Gumpert / Sommer Duo plus Manfred Hering, The Old Song (side A)

The piano / sax / drums trio format had grown popular in free jazz and related improv circuits in the early-70s.  Von Schlippenbach Trio's Pakistani Pomade dates from 1972, and the Cecil Taylor Unit's freeblowing Akisakila came a year later.  Also in 1973, the Gumpert / Sommer duo teamed with alto saxist Manfred Hering for this record.  While its format and dynamic intensity rivals that of its contemporaries, the musicianship on The Old Song has a very different feel.  Günter "Baby" Sommer's drumming relies less on creating a sense of flowing movement, and more on the gestures of which it is composed.  While the structures rely on pattern and even rhythm, the purpose of these patterns is never to create feelings of propulsion or movement — they exist more as a reference to this form than as an underlying pulse.  Sommer's piano playing is also a bit out of place in a free context — even more than Irene Schweizer, he often employs a lyrical and almost romantic vocabulary evocative of Martial Solal.  Perhaps because he's a guest and not a regular group member, Hering seems to follow the other players more often than he pulls in a third direction.  The trio generally do manage to pull their seemingly incongruous styles into logical collaborations, often with one personality driving.  The lo-fi nature of the recordings is emphasized when Sommer's playing grows loud, as it tends to drown the entire group in the distortion that its volume introduces.  The austerity of the front cover is beautiful and uninviting.

Sparks, Kimono My House (side A)

With 1974's Kimono My House, Sparks refined the eccentric glam style for which they're remembered.  The Beatles influences of their debut are gone, and they've emphasized their exaggerated songwriting, which relies heavily on Russell Mael's impressive falsetto register.  The funny lyrics on songs like "Thank God it's Not Christmas" and "This Town Ain't Big Enough for Both of Us" come to the foreground when sung in this unusual register, but never to a point where it distracts from the rock impulses.  The technical sound of Kimono My House has an odd bit of sheen.  While the drums especially have plenty of impact and the frequency distribution is appropriate and even (some songs are only slightly bass-light), the album almost seems to have a weird scrim over it, and it's hard to tell the technical source.  It almost foreshadows the SSL bus compressor sound that became popular in the 90s.  While the front cover image is iconic, I particularly envy the Maels' fantastic wardrobe on the back cover image.

Eyeless in Gaza, Photographs as Memories (side A)

1981's Photographs as Memories sounds amazingly tiny and bright.  The guitar falls into a narrow range, without high or low-mid frequencies audible — it presents a sonic wash, without much attack, presence, or definition.  The primitive drum machines are not high up in the mix, and their limited inherent punch is de-emphasized.  The keyboard does cut through with a fuller frequency response, with really present highs on some songs that are emphasized in mastering.  They never sound shrill, but they sometimes leap out as the loudest thing in the mix.  Martyn Bates's vocals occupy a narrow space as well, and they're typically kept low in the mix.  Most songs here follow a simple verse-chorus structure, drawn neatly from a pop tradition, only without the prominent vocal melodies.  Occasionally, as on "John of Patmos" at the end of side A, the palette and structure move in a somewhat more abstract direction.  These moments hint at the freer experiments of a year later, when Eyeless in Gaza made Pale Hands I Love So Well.  The blurry cover image, bright yellow border, and hand-drawn font reflect the era and style of the music perfectly, and present an iconic design to match the perfectly stylized album.

Six Finger Satellite, Paranormalized (side A)

1996's Paranormalized adds a bit of clarity and a more diverse sound palette to its predecessor Severe Exposure.  Where Severe Exposure was pretty consistently heavy and dark, Paranormalized includes some more spacious songs like "Coke and Mirrors" and "Perico".  Synthesizers are a bit more prominent here, with less focus on the consistently dense guitar.  The sound, while still lo-fi and often weirdly distorted, lacks the consistently muffled feel that gave Severe Exposure its odd sonic character.  The song structures have also grown a bit more complex, with dynamic break-downs sometimes happening mid-song.  Paranormalized remains a weird-sounding and fairly lo-fi excursion, with a very good mastering job preserving some clarity.  I do wish there were more low-end on the bass guitars and synthesizers, but I can't tell if this was a mixing or mastering decision.  The crazily-colorized four-headed band on the cover fits the music perfectly, capturing both its beauty and its grotesqueness.

