Freitag, 26. Februar 2021

Ed Sanders - Beer Cans On The Moon (1973)


"They say rock & roll and politics don't mix," sings Ed Sanders at the very beginning of his second and final solo LP. That's not necessarily true, but if you were going to make an argument against that declaration, this album is one of the last exhibits you'd want to use as evidence.

The crucial flaws were not those of intent: Sanders wasted no time in advocating "Nonviolent Direction Action," satirizing the war-mongering of Henry Kissinger, hailing the unwinding of the Watergate scandal, and grinding out a "Universal Rent Strike Rag." Perhaps these weren't as immediately attention-grabbing issues as Vietnam and free love, but they were still important, especially in 1973. But Sanders was let down by the pedestrian, typically laissez-faire early-'70s rock arrangements, the severe limitations of his nasal twanging vocals, and most crucially by his own bluntly unwitty songwriting.

Sanders had proved he was skilled at crude wit with the Fugs, yet even though his efforts here are similar thematically, they sound forced and overly didactic, and are more tiresome than funny, even for many who wholeheartedly agree with his sociopolitical outlook. Sad to say, even many left-wingers and Fugs fans will demand the record be removed from the turntable long before its conclusion, or at any rate before the daft, echo-laden novelty tune about a "Yodeling Robot" that falls in love with Dolly Parton.

- Richie Unterberger

Ed Sanders - Beer Cans On The Moon (1973)
(256 kbps, cover art included)

Donnerstag, 25. Februar 2021

Richie Havens - Alarm Clock (1971)

Richard P. "Richie" Havens (born January 21, 1941; died April 22, 2013) is an American folk singer and guitarist. He is best known for his intense rhythmic guitar style (in open tunings), soulful covers of pop and folk songs, and his opening performance at the 1969 Woodstock Festival.

Following the success of his Woodstock performance, Richie started his own record label, "Stormy Forest", and delivered "Stonehenge" in 1970. Later that year came "Alarm Clock", which yielded the George Harrison- penned hit single "Here Comes the Sun", and became Havens's first album to reach Billboard’s Top 30 Chart.


Tracklist:

A1 Here Comes The Sun 3:43
A2 To Give All Your Love Away 2:48
A3 Younger Men Grow Older 3:34
A4 Girls Don't Run Away 4:17
A5 End Of The Seasons 3:38
B1 Some Will Wait 2:40
B2 Patient Lady 4:45
B3 Missing Train 4:55
B4 Alarm Clock 5:17

Richie Havens - Alarm Clock (1971)
(320 kbps, cover art included)

Dienstag, 23. Februar 2021

Os Mutantes - Tecnicolor (1970)

"Tecnicolor" would have been the fourth album by the Brazilian band Os Mutantes. The album was intended to be their introduction in the English-speaking world and included English versions of songs from the albums "Os Mutantes" and "A Divina Comédia ou Ando Meio Desligado", re-recordings in Portuguese and French and several new songs.

It was recorded in Paris in 1970, the tapes were lost until writer Carlos Calado, working on an Os Mutantes biography, uncovered them. Another version of the myth is that they were unsatisfied with many of the recording and abandoned the project to return to Brazil, explaining why three of the recordings were used later that year for their album "Jardim Elétrico".

It was released in 2000 on Universal Records, with artwork by Sean Lennon, in order to capitalize on the growing interest in Os Mutantes following the re-release of their early albums in the late 1990s.
By no means did Mutantes commercialize their sound. The tape-music experimentation and freak-out guitar lines are, if anything, farther out than the first few Mutantes LPs.

Though a few of the tracks -- "Panis Et Circenses" especially -- lose much of their cache with the addition of English lyrics, for the most part these versions equal or even better the originals.


Tracklist:

Panis Et Circenses 2:12
Bat Macumba 3:16
Virginia 3:23
She's My Shoo Shoo (A Minha Menina) 2:52
I Feel A Little Spaced Out (Ando Meio Desligado) 2:51
Baby 3:36
Tecnicolor 3:54
El Justiciero3:52
I'm Sorry Baby (Desculpe, Babe) 2:42
Adeus, Maria Fulo 2:39
Le Premier Bonheur Du Jour 2:46
Saravah 2:59
Panis Et Circenses (Reprise) 1:23


Os Mutantes - Tecnicolor (1970)
(192 kbps, cover art included)

Arlo Guthrie - Arlo Guthrie (1974)

Arlo Guthrie's seventh record follows a formula that he'd been developing over the past several years - a handful of interesting originals mixed with a song or two by a legend, something traditional, a couple of jokes, and one of Dad's tunes.
Guthrie's fondness for nostalgia mixed with his '60s idealism could turn such predictability into folky mush, but things are kept fresh by his strong sense of tradition, commitment, and taste, along with his growth as an artist in general. As far back as "Alice's Restaurant", Guthrie proved himself to be an affable performer, but the 1970s showed an added depth and maturity with each new release.
The Nixon diatribe "Presidential Rag" and the Mideast peace plea "Children of Abraham" bookend Woody Guthrie's "Deportees" nicely, while Jimmie Rodgers' "When the Cactus Is in Bloom" is a good fit with Arlo's bucolic tales "Me and My Goose" and "Bling Blang." Elsewhere, "Nostalgia Rag" hints at Randy Newman, "Go Down Moses" has the backing of a full gospel choir, "Won't Be Long" sports a country feel, and "Hard Times" is mountain music.
Along with producers John Pilla and Lenny Waronker, Arlo chooses from a cream-of-the-crop collection of musicians to pull off this eclectic mix. And it's to his credit that he's successful more often than not. Though there's nothing drastically different here for Guthrie, the album continued a steady growth through the '70s, which placed him firmly at the doorstep of what would be the pinnacle of his career.


