now) and the rather cerebral, elegant first effort Song to a Seagull – that has her early, totally captivating ‘little girl’ voice with some of the most poignant lyrics she ever composed - here is the haunting title track. Supremely elegant intonations and background instrumentals.

Mitchell in my view is one of the most important popular female singer-songwriter over the last 50 years. She sounds timeless – fresh, undated, with a style of her own.

Here are a few more video clips I have collected. California. Blue, Big Yellow Taxi, Both Sides Now, Circle Game, Free Man in Paris.

Classical music blogs & sites

Courtesy of Saturday’s AFR (the gist is here) I learned of Alex Ross’s classical music blog ‘The Rest is Noise’ – the title is also that of his first book, which provides a guide to classical music of the twentieth century. He claims there has been a revival of interest in classical music has been driven by internet browsing. The classical music business he claims is also experiencing a bit of a boom.

I am not sure of either of these claims – the costs of operating a symphony orchestra are huge - but Ross has accumulated a lot of information on the role of the web and that is of interest. His blog is certainly something I’ll watch. He provides a great list of links in this area also. Here is a sample:

· ArkivMusic – a site selling classical music. To test I searched for conductor Wilhelm Furtwangler and got 216 recordings. It really is very useful and comprehensive even if you don’t buy from this site.

· Arts & Letters Daily – a great general site provided by the Chronicle of Higher Education. It has links to all sorts of secondary newspaper sites. As an example, this is an interesting article on Arnold Schoenberg.

· ArtsJournal – an interesting miscellany of excerpts from the press on music and the arts. As an example, on Brahms: ‘I greet his appearance as you would the entrance of a person at a party whom you're not all that eager to talk to, even though you may have had intense and intermittently rewarding conversations over the years’.

· Classical Domain New York City’s classical music website. Great voyeurism – it is a rich scene.

· Critics and Music Sites – a page from Ross’s site given an amazing range of critical views on a wide range of music. Includes serious academic sites such as the Library of Congress music archives. The latter an amazing resource.

· Music Blogs – a page from Ross’s site given an amazing range of classical music blogs.

· New Music Links – a page from Ross’s website listing sites devoted to modern classical composers and performers.

· Opus 1 Classical – a directory of concerts in most major world classical music centres. Includes Sydney but not the cultural and sporting capital of Australia, Melbourne!

· PlaybillArts – information plus sales of an amazing ranger of merchandise. For example 120 operas on DVD.

· The Gramophone – stingy taste of material from the world’s leading source of information on classical music. You can get the lot by subscribing but, yes. It is expensive.

By the way ignoring issues of sound quality you can subscribe to the NAXOS library of 5000 classical CDs online with 50 new recordings per month from less than $20US annually. It is an good real. Or listen for free to any one of 144 classical radio stations around the world here.

Stereo advice from FXH

Partly in response to my earlier stereo system bleg, Francis Xavier Holden has put his shoulder to the wheel and delivered the first of a series of advice posts on how to buy a stereo system at modest cost. Worth a look, here.

Quite independently FXH offers a hilarious 'concept song' that will ring inner angry-comic bells with most Australian parents. I showed it to my own kids - two laughed and one walked out of the room in disgust. I laughed too but the laughter had a hard edge - I recalled the frustration of 'extracting teeth'-style conversations with youth. What do you think?

1001 albums to listen to before you die

I am reading 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die edited by Robert Dimery. It attempts the impossible task of selecting the best popular - mainly rock - albums since the mid-1950s – there is an equivalent effort for classical music. It has been criticised as a pointless attempt to ‘list’ modern musical culture but I must admit I found it interesting.

Much of the music I enjoyed in the late 1960s early 1970s is featured here (Cream, Donovan, Dylan, The Beach Boys, The Byrds, The Animals, Crosby Stills Nash & Young, Santana, Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Country Joe and the Fish, Quicksilver Messenger Service, Rolling Stones, The Kinks, The Yardbirds, Velvet Underground, Nico, Lou Reed, David Bowie, United States of America, Fairport Convention, Frank Zappa & the Mothers, Phoebe Snow*).

The very restricted character of my pop music tastes is revealed by my lack of experience of almost all popular music since then. In fact I have listened to little new contemporary music since 1975 – or more accurately I have heard it and then moved away from it or turned it off. My tastes became set in the earlier period and didn’t budge – partly because, after 1975, I mainly listened to classical music.

I suppose this is generally true – people develop tastes for a particular period and largely stick to that. Then they complain about the contemporary music of the next generation and praise the older music.

While I have not progressed forward it is easy for me to go backwards to the classic earlier music of the 1950s. As a result of this book I did a terribly bourgeois thing and bought a couple of Frank Sinatra performances recorded in the mid-1950s and now on CD – ‘In the Wee Small Hours’ (a pensive conceptual effort that followed the collapse of Sinatra’s marriage with Ava Gardner) and the gauchely-labelled but superb ‘Songs for Swinging Lovers’. Ah wonderful music – my brain might be turning to soup but these classic performances are sensationally easy listening as I continue the not-so-long march toward boot hill. Let's hear it for nostalgia!

*Dimery’s contributors forgot the extraordinarily talented (and still performing) guitarist Stanley Jordan!

Rock from the late 1960s: A particular state of mind

On a Sunday night sans psychedelics – the kids are watching 'Kath and Kim' and the closest thing to excitement is a rainy Melbourne evening. Yeah, don't tell me, we need the rain. Nothing much to do, so search for long lost great music on YouTube.