Islaja, Keraaminen Pää (side A)

Islaja's 2007 Ulual YYY has always impressed me — it's primitive and stripped-down, but also focused and impressively distinctive.  By 2010's Keraaminen Pää, she's self-consciously matured into a less distinctive artist.  While the album retains her sparse approach, the exposed and bare qualities of Islaja's early albums are gone.  While hardly as bombastic as, for example, Björk, who might be an obvious comparison, Islaja uses much bigger sounds here, and her vocals project with more confidence and power.  It's unclear whether she's seeking a broader audience, or whether the naïve qualities that I valued were unintentional on Ulual YYY.  No matter the cause, I appreciated the tiny austerity of her early work, and the more ambitious sounds here feel like a departure.  Islaja's still an impressively talented songwriter and arranger, and Keraaminen Pää successfully captures some of that magic.  The gestures in which her talent is wrapped feel a lot more purposeful and a lot less exposed than in her earlier work, and that transformation sometimes distracts me from the magic that's still here.  The cover image has also moved away from a rustic appearance and feels more stylish — it matches the contents perfectly.

Kinks, Face to Face (side A)

The Kinks' creative evolution in the mid-to-late 60s was linear and easy to trace.  1965's Kinda Kinks brought a lot more focus on subtlety in songwriting, with songs like "Something Better Beginning" and "Nothing in this World can Stop Me Worryin' 'Bout that Girl".  By 1967, with Something Else by the Kinks, the group's songwriting and arranging maturity was in full display with "Waterloo Sunset".  1966's Face to Face continues the gradual transition and maturity between the two.  Hints of the arrangement magic turn up — they'd be fully realized a year later.  Some of the earlier, simpler charms are here too, like "Sunny Afternoon".  The recording sound seems surprisingly primitive, but I think that's because I have a weird Spanish copy that must have been mastered poorly.  The crazy cartoon cover is iconic — it looks more like a movie poster from this era than an album cover, and the album is certainly more conventional than the cover would indicate.

Jon Mueller, Alphabet of Movements (side A)

2011's Alphabet of Movements consists of two side-long pieces.  The pieces follow a similar form, and each might be drawn from the same process.  On each piece, a fast rhythm of a very consistent sound establishes itself — judging from the track titles, side A was created with a snare drum and side B with small gongs.  Once this pattern has established itself, with both the sound's attack, and the interference created from overtones, a second sound is introduced.  The new sound is a processed, evolving electronic sound, which has enough in common with the underlying pattern that it might in some way be derived from the acoustic sound.  This electronic sound slowly builds in volume and complexity until it has completely overtaken the original acoustic impulse.  After it has clearly established itself as the defining idea, the electronic sound begins a long, gentle fade, which ends with only the acoustic sound remaining.  The recording captures this process organically, with the details preserved in a natural balance, and the mastering preserves the excellent sound quality.  The packaging features nice reverse-stock paper, with scribbled notes covering the front (and center stickers too), and then a sparse design on the back with relevant text in tiny print.

Basement 5, 1965 — 1980 (side A)

For a band as heavily informed by dub as the Basement 5, it's surprising how bright their album sounds.  The prominent instrument on 1965 — 1980 is clearly the chiming rhythm guitar, with the bass playing a secondary role.  The bass also sounds surprisingly thin and clear.  Martin Hannett and Chris Nagle brought some of their Joy Division sonic formula here — the sound emphasizes the punk energy of the group but diminishes the reggae roots that distinguish the group.  While the vocals follow the album's bright sound, the accented English (and song with lyrics about immigration) help to clarify the Basement 5's identity.  Accompanying the three members pictured on the back is established punk session drummer Richard Dudanski, who sounds consistently great here.  1965 —1980 has an iconic logo embossed on the cover, a nice printed inner sleeve, and, enclosed, a primitive but glossy collage-image poster.

