Montag, 31. Juli 2023

Horden Raikes – King Cotton And Songs Of The Working Classes During The Period 1750-1850 (1972)

"The many must work that the few might prosper / 
This is the valley where cotton is King."


The British folk duo Horden Raikes - Brian Dewhurst and Ron Flanagan, accompanied on this album by Martin Carter and Roger Barnes - played traditional english folk with social and political reflecting lyrics.

Brian Preston began his life and his folk music career under his family name as Brian Dewhurst. He served his apprenticeship as a floor-singer and resident in the folk clubs of his native Lancashire through the early years of the Folk Revival. In 1966 he joined the highly-respected and popular band the Wayfarers where he continued to polish his trade. In 1970 he formed the semi-professional duo Horden Raikes with Ron Flanagan.

This album is a collection of working class songs from the the late 18th and early 19th century. It was released in 1972 on the Folk Heritage Recordings label.




Tracklist:

A1 King Cotton
A2 Bread Tax
A3 The Factory Bell
A4 Bony At Morn
A5 Maid Of The Mill
A6 Grimshaws Factory Fire
A7 The Smokeless Chimneys
A8 July Wakes
B1 My Master & I
B2 Preston Guild 1842
B3 Bury New Loom
B4 The New Farmer
B5 The Preston Mills
B6 Great Enoch
B7 We Are Forced To Be Contented

(ca. 192 kbps, cover art included)

Rip, Rig & Panic - God (1981)

One of the Pop Group's numerous offshoots, Rip Rig + Panic was a jazz-funk fusion band that left art-punk behind musically but retained a similarly irreverent sensibility. Named after a Roland Kirk LP, the band appropriately featured saxophone/piano free-for-alls. They were not as anarchic as their jazz inspirations, though; repetitive bass licks (Sean Oliver) and stable percussion (Bruce Smith) are great aids for more centrist listeners.

The band's most appealing aspect is its high-spiritedness. Beyond absurd titles, Rip Rig + Panic leaps around stylistically from (short) track to track. Tranquil piano (Mark Springer) solos and silly chats provide respite from screeching sax (Gareth Sager), Arabic and Far Eastern touches and hard-edged vocals (a very young Neneh Cherry and, on God, ex-Slit Ari Upp).

With Gareth Sanger leading the charge, Rip, Rig & Panic's debut is much more user-friendly than anything recorded by Sanger's previous band, the always abrasive Pop Group. This record gallops along from start to finish, honking and buzzing along the way, with loads of odd vocalizing and feral, primal, repetitive rhythms. Not the most significant album to come out of the early days of English post-punk, but one that still delivers plenty of smiles 15 years later. ~ John Dougan, All Music Guide


Tracklist:

Red Side
Constant Drudgery Is Harmful To Soul, Spirit & Health 3:24
Wilhelm Show Me The Diagram (Function Of The Orgasm) 1:10
Through Nomad Eyeballs 3:28
Change Your Life 3:01
Yellow Side
Knee Deep In Shit 3:30
Totally Naked (Without Lock Or Key) 1:54
Try Box Out Of This Box 2:34
Need (De School You) 1:32
Green Side
Howl! Caged Bird 3:30
Those Eskimo Women Speak Frankly 3:13
The Blue Blue Third 5:25
Blue Side
Shadows Only There Because Of The Sun 2:41
Beware (Our Leaders Love The Smell Of Napalm) 1:51
Miss Pib 1:34
It Don't Mean A Thing If It Ain't Got That Brrod 2:58

Rip, Rig & Panic - God (1981)
(ca. 226 kbps, cover art included)

Patti Smith - Live In Paris, 1978

Punk rock's poet laureate, Patti Smith ranks among the most influential female rock & rollers of all time. Ambitious, unconventional, and challenging, Smith's music was hailed as the most exciting fusion of rock and poetry since Bob Dylan's heyday.

If that hybrid remained distinctly uncommercial for much of her career, it wasn't a statement against accessibility so much as the simple fact that Smith followed her own muse wherever it took her - from structured rock songs to free-form experimentalism, or even completely out of music at times. Her most avant-garde outings drew a sense of improvisation and interplay from free jazz, though they remained firmly rooted in noisy, primitive three-chord rock & roll. She has a powerful concert presence, singing and chanting her lyrics in an untrained but expressive voice, whirling around the stage like an ecstatic shaman delivering incantations.

The Stooges may have defined the sound and attitude of punk rock, and the New York Dolls lent it some style, but Patti Smith gave it its substance. Imbued with an all-consuming passion for the verse of Arthur Rimbaud and the grit of early rock ‘n’ roll, Patti combined simplicity and intellect to help forge the most vital and honest musical form of the 20th century.After humble beginnings in Chicago and chasing her muse to Paris, Patti Smith eventually found her way to the artistic circles of New York in the early ‘70s. Her readings at St. Mark’s Poetry Project lead to performances including musicians like rock historian and guitarist Lenny Kaye and pianist Richard Sohl, who would later comprise her fully fledged rock band and contribute to a series of records that were as aggressive and daring as they were beautiful.

Here´s a bootleg called "Live In Paris, 1978". The sound quality is excellent. All but the last 5 tracks were recorded live in Paris in 1978 - performance is fair to good. This show from March of 1978 was a sort of spiritual homecoming for the woman that had once busked on the streets of the City of Light, immersed in the environs that had created her favorite poems. But the cobbled alleyways needn’t have served as her theatre this time around; the punk scene Patti helped nurture was in full swing and the recent release of the album Easter yielded her highest charting hit, “Because the Night,” co-written by Bruce Springsteen. The band is in top form as the rattle through a brief set, book-ending their palpitating version of Them’s “Gloria” with newer material that is just as transcendent - listen for a room full of raucous French fans chanting, “pah-TEE, pah-TEE!!”

The first 4 of the last 5 tracks were from "The Mike Douglas Show" in 1976 - performance is excellent. The very last track is from "The Today Show" in 1978 - Patti sounds a little bit worn out. The cover shows a picture of Patti's back (in Vietnam jacket) and pink cartoon hands with paintbrush and pen nib on index fingers.


Tracklist:

Ask The Angels 2:57
25th Floor 5:29
High On Rebellion 3:28
Till Victory 3:13
Set Me Free 3:37
Because The Night 3:18
Gloria 7:00
Ask The Angel
Free Money 3:43
I Was Working Real Hard 2:12
Keith Richard Blues 1:35
I Was Working Real Hard (Reprise) 2:26

Patti Smith - Live In Paris, 1978
(192 kbps, front cover included)

Mark Stewart - Jerusalem (On-U Sound, 1982, vinyl rip)

Originally posted in October 2010:

Tomorrow I will visit a screening of the documentary “On/Off: Mark Stewart from Pop Group to Maffia” with Mark as a special guest.