I enjoyed this tribute to Pink Floyd’s Syd Barrett (1946-2006). This put me in the mood for some vintage Jerry Garcia (Death Don't Have No Mercy, He’s Gone), some of Mona in an atonal, frenetic performance by Quicksilver Messenger Service and a visual verdict to Porpoise Mouth by Country Joe and the Fish. Oh yes and Frank Zappa crept in!

Ah, the 1960s (thanks to Mark U for correction) – yes I was there and sorta remember.

Stereo systems bleg

I am trying to buy a stereo system of the old type - good speakers, amplifier and CD player. My budget is up to about $3500 but I'd be happy to pay less than that.

I am mainly interested in listening to classical music (orchestral, piano sonatas, opera) though I listen to rock and some folk music as well.

I've looked at a few systems in specialist audio stores and frankly thought the sound quality was unattractive with thick, very unnatural bass sounds that seemed to dominate. Even orchestral music had a rock album 'thump, thump, thump' quality to it and a dullness which you didn't seem to be able to correct by altering the balance. I've heard that the dislike of strong bass sounds is connected to age - it gets harder to hear treble sounds as you age.

I was also underwhelmed by the 'test' recordings retailers supply - obviously intended to make you go 'wow' with the wild sound flourishes - so of course I now take my own CDs.

I haven't bought a decent stereo system for 20 years so - as salespeople are quick to intuit - I am not knowledgeable. I'd be interested in ideas from readers - not retailers.

Is my budget too low - surely not in an era of cheap Chinese imports? Who are good retailers in Melbourne? Are any of the music magazines or online sources of information reliable or do they simply promote commercial interests? What about all this stuff on cables - is it baloney?

Comments welcome.

Luciano Pavarotti dies aged 71

Luciano was a personality with a magnificent voice. He will be missed by millions. Nessun Dorma almost became his signature performance. Look & listen.....and the same piece in with Zubin Mehta and the Three Tenors. Here is a clip from La Traviata with our Joan at the Sydney Opera House in 1983 and in a trio with Marilyn Horne that continues here.

Setting up new computers with musical finale

I've set up new computers (one desktop, two laptops) in my home using Windows Vista Ultimate and the new Microsoft Office 2007. The only hitch that took me several hours to unravel was that the cable modem connection I needed required an ethernet not a USB cable. Everything eventually clicked and was in apparently good working order late last night - I even installed a surround sound system around my desktop to create inspiration when it might otherwise be lacking.

I celebrated completing this task by viewing some rock videos on DVD I bought from DirtCheapCDs in Swanston Street. Have you noticed that CDs are vanishing from stores and being replaced by MP3 files? Music stores seem to sell mainly DVDs. This is great if you are a fan of modern music but the format did not even exist when the music that I enjoy most was around.

The DVDs I purchased were recordings of older performances - I thought they were as good as anything I've seen for years and much better than the bopper nonsense my kids listen to - I know my vintage is showing! The three I looked at were:

The Band’s The Last Waltz was a movie made by Martin Scorsese in 1976 just before the group split up. It was released in 2002 as a DVD. The Band is one of the most talented and unique rock-country sounds that I have heard. Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Dr. John, Joni Mitchell... all joined in with the fun. Extreme musical talent, it sounded - if anything - better than the studio versions of the same material – here are some YouTube clips.

For pure exuberance and good vibes I have heard nothing as extraordinarily vibrant as Tina Turner’s One Last Time In Concert. This was made in about 2000 at Wembley Stadium and she really belts it out in a sweaty, sexy extravaganza. Lots of great sample clips here. The version of "River Deep Mountain High" was good but not up to the standard of the widely-televised version of years ago. I searched YouTube but couldn't find this older version.

Finally, I have been getting enormous pleasure for months from the Roy Orbison and Friend’s DVD Black and White. It is a black and white movie with supremely talented backing musicians. Clips here. Orbison had the most expressive, tragic voice I have heard - why does it feel so wonderful to be moved to tears? Co-performers included Jackson Browne, Elvis Costello, k.d. lang, Bonnie Raitt, Bruce Springsteen, Tom Waits, and Jennifer Warnes, along with the rhythm section from Elvis Presley's fabled late '60s and early '70s touring band. Great stuff.

Song of a Salesman

I got this from Tim Blair's blog - it made me feel wonderful.

Mr. Paul Potts has a wikipedia entry.

Mstislav Rostropovich 1927-2007 RIP

Considered to be one of the greatest cellists of the twentieth century as well as stern critic of the Soviet system. Farewell Maestro.

Try this (really something, even on my lousy computer sound system!) and if that wets your appetite look here.

Everything in the known universe tagged Rostropovich.

Velvet Underground & Nico

The original studio recording of this famous album (the one that was originally sold with an Andy Warhol banana - with removable skin - on the cover) is being sold on Ebay - the current bid is $57,057US - not sure how long this link will last. It is a bit scratched but who cares about that when you are buying history.

I've got an early commercially-released version of the same album - which is also a bit scratched - and I am happy to flog it for $100. I am a big fan of VI and of the seductive, gravel-voiced Nico but the re-released CD version of this same album does me! I remember the late Lillian Roxon's early assessment of this music in her Rock Encyclopedia - 'not for the kiddies'. Of course, as a pimple-faced ex-adolescent struggling to achieve recognition as a newly-emerged adult, I went straight out and bought it.

Update: By 8-45am this morning the bid price had escalated to $100,100US.

Thanks David Prentice.