Tracklist:

1 Won't Be Long 2:38
2 Presidential Rag 4:27
3 Deportees (Plane Wreck At Los Gatos) 3:48
4 Children Of Abraham 2:24
5 Nostalgia Rag 2:51
6 When The Cactus Is In Bloom 2:19
7 Me And My Goose 2:00
8 Bling Blang 2:45
9 Go Down Moses 2:41
10 Hard Times 2:43
11 Last To Leave 2:34

Arlo Guthrie - Arlo Guthrie (1974)
(192 kbps, cover art included)

Samstag, 20. Februar 2021

Miriam Makeba – The Queen Of African Music (1987, Pläne)

Following a three-decade-long exile, Miriam Makeba's return to South Africa was celebrated as though a queen was restoring her monarchy. The response was fitting as Makeba remains the most important female vocalist to emerge out of South Africa. Hailed as the Empress of African Song and Mama Africa, Makeba helped bring African music to a global audience in the '60s. Nearly five decades after her debut with the Manhattan Brothers, she continues to play an important role in the growth of African music.

"The Queen Of African Music" is a 17-track compilation album by Miriam Makeba, released by Theo König, Verlag Pläne in 1987.


Tracklist:

1 African Convention
2 I Shall Sing
3 Goodbye Poverty
4 Mas Que Nade
5 Murtala
6 Chicken (Kikirikiki)
7 The Lion Cries
8 Samba
9 Quit It
10 We Got To Make It
11 Jolinkomo
12 Ndibanga Hamba
13 Iyaguduza
14 Click Song
15 Malaisha
16 Mama Ndiyalila
17 Pata Pata


Miriam Makeba – The Queen Of African Music (1987, Pläne)
(320 kbps, cover art included)

Mittwoch, 17. Februar 2021

Pete Seeger - Studio Recording At The National Czech Radio (1964)

This is the second part of the Pete Seeger recordings from Czechoslowaki in 1964. Gene Deitch recorded these tracks on March 28, 1964, in an empty studio at Radio Karlin, Prague.

Many thanks to Ruth Ellen Gruber for sharing this information on http://blog.ebma.org:

"I just spent the weekend in Czech Republic, participating in the launch of the new bluegrass fusion CD by the Malina Brothers band. It can be said that the great Pete Seeger, who died Monday, launched the entire Czech bluegrass scene with his performances in the then communist Czechoslovakia in 1964. For the first time, people saw a five-string banjo being played, after hearing it on American Forces radio broadcasts. The first Czech five-strings were made from photos of Pete's. The concert was arranged in Prague by Pete's longtime friend Gene Deitch, who recorded the concert and issued it as an album, which has now been posted online."

Tracklist:

Coal Creek march
Darlin' Cory
Oh had I a golden thread
I can see a new day
What did you learn in school today?
Little boxes
Living in the country
We shall overcome
Little Molly
I want to go to Andorra!
Ida Red ; Old Joe Clark (played on home-made banjo)
Pretty Saro (wooden flute-recorder)
Woody's rag (mandolin)
900 miles (mandolin)
Oleana (with variations)
Clementine
Careless love

Pete Seeger - Studio Recording At The National Czech Radio
(320 kbps)

Dienstag, 16. Februar 2021

Pete Seeger - At The ABC Theatre, Prague, 1964


Here´s the first part of Pete Seeger live recordings from Czechoslovakia. The songs were recorded by Gene Deitch on March 27, 1964, at a theatre performance at the ABC Divadlo, Prague.

The ABC Theatre is located near Wenceslas Square in Prague. Together with Rokoko Theatre and Ábíčko it belongs to the groupe of Municipal Theatres of Prague.

Gene Deitch remembers on http://genedeitchcredits.com/roll-the-credits/22-pete-seeger/:

"By 1964, Pete, with Toshi and three kids, hade embarked on a world tour, which included communist Czechoslovakia, where I’d already been working four years. As he’d been sidelined as a political pariah in mainstream America, he expected he’d get a bigtime welcome here, right? Wrong! Here’s the irony: even though Pete may have felt himself to be a “communist,” the “Marxist-Leninist” Czechoslovak government was more suspicious of free-thinking “communists” who were not strict followers of the ever-shifting Soviet line, than they were of “capitalists,” who were their more clearly defined antagonists. “Diversionist” left-wingers were considered the greatest actual danger to their rule.

A local Seeger fan, Zbyněk Macha, who worked for the Czechoslovak Ministry of Culture had managed to get permission from the authorities to allow Pete a series of concerts in the country, but cautiously limited him to low-key venues, and there was no radio or TV coverage of his visit. The officials were afraid he’d be a loose-cannon, with his songs about freedom! So I was the only person with professional stereo equipment, able to privately record him. I sneaked my gear into Pete’s Prague theater concert, and Zbyněk Macha even got me into an unused radio studio with decent acoustics! Years later, my historic recordings were issued on a British FlyRight CD, “Pete Seeger in Prague 1964”, now a collectors’ item."

Tracklist:

T-for Texas
Kai-yo-wa-ji-neh (Native American)
Amazing grace
The Devil and the farmer
Banjo breakdown: Ida Red ; Old Joe Clark
Mr. Tom Hughes' town
Irene, goodnight
Bourgeois blues
So long
Talking Columbia
Lord God, Pittsburgh!
Why, Oh why?
Oleana
Michael row the boat ashore
Bayeza
Cumberland Mountain bear chase (Holka modrou oka)
Tzena tzena
Down by the riverside
Where have all the flowers gone?
Living in the country
Pete Seeger's comments, February 2001
(the songs "Rock Island Line" and "Dark As A Dungeon" are missing, sorry!)

