Weather Report - I Sing The Body Electric (1972)

Weather Report's second album was another small step towards becoming a fusion juggernaut, and does fill out the rhythmic/percussive base more, helped in no small part by Dom Um Romão.  For the most part though, it was still pretty off-beam and experimental, even more so than their debut (link below), and swims nicely in the primoridal soup emanated from the big bang of Bitches Brew.

 

The album opener Unknown Soldier displays both Zawinul's increasingly complex compositional skill, and his first use of synthesiser, having just bought an ARP 2600.  Wordless voices and guest brass arrangements fill out the evocation of Zawinul's memories of the end of WWII.  Next up, on The Moors, is a sound unusual for any WR record - 12 string acoustic guitar, in a guest spot from Ralph Towner - before the track starts to groove.  A more obtuse composition from Miroslav Vitouš and another great Zawinul tune fill out the album's first half.

The rest of I Sing The Body Electric is recorded live, in excerpts from a January 1972 concert in Tokyo (the Japanese market also got a double-LP's worth, called Live In Tokyo).  The edits here just hint at the complex firepower that this lineup were capable of on stage, but it's enough to still be very impressive.  This was clearly a group that could take the experimental ethos of electric Miles Davis and run with it in their own unique style.

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pw: sgtg

 

Previously posted at SGTG: s/t debut

Egberto Gismonti - Sol De Meio Dia (1978)

Some classic ECM Gismonti in his second album for the label, to follow on from last Friday's post of Academia Da Danças.  Where that album was one of Gismonti's most sophisticated in its arrangements and production, Sol De Meio Dia (Midday Sun) is stripped down to the bare essentials, in keeping with his other ECM releases.  The two albums do, however, start with the same song.

The version of Palácio de Pinturas that opens Sol De Meio Dia is a sublime duet between Gismonti and Ralph Towner.  Towner's Oregon bandmate, and another ECM stalwart until his untimely death in 1984, Collin Walcott is up next, laying a bed of insistent tabla for Raga.  There's plenty of Nana Vasconcelos on board for this album too, until Gismonti takes a solo spotlight on piano for the utterly gorgeous Coração.

The second half of the album brings together four songs in the kind of suite typical of 70s Gismonti, and starts with one of his most enduring compositions, Café.  Later covered by Norma Winstone, here the melody line is taken by Jan Garbarek, foreshadowing the hugely successful Magico trio with Charlie Haden.  After no less than 12 minutes of this, and further sparring with Towner, the suite then furrows deeper into Gismonti's overall inspiration for Sol De Meio Dia: the time he'd spent with the peoples of the Xingu river region in the North of Brazil.  All in all, one of Gismonti's very best albums; can't recommend it enough.

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pw: sgtg

Previously posted at SGTG: 
Academia Da Danças
Circense
Sanfona
Dança Dos Escravos
In Montreal (with Charlie Haden)

Ralph Towner, Wolfgang Muthspiel, Slava Grigoryan - Travel Guide (2013)

Played this album daily for months when it came out, soundtracking that whole autumn and winter of 2013-4 with its gorgeous guitar trio sound, so it's been well due a fresh rediscovery by me and a posting here.  Ralph Towner had already made a trio album in 2008 with Austrian Muthspiel and Armenian-Australian Grigoryan as MGT, which I really ought to have picked up ages ago, but keep getting distracted by other things.  Anyway, here's their ECM debut, recorded in Lugano in August 2012.

Half the tracks are composed by Towner and half by Muthspiel, and all are beautiful interminglings of the latter's smooth, fluid electric tone and the various acoustics of the other two guitarists.  My absolute favourites are Amarone Trio and the slowly unfolding opener The Henrysons, but the whole album is absolutely beautiful stuff.  Highest recommendation.

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pw: sgtg

Ralph Towner - Solo Concert (1980)

Just before heading to Oslo to meet up with Azimuth for Départ, Ralph Towner was performing solo in Europe, with dates in Munich and Zurich providing the recordings for this spellbinding live album.  Sometimes known as 'Köln for the guitar', the comparison only really works inasmuch as they're both high watermarks in ECM's catalogue of concert recordings; there's no epic improvisations here, just seven perfectly rendered compositions, four of them Towner originals.

Opening with a flourish of echoing harmonics, Solo Concert grabs the listener right from the off with its longest and most spectacular track - the shimmering 12-string waves of Spirit Lake.  The rich, reverberating acoustics of these recordings also illuminate the nylon-string performances like Ralph's Piano Waltz (one of two John Abercrombie compositions here) that follows next.

Things get more intricate and spidery with Train Of Thought, one of the best explorations of Towner's virtuoso technique here, but to be honest that could be said of the whole record.  The Miles Davis standard Nardis hits a fresh new groove, and the closing take on Abercrombie's Timeless is just... timeless.  If you only own one Ralph Towner record, make it this one.

