Kevin Ayers in Tienerklanken (1975)

A full episode of the Belgian TV show Tienerklanken (1975) dedicated to Kevin Ayers.

Swordfish fight anyone?

Falling Behind

I´m falling behind in this blog. So much great music is being played and released, that it´s almost too much!
I realized that I have hardly mentioned the new Richard Thompson album here, so I will cheat a bit, and just make a list of recommendations to catch up.

You know what I like, so please check these ones out right away, if you need some more great music that is!

AKODE: AKODE (Gaffer Records)
- Norwegians Johannesen, Høyer, Knedal Andersen with Alan Wilkinson very much alive in Sandnes (Norway)!

Charles Bradley: "Victim of love" (Daptone/Dunham)
- Powerful, hot soul.

Grand General: "Grand General" (Rune Grammofon)
- Prog-jazzrock with Ola Kvernberg on violin and viola.

Kristoffer Lo: "Anomie" (Gigafon)
- Slow, dark, spooky tuba music.

Roscoe Mitchell: "Duets with Tyshawn Sorey and Special Guest Hugh Ragin" (Wide Hive)
- Let´s cite the record company: "Frequently called an innovative genius, Roscoe has a remarkable ability to catch the improvisational spark with a practiced and methodical accuracy." Nice!

Phantom Orchard Orchestra: "Trouble in Paradise" (Tzadik)
- Beautiful experimental music with a.o. Maja Ratkje and Hild Sofie Tafjord.

Shuggie Otis: "Introducing" (Epic)
- Much talked about funky disco-soul. I found this one on Record Store Day (top picture).

Mark Solborg: "The Trees" (Ilk/The Orchard)
- Fantastic album from the Danish guitar player Solborg, with a.o. Evan Parker and Mats Eilertsen. Listen at bottom of blog post.

Splashgirl: "Field Day Ritual" (Hubro)
- Beautiful doom piano trio, with Eyvind Kang guesting.

Richard Thompson: "Electric" (Proper)
- Great rock-and-doom-and-gloom-folk. I need to see Thompson live again! Soon!

The Thing & Otomo Yoshihide

Ah! Watch and listen to The Thing with Otomo Yoshihide, in this video from Austria in 2010!

Otomo Yoshihide is touring with Paal Nilssen-Love these days, and here is (part of?) the route they will follow (taken from PNLs web site):

02/05/2013

Yoshihide/Nilssen-Love

Taxitakeaway/Oslo/NO


03/05/2013

Yoshihide/Nilssen-Love

Bergen Kjøtt/Bergen/NO


04/05/2013

Otomo Yoshihide/Paal Nilssen-Love

Copenhagen Jazzhouse/Copenhagen/Denmark


A few days later Yoshihide will rule Cafe Oto.

Quercus

If you have visited this blog sometimes, you have probably noticed that I´m quite fond of melancholic British folk music, June Tabor included? You will not be surprised then, when I tell you to please get hold of a copy of the album Quercus, named after the trio Quercus, and released by ECM?

Forget what you think you know about ECM records, this is a folk album focusing on June Tabor´s beautiful voice. Tabor´s regular pianist Huw Warren and the Food sax player Iain Ballamy make this a perfect match!

Not that you are going to be able to hear any audience noises, but this music was recorded live in 2006, and they are touring again these days. Wish I could hear them live soon!
The songs are written by Burns, Shakespeare, Les Barker and others, and if you buy the CD you will get the lyrics too, but me, stupid guy, downloaded from iTunes and got nothing but sound.
(Couldn´t find a hard copy in all of Bergen, to be honest).

You may read reviews over at Dalston Sound and AAJ before you buy, and maybe read a little bit about the oak too?

Graham Brice - Sea Song (R. Wyatt)

Graham Brice is an "alternative art-pop folk-jazz independent international songwriter" from Seattle, if we believe the tags on The China Sea Recordings Concern´s web site on Bandcamp.