Pete Seeger - At The ABC Theatre, Prague, 1964
(320 kbps, front cover included)

The Fugs - It Crawled into My Hand, Honest (1968, vinyl rip)

Having attained a professional rock-band sound on "Tenderness Junction", the Fugs seemed determined to further expand their arrangements (aided, perhaps, by a major-label budget) on "It Crawled into My Hand, Honest".

Indeed, the album is ridiculously eclectic. There's stoned psychedelic folk-rock ("Crystal Liaison"); cry-in-your-beer country music with vehemently satirical or surrealistic lyrics ("Ramses II Is Dead My Love," "Johnny Pissoff Meets the Red Angel"); grand, sweeping classical orchestration ("Burial Waltz"); a Gregorian chant about "Marijuana"; down-home gospel with lyrics that no preacher would dare enunciate ("Wide Wide River," with the line: "I've been swimming in this river of shit/More than 20 years and I'm getting tired of it"); and, almost buried along the way, the kind of tuneful, countercultural folk-rock Tuli Kupferberg contributed to earlier albums ("Life Is Strange"). Choral backup vocals abound, and the mere presence of a half-dozen outside arrangers testifies to how much the group's attitude toward exploiting the studio had developed since the bare-bones ESP albums.

Generally, the songs (most written by the core trio of Sanders, Kupferberg, and Weaver) are more concerned with deft poetry and humor than political statements, although the customary social satire and calls for sexual freedom and drug use are present in diminishing degrees.

Although side one is five discrete tracks, side two is a side-long cut-and-paste of tracks varying in length from three seconds to four minutes, the stylistic jump-cuts similar to those employed by the Mothers of Invention in the same era. It's an impressive and, usually, fun record, but it's also less-lyrically cogent and powerful than their early albums. One senses that the Fugs' personality and individuality were ultimately somewhat muted by the more ambitious production values and frequent use of external musicians and arrangers.

The Fugs - It Crawled into My Hand, Honest (1968, vinyl rip)
192 kbps, cover art included

Samstag, 13. Februar 2021

Nina Simone - At Carnegie Hall (1963)

Nina Simone was one of the most gifted vocalists of her generation, and also one of the most eclectic. Simone was a singer, pianist, and songwriter who bent genres to her will rather than allowing herself to be confined by their boundaries; her work swung back and forth between jazz, blues, soul, classical, R&B, pop, gospel, and world music, with passion, emotional honesty, and a strong grasp of technique as the constants of her musical career.                

"At Carnegie Hall" is a live album recorded at Simone's first solo appearance at Carnegie Hall in New York, on April 12, 1963, and was released on Colpix Records. Miss Simone works her particular brand of magic in a mysterious and awe-inspiring way. The album has a broad choice of material all delivered in dramatic fashion. "Black Swan," "Twelfth of Never" are two highly playable tracks.

This was Nina Simone's third Carnegie Hall appearance. Her debut appearance was on May 21, 1961, when she shared the stage with her great friend and fellow civil rights activist Miriam Makeba.
Having performed here twice previously, April 12, 1963, marked Nina Simone's headlining debut. It was not to be an easy transition from sharing to topping the bill. Writing in Nina Simone "Black Is The Color ..." Andrew Stroud - Simone's one-time husband and manager - recalls, "In 1963, Nina was adamant about making a solo appearance at Carnegie Hall in fulfillment of her childhood dream as the first black female classical pianist. None of the concert promoters would undertake such a presentation because they did not believe she could carry off a solo concert. Therefore, when I resigned from the NYPD, I took my pension rebate and, on the advice of experts in the music industry, hired Felix Gerstman, New York City's premier concertmaster, to manage the presentation."
Joining Nina Simone that evening were guitarists Alvin Schackman and Phil Orlando, Lisle Atkinson on bass, and drummer Montego Joe. Simone demonstrated the unclassifiable nature of her artistry that evening with performances of jazz, soul, spiritual-tinged tunes, and - displaying her background in classical music - a theme on Saint-Saëns's Samson and Delilah.
While her final headlining concert here took place in June 2001, Nina Simone's final Carnegie Hall appearance was on April 13, 2002, as part of Sting's Rainforest Foundation benefit. She died almost exactly a year later.

Tracklist:
A1Black Swan6:13
A2Theme From Samson And Delilah5:50
A3If You Knew3:35
A4Theme From Sayonara2:35
B1The Twelfth Of Never3:20
B2Will I Find My Love Today6:55
B3The Other Women / Cotton Eyed Joe7:25

Nina Simone - At Carnegie Hall (1963)
(320 kbps, cover art included)

Mercedes Sosa - La voz de la zafra (1959)

Mercedes Sosa was the most renowned Latin-American singer of her generation; she was known as "La Negra" for her long, jet-black hair, and as "the voice of the voiceless ones", for her performances of songs which championed the rights of the poor.

In early 1979, Sosa was performing in the Argentinian university city of La Plata when the military stopped the concert. Humiliating Sosa by searching her on stage, they then arrested her and 350 members of the audience. Sosa was detained for 18 hours until international pressure forced her release (she had to pay a large fine) but this event – alongside increasing numbers of death threats – forced her to flee to Europe, where she lived in Madrid and Paris.

If you hear this young Mercedes Sosa, you will notice that her voice is not as strong than later. But from the moment she began to recording, she was always true to herself. This is the very beginnig and a great collector's item.