The film retraces Mark Stewart’s steps and paths from the early days of The Pop Group right up to the present. Director Toni Schifer followed the singer around for a full two years and the result is said to be a crafted and detailed, often intimate portrait of the artist, supplemented by interviews with Mark Stewart himself, Adrian Sherwood (On-U Sound), Daniel Miller (Mute), Nick Cave, Mick Harvey, Doug Wimbish, Skip McDonald, Keith LeBlanc, Gareth Sager (The Pop Group, Rip Rig and Panic) and many others, plus live recordings and music clips.

Celebrating this very special event we will post some of Mark Stewarts recordings, starting with a vinyl rip of the On-U Sound single "Jerusalem" from 1982.


Tracklist:

A1 Jerusalem
A2 High Ideals And Crazy Dreams
B Welcome To Liberty City



Mark Stewart - Jerusalem (On-U Sound, 1982, vinyl rip)
(320 kbps, front cover included)

Sonntag, 30. Juli 2023

Mikis Theodorakis & Pablo Neruda - Canto General (Amiga, vinyl rip)

"Canto General" is a oratorio for two solo parts, mixed choir and orchestra by Mikis Theodorakis with poems by Pablo Neruda

This album was recorded 1980 in Berlin in the Palace of the Republic (Palast der Republik), performed at the "10. Festival des politischen Liedes".

A delight for the ear and a pleasure for the soul ... It is difficult to translate the feelings when listening to this music. Theodorakis and Neruda achived with their composition "Canto General" a master piece.


Tracklist:
1. Amor America
2. Algunas Bestias
3. Voy A Vivir
4. Los Libertadores
5. Vienen Los Pajaros
6. La United Fruit Co.
7. Vegetaciones
8. America Insurrecta

Mikis Theodorakis & Pablo Neruda - Canto General (Amiga)
(320 kbps, cover art included)

Mikis Theodorakis - Sadduzäer-Passion - Passion of the Sadduccees (1982)

This disc will come as somewhat of a culture shock to those who, like myself, have only previously encountered Theodorakis, Zorba's Dance aside, in his rather overblown Ode to Zeus, on John Williams' (the film composer) 1996 Olympic disc, nestling alongside (and completely outshone by!) Michael Torke's glorious Javelin, and in miniatures championed by the likes of John Williams (the Australian guitarist) and Sharon Isbin.

In complete contrast, Sadduzäer-Passion is a complex allegorical work, based ostensibly on the history of the ancient Jewish sect but written as an elegy to the Greek political left, in which Theodorakis was heavily involved (and subsequently jailed for) around the time of the "Colonels’ Coup". It is also sung in German (no translations included) though based on the words of his friend Michalis Katsaros.

Anyway, what about the music, you are probably asking. If it is a masterpiece, and at least two of its seven sections at least approximate to that description, then it is probably a flawed one, as is the performance, if only by the nature of it being a live take, pops, clicks and all (it has been digitally remastered however). One of the main reservations, and one that would strike the casual or uncommitted listener immediately, is the (excessively?) forceful delivery of the speaker whose recitation has unnerving echoes, given the language, of the Nuremberg rallies (maybe this was what Theodorakis intended, given the subject matter). Still, the music is, without exception, interesting and often very moving, and reminds me, variously, of Wagner (unsurprisingly), Lili Boulanger, Koechlin (Law of the Jungle), Berg, the Ropartz of St. Nicolas and the Martinů of The Epic of Gilgamesh (even, in places, of Messiaen or the recent work of someone like Haukur Tomasson). Despite this the piece holds together very well as a whole and I am probably doing Theodorakis a disservice by implying that it is so polystylistic, because it actually isn't!

The first section, Form meines Ego (Form of my Ego), is upbeat and fairly light in mood, lulling you into a sense of false security, quickly dispersed by the almost Bergian angst of the first part of the second movement Blinde Zeit (Blind Time). The heart of the piece is, at least to my mind, located in the fifth and sixth sections (Im Toten Wald and Blonder Jüngling), where Theodorakis's Greek roots are displayed to their full in some wonderfully potent, archaic modality (the only direct parallels I can recollect are in some of the movements of John Foulds' brilliant Hellas suite and, maybe, in something like Pour les Funérailles d'un Soldat by the aforementioned Lili Boulanger). The finale starts off promisingly and, despite a long (overlong?) section with the speaker to the fore, ends with a remarkably powerful climax, a transfiguration of the insistent percussive and vocal rhythms of the germinative first movement into something more sinister, "a warning for the future" as the highly informative booklet notes would have it.

This score continues to fascinate me and I would recommend anyone at all interested in twentieth century music to hear it at least once. The recording is not flawless but the intensity of feeling, conveyed across 19 years, via CD, from this performance, remains undiminished. As much as I love the English pastoral and American "outdoor" traditions, a work like this demands to be heard and, in my case, reheard, irrespective of its independence from those or any other obvious idioms.

Neil Horner, www.musicweb-international.com

This album was recorded at Metropol-Theater, Berlin, 23rd February 1983 (during the 9th Musik-Biennale Berlin, with the Rundfunkchoir Berlin, the Berliner-Sinfonie-Orchestre, conducted by Hans-Peter Frank.


Mikis Theodorakis - Sadduzäer-Passion - Passion of the Sadduccees (1982)
(256 kbps, cover art included)

Samstag, 29. Juli 2023

Mikis Theodorakis, Maria Farantouri, John Williams - Songs Of Freedom (1974) / Songs And Guitar Pieces By Theodorakis

Happy birthday, Mikis Theodorakis!

This was an international release during the Greek dictarorship, of the songs of one of the greatest Greek composers and musicians, as well as popular political leader and fighter for political and social liberation and freedom, namely Mikis Theodorakis, adapted, arranged and performed by one of the greatest world classical guitarists John Williams with the voice of the emblematic female singer Maria Farantouri. Half of the songs are based on lyrics of Federico Garcia Lorca, translated by another nobel prize nominated Greek poet Odysseas Elytis. Most of the others are in lyrics of another great Greek poet, Yiannis Ritsos. It is an exceptional album of a great collaboration. This album was reissued in a CD form in 1995. 

Tracklist:
A1 I. Tou Pikramenou 2:21
A2 II. Antonio Torres Xepentia 1 3:17
A3 III. Antonio Torres Xepentia 2 3:01
A4 IV. Xamos Apo Agapi 3:34
A5 V. I Kalogria I Tsingana 2:36
A6 VI. Tou Anemou 4:29
B1 VII. I Pandermi 5:30
B2 Epitafios 2 2:05
B3 Epitafios 3 2:25
B4 Epitafios 4 2:19
B5 Epitafios 5 1:17
B6 I. To Yelasto Pedi 3:53
B7 II. Silva 2:36
B8 III. Irthan I Anthropoi 4:04




(flac, cover art included)

Freitag, 28. Juli 2023

VA - Melodien der Freundschaft (ETERNA, 1973, X. Weltfestspiele)

50 years ago, July 28, 1973, was the opening day of the "X. Weltfestspiele der Jugend und Studenten".

