"Blue" Gene Tyranny & Peter Gordon - Trust In Rock (review only - brand new release of 1976 archive recordings)

Couldn't resist grabbing a copy of this when it came to my attention on Boomkat a couple of weeks back.  I knew that Robert Sheff, aka "Blue" Gene Tyranny had released his own records on the Lovely Music label as well as playing with Robert Ashley on Private Parts (The Record), and I'd heard little snippets of Tyranny's stuff; ditto for Peter Gordon, whose LP Star Jaws appears to have been the first release when Lovely Music was set up by Ashley.  Now that I've heard this archival concert recording, though, Tyranny & Gordon's debut albums make a lot more sense in context.

Both men were around in the Bay Area new music scene of the mid 70s, and as Unseen Worlds note in their explanation of this release, "by 1976, the idea of a capitalized 'New Music' had increasingly lost its punch for Tyranny and Gordon. Rock and Roll, likewise, was nearing an apparent generational expiration."  What they envisaged, and put into practice with a group of like-minded musicians, was something that would combine and refresh both genres.  As Unseen Worlds' description continues: "The way out of this impasse was trust in rock, which was both description and command. Rock, for this all-star cast of Bay Area heads, became a perpetual revolution that could be serious, playful, polemic, focused, technical, and lovely."

What is now available, then, is two hours of live music, firstly four of Tyranny's pieces, then five of Gordon's.  The opener Without Warning starts out as a normal rock song, with vocals (as on all the other vocal track) by Patrice Manget, and then just goes on and on. For 20 minutes.  There's elements of funk and jazzy touches, and a sort of minimalism that takes the small-group approach of early Philip Glass but nowhere near as repetitive.  It's maybe a kind of progressive rock, but without any pretentiousness.  Sometimes it's just absolutely lovely, with Next Time Might Be Your Time (the eventual opening track on Tyranny's first album) sounding in places like a reimagining of My Sweet Lord, had Harrison been influenced by Dale Carnegie rather than Krishna Consciousness.  

As a whole, and in a similar time frame, Trust In Rock could perhaps be compared to Henry Cow, but infinitely more accessible.  The furthest "out" this music really goes is Gordon's closing track Intervallic Exapansion, which is 27 minutes of churning minimalism, but still in a jazz-rock context.  Just have a listen at the link below, this music is absolutely wonderful - huge kudos to Unseen Worlds for making it available.  This is hands down my favourite archive release of 2019, unless something else truly stunning comes out to beat it.

Listen online and/or buy 2CD/3LP/dl here.