Tracklist:

1. Los Hombres Del Rio [Canción Litoraleña]
2. Recuerdos Del Paraguay [Guarania]
3. Jangadero [Galopa]
4. La Zafrera [Zamba]
5. El Rio Y Tu [Canción Guarania]
6. Tropero Padre [Zamba]
7. Nocturna [Guarania]
8. El Indio Muerto [Zamba Salteña]
9. La De Los Humildes [Zamba]
10. Zamba De La Distancia
11. Selva Sola [Galopa]
12. Sin Saber Por Que [Guarania]

Mercedes Sosa - La Voz De La Zafra (1959)
(192 kbps, cover art included)

Nina Simone - Let It All Out (1965)

"Let It All Out" is one of Nina Simone's more adult pop-oriented mid-'60s albums, with renditions of tunes by Duke Ellington ("Mood Indigo"), Billie Holiday ("Don't Explain"), Irving Berlin ("This Year's Kisses"), and Rodgers & Hart ("Little Girl Blue").

As ever, Simone ranges wide in her selection: Bob Dylan's "The Ballad of Hollis Brown," a swaggering adaptation of "Chauffeur Blues" (credited to her husband of the time, Andy Stroud), the gospel hymn "Nearer Blessed Lord," and Van McCoy's "For Myself." "Images" is an a cappella adaptation of a poem about the beauty of blackness by Waring Cuney. All of Simone's Philips albums are solid, and this is no exception, while it isn't the best of them.

"Love Me or Leave Me" and "Mood Indigo" were also featured on Simone's debut album "Little Girl Blue" (1958); these are new performances and different arrangements.

Tracklist:
Mood Indigo2:25
The Other Woman3:02
Love Me Or Leave Me4:05
Don't Explain4:18
Little Girl Blue2:32
Chauffeur2:48
For Myself2:05
The Ballad Of Hollis Brown4:55
This Year's Kisses2:58
Images2:50
Nearer Blessed Lord4:30

Nina Simone - Let It All Out (1965)
(320 kbps, cover art included)

Mercedes Sosa - Homenaje a Violeta Parra (1971)



Mercedes Sosa was born in poverty, her father a day laborer, her mother a washer woman, in Tucumán, a province in northwest Argentina, on July 9, 1935.
At 15, she won an amateur-hour contest sponsored by a local radio with a two month contract for appearances as its grand prize. It turned out to be the start of her career.

By the late 50s she had moved on from traditional folk and embraced the Movimiento del Nuevo Cancionero, a fledging movement with a new approach to folk music that updated the standard folk lyrics to sing about the plight of the poor and disenfranchised. This, naturally, led her in time to champion the Nueva Canción (New Song), a movement in Latin America in the 60s that blended traditional rhythms and lyrics addressing social and political concerns. This became a deadly serious business in Latin America in the 70s, as ruthless military dictatorships took power. Sosa was detained and body searched on stage at a concert in 1979. Many in the audience were detained. In the following weeks, her concerts were cancelled after anonymous bomb threats were called in. And while there was no cause open against Sosa, her songs were banned on the radio and she was prohibited from performing.

Understandably feeling persecuted and unable to make a living, Sosa left in self imposed exile to France and Spain.
She returned to Argentina in 1982, just as the military dictatorship was beginning to disintegrate. (In fact, in retrospect, Sosa´s epochal 13-night comeback stand at the Opera Theatre in Buenos Aires, captured on the disc Mercedes Sosa en Argentina, was in itself a measure of the increasing weakness of the regime.)

Sosa had been an international artist, performing in the United States and Europe, since the 1960s, but in her condition as an exile she transcended her role as a folk singer and became a symbol of resistance and the struggle for human rights. It was a heavy mantle that she carried effectively – while also making clear to whoever wanted to listen that she was an artist first.

“Sometimes, one is made to be a big mouth or some sort of Robin Hood and it’s not like that,” she once told me, in the 90s, with an edge of frustration in her voice. “I am a woman who sings, who tries to sing as well as possible with the best songs available. I was bestowed this role as big protester and it’s not like that at all. I’m just a thinking artist.”
And being a “thinking artist” for Sosa not only meant singing questioning lyrics, but also opening up her musical world.

Since her return to Argentina and for the past 20 years, rather than basking on the warm glow of her status and playing it safe musically, Sosa increasingly crossed over stylistic boundaries, taking a Pan-Ibero-American approach. She would still sing Argentine folk music and remain true to her Nuevo Cancionero roots, but also integrate music by Brazilian artists such as Milton Nascimento, Caetano Veloso and Chico Buarque; Spanish singer songwriter Joan Manuel Serrat and rocker Joaquin Sabina. And in Argentina, where the music communities long lived in parallel worlds that rarely acknowledged, much less addressed, each other, Sosa seemed to make a point of ignoring stylistic boundaries. She worked with neo-folk singers such as Leon Gieco (a Bob Dylan-like figure) but also recalcitrant rockers such as Charly Garcia, pop rockers such as Fito Páez and new tango stalwarts such as bandoneonist Rodolfo Mederos. And it wasn’t just big names but also up-and-coming songwriters, playing sort of fairy godmother by calling attention to their work, giving them, in a word, her blessing.

Here´s her hommage to Violeta Parra, the famous Chilean composer, songwriter, folklorist, ethnomusicologist and visual artist, who set the basis for "Chilean' New Song", the Nueva canción chilena, a renewal and a reinvention of Chilean folk music which would absorb and extend its influence far beyond Chile.

Tracklist:

Defensa De Violeta
Graicas A La Vida
Segun El Favor Del Viento
Arriba Quemando El Sol
Me Gustan Los Estudiantes
Volver A Los 17
La Carta
Que He Sacado Con Quererte
La Lavandera
Rin Del Angelito
Los Pueblos Americanos 

Mercedes Sosa - Homenaje a Violeta Parra (1971)
(256 kbps, cover art included)

Freitag, 12. Februar 2021

Boulat Okoudjava - Le Soldat en Papier

If Vladimir Vissotski was the Léo Ferré of the Soviet Union, Boulat Okoudjava was, perhaps, its Georges Brassens.