On the compilation album "Horfes Turn'd Jockies" (2013) he is doing a quite alright version of Robert Wyatt´s "Sea Song", and you may download the full album for nothing, or a bit more if you choose.

Evan Parker, John Edwards and John Russell

I have already mentioned the UK tour of the free impro group Mopomoso.

In this post you may all enjoy Evan Parker, John Edwards and John Russell in Brighton, filmed by Helen Petts 24 April.

Follow Mopomoso´s YouTube channel and hope for more!

Grey (Grå)

Bergen street artist Argus, is so fed up by being painted over by the grey bureaucrats, that he has started to use their favorite color.

Brian Eno and J. Peter Schwalm remix Reggie Watts

In September 2012 Brian Eno was the PUNKT festival curator. He also joined J. Peter Schwalm on stage, to do a live remix of the fantastic Reggie Watts.

Schwalm uploaded 6 minutes of the remix on SoundCloud, for your pleasure, so check it out and see what you think about it.

Reggie Watts is coming to Bergen for the Nattjazz festival this spring, but we still know nothing about this autumn´s PUNKT festival.

Dans Dans: East Timor

Have a listen to Dans Dans´ version of Rober Wyatt´s "East Timor", originally a song on his solo album "Old Rottenhat" (1985).

Dans Dans is an Antwerpen trio, releasing their second album "I/II" (Unday Records) today. It´s on iTunes already, but you may also find all of it over at SoundCloud (for how long I don´t know).

If I catch the lingo in De Standaard, 200 numbered copies of a white vinyl double album version, were released for Record Store Day last week.

Dans Dans is Bert Dockx (guitar), Fred Lyenn (bass) and Steven Cassiers (drums).

Stone Floor Records

I might be a little late here, but I still want to point you towards the new independent Norwegian free jazz (and other improvised music) label Stone Floor Records.

They released three albums in 2012:

- All Included: Reincarnation of a free bird (SFR 001, 2012)
Martin Küchen: saxophones; Thomas Johansson: trumpet; Mats Äleklint: trombone; Jon Rune Strøm: double bass; Tollef Østvang: drums.
Read a review in AAJ.

- SAKA: Cementen (SFR 002, 2012)
Kristoffer Berre Alberts: tenor saxophone; Jon Rune Strøm: double bass; Dag Erik Knedal Andersen: drums.
Read a review in AAJ.

- Universal Indians: Nihil is now (SFR 003, 2012)
John Dikeman: saxophones; Jon Rune Strøm: double bass; Tollef Østvang: drums.
Read a review in AAJ.

So far I have been listening to All Included and SAKA, and they are highly recommended!

Coverdesign on both of "my records" (and probably the third one too): Lasse Marhaug.

Sunny Murray

Sunny's time now from NI VU NI CONNU on Vimeo.

Looking for some jazz videos the other night, I happened to watch a teaser for the film "Sunny´s Time Now" by Antoine Prum, a documentary on the drummer Sunny Murray, and I was happy to see they had also interviewed Robert Wyatt, among lots of other people, on what Murray had meant to them.

Let´s steal from Vimeo:

"Featuring a series of interviews with key time witnesses (Val Wilmer, Cecil Taylor, Tony Bevan, Bobby Few, Sonny Simmons, François Tusques a.o.) and extensive concert footage, the film adopts a European point of view to reassess the complex relationships between the libertarian music movement and the political climate of an era whose revolutionary echoes still resonate today."

And surprise!, surprise! you may watch the whole film right here! Recommended!
Robert Wyatt is on around 79 minutes, under the title "End of an ear".

Lol Coxhill & Alex Ward

Lol Coxhill & Alex Ward @ Just Not Cricket! from NI VU NI CONNU on Vimeo.

I already had a blog post on Just Not Cricket!, a three day long festival focusing on British improv, held in Berlin in 2011.