The GDR’s leaders were very sensitive about how their country was perceived internationally. Seen by many as a rump state and proxy of the Soviet Union, East German leaders took great pains to assert their legitimacy whenever and however they could. These efforts increased in 1971 with the ascension of Erich Honecker to the positions of First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Socialist Unity Party (SED) and Chair of State Council. Under Honecker, East Germany pursued international recognition through a variety of means including diplomacy (e.g. supplying aid to Third World countries, applying for and receiving member status at the United Nations (1973), signing the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe at Helsinki (1975)) and sport (by pouring huge amounts of money (and anabolic steroids) into the country’s Olympic programs to support the country’s “diplomats in training suits”). Another way the GDR attempted to massage its international image was by hosting the 10th iteration of the World Festival of Youth and Students in East Berlin in the summer of 1973, an event that has come to be known by some as the “Red Woodstock”.

The World Festival of Youth and Students was called into existence  in the aftermath of World War II by the World Federation of Democratic Youth and was initially inspired by a spirit of peace and anti-fascist activism. It offered one of the few platforms for exchange between young people from East and West (and the Global South) during the Cold War and was intended to be held at sites around the world on a regular basis. However, the festival quickly came to be controlled by supporters of the Soviet Union and its political agenda with the result that it tended to be hosted by East Bloc countries or their allies. The festival participants were typically left-leaning youth and usually convened under a motto exhorting the participants to “peace”, “friendship” and, in later years (including 1973) “anti-imperialist solidarity”.

East Germany hosted the third festival in East Berlin 1951, an event that was in many ways its international “coming out”, but country really pulled out all the stops twenty-two years later seeing in the festival a chance to buff its international image after the PR debacle that was the building of the Berlin Wall in 1961. By 1973, much of the East Berlin city centre had received its “socialist facelift” and was ready to act as the stage for an event which would attract some eight million visitors between July 28 and August 5, 1973. Of these participants, over 25,000 were international guests from more than 140 countries.

The festival program included 1,500 seminars conferences, lectures and discussions on a wide variety of themes plus a cultural program with more than 5,000 events taking place on 95 stages across the city. At the time, the festival seemed to come at a moment when some observers were beginning to wonder whether East German might be getting it right: wages were up, shelves were filling with consumer goods and relations with West Germany were moving in the direction of normalcy thanks to the signing of the Basic Treaty by Honecker and his West German counterpart, Chancellor Willy Brandt.

For many former-East Germans who were teenagers or young adults at the time of the festival, the event is recalled as a time of real openness in which the stringent social controls normally in place were suspended, if only briefly. Participants’ reminiscences are filed with stories of partial nakedness in public fountains, camping at the foot of the Berlin TV tower and trysts with exotic visitors in city parks. These sorts of behaviours would normally not have garnered just a wink and a nod from the People’s Police, but the accounts of the event suggest that authorities, eager to leave a good impression, largely left participants to themselves.

The festival program was heavy on the anti-imperialist ideology and reflected the Cold War debates of the time. Amongst the notable foreign guests present was Angela Davis, the American political activist famous for her membership in the Communist Party USA and for her links to the Black Panther Party (see above).
 
Thanks to http://gdrobjectified.wordpress.com/



Musikschau des Zentralen Musikkorps der FDJ und der Pionierorganisation "Ernst Thälmann" anläßlich der Eröffnungsveranstaltung Der X. Weltfestspiele der Jugend und Studenten

Tracklist:
 
A Melodien Der Freundschaft
B Melodien Der Freundschaft






(192 kbps, cover art included)

Gerry Wolff - Porträt in Noten (Amiga, 1969)


Gerry Wolff was born on June 23, 1920 in Bremen, Germany. He was an actor, known for "Wenn du groß bist, lieber Adam" (1990), "For Eyes only (Streng geheim)" (1963), "Nackt unter Wölfen" (1963) and "Die Jagd nach dem Stiefel" (1962). He was married to Mirjam Asriel. He died on February 16, 2005 in Oranienburg, Brandenburg, Germany.

Gerry Wolff was born as a son of the actor Martin Wolff and the soubrette Grete Lilien. At the age of eleven years he became an orphan and grew up by his grandmother. They emigrated in 1935 to England because of their Jewish origin and survived thereby the Holocaust.
Gerry Wolff returned to Germany in 1947 and became an ensemble member at the Theater am Schiffbauerdamm and later at the Volksbühen in East Berlin. He also started working as an film and tv actor in the DEFA ensemble.

He was also a well-known chanson interpreter in the GDR ("Die Rose war rot") and a TV moderator.
The Dietz publishing house released a wonderful book about the life of Gerry Wolff, edited by Wolfgang Herzberg, named "Gerry Wolff: Die Rose war rot".

The album "Porträt in Noten" was released in 1969 on the Amiga label in the German Democratic Republic. The album features tracks like the forementioned "Die Rose war rot" and interpretations of songs/lyrics by Georg Herwegh, Mikis Theodorakis, C. M. Bellmann, Francois Villon, Carlos Puebla and Ewan McColl.

Gerry Wolff - Porträt in Noten (Amiga, 1969)
(256 kbps, cover art included)

Afrique Dynamique! - Les Sons Funky Du Coeur D´Afrique!

DJ Hamid Zagzoule's Afrique Dynamique! selection has no governing theme beyond a bias towards uptempo dancefloor certainty.

His favourite period seems to be the 1980s, an ascendant time for the continent's music. Countries covered stretch from Mali down to South Africa, though the emphasis is definitely on West Africa.

The disc bolts off with a pair of classic Congolese soukous duets by Franco/Sam Mangwana and Pepe Kalle/Nyboma, both flooded with golden vocal harmonies and serpentine guitar chases. Numbers by Mahlathini & The Mahotella Queens and King Sunny Ade offer the widest stylistic diversions, the Queens supplying compulsive chorus hooklines, the neglected King Sunny still sounding out on his own with Nigerian ju-ju wobble-drums pulsing under bizarrely Hawaiian steel guitar phrases.

Ghanaian Highlife guitarist Eric Agyeman provides a 1970s classic, while Baaba Maal contributes an early, reggae-infused tune with one of his trademark vocal flights. One thing that's noticeable on tracks by Tshala Muana and Charlotte Mbango is the harshness of their programmed beats, increasingly prevalent once into the 1990s.

Afrique Dynamique! - Les Sons Funky Du Coeur d´Afrique!
(192 kbps, front cover included)

VA - Künstler für den Frieden - 2. Forum der Krefelder Initiative (1981)

A very large peace movement emerged in East and West Europe in the 1980s, primarily in opposition to American plans to fight the Cold War by stationing nuclear missiles in Europe. Moscow supported the movement behind the scenes, but did not control it

During the Cold War (1947–1989), the West German peace movement concentrated on the abolition of nuclear technology (particularly nuclear weapons) from West Germany and Europe. Most activists criticized both the United States and the Soviet Union.