Boulat Okoudjava (also transliterated as Boulat Okudjava, Okoudjava, Okoudzhava or Bulat Okudzhava) was born in Moscow on 9 May 1924 of Georgian parents (hence, no doubt, his nature of the "Meridional of the North"). His father, a high-ranking Communist Party member from Georgia, was arrested in 1937 during the Great Purge and executed as a German spy on the basis of a false accusation. His mother was also arrested and spent 18 years in the prison camps of the Gulag (1937–1955).

In 1942, he left high-school and enlisted as a volunteer for the Red Army infantry, and from 1942 he participated in the war with Nazi Germany.
In 1956, three years after the death of Joseph Stalin, Okudzhava returned to Moscow, where he worked first as an editor in the publishing house "Young Guard," and later as the head of the poetry division at the most prominent national literary weekly in the former USSR, Literaturnaya Gazeta ("Literary Newspaper"). It was then, in the middle of the 1950s, that he began to compose songs and to perform them, accompanying himself on a Russian guitar.

Soon he was giving concerts. He only employed a few chords and had no formal training in music, but he possessed an exceptional melodic gift, and the intelligent lyrics of his songs blended perfectly with his music and his voice. His songs were praised by his friends, and amateur recordings were made. These unofficial recordings were widely copied as magnitizdat, and spread across the USSR and Poland, where other young people picked up guitars and started singing the songs for themselves. In 1969, his lyrics appeared in the classic Soviet film "White Sun of the Desert".

Though Okoudjava's songs were not published by any official media organization until the late 1970s, they quickly achieved enormous popularity, especially among the intelligentsia - mainly in the USSR at first, but soon among Russian-speakers in other countries as well. Vladimir Nabokov, for example, cited his "Sentimental March" in the novel "Ada or Ardor".

Okoudjava, however, regarded himself primarily as a poet and claimed that his musical recordings were insignificant. During the 1980s, he also published a great deal of prose (his novel The Show is Over won him the Russian Booker Prize in 1994). By the 1980s, recordings of Okudzhava performing his songs finally began to be officially released in the Soviet Union, and many volumes of his poetry were also published. In 1991, he was awarded the USSR State Prize. He supported the reform movement in the USSR and in October 1993, signed the Letter of Forty-Two.
He was one of the founders of the Russian genre called "author song" (авторская песня, avtorskaya pesnya). Though his songs were never overtly political (in contrast to those of some of his fellow bards), the freshness and independence of his artistic voice presented a subtle challenge to Soviet cultural authorities, who were thus hesitant for many years to give official recognition to Okoudjava.

Boulat Okoudjava remains emblematic of the renewal of Soviet poetry under the Kruschev regime, where he was one of the most prestigious poets and one of those held in great esteem by the intelligentisa as well as an idol for young people, who recognised their own dreams and aspirations in the scarcely veiled and totally unambiguous word of his forbidden songs.

He died near Paris on June 12 1997, during a stay in France.

This album presents a summary of all his themes: the rank and file, the streets of Moscow, the pangs and heartbreak of love, the horror of war, the small joys and immense sadnesses of life.

Tracklist:

1 Chanson Des Pirates
2 Anton Tchekhov
A Dans Mon Coeur Est Gravé
4 Sur Volodia Vissotski
5 La Petite Pluie Du Succès
6 Que Mon Amour Soit Vieux
7 François Villon
8 Le Soldat De Papier
9 Le Roi
10 Chanson De Ma Vie
11 Chanson Du Chat Noir
12 Chanson De La Piétaille
13 Chanson Du Ballon Bleu
14 Chanson Des Bottes De Soldat
15 Chanson Du Moucheron Moscovite
16 Vous Les Peintres
17 Le Dernier Trolley
18 Moscou La Nuit
19 Dommage Quand Même
20 Chanson De L'Arbat
21 Chanson Du Métro De Moscou
22 Nadia, Petite Nadia
23 La Route De Smolensk
24 Chanson Du Vieux Joueur D'Orgue
25 Les Trois Soeurs

Boulat Okoudjava - Le Soldat en Papier
(256 kbps, cover art included)

Pete Seeger - Hootenanny With Pete Seeger


"Hootenanny with Pete Seeger" was released on Folkways Records and on Le Chant Du Monde in France. It features live recordings by Pete Seeger, accompanied by Big Bill Broonzy, Lightnin´ Hopkins, Memphis Slim and Willie Dixon.


Tracklist:

1. Pete Seeger with Big Bill Broonzy - Down By The Riverside (5:14)
2. Pete Seeger with Lightnin' Hopkins - Oh, Mary, Don't You Weep (3:15)
3. Pete Seeger - Michael, Row The Boat Ashore (2:28)
4. Pete Seeger - Mrs McGrath (4:16)
5. Pete Seeger - Risselty Rosselty (2:41)
6. Pete Seeger - Wimoweh (2:40)
7. Pete Seeger - Deep Blue Sea (2:39)
8. Pete Seeger - The Hammer song (2:15)
9. Pete Seeger - Streets Of Laredo - Brandy Leave Me Alone - Didn't Old John (4:08)
10. Pete Seeger with Memphis Slim and Willie Dixon - Hold On (3:44)
11. Pete Seeger - I'm On My Way (4:14)
.
 Pete Seeger - Hootenanny With Pete Seeger
(320 kbps, cover art included)

Elizabeth Cotten - Live

Elizabeth Cotten was among the most influential guitarists to surface during the roots music revival era, her wonderfully expressive and dexterous finger-picking style a major inspiration to the generations of players who followed in her wake.
Cotten was born in Chapel Hill, North Carolina in the early weeks of 1893; after first picking up the banjo at the age of eight, she soon moved on to her brother's guitar, laying it flat on her lap and over time developing her picking pattern and eventually her chording. By the age of 12 she was working as a domestic, and three years later gave birth to her first child; upon joining the church, she gave up the guitar, playing it only on the rarest of occasions over the course of the next quarter century. By the early 1940s, Cotten had relocated to Washington, D.C., where she eventually began working for the legendary Charles Seeger family and caring for children Pete, Peggy and Mike.