Someone is making a film on the history of the British improv scene (to be released in 2013!), and a couple of great videos from this one are uploaded on Vimeo. Watch Lol Coxhill and Alex Ward at Just Not Cricket! in this very blog, and run all the way over to Vimeo for Tom Arthurs, Steve Beresford,Phil Minton and Eddie Prévost.

Paal Nilssen-Love & Otomo Yoshihide

Watch and listen to Paal Nilssen-Love & Otomo Yoshihide live on video from SuperDeluxe, 22 January 2013. The duo will play at Taxi Takeway in Oslo 2 May and at Bergen Kjøtt 3 May!

Paal Nilssen-Love has also put together a super band for Moldejazz in cooperation with Sjøbygda Kunstnarhus.

Paal Nilssen-Love Large Unit:
Paal Nilssen-Love - drums, Andreas Wildhagen - drums, Jon Rune Strøm - bass, Mats Äleklint - trombone, Christian Meås Svendsen - bass, Klaus Holm - alto, Kasper Værnes - alto,
Thomas Johansson - trumpet, Børre Mølstad - tuba, Ketil Gutvik - guitar, Lasse Marhaug - electronics.

The Age of Self

"They say the working class is dead
We’re all consumers now
They say that we have moved ahead
We’re all just people now"

I won´t dance on anybody´s grave, but after Margaret Thatcher died, lots of people have made lists of songs "inspired" by her and her politics.
Clive Langer/Elvis Costello/Robert Wyatt´s "Shipbuilding" are all over the place, check "7 Of Best: Thatcher Rants" (Clash) for example, but Dummy chose another Robert Wyatt song, the great "The age of self".

This song was originally released on a 7"(Rough Trade/TUC 1984) with The Grimethorpe Colliery Brass Band´s "Raise Your Banners High" on the b side, in support of the striking miners. The song would later appear on "Old Rotten Hat" (1985).

I have mentioned "The Age of Self" several times already in this blog, and we even had a post on Bullion´s cover, but the song is so fine and some of you probably have not bought "Old Rotten Hat" yet, and we need some Wyatt related stuff in here too!

Voodoo Child

Bergen street artist Argus points needles at capitalism!

Nils Økland in Copenhagen

Nils Økland live at The Jazzhouse (Copenhagen) 5 April.

On the same night Økland also played with 1982 and BJ Cole, and Solhorn was on the program too.
Let´s hope Jazz Peter has got more in store.

How Beautiful You Are

Olivier Mellano LA SUPERFOLIA ARMAADA DEL CRAZIEST MELLANOX COMPANEROS III "How beautifull you are" from Olivier Mellano on Vimeo.

The band seems to be named LA SUPERFOLIA ARMAADA DEL CRAZIEST MELLANOX COMPANEROS III (? - let´s write it in capital letters!), and on piano and vocals they have John Greaves (January 2012).

The song "How beautiful you are" (Blegvad/Greaves) was released on Peter Blegvad´s album "The naked Shakespeare" (Virgin 1983).

Contemporary Music for Horn and Piano

I´m still looking for new records to complete the list of covers made by the Norwegian author and illustrator Thore Hansen.
I got a new one today from @CarlKristianJoh on Twitter, who found "Contemporary music for horn and piano" at a flea market, and sent me a picture.

According to this library catalog post, Frøydis Ree Wekre (horn) and Jens Harald Bratlie (piano) are playing:

Introduction and allegro, op.30, for horn and piano / Johan Kvandal(7 min., 39 sec.)--Sonate, op.24, for horn and piano (Hommage à Franz Schubert) / Trygve Madsen (14 min., 18 sec.)--Lègende, for horn and piano / Marcel Poot (4 min., 38 sec.)--Sonate, op. 7, for horn and piano / Jane Vignery (17 min., 4 sec.)