This double album was released in 1981 and is one of the most important musical documents of the peace movement in West Germany in the 1980s. It is a live recording of the final event of the "2. Forum der Krefelder Initiative" in Dortmund, November 21 1981.



Tracklist:

A1 Bots – Sag Nein ! 1:34
A2 Bots – Das weiche Wasser 4:02
A3 Udo Lindenberg – Wozu sind Kriege da ? 4:45
A4 Ludwig Hirsch – 1928 3:46
A5 Knut Kiesewetter – Wo bleibt da der Zusammenhang ? 3:44
A6 Andrè Heller – Vom Schrei nach Frieden 3:37

B1 Esther Bejarano – Dos Kelbl 4:32
B2 Esther Bejarano, Donata Höffer, Eva Mattes – Sog nischt kejnmal 2:20
B3 Esther Bejarano, Donata Höffer, Eva Mattes, Angela Winkler – Lied von der Soija 3:31
B4 Franz Josef Degenhardt – Es denken die Leute von Gestern wieder an Morgen 3:42 (missing)
B5 Helmut Ruge – Russisches Erdgas - Der Herzschrittmacher 3:10
B6 Peter Franke, Joachim Kuntzsch, Franz Niermann, Michael Ernst - Pörksen – Lied der Deutschen 2:14
B7 Sänger Freies Berlin – Die Abnehmer 2:19

C1 Erika Pluhar – Jetzt 2:55
C2 Fasia Jansen, Joachim Kuntzsch, Dieter Süverkrüp – Feuer 2:10
C3 Angela Winkler – Mein Lied 2:00
C4 Donata Höffer, Eva Mattes – Das kleine tote Mädchen 3:53
C5 Dieter Süverkrüp – Mister General 4:51
C6 Dieter Süverkrüp – Der 1969. Psalm 1:57
C7 Dietmar Schönherr, Alle Künstler – Erklärung der Künstler & Sag mir wo die Blumen sind 1:55

D1 Curt Bois – An meine Landsleute 1:58
D2 Chor – Wir wollen Frieden 2:20
D3 David Bennent – Der Soldat 0:20
D4 Hannes Wader – Es ist an der Zeit 5:55
D5 Klaus Hoffmann – Glaub an Dich 2:25
D6 Klaus Hoffmann – Wo die Angst ist 3:20
D7 Dietmar Schönherr, Harry Belafonte – Statement Harry Belafonte 6:00






The Mahotella Queens - Kazet

Photobucket The Mahotella Queens are South Africa's foremost afro-pop singing group. The Queens -Hilda Tloubatla, Mildred Mangxola, and Nobesuthu Mbadu- first sealed their place in the legend of urban South African music in the early 1960's when, with Simon Nkabindé Mahlathini (the "Lion of Soweto") and the musicians of the Makgona Tsothle Band ("The Band Who Knows Everything"), they invented Mbaquanga. Mbaquanga (the Zulu word for a kind of dumpling, implying the homemade quality of the music's origin) is a strong and explosive potion of various types of traditional music (Zulu, Sotho, Shangaan, Xhosa) mixed with Marabi (South African jazz), American r&b, soul and gospel.

Throughout the 1960s and beginning of the 1970s Mahlathini and the Mahotella Queens played beer halls and township dances in South Africa. Their original sound came to be dubbed the "indestructible beat of Soweto", and their solid four-to-the-floor dance rhythm and soaring vocal harmonies came to embody the spirit of the oppressed peoples of the townships. They soon hit the international stage as heroes of the cultural resistance to apartheid and as idols to South Africa's black community during the dark years. They took a break in the mid-'70s to raise families, but reunited in the beginning of the eighties. In 1987, producer West Nkosi - saxophonist, penny-whistle player, and conductor of the Makgona Tsothle Band - took advantage of a stay in Paris to cut the record "Paris -Soweto" for the French label Celluloid, resulting in the Mahlathini & the Mahotella Queens' international hit "Kazet".

The album "Kazet" is a compilation of recordings that had recently been recorded in South Africa and in Paris, and included the South African national anthem "Nkosi Sikelel' i Afrika" in addition to new compositions such as "Amazemula" ("Monster"), "Nomshloshazana" (A woman's name) and "Ubusuku Nemini" and classics like "Kazet".


The Mahotella Queens - Kazet (192 kbps)

Ludwig Hirsch - Komm großer schwarzer Vogel (1979)

Austrian singer/songwriter Ludwig Hirsch was an accomplished and popular musician know for his dark humor and literate, often morbid lyrics. 

Born in Sankt Magdalena am Lemberg, Styria in 1946, Hirsch spent much of his youth in Vienna. Hirsch first studied visual art at university and, from 1975 to 1979, he was a member of the Theater in der Josefstadt. 

In 1978 he released his debut album, "Dunkelgraue Lieder" (Dark Grey Songs). That album's success launched his career and helped build his reputation as one of the architects of the burgeoning Austropop movement, which later saw the rise of other successful artists including Falco. 

Despite Hirsch's often darkly sardonic music, he achieved a high level of success and garnered several accolades during his lifetime, including appearing on a stamp issued by the Austrian postal service in 1993 and winning an Amadeus Austrian Music Award for his 2002 release "Perlen" (Pearls). 

Hirsch died on November 24, 2011 after jumping from a window at the hospital in Vienna where he was purportedly being treated for lung cancer. In 2012, Hirsch was posthumously granted the IFPI Lifetime Achievement Award from the Association of the Austrian Music Industry.


Tracklist:

Ich hab's wollen wissen 4:40
Das Geburtstagsgeschenk 3:22
Tante Dorothee 3:54
Der Clown 3:50
Herbert 4:34
1928 5:56
Die gottverdammte Pleite 4:06
Komm großer schwarzer Vogel 6:51
An Euch


Ludwig Hirsch - Komm großer schwarzer Vogel (1979)
(320 kbsp, cover art included)

VA - Bauer Maas - Lieder gegen Atomkraftwerke



Originally posted in November 2011:

A big number and high variety of actions is expected for November 23-28, 2011, due to the 13th transport of high level active atomic waste (the so-called Castor transport) from the reprocessing unit (plutonium factory) La Hague in France to the temporary repository in Gorleben, Germany.

To support the protest against nuclear waste dump in Gorleben (Wendland, Germany), we post the classic album "Bauer Maas - Lieder gegen Atomkraftwerke". It was released in 1979 on the "Pass-Op" label and contains tracks by Frank Baier, Fiedel Michel, Schmetterline and  more. This compilation contains protest songs against the atomic power plant in Kalkar.

VA - Bauer Maas - Lieder gegen Atomkraftwerke
(~160 kbps, cover art included, two tracks from the original album are missing)

More information about the protest action can be found via https://www.gorleben-castor.de/index.php or https://www.x-tausendmalquer.de/.