Labradford, E Luxo So (side A)

The more ambient music evolves in digital and primitive directions, the more distinctive 1999's E Luxo So sounds.  The palette, which ranges from a string quartet and a piano to what sounds like a digital sampler, always has a lush, rich quality, full of dark low-mids.  The piano sound is especially haunting and beautiful, and the electric guitar and organs also contribute to the classic tone of the recording.  Some pieces still feature Labradford's characteristic Morricone-tinged guitar lines, but the parts that emphasize piano and strings sound more like a late-80s Roedelius album.  While the tonality and arrangements hint at the new-age side of Roedelius, E Luxo So avoids even the hints of cliché that could turn up on his piano albums.  The blurry black and white image on reverse stock paper looks great and fits the music perfectly.

Chuck Berry, The Great Twenty-Eight (side A)

The Great Twenty-Eight collects most of Chuck Berry's hits between 1955 ("Maybellene") and 1965 ("I want to be Your Driver", which is less memorable to me than 1964's "No Particular Place to Go").  It does omit "You Never Can Tell", which is apparently perceived as more of a hit today, thanks to its prominent movie soundtrack placement, than it was in 1984 when this compilation was assembled.  My biggest surprise on listening was the diversity of arrangements.  For example, there are no cymbals on "Memphis", while the guitar solos are illogically loud in "Carol".  The liner notes also surprised me, as I had not realized that Willie Dixon played bass on many of these tracks, or that Jerome Green contributed maracas on "Maybellene".  Berry's tenor sounds rich and beautiful on most tracks, though there is occasionally weird mix EQ, as on "Back in the USA".  I have a 1987 copy, with ugly packaging, apart from the large, impressive picture of Berry in the studio inside the gatefold.  The mastering job wisely preserves the dynamics, even unusual ones like "Carol", but the emphasized treble brings unflattering focus to the hi-hats and cymbals.

Negativland, Escape from Noise (side A)

1987's Escape from Noise captures a wide cross-section of Negativland's conceptual palette.  The group is obviously known for its creative use of appropriation, and tracks like "Sycamore" and "Yellow Black and Rectangular" emphasize this aspect of their work.  Where these tracks bring the appropriated elements to the foreground, other tracks like the notorious "Christianity is Stupid" juxtapose it against a vaguely "industrial" beat that resembled fashionable dance music in 1987.  It's not clear if Negativland enjoyed such hits or mocked them, or perhaps if they thought appropriating a vaguely then-commercial might help them reach an audience.  No matter their motivation, the palette of beats sounds somewhat dated today, and makes their whole approach feel slightly confusing.  Alongside the direct appropriation are songs with more subtle commentary on brands and advertising, like "Nesbitt's Lime Soda Song" and "The Playboy Channel" — alongside the commentary on brand comes a playful questioning of taboos.  There are also purely playful moments like "Car Bomb", which emphasize that even the group's most scathing commentary was meant with purposeful levity.  The sound quality is diverse, which is unsurprising given the range of approaches here — I do wish the mastering job brought things a bit more together, but perhaps that was not the group's intention of the absurd diversity of material.  The front cover, full of text and with an upside-down image, hints well at the chaotic range of the music, and the zine-like insert provides a nice contextual overview of the group's work at the time.

Dyani / Temiz / Feza, Music for Xaba (side A)

In some ways Music for Xaba logically follows the second half of Don Cherry's 1971 LP Orient.  A year after working with Cherry, Johnny Dyani and percussionist Okay Temiz teamed with Dyani's former collaborator from The Blue Notes, trumpeter Mongezi Feza.  While Music for Xaba was recorded only a year after Orient, the change in trumpeter led to a very distinctive change.  Where Cherry was clearly the leader, driving the music and mixed the loudest on record, Feza (who may be best-remembered for his collaboration with Robert Wyatt on "Sonia") falls more into the ensemble here.  He often plays percussion in extended sections that focus heavily on groove and place Temiz into the foreground.  Even when Feza switches back to his natural trumpet, he's not leading here on melodies like "Sonia" — the ensemble feel is really central here.  Music for Xaba was originally released in 1973, but the US reissue did not come until 3 years later (and Volume 2 was not reissued in the US until 1979).  The cover photo of the trio wearing overcoats in a snowy field is amazing, and the simple live recording captures the magic of this group's collaboration.