Thore Hansen´s cover list so far:

Per Husby Septett: «Peacemaker» (1976)
Frøydis Ree Wekre og Jens Harald Bratlie: "Contemporary music for horn and piano" (Varèse International (?) 1981).
Frode Thingnæs´ Quintet: "Samba karneval/Karneval i by'n" (7" 1983)
Various Artists: "Maiden Voyage" (Melodisc 2002)
Kiruna : "Irun" (Melodisc 2003)
Various Artists: "Aerien Voyage" (Melodisc 2004)
Various Artists: "Stellar Voyage"(Melodisc 2005).
Trygve Madsen: "Sketches from Norway" (Pro Musica 2005).
Various Artists: «Drunk In A Ditch - Tales From Rock Limbo 1969-1980» (Rhino/Warner) (2006).
Motorpsyho and Ståle Storløkken: "The Death Defying Unicorn" (Rune 2012) (på tekstheftet).
El Cuero: "Victors Justice" (EMI 2013).

More Thore Hansen in this blog.


Added 14 September 2013 - thanks to Jan Olofsson:

Sverre Anker Ousdal M/ Venner & Kjente - "Godnattsang For Jørgen Moes Vei Nr. 13"/ "Ruffens sang" (EMI/Odeon 1973)

Frøydis Ree Wekre et al: "Songs of the Wolf" (Crystal 1996)


Added 9 October 2014:

Various artists: Jeg har mitt hjerte i Oslo" (Talent 1979)
Trygve Madsen/ Tor Åge Bringsværd: "Det blå folket" (EMI 1975) (takk Olofsson igjen)

Shining: One One One

Shining has moved from "Blackjazz" to orange "One One One" (Universal 2013), but it´s still dark music! And it´s tight, and brutal and more rock than jazz. They covered "21st century schizoid man" on Blackjazz, here they could have done "Ace of spades", because they are more Motorhead than King Crimson now. It´s great music, and should be played very loud of course, but I must admit I prefer my Shining in smaller servings.

Shining is (copied from Wikipedia):
Jørgen Munkeby – Sax, guitar, Akai EWI, vocals etc. (since 1999)
Torstein Lofthus – Drums (since 1999)
Tor Egil Kreken – Bass (since 2008)
Bernt Moen – Keys (since 2008)
Håkon Sagen – Guitar (since 2010)

They are touring right now, but I don´t know if I dare go to see them once more.
Here are some pictures from concerts in Molde and Bergen.

Tour dates (from Shining´s site):

15-FEB 2013
Larm, Rockefeller, Oslo (NO)

18-APRIL 2013
Kvarteret, Bergen (NO)

19-APRIL 2013
Arena, Stord (NO)

20-APRIL 2013
Folken, Stavanger (NO)

26-APRIL 2013
Rockefeller, Oslo (NO)

27-APRIL 2013
Byscenen, Trondheim (NO)

3-MAY 2013
Assymetry Festival, Wrocław (PL)

29-JUNE 2013
Steinkjerfestivalen, Steinkjer (NO)

26-JULY 2013
Qstock, Oulu (FI)

27-JULY 2013
Månefestivalen, Fredrikstad (NO)

Moldejazz 2013

The Molde International Jazz Festival 2013 is happening 15 - 20 July. In Molde, Norway! Check out the program, and see if you like it so far.

I have made my mark in the list besides Trondheim Jazzorkester & Albatrosh, Tim Berne´s Snake Oil, Stian Westerhus & Pale Horse and Norwegian rapper Lars Vaular with sax man Kjetil Møster, and am hoping for some more artists in the improv, free jazz, noisy area later on.

A lot of men so far?

Real Ones: Separation Blues

Real Ones - Separation Blues from André Chocron // Frokost Film on Vimeo.

Divorces and other kinds of separations may be sad stuff indeed, and there are so many sad songs about them, but "Separation Blues" by the Bergen band Real Ones is so catchy you may almost see light in the end of the tunnel! Or?

The stop-motion video was made by André Chocron, who has also made nice videos for artists like Cold Mailman, Jonas Alaska, Pelbo and Mikhael Paskalev.

DotDotDot

Street artist DotDotDot has visited Bergen again.

So far I have found La Linea and Snoopy in action.