Donnerstag, 27. Juli 2023

Gisela May - Die sieben Todsünden (Brecht & Weill, vinyl rip, 1966)

Gisela May died in December 2016. Rest in peace!
 
Here are the classic recordings featuring Gisela May and the Rundfunk Sinfonie Orchester Leipzig, released on Deutsche Grammophon.

This recording of "Die sieben Todsünden" made in 1966, remains the most authentic interpretation (along with the 1956 recording featuring Lotte Lenya) despite later versions starring Julia Migenes, Milva, Elise Ross, Ute Lemper and others. The high-powered reading given by Herbert Kegel and the Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra and the superbly cast male quartet would by themselves have ensured the internatinal success of this recording (which earned the Grand Prix du Disque in 1968), but the crownig glory is Gisela May´s vocal performance in the part of Anna.


Tracklist:
Prolog
A1 Lied Der Schwestern: "Meine Schester Und Ich Stammen Aus Louisiana" (Andante Sostenuto)
I. Faulheit (Im Begehen Des Unrechts)
A2 Lied Der Familie: "Hoffentlich Nimmt Sich Unsere Anna Auch Zusammen" (Allegro Vivace)
II. Stolz Auf Das Beste Des Ichs (Unverkäuflichkeit)
A3.1 Lied Der Schwester: "Als Wir ABer AUsgestattet Waren" (Allegretto, Quasi Andantino)
A3.2 Lied Der Familie: "Das Geht Nicht Vorwärts" (Allegretto, Quasi Andantino)
III. Zorn Über Die Gemeinheit
A4 Lied Der Schwester: "Jetzt Geht Es Vorwärts" (Molto Agitato)
IV. Völlerei (Sättigung, Selberessen)
B1 Lied Der Familie: "Da Ist Ein Brief Aus Philadelphia" (Largo)
V. Unzucht
B2 Lied Der Schwester: "Und Wir Fanden Einen Mann In Boston" (Moderato)
VI. Habsucht Bei Raub Und Betrug
B3 Lied Der Familie: "Wie Hier In Der Zeitung Steht, Ist Anna Schon In Baltimore" (Allegro Giusto)
VII. Neid Auf Die Glücklichen
B4 Lied Der Schwester: "Und Die Letzte Stadt Der Reise War San Francisco" (Allegro Non Troppo)
Epilog
B5 Lied Der Schwester: "Darauf Kehrten Wir Zurück Nach Louisiana" (Andante Sostenuto)


Gisela May - Die sieben Todsünden (Brecht & Weill)
(192 kbps, front & back cover included)

Louis Killen, Stan Hugill, The X Seamen's Institute and Friends - Sea Songs (1979)

Featuring the voices of noted English folksingers and “shantymen” Stan Hugill and Lou Killen, "Sea Songs" is a celebration of maritime work songs. The term shanty (sometimes spelled chantey or chanty) refers to a specific style of work song belonging to 19th century sailing maritime traditions. This album, released in 1979, captures the spirit of the music residing within the hearts of those dedicated to its preservation.



Sleeve Notes:

"The sparkling summer skies of Seattle smiled down as July turned to August over Puget Sound. I was fortunate, along with the rest of the musical X Seamen's Institute, to join in a solid week of song to welcome ships and sailors of the American Sail Training Association's 1978 Tall Ships Pacific. And the company of English singer Louis Killen and the legendary Stan Hugill made the week unforgettable.

Greeting the US Coast Guard's majestic training bark Eagle, accompanied by a fleet of smaller square-riggers, yachts and wooden fishing vessels, was an international host of chantey singers, gathered from across the nation and across the sea to join in the choruses of sea music, from soulful forebitters to rousing capstan and halyard chanteys. After a week of singing and sailing in the matchless Northwest air and sea, we all came away with a feeling that sea music is a still-growing and living tradition-and we and the thousands in our audiences had shared a very special time together.

The tradition will continue to grow, as yearly festivals are being planned, the next one on the East Coast to be sponsored by the American Sail Training Association, the National Maritime Historical Society, and Tapinta."


Tracklist:

01 - Racine Morton & Marc Bridgham - Ize the Boy
02 - Dan Aguiar - Santianno
03 - Louis Killen - Shoals of Herring
04 - Clark Branson - Hanging Johnny
05 - Paddy Hernon - Mingulay Boat Song
06 - Mary Benson - Roll the Old Chariot
07 - Stan Hugill - Lowlands
08 - Stan Hugill - A Long Long Time Ago
09 - Mary Wilson - Sailboat Malarkey
10 - Louis Killen - The Bleecher Lass of Kelvin Hall
11 - John Townley - Run Come See
12 - Dave Baumgarten with Blue Sandrock - Greenland Fisheries
13 - Bernie Klay - The Sailor's Alphabet
14 - Dan Aguiar - Alice Wentworth

Louis Killen, Stan Hugill, The X Seamen's Institute and Friends - Sea Songs (1979)
(320 kbps, cover art included)

Reverend Gary Davis - Live At Newport (1965)

This is one of the few handful of recordings to feature the Rev. Gary Davis in concert. As the name of the project suggests, the proceedings were documented at the Newport Folk Festival in July of 1965.

The Reverend's solo vocal is accompanied by his own six- and twelve-string guitar(s) as well as mouth harp. The repertoire incorporates a wide range of secular blues and sacred gospel. Davis' material is derived from his own writings and notable interpretations of folk and blues standards such as "Lovin' Spoonful" and "I Won't Be Back No More." Also featured are insightful readings of some of his best-known and loved religious sides - namely "Death Don't Have No Mercy" and "Twelve Gates to the City."

It is remarkable that although the Reverend was approaching 70 - at the time of this recording - his driving passion and verve are of a man half his age. The frenetic "Samson & Delilah (If I Had My Way)," the haunting "You've Got to Move," the high-spirited "Buck Dance," and "Twelve Sticks" are among the most passionate and emotionally charged selections available in his canon. This set provides the platform for Davis to raise them to an even greater exceptionally potent level. The clean and nimble fret and fingering that became his signature sound has arguably never been as direct and forceful. The two instrumentals best reveal this facet of his performance. Unlike a majority of the garden-variety studio renditions of these songs, there is an almost palpable sense of salvation and urgency in the concert recordings - making them seminal installments of his musical catalog.