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Azimuth with Ralph Towner - Départ (1980)

Autumnal ECM loveliness of the highest order.  Of course, that description could apply to about half of the label's catalogue, especially from its mid 70s to early 80s golden era.  This album though, recorded in the last month of the 70s, even has a track named Autumn, complete with suitably evocative lyrics from Norma Winstone.

Winstone, along with John Taylor and Kenny Wheeler, had by this point recorded two wonderfully airy, hypnotic albums as Azimuth, taking as much inspiration from Reichian minimalism as from the British jazz scene of their backgrounds.  For this third outing, ECM 's Manfred Eicher suggested adding a guest guitarist, and all three requested Ralph Towner, who they'd met the previous year.

Towner's chiming 12-string is therefore the first accompaniment to be introduced to album opener The Longest Day, over the top of Taylor's circular piano figures, before Winstone and Wheeler begin to take flight.  He switches to classical guitar for the aforementioned Autumn, and for the first two parts of the Touching Points suite.  This mid-album four-parter is particularly interesting as there's increasingly less typically Azimuth drift and more choppy free improv (especially in the third section), plus a chance to hear Taylor on Terry Riley-esque organ on the fourth section.  He sticks to organ for the gorgeous title track's intro, returning to piano for Winstone's brief haiku-like lyric, before everyone soars into the stratosphere again.

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see also: 
Sounds & Shadows (Towner)
Somewhere Called Home (Winstone with Taylor)
Double, Double You (Wheeler)

John Abercrombie & Ralph Towner - Sargasso Sea/Five Years Later (1976/1982)

In memoriam John Abercrombie, 16 Dec 1944 - 22 Aug 2017

Oh well, I did say on Friday that normal service would be resumed on Monday for this blog... and if normal service now means bidding sad farewells to artists whose music has meant so much to me, then so be it.  John Laird Abercrombie was born in Port Chester, NY to Scottish immigrants, and after a lifetime crafting an instantly identifiable guitar signature, has passed at age 72.  Having neglected to pick up his latest album at the beginning of this year due to other musical obsessions, I'm definitely going to do so now, but for today here's my two favourites of Abercrombie's career, both in the company of ECM labelmate Ralph Towner.  Previously posted at SGTG: the completely solo Characters, and Jack DeJohnette's Pictures.

Sargasso Sea was recorded in May 1976, and proved a genius pairing of two of ECM's rising stars right from the start.  Ralph Towner's silky 12-string overlaid with Abercrombie's liquid electric lead makes for a stunning album opener, with the eight minutes of Fable scoping out the breadth of their melodic talents and virtuoso skill, as would the title track and the explosive Elbow Room.  Elsewhere, we get the sublime sound of both guitarists going acoustic in a melding of their individual styles, and even some occasional piano from Towner, most notably in the gorgeous closer Parasol.

Deciding to repeat this memorable duo pairing five years later, Abercrombie and Towner already had their album title right there, and produced an even more ambitious effort, with a couple of tracks here hovering around the ten-minute mark.  One of these is the atmospheric, improvisatory opener Late Night Passenger, with Abercrombie's volume swells and percussive echoes contrasting with Towner's prepared-guitar buzzing.  The liquid lead versus shimmering 12-string magic formula returns in Isla and the cavernous reverberations of Microtheme.  The following track, the solemn Caminata, gives further proof that Abercrombie, Towner and Manfred Eicher were turning up the focus on ambience this time around, letting the acoustic fill the space, always in support - never dominating - of these two massive talents.  The other lengthy improv, the exciting race for transcendence that is Bumabia, underlines this too.

RIP John, and thanks for all the wonderful music.

Sargasso Sea link
Five Years Later link

Ralph Towner - Solstice: Sound And Shadows (1977)

The last two postings of ECM guitarists both went down well, so here's a third; a third American as well, in Washingtonian Ralph Towner.  Towner's trademark sound, based on chiming 12-string guitars and nylon-string guitars more classical in leaning than jazz, was always going to be a great fit when placed among one of ECM's Nordic crack teams.  So when he was matched up with Jan Garbarek, Eberhard Weber and Jon Christensen for 1975's Solstice, an instant classic was born, and this lesser-known sequel from two years later deserves equal appreciation.

Five fairly lengthy tracks here, giving each player a chance to shine and these rambling, autumnal pieces room to roam.  Distant Hills is the perfect opener, with soft-focus layers of Towner's guitars, stately Garbarek solos, and a subtle underpinning from Weber and Christensen.  For all his guitar genius, it shouldn't be forgotten how good a pianist Towner is as well, and Arion, a definite highlight for me, shows it beautifully.

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