Apologies if some of you are offended by finding stuff like this in a family friendly blog like Robert Wyatt and Stuff!

Kevin Ayers tribute in Uncut

There is a nice tribute to Kevin Ayers in Uncut no 192 (May 2013): Allan Jones: "Kevin Ayers 1944 - 2013" (p. 16-20, and editorial).

You get the usual picture of Kevin Ayers being more focused on drinks and ladies than on working on his career, and you get interviews with collaborators like Robert Wyatt, Mike Oldfield and Peter Jenner.
Let´s cite Wyatt: "To me, what gave us the right, what gave us the nerve to become Soft Machine and do our own stuff was Kevin´s songs. Unfortunately, they got kind of side-lined and torpedoed by the live act we became. We always blasted away instrumentally and marginalised these great songs, and I´ve always felt a little sheepish about that".

Uncut recommend four Harvest albums:
"Joy of a toy" (1969), "Shooting at the moon" (1970), "Whatevershebringswesing" (1971) and "Bananamour" (1973). I suggest you pick up "The Unfairground" (Lo-Max 2007) too.

Enjoy the video with Kevin Ayers singing "Falling in love again", and don´t turn it off until you have seen how he finishes the song!

MOdernismPOstMOdernism SO what?

John Russell and the London based free impro group Mopomoso are touring UK this month.
SoundandMusicTV did an interview with Russell on free improvisation. Watch it right here in this blog post!

Keith Tippett is playing one of the concerts. More on the concerts over here.

Tour dates:
Tues 23rd April – Birmingham – Sound Kitchen
Weds 24th April – Brighton – Safehouse
Friday 26th – Oxford – Oxford Improvisers
Saturday 27th – Bristol – Colston Hall
Sunday 28th – Sheffield - Notes & Sounds
Monday 29th – Newcastle - A Better Noise
Tuesday 30th – Manchester - Tubers Music

Nils Økland at Troldhaugen

One of the really good things about living in Bergen, is that you (without much fuzz) on an ordinary Sunday afternoon in April, may go to a concert with the fiddle player Nils Økland in Edvard Grieg´s home at Troldhaugen, some kilometers outside town!
On Friday 7 April Økland played a concert called "Pas Des Deux", focusing on his solo album "Monograph" (ECM 2009), in front of (or rather surrounded by) 50 people (that is a sold out house here).

Økland played fiddle, Hardanger fiddle and viola d´amore, and even if the music is obviously folk based, he also explained and showed his inspiration from punk, rock (Jimi Hendrix), blues and hip-hop (Swedish Timbuktu) (believe it or not!).

And while it was snowing heavily outside (it´s called spring over here) he also played some Grieg for us, in Grieg´s own living room. Way to do it!

Please check out Nils Økland´s solo albums and his records with the trio 1982 (Økland, Sigbjørn Apeland, Øyvind Skarbø) and other projects, and make sure you see him live if you can!

Soft Machine - "Hibou, Anemone and Bear" live

This enjoyable video of Soft Machine playing "Hibou, anemone and bear", live in a French TV studio in 1969, seems to have gone below my radar.
Complete with credits and studio atmosphere.

The band:

Mike Ratledge - Organ, Electric Piano
Hugh Hopper - Bass
Robert Wyatt - Drums
Elton Dean - Alto sax
Lyn Dobson - Soprano and Tenor Saxes
Marc Charig - Cornet
Nick Evans - Trombone

Visit BassLudemann´s YouTube channel for more Soft Machine.

Guitar weekend

So far it has been a guitar weekend.

Friday night I´m glad I chose to go and see Mikkelborg/Rypdal/Rypdal (Palle Mikkelborg (tp), Terje Rypdal (g), Marius Rypdal (electronics)), at the Bergen Jazzforum club. The audience were stunned by the music of Mikkelborg and father and son Rypdal, and their soundscapes, electronica and howling guitar solos.
As an encore Palle Mikkelborg promised an extraordinary Danish-Norwegian cooperation, and you may enjoy all of it in the video below.