Tracklist:
01. Samson and Delilah
02. I Won't Be Back No More
03. Buck Dance
04. Twelve Sticks (the Dozens) 
05. Death Don't Have No Mercy 
06. You Got to Move
07. Lovin' Spoonful
08. She Wouldn't Say Quit 
09. I've Done All My Singing for My Lord 
10. Twelve Gates to the City
11. I Will Do My Last Singing in This Land Somewhere
12. Soldier's Drill
13. Get Along Cindy 


Reverend Gary Davis - Live At Newport
(320 kbps, cover art included)

The New Lost City Ramblers - Songs From The Depression (1959)

During the folk boom of the late '50s and early '60s, the New Lost City Ramblers introduced audiences to the authentic string band sound of the 1920s and '30s, in the process educating a generation that had never heard this uniquely American sound of old-time music. While maintaining music with a social conscience, they added guts and reality to the folk movement, performing with humor and obvious reverence for the music. In 1958, Mike Seeger, John Cohen, and Tom Paley modeled their band after groups like the Skillet Lickers, the Fruit Jar Drinkers, and the Aristocratic Pigs, choosing a name in keeping with the past. When Tracy Schwarz replaced Paley in 1962, the NLCR added solo songs from the Appalachian folk repertoire, religious and secular, educating a large segment of the American population about traditional music. Folkways recorded the NLCR on five albums in the early '60s, making the Ramblers famous and leading to TV appearances, successful tours, and appearances at the Newport Folk Festival. A songbook with 125 of their songs came out in 1964 and sold well.                   

The third album by this group definitely gets an "A" for effort, as simply gathering up so many worthwhile songs about the American depression was worth doing, no matter how listeners might feel about individual tracks. The choice of material doubles up on numbers by Blind Alfred Reed and Bill Dixon, includes fascinating historical material by Fiddling John Carson and Slim Smith, and wisely includes the genre of instrumental music, which sometimes makes the most succinct comment of all, such as the tough fiddle solo "Boys, My Money's All Gone." Many of the medium-tempo numbers are played with the finesse of a fine classical chamber quartet, the fiddle and banjo playing sharp and radiant. The Tom Paley-era Ramblers have a bit more of a college campus-type folky sound, but in some cases this suits these types of songs, making this one of the better early albums by this band. Mike Seeger is busy on an assortment of instruments, livening up one track with harmonica, another with mandolin. As usual, his fiddle and banjo playing is topnotch. There is also nice use made of Hawaiian and steel guitars. While some albums by this group seem like the ensemble is taking on a bit too much territory, here the clear focus of the subject matter creates a more relaxed atmosphere, despite the despair of the lyrics. But OK, it is not a record to put on when one wants to serenade away a bad mood. The original booklet includes lyrics and much interesting information about the original artists and the depression era in general.                


The New Lost City Ramblers - Songs From The Depression (1959)
(320 kbps, cover art included)

Malvina Reynolds - Sings The Truth (1967)

Born Malvina Milder of Jewish socialist immigrant parents in San Francisco, Malvina was refused her diploma by Lowell High School because her parents were opposed to US participation in World War I. She entered UC Berkeley anyway, and received her BA and MA in English. She married William Reynolds, a carpenter and organizer, in 1934 and had one child, Nancy, in 1935. She completed her dissertation and was awarded her Doctorate in 1936. It was the middle of the Depression, she was Jewish, socialist, and a woman. She could not find a job teaching at the college level. She became a social worker and a columnist for the People's World and, when World War II started, an assembly-line worker at a bomb factory. When her father died, she and her husband took over her parents' naval tailor shop in Long Beach, California. There in the late forties she met Earl Robinson, Pete Seeger and other folk singers and songwriters and began writing songs. She returned to Berkeley, and to the University, where she took music theory classes in the early fifties. She gained recognition as a songwriter when Harry Belafonte sang her “Turn Around.” Her songs were recorded by Joan Baez, Judy Collins, The Seekers, Pete Seeger, and the Limeliters, among others. She wrote songs for Women for Peace, the Nestle Boycott, the sit-ins in San Francisco on auto row and at the Sheraton-Palace, the fight against putting a freeway through Golden Gate Park and other causes. She toured Scandinavia, England and Japan. A film biography, Love It Like a Fool, was made a few years before she died in 1978. Ellen Stekert is writing a biography and would like information about Malvina's pre-1945 activities.

How many other musicians made their major-label recording debuts as grandmothers in their mid-sixties, as Malvina Reynolds did on this circa late-1966/early-1967 LP, produced by John Hammond? But those were different times, which saw ridiculously uncommercial, avowedly antiestablishment albums released by the labels of large corporations. And this is certainly an uncommercial record, Reynolds' wavering voice - even the liner notes disclose how "she admitted to one critic that she had a semi-permanent frog in her throat" - backed by plain acoustic guitar-dominated instrumentation, though it sounds like a bass is in the mix at points. As froggy as it is here, though, her voice was in better shape than it would be on her 1970s recordings for the small Cassandra label. And this does give you the chance to hear Reynolds' own versions of her two most famous songs, which were primarily associated with other performers on record - "Little Boxes" (which was a small hit for Pete Seeger) and "What Have They Done to the Rain?" (a hit for the Searchers, and also recorded by Joan Baez, Marianne Faithfull, and the Seekers). Those two compositions, particularly "What Have They Done to the Rain?," are the best songs on the LP, which otherwise ranges from moving and inspirational '60s folk ("I Don't Mind Failing," the melancholy closer "Bitter Rain") to unappealingly didactic folk protest. In part because of that streak of blunt righteousness, and in part because the melodies and singing often aren't that strong, much of this hasn't dated well, even if the spirit of Reynolds' anger and satire - targeting bigotry, suburban conformity, religious fundamentalism, and overdevelopment - remains right-on and commendable in many ways.


Tracklist:

The New Restaurant
What's Goin' On Down There
Little Boxes
Battle of Maxton Field
God Bless the Grass
I Don't Mind Failing
What Have They Done to the Rain?
The Devil's Baptizin
Singing Jesus
The Bloody Neat
Quiet
Love Is Something (Magic Penny)
Bitter Rain

Malvina Reynolds - Sings the Truth (1967)
(320 kbps, front cover included)

Kurt Weill - The Seven Deadly Sins & Little Threepenny Music (Julia Migenes & London Symphony Orchestra)

"The Seven Deadly Sins" ("Die sieben Todsünden"), a ballet with songs, is surely one of Brecht and Weill's most (unfortunately) neglected masterpieces, and definately one of their most unorthodox pieces.

Image

Kurt Weill fled Germany in 1933 after the Nazis banned his music. Almost immediately upon his arrival in Paris as a refugee, he was commissioned to compose a ballet for a newly formed company, Les Ballets 1933, headed by Boris Kochno and George Balanchine. What resulted was a ballet-with-songs, a story acted, danced and sung. The work brought together again - for the last time as a unit - some of Weill´s most familiar collaborators: Bertolt Brecht for the text, Caspar Neher for the decor, and Lotte Lenya, the composter´s actress-wife. Balanchine took on the duties of choreographer and chose as his principal dancer Tilly Losch. The result was "The Seven Deadly Sins", which received its first public performance in June 1933 at the Théatre des Champs-Elysées.

Julia Migenes (born March 13, 1949) is an American soprano opera singer. She was born on the Lower East Side of New York to a family of Greek and Irish-Puerto Rican descent.

Julia Migenes, of course, sings this masterpieces all divinely, and her dramatic flair and tension is all there, too. Her acting genuinely comes through...