When the Seegers learned of Cotten's guitar skills a decade later, they recorded her for Folkways, and in 1957 she issued her debut LP, "Folksongs and Instrumentals". The track "Freight Train," written when she was 12, became a Top Five hit in the U.K., and its success ensured her a handful of concert performances. The great interest in her music spurred her to write new material, which appeared on her second album, "Shake Sugaree". As Cotten became increasingly comfortable performing live, her presentation evolved, and in addition to playing guitar she told stories about her life and even led her audiences in singing her songs; over the years, she recalled more and more tunes from her childhood, and in the course of tours also learned new material. Cotten did not retire from domestic work until 1970, and did not tour actively until the end of the decade; the winner of a National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellowship Award as well as a Grammy — both earned during the final years of her life — she died on June 29, 1987.

No dates are given for this live disc, although according to the liners, "this album is a sampler of performances during her ninth decade" (which would be roughly the early 1970s to the early 1980s). She does some of the most popular items from her repertoire over the course of this 50-minute recording, including "Freight Train," "Shake Sugaree," and "Oh Babe, It Ain't No Lie" (which was covered by the Grateful Dead). There's plenty of storytelling between the numbers, and audience participation on some of the choruses during the songs.

Bulat Okudshawa - Lieder 2 (Pläne)

Bulat Shalvovich Okudzhava (May 9, 1924 – June 12, 1997) was a Russian poet, writer, musician, novelist, and singer-songwriter of Georgian-Armenian origin. He was one of the founders of the Russian genre called "author song" (авторская песня, avtorskaya pesnya) and the author of about 200 songs, set to his own poetry. His songs are a mixture of Russian poetic and folksong traditions and the French chansonnier style represented by such contemporaries of Okudzhava as Georges Brassens. Though his songs were never overtly political (in contrast to those of some of his fellow bards), the freshness and independence of Okudzhava's artistic voice presented a subtle challenge to Soviet cultural authorities, who were thus hesitant for many years to give official recognition to Okudzhava.

Bulat Okudzhava was born in Moscow on May 9, 1924 into a family of communists who had come from Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia, to study and to work for the Communist Party. The son of a Georgian father, Shalva Okudzhava, and an Armenian mother, Ashkhen Nalbandyan, Bulat Okudzhava spoke and wrote only in Russian. Okudzava's mother was the niece of a well-known Armenian poet, Vahan Terian. His father, a high-ranking Communist Party member from Georgia, was arrested in 1937 during the Great Purge and executed as a German spy on the basis of a false accusation. His mother was also arrested and spent 18 years in the prison camps of the Gulag (1937–1955). Bulat Okudzhava returned to Tbilisi and lived there with relatives.
In 1941, at the age of 17, one year before his scheduled school graduation, he volunteered for the Red Army infantry, and from 1942 he participated in the war with Nazi Germany. With the end of the Second World War, after his discharge from the service in 1945, he returned to Tbilisi where he passed his high school graduation exams and enrolled at Tbilisi State University, graduating in 1950. After graduating, he worked as a teacher, first in a rural school in the village of Shamordino in Kaluga district, and later in the city of Kaluga itself.
In 1956, three years after the death of Joseph Stalin, Okudzhava returned to Moscow, where he worked first as an editor in the publishing house "Young Guard," and later as the head of the poetry division at the most prominent national literary weekly in the former USSR, Literaturnaya Gazeta ("Literary Newspaper"). It was then, in the middle of the 1950s, that he began to compose songs and to perform them, accompanying himself on a Russian guitar.
Soon he was giving concerts. He only employed a few chords and had no formal training in music, but he possessed an exceptional melodic gift, and the intelligent lyrics of his songs blended perfectly with his music and his voice. His songs were praised by his friends, and amateur recordings were made. These unofficial recordings were widely copied as magnitizdat, and spread across the USSR and Poland, where other young people picked up guitars and started singing the songs for themselves. In 1969, his lyrics appeared in the classic Soviet film White Sun of the Desert.
Though Okudzhava's songs were not published by any official media organization until the late 1970s, they quickly achieved enormous popularity, especially among the intelligentsia – mainly in the USSR at first, but soon among Russian-speakers in other countries as well. Vladimir Nabokov, for example, cited his Sentimental March in the novel Ada or Ardor.
Okudzhava, however, regarded himself primarily as a poet and claimed that his musical recordings were insignificant. During the 1980s, he also published a great deal of prose (his novel The Show is Over won him the Russian Booker Prize in 1994). By the 1980s, recordings of Okudzhava performing his songs finally began to be officially released in the Soviet Union, and many volumes of his poetry were also published. In 1991, he was awarded the USSR State Prize. He supported the reform movement in the USSR and in October 1993, signed the Letter of Forty-Two.
Okudzhava died in Paris on June 12, 1997, and is buried in the Vagankovo Cemetery in Moscow. A monument marks the building at 43 Arbat Street where he lived. His dacha in Peredelkino is now a museum that is open to the public.

The german Pläne label released two albums with songs by Bulat Okudshawa. The label translated the song titels into german language, Bulat of course sings in russian language.