Saturday I attended a double lunch concert at Bergen´s music library with the guitar duo Frevo (Pål Granum and Andreas Karlsen) and Kim Myhr.

Frevo played a set of composed contemporary music (very fine indeed, especially when Robert Johnson met Vivaldi) and Kim Myhr played a fantastic (partly) improvised set on 12 string guitar. I was surprised he didn´t use electronics, but had to realize the droning was made by overtones.
Amazing music!

Brötzman/Nilssen-Love DUO

Peter Brötzmann and Paal Nilssen-Love are travelling again.
The video was recorded in Copenhagen 4 April 2013, and the next stops during the tour are (stolen from this site):

5 April - Crescent Music Centre, Moving on Music, Belfast. Tickets.
6 April - National Concert Hall, Dublin. Tickets.
7 April - Glad Cafe, Glasgow. Tickets.
8 April - Cafè OTO w/ Pat Thomas, piano, London. Tickets.
9 April - Cafè OTO w/ Calude Deppa, trumpet, London. Tickets.

Later they go on to France and Italy, and you may find detailed info over at PNL' s site.

Canciones para el monstruo

El Pais has a piece on Robert Wyatt focusing on his Rough Trade single "Stalin wasn’t stalling’" (1981)! It is written by Diego A. Manrique, and seems to have been published twice:
"Un ‘indie’ bolchevique" (31 March) and "Canciones para el monstruo" (1 April).

My Spanish is a bit rusty, but Google Translate might help you too, if your Spanish is just as bad as mine. Here is a small part translated into English:

"There were groans of discontent. Trotskyist contingent and liberal critics like Greil Marcus: how was it possible that such a model company as Rough Trade exalted memory (possibly) greater murderer of the twentieth century? Wyatt hid behind military history: according to Western popular culture, were British and Americans who finished with Nazism. In fact, the Third Reich was destroyed in Eastern Europe. He quoted the historian A. J. P. Taylor: "From the moment the Russians entered the war, had to fight most of the time with four-fifths of the German Army"".

Willie Johnson wrote the song in 1943, and you may read the lyrics over here.

This is the first verse:

"Well now, Stalin wasn't stallin'
When he told the beast of Berlin
That they'd never rest contented
Till they had driven him from the land.
So we called the Yanks and English,
And proceeded to extinguish
Der Fuehrer and his vermin,
This is how it all began".

Hild Sofie Tafjord at Tusk

Harmonicrooms recently uploaded a video of Hild Sofie Tafjord (Spunk, Fe-mail, Lemur, ++) performing at Tusk Festival in 2012.

Tusk Festival also uploaded Hild Sofie Tafjord´s solo album "Kama" (Pica Disk 2007) on SoundCloud. About time for a new solo album now. Yes?

Sult: Harm (Bocian 2013)

Acoustic noise? Anything for you?
Please note that Sult (meaning hunger) released the album "Harm" on the Polish company Bocian Records.

Check out Sult´s sounds on SoundCloud, and watch a video from the 300 Acting Spaces concert series (Oslo 15 May 2012) in the bottom of the blog post.

Sult is: Guro Skumsnes Moe, Håvard Skaset, Jacob Felix Heule and Tony Dryer.

If you should happen to be in the USA these days, you might find the quartet here:

4/1 Milwaukee @ Sugar Maple w/ Burns+ Hal Rammel+Woods.
4/2 Minneapolis @ Madame of the Arts Tuesday Series
4/3 Madison @ Dobra Tea
4/4 Ann Arbor @ TBA
4/5 Toledo @ Robinwood Concert House
4/6 Rochester @ Carriage House w/ Bassin/Borden/Merritt/Gunduz quartet & the Blood and Bone Orchestra.
4/7 Manhattan @ COMA / ABC No Rio w/ Cheryl Pyle + Nicolas Letman-Burtinovic; Bob Meyer + Steven Frieder + Luke Franco; & an open session.