Brechtian "scholars" pointing fingers at Migenes, saying that she would make a pretentious operatic sound while singing this piece, would do better to point their fingers elsewhere. Migenes was a sublime interpreter of Weill's music, and she doesn't just sing it 'prettily' (i.e., 'blandly') like some pretentious Brechtians would accuse. The male quartet that makes up the Annas' family (two tenors-brothers, baritone-dad, bass-mom), are all of very good voice (among them vetrans Alan Opie and Robert Tear).

Of course, the level of comparison is high: The Lotte Lenya recording of this music sets the standard. Her biting, rough-textured voice and dramatic abilities are outstanding....but Ute Lemper comes close, Gisela May comes closer and Marianne Faithfull comes closest. The Faithfull performance has the added benefit of being done in a fine English translation.

But even if Julia Migenes is not one of the top three interpreters of this music, these recordings are definitly worth listening. Sitting in the dark and listening to it is a great experience: the bittersweet ending of the piece is a heart-stopping, brilliant moment.

The orchestra's work is really wonderful, full and rich. Tilson Thomas has gone for a grand performance and it works up to a point.

(192 kbps, front cover included)

Mittwoch, 26. Juli 2023

Linton Kwesi Johnson - More Time (1998)

Linton Kwesi Johnson, one of the founding fathers of the reggae subgenre known as "dub poetry," doesn't always get all the respect he deserves. 

Purists point out that his patois is something of a put-on -- he writes songs (or poems, as he prefers) with titles like "If I Waz a Tap Natch Poet" and "New Word Hawdah," but he can turn it on and off at will and has written in standard English for scholarly journals. But despite his tweedy, bespectacled image, his politics are anything but objective or disengaged -- he writes about social injustice in general and racism in particular with a quiettly seething sense of outrage and an incisive wit. 

His latest effort finds him exploring familiar territory -- racist violence ("Reggae fi Bernard"), police oppression ("Liesense fi Kill" -- "liesense," get it?) -- but also getting a bit more introspective as he ponders poetry itself ("If I Waz a Tap Natch Poet") and domestic bliss ("Seasons of the Heart"). As always, the music is provided by Dennis Bovell's top-notch Dub Band, whose springy, sometimes swinging groove provides an interesting counterbalance to Johnson's often dour poetic insights.


Tracklist:

1 More Time 5:55
2 Reggae Fi Bernard 6:27
3 Hurricane Blues 5:54
4 Liesense Fi Kill 6:48
5 If I Waz A Top Natch Poet 5:39
6 Reggae Fi May Ayim 6:24
7 Poems Of Shape And Motion 6:24
8 Seasons Of The Heart 6:24
9 New Word Hawdah 6:01

(192 kbps, cover art included)

Perry Friedman - Hootenanny Vol. 2

"Singe-Bewegung" and "Oktoberklub" in East Germany, part 1.

In the early 1960s, after the erection of the Berlin wall, East Germany underwent a phase of economic reforms accompanied by a short-lived ideological thaw. Literature and cinema dared a critical take on real life behind the Iron Curtain. The “hot music” the regime had formerly stifled was now promoted. With the indigenous folk and protest songs came “left-wing” songs from “the other side”. The new song culture that emerged differed markedly from the songs of struggle and agitprop of previous years.

The musical protest movement in the West inspired many artists in East Germany. In 1963 Wolf Biermann wrote Ballade vom Briefträger William L. Moore (Ballad of a Mailman), which Fasia Jansen performed to resounding applause at the first West German folkfest at Burg Waldeck in 1964. In July 1966, half a year after being barred from performing and publishing his work, Biermann sent a Vietnam song to Walter Ulbricht (first secretary of the socialist party), declaring that it had “every chance of becoming an important song in the international anti-Vietnam war movement”. Gerhard Schöne, the 15-year-old son of a priest in the Saxon town of Coswig, wrote Sag mir, was ist deine Welt (Tell me what’s your world) to the tune of the West German hit Welche Farbe hat die Welt (What colour’s the world), which made a name for him in church circles. Around the same time an 18-year-old high school student in East Berlin, Hartmut König, composed Sag mir, wo du stehst based on the American song Which Side Are You On: König’s version became the most best-known title at the Hootenanny Club (later called the Oktoberklub). In 1968 Eulenspiegel-Verlag, an East Berlin publisher, put out a collection of protest songs with lyrics by Bob Dylan, Phil Ochs, Franz Josef Degenhardt, Dieter Süverkrüp, Hartmut König et al. It came with an LP on which Manfred Krug sang songs from Chile, France, the US and a Vietnam song of his own.

In 1960 Perry Friedman, a Canadian folk singer who’d moved to East Berlin the year before, began holding “hootenannys” there, i.e. sing-along folk music parties. He set out to transplant in the GDR the casual style of singing and performing songs that had become an established tradition in American left-wing circles. In 1965, DT 64, the radio station for young people, began promoting these events, and hootenanny clubs sprouted up a year later in Berlin and other East German cities. These clubs attracted both amateurs and pros, including Perry Friedman, Hartmut König, Reiner Schöne, Bettina Wegner, the Beat band Team 4, and many others. The hootenanny movement was neither oppositional nor unofficial. Though government-funded, it was not a campaign decreed from above, but a relatively spontaneous outgrowth that was unusually laid-back and unconstrained by East German standards in those days.

Perry Friedman - Hootenanny Vol. 2 (AMIGA, 1966)
(320 kbps, vinyl rip, cover art included)


If you want to find out more about the "Hootenanny" in East Berlin, visit this years "Festival Musik & Politik".

Joan & José ‎– Guanyarem! Wir werden siegen! Ganaremos! (1967)

Joan & José was a duet playing and singing the song of the Spanish resistance in exile.
Joan Esteller (Alcanar, Tarragona, 1939) met José Suarez (Cedeira, A Coruña, 1943) in Heldelberg, Germany, where both worked, back in 1963.

They released two albums with important songs of resistance and were well known in Germany.

"Guanyarem! - Wir werden siegen! - Ganaremos!" was their first album, sung in Catalan and an important contribution to the New Song movement.