Tracklist
A1Das Lied vom Heuschreck
A2Das Lied von unserem Hof
A3Pariser Phantasien
A4Über Volodja Vissotski
A5Das Omen
A6Die Klugen und die Dummen – (Aus dem Film "Aus dem Leben des Chefs der Kripo")
A7Ein kleines Lied, kurz wie das Leben
A8Der Musiker
B1Die Musik des Herzens
B2Die liebe Sonne scheint, die Musik spielt auf ...
B3Noch eine Romanze
B4Klagelied um den Arbat
B5Ein Geschenk zum Geburtstag
B6Lied vom jungen Husar
B7Zum ewigen Angedenken

Bulat Okudshawa - Lieder 2 (Pläne)
(256 kbps, front cover included)

Peggy Seeger - Folk Songs Of Courting & Complaint (1955)




Tracklist:
1. Whistle Daughter Whistle
2. When I Was Single
3. The House Carpenter
4. When First Unto This Country
5. All Of Her Answers
6. Young Man who Wouldn't Hoe Corn
7. The Wagoner's Load
8. Long Lonesome Road
9. The Butcher's Boy
10. The Old Maid
11. Katy Cruel
12. Leatherwing Bat


Peggy Seeger - Folk Songs Of Courting & Complaint (1955)
(192 kbps, cover art included)

Gisela May - Die sieben Todsünden

Amongst the many records which Gisela May has made, her recording of Brecht/Weill´s ballet with voice, "Die sieben Todsünden" ("The Seven Deadly Sins") was awarded the "Grand Prix du disque" in Paris 1968.

After a performance of the ballet in Milan in 1971, the critic form the local newspaper "Avanti" had the following to say about Gisela May´s performance of Anna II: "With her diction, she fires hard salvos of syllables and rhythms at the audience, enchanting the spectators with smooth sounds and sweet, melodic passages. The very speical nature of the character is conveyed in every aspect of her singing, her reciting, her style and her gestures."
This commentary could just as well have been written about the songs on this record.

Tracklist:

Prolog
A1Lied der Schwestern: "Meine Schwester und ich stammen aus Louisiana" (Andante Sostenuto)
I. Faulheit (Im Begehen des Unrechts)
A2Lied der Familie: "Hoffentlich nimmt sich unsere Anna auch zusammen" (Allegro Vivace)
II. Stolz auf das Beste des Ichs (Unverkäuflichkeit)
A3.1Lied der Schwester: "Als wir aber ausgestattet waren" (Allegretto, Quasi Andantino)
A3.2Lied der Familie: "Das geht nicht vorwärts" (Allegretto, Quasi Andantino)
III. Zorn über die Gemeinheit
A4Lied der Schwester: "Jetzt geht es vorwärts" (Molto Agitato)
IV. Völlerei (Sättigung, Selberessen)
B1Lied der Familie: "Da ist ein Brief aus Philadelphia" (Largo)
V. Unzucht
B2Lied der Schwester: "Und wir fanden einen Mann in Boston" (Moderato)
VI. Habsucht bei Raub und Betrug
B3Lied der Familie: "Wie hier in der Zeitung steht, ist Anna schon in Baltimore" (Allegro Giusto)
VII. Neid auf die Glücklichen
B4Lied der Schwester: "Und die letzte Stadt der Reise war San Francisco" (Allegro Non Troppo)
Epilog
B5Lied der Schwester: "Darauf kehrten wir zurück nach Louisiana" (Andante Sostenuto)

Gisela May - Die sieben Todsünden
(192 kbps, cover art included)

Dienstag, 9. Februar 2021

The Fugs - Golden Filth (1970)

By the time of this recording on June 1, 1968 at the Fillmore East, the Fugs had evolved from their primitive beginnings into a pretty full and tight rock band. They'd also grown into a pretty large group, in fact, with ten musicians, including two drummers.

However, most of the material was initially recorded between 1965 and 1966, ESP era. While some listeners might be disappointed by the absence of live versions of highlights from their Reprise records, this release actually has more value than the typical live album because it has notably different arrangements of well-known songs.

On the Fugs' first recordings in particular, the sound and execution was pretty primitive, and it's good to have full, together rock versions of notable songs like "Slum Goddess," "Supergirl," "Nothing," "I Couldn't Get High," "Coca-Cola Douche," and "How Sweet I Roamed." The spoken intros haven't dated as well, with Sanders' monologues about lesbian dwarfs and zebra puke, and Kupferberg moaning at one point, "I want a titty"; what was once a shocking and taboo-breaking is now superfluous to the music. 

Tracklist:
                                             
A1Slum Goddess
A2CCD
A3How Sweet I Roamed
A4I Couldn't Get High
A5Saran Wrap
B1I Want To Know
B2Homeade
B3Nothing
B4Supergirl

The Fugs - Golden Filth (1970)  
(320 kbps, cover art included)       

Miriam Makeba - The Queen Of African Music Vol. 2 (Pläne)


Miriam Makeba (4 March 1932 – 10 November 2008), nicknamed Mama Africa, was a Grammy Award-winning South African singer and civil rights activist.

In the 1960s she was the first artist from Africa to popularize African music in the U.S. and around the world. She is best known for the song "Pata Pata", first recorded in 1957 and released in the U.S. in 1967. She recorded and toured with many popular artists, such as Harry Belafonte, Paul Simon, and her former husband Hugh Masekela.

She actively campaigned against the South African system of apartheid. As a result, the South African government revoked her citizenship and right of return. After the end of apartheid she returned home. She died on 10 November 2008 after performing in a concert in Italy organized to support writer Roberto Saviano in his stand against the Camorra, a mafia-like organisation local to the region of Campania.