Hudson-Styrene, A Monster and the Devil (side A)

While the Styrenes released their first single in 1975 ("Drano in Your Veins") and a collection of their early singles in 1982 (Girl Crazy), it took them 14 years to make an album that was not a singles compilation.  1989's A Monster and the Devil marks, in many ways, a departure from their earlier work.  Vocalist Mike Hudson of the Pagans is a new collaborator in the group's shifting line-up, and he receives equal billing to the rest of the band.  The songs are built around his deadpan narrative style, with his storytelling placed in the foreground.  Side A contains a series of short songs, while side B is filled with one long tale, "Jetsam".  Hudson wrote all of the lyrics that he recites except in "Opus 12", where he and the group rework an old Styrenes tune from Girl Crazy.  His voice is equalized drastically, and the timbre hints at the sound of an old phone.  His stories are equally drastic, full of dark, somber events and personalities — many seem to have roots in his personal experience.  The group here combines electric and acoustic instrumentation, with founder Paul Marotta's piano (which sounds like an electric) prominently placed in the foreground.  The line drawings on the cover, by John Morton of the Electric Eels, fit nicely with the dark and brooding content of Hudson's tales.  These songs were also reissued with similar material on the CD All the Wrong People are Dying in 1998.

Black Motor, Black Motor (side A)

Black Motor hail from Finland, and this self-titled 2007 LP is their debut.  They can loosely be described as a free-jazz trio, with saxist Sami Sippola splitting time between tenor and alto in their sax / bass / drum configuration.  Black Motor feels less chaotic and more compositional than ESP-style energy jazz from the 60s, but swinging and jazzier than more FMP's more improv-centric albums of the 80s.  Four of the five tracks even have a composition credit assigned solely to bassist Ville Rauhala.  The recording is even more lo-fi and dirty than most old ESP releases.  The loudest things are clearly the hi-hat and ride cymbals, with the rest of the kit sounding murky and the kick drum getting slightly lost.  The saxophone is roughly even with the drums, but lacks body and distorts a bit.  The upright bass is a bit too quiet also.  The nice black-and-white photo on the front cover gives no stylistic hints about the music by Black Motor.

Trummors, Over and Around the Clove (side A)

I've always enjoyed Trummors's live performances because of their timeless songwriting.  Their songs nicely reference '70s country-tinged folk-rock without ever seeming derivative or dated, and they live nicely in a classic tradition.  On 2012's Over and Around the Clove, the songs are presented with strong vocal and instrumental performances that help their subtle details shine through.  Marc Orleans, who sometimes accompanies the band live, shares the dobro and pedal steel accompaniment here with Chris Zaloom, and Dave Lerner adds bass overdubs on a few songs that show off his amazing talents there.  The recordings, and to a lesser extent the arrangements, reflect the duo's roots in '90s indie rock — the sounds hint at lo-fi, and there are some creative, untraditional mix and reverb decisions.  A part of me wishes the record sounded more like a reissue, and in other ways I like how the approach emphasizes Trummors's distinctive personality — it's nice to feel like a living band and not a stylized exercise.  The beautiful, handmade packaging is particularly remarkable, fitting the band perfectly without feeling referential.

Ken Lauber, Ken Lauber (side A)

Ken Lauber's second album, from 1971, follows a similar formula to his 1969 debut, Contemplation (View).  He's again teamed up with professional session musicians to perform his well-crafted songs, and his slightly innocent and awkward vocal style remains out of place against such a polished backdrop.  The songs themselves still feature hints of narrative in their lyrics, which are placed in a traditional pop structure.  While the Dylan reference remains obvious, the LA session players here, including Larry Carlton, take a more conservative and commercial approach than the Dylan associates on Contemplation (View).  Joe Osborn is the most interesting player, and the increasing prominence of funk bass shows up at times in his playing, in a way that reminds me of parts of Colin Blunstone's One Year.  The songwriting on Ken Lauber also fears a bit more forced the second time around, without the weird highlights like "Undertow".  Even song titles like "I've been a Fool" and "Follow the Wind" hint that Lauber's playing it a bit straighter here.  The recording (by Dave Hassinger, once known for his disagreement with the Grateful Dead and for hiring session players on Electric Prunes record) and cover design also feel appropriate for a commercial songwriter record of 1971.  Lauber's songwriting talent and personality still peek through in places, but Ken Lauber has fewer of the magical moments that differentiate Contemplation (View).