The Queen Of African Music Vol. 2 is a 15-track compilation album by Miriam Makeba, released by Theo König, Verlag Pläne in 1991.

Miriam Makeba - The Queen Of African Music Vol. 2 (Pläne)
(192 kbps, front & back cover included)

The Fugs - The First Album (1966)

A loping, ridiculous, and scabrous release, the Fugs' debut mashed everything from folk and beat poetry to rock and rhythm & blues - all with a casual disregard for sounding note perfect, though not without definite goals in mind. Actually compiled from two separate sessions originally done for Folkways Records, and with slightly different lineups as a result, it's a short but utterly worthy release that pushed any number of 1964-era buttons at once (and could still tick off plenty of people).

Sanders produced the sessions in collaboration with the legendary Harry Smith, who was able to sneak the collective onto Folkways' accounts by describing them as a "jug band," and it's not a far-off description. A number of songs sound like calm-enough folk-boom fare, at least on casual listening, though often with odd extra touches like weirdly muffled drums or out of nowhere whistles and chimes. Others, meanwhile, are just out there -- thus, the details of the perfect "Supergirl." Then there's "Boobs a Lot," the post-toke/acid lament "I Couldn't Get High," and the pie-in-the-face to acceptable standards of the time, "Slum Goddess."

Throughout it all, the Fugs sound like they're having a perfectly fun time; the feeling is loose, ragged, but right, and while things may be sloppy around the edges, often that's totally intentional. Certainly little else could explain the random jamming and rhythmic chanting/shouting on "Swinburne Stomp."

The album was originally released in 1965 as The Village Fugs Sing Ballads of Contemporary Protest, Point of Views, and General Dissatisfaction on Folkways Records before the band signed up with ESP-Disk, who released the album under its own label with a new name in 1966

Tracklist:
  1. "Slum Goddess" (Ken Weaver) – 1:58
  2. "Ah, Sunflower, Weary of Time" (William Blake, Ed Sanders) – 2:15
  3. "Supergirl" (Tuli Kupferberg) – 2:18
  4. "Swinburne Stomp" (Sanders, A.C. Swinburne) – 2:50
  5. "I Couldn't Get High" (Weaver) – 2:06
  6. "How Sweet I Roamed" (Blake, Sanders) – 2:11
  7. "Carpe Diem" (Kupferberg) – 5:07
  8. "I Feel Like Homemade Shit" (Sanders) – 2:18
  9. "Boobs a Lot" (Steve Weber) – 2:12
  10. "Nothing" (Kupferberg) – 4:18


The Fugs - The First Album (1966)
(320 kbps, cover art included)


Samstag, 6. Februar 2021

Rita Reys ‎– The Cool Voice Of Rita Reys (1956)

Rita Reys (born Maria Everdina Reijs; 21 December 1924 – 28 July 2013) was a jazz singer from the Netherlands. She was billed as "Europe's First Lady of Jazz" and was one of the top jazz singers in Europe from the mid-'50s to the turn of the millennium. Born in Rotterdam, she began singing as a teenager. Reys won several song contests and in 1941, when she was 16, joined the Hawaiian Minstrels. In 1943 she became a member of her father's theater orchestra. Other early experiences included touring with Lex Van Spall, Ted Powder, and the Piet Van Dijk Orchestra. 

In 1945 she married drummer Wessel Ilcken, who introduced her to the postwar jazz scene. She worked with her husband's sextet for most of a decade. They were based in Stockholm for a time, where she recorded with the great baritonist Lars Gullin in 1953. In 1956 Reys recorded probably her most famous album, "The Cool Voice of Rita Reys". Her backup band was Art Blakey & the Jazz Messengers. Reys and Ilcken spent a few months in the United States during 1956-1957. She had opportunities to sing not only with Blakey but Jimmy Smith, Chico Hamilton, Clark Terry, and Mat Mathews.

Back in Europe, tragedy struck in 1957 when a car accident resulted in the death of Wessel Ilcken. After some time, Reys continued her career. In 1960 she married pianist Pim Jacobs, working regularly with his combo up until his death in 1996. Along the way she performed with Zoot Sims, Oliver Nelson, the Dutch Swing College Band, and other notables. Reys, despite being influenced by Ella Fitzgerald and Mel Tormé, had her own approach to caressing ballads and swinging uptempo tunes. She celebrated her 80th birthday during 2004-2005, writing her memoirs (Rita Reys -- Lady Jazz) and having many special performances, including television specials and concerts all around the Netherlands.

The  album "Cool Voice of Rita Reys" features sessions recorded with bands led by drummers Wessel Ilcken and Art Blakey divided over each side of the original LP which was released on the Dutch Philips and US Columbia labels.


Tracklist:

"It's All Right with Me" (Cole Porter) – 2:37
"Gone with the Wind" (Allie Wrubel, Herb Magidson) – 2:35
"My Funny Valentine" (Lorenz Hart, Richard Rodgers) – 2:59
"But Not for Me" (George Gershwin, Ira Gershwin" – 2:09
"I Should Care" (Axel Stordahl, Paul Weston, Sammy Cahn) – 2:38
"There Will Never Be Another You" (Harry Warren, Mack Gordon) – 2:27
"I Cried for You" (Gus Arnheim, Arthur Freed, Abe Lyman) – 3:30
"You'd Be So Nice to Come Home To" (Porter) – 3:36
"My One and Only Love" (Guy Wood, Robert Mellin) – 4:14
"That Old Black Magic" (Harold Arlen, Johnny Mercer) – 2:56
"Spring Will Be a Little Late This Year" (Frank Loesser) – 3:41
"Taking a Chance on Love" (Vernon Duke, John La Touche, Ted Fetter) – 2:34

(320 kbps, cover art included)