Tracklist:
A1 El Vent (Aizea) / Der Wind / El Viento
A2 Ja Sé / Ich weiß schon / Ya Sé
A3 Fins Quan Durarà Tanta Nit / Bis wann wird diese lange Nacht dauern / Hasta Quando Durará Tanta Noche
A4 Què És El Que Fem, Amics? / Was tun wir, Freunde? / Qué Es Lo Que Hacemos, Amigos?
A5 La LLuna (Illargui) / Der Mond / La Luna
B1 Volem / Wir wollen / Queremos
B2 Plany / Klage / Lamento
B3 El Meu Jardí / Mein Garten / Mi Jardín
B4 La Meva T'Estranya / Mein Schmerz ist dir fremd / Te Extraña Mi Pena
B5 Amnistia / Amnestie / Amnistía
B6 Guanyarem / Wir werden siegen / Ganaremos

 Joan & José ‎– Guanyarem! Wir werden siegen! Ganaremos!  (1967) 
(320 kbps, cover art included)

VA - Encuentro De La Canción Protesta. Casa de las Américas, Cuba (1967)


The term "nueva canción" was first mooted in public at a key event which took place in Cuba from 29 July until 10 August 1967: the "Encuentro de la Canción Protesta". This first international meeting of artist performing protest songs was organized by the "House of Americas"
Fifty musicians from eighteen countries were given the opportunity to hear each other perform, exchange ideas and experiences, discuss the role of singer and song and establish friendships and contacts. Artist from four continents were brought together at a time of political upheavel in different parts of the world.
The appearance of Gerry Wolff, film actor and singer in the GDR, is another clue for the connection between the GDR song movement ("Singebewegung") and international revolutionary artists as mentioned before in the "Canto Libre" posting.
Daniel Viglietti, who participated in those days, said that "the meeting was an opportunity to discover that if you had fallen into the error of thinking we were alone, we were not alone". Singing in many languages, artists from all around the world expressed solidarity with the oppresed people and their fight for a better world.
The various stages reached in the development of movement in individual countries with different economic, social and political conditions and musical cultures had resulted in the usage of different terms: "Canción protesta", "canción comprometida", "canción politica revolucionaria" and "nueva canción". Other names used before and after include "canción folklórica", "cancion popular", "canción politica", "canciones de lucha y esperanze", "canto libre" and "canto nuevo".
Musicians, especially those who are members of, or allied to, the Communist Party, met intermittently before and after the Cuban "Encuentro" at Youth Festivals held every four years in the Socialst countries, as they also do at "International Festivals of Political Songs" held annualy in the GDR, at "Victor Jara Festivals", "Concert for Peace", various solidarity concerts and more recently "Nueva Canción" and "Canto Nuevo" Festivals held in Latin America. At the Cuban meeting, an "Encuentro", not a Festival, it was resolved that song should play an important role in the liberation struggles against North American imperialism and against colonialism, as it was agreed that song possessed enormous strength to communicate with the people and break down barriers, such as those of illiteracy, and taht in consequence it should be a weapon at the service of the people, not a consumer product used by capitalism to alienate them. Protest singers (as they continued to call themselves despite the debate) should be engaged in a constant enriching search for artistic quality, in itself a revolutionary activity. They should work amongst their people, confronting problems within their societies. For some of those involved this merely reflected what they wer doing already.

Tracklist:
01. Me gustan los estudiantes – Ángel Parra
02. A yime yo be Singing – Jean Lewis
03. Canción para mi América – Daniel Viglietti
04. Certainly Lord – Julius Lester
05. Mia cara moglie – Ivan Della Mea
06. Hasta siempre – Carlos Puebla
07. The ballad of Ho Chi Minh – Ewan Mccoll
08. Porque los pobres no tienen – Isabel Parra
09. Epigrama – Luis Cilia
10. The cutty wren – John Faulkner, Sandra Kerr y Terry Yarnell
11. Mi honda es la de David – Oscar Chávez
12. Vous – Martha Jean Claude
13. Bella ciao – Giovanna Marini, Elena Morandi e Ivan Della Mea
14. El pobre y el rico – Los Olimareños
15. Lettera del condennatto a morte – Elena Morandi
16. Juventud – Carlos Molina
17. Le coq chant – Onema Djamba Pascal
18. Lullaby for the times – Sandra Kerr
19. El mensú – Ramón Ayala
20. San Sang Ban – Tran Drung y Pham Duong
21. Der Hammer – Gerry Wolff
22. Coplas al compadre Juan Miguel – Alfredo Zitarrosa
23. Diguem no – Raimon
24. Coplera del viento – Oscar Matus y Armando Tejada Gómez
25. Hitler Ain’t Dead – Peggy Seeger
26. Coplas del pajarito – Rolando Alarcón
27. Hell no – Barbara Dane

(192 kbps, cover art included)

Dario Domingues - Exodus South Of Rio Grande (Trikont, 1983)

 

In the early 80th Dario Domigues became a symbol of World Music - long before the cathegory was established. He was symbol between indian music and influences from other cultures.

Dario was a genius with his South American flutes. His music is a combination of South American rhythms, old indian music and original melodies with a range of exotic, acoustic and electronic instruments, some of them self made. He sang his own compositions and he played a wide variety of native drums including the Bombos from Argentina and Afro-Brasilian-Percussions.

 Dario Domingues was born in the Patagonia region of Argentina, which he had to leave in 1976. He came to Canada in 1977 where he made his home in Ottawa. - In Germany, his first album "The end of Yagans journey" won the annual German Critics choice Award; the second album as well. He has enthused audiences world wide having toured extensively in Europe since 1981 but also playing in Canada, the U.S.A. and Japan. Dario Domingues died aged 46 in April 2000.

Born 1950 in Argentina, came to Canada, Ottawa in 1977. Worked with folk musician Willie Dinn, Eberhard Schöner, and others. In Germany, his first album "The end of Yagans journey" won the annual German Critics choice Award. He toured extensively in Europe, Canada, the U.S.A. and Japan. Dario Domingues committed suicide in 2000.

Tracklist:

A1 Ill Rivers 4:40
A2 Exodus South Of Rio Grande 5:45
A3 Encuentros (Meetings) 3:15
A4 Survival In Otavalo 3:50
B1 Don't Lie, Don't Make War 5:23
B2 On The Nazca Paths 3:40
B3 Riots In Quito 1:50
B4 Our Beloved Children Of The Third World 6:45

Dario Domingues - Exodus South Of Rio Grande (1983)
(256 kbps, cover art included)

Sally Timms - To The Land Of Milk & Honey (1995)

Best known for her tenure with the legendary Mekons, singer Sally Timms was born November 29, 1959 in Leeds, England; as a teen she became infatuated by glam rock, but it was the rise of punk which inspired her to pursue a musical career of her own, and in 1980 she collaborated with the Buzzcocks' Pete Shelley on the album "Hangahar". 

Timms fronted her own all-female group the Shee Hees before joining the Mekons in 1985, debuting on the acclaimed "Fear and Whiskey"; two years later, she and backing outfit the Drifting Cowgirls issued an EP, "The Butcher Boy". Timms continued balancing her Mekons duties with solo projects in the years to follow, further expanding upon the country influences which informed the band's albums like 1987's "Honky Tonkin'"; her first full-length solo effort, "Somebody's Rocking My Dreamboat", appeared in 1988, although the follow-up, "To the Land of Milk and Honey", was seven years in forthcoming. "Cowboy Sally's Twilight Laments for Lost Buckaroos" surfaced in 1999.

On "To The Land Of Milk & Honey" there are some originals, by Timms and Jon Langford, and some covers. You've got her beautiul voice, an excellent group of musicians, and a casual let's just play some music and have a good time vibe - an attitude you can call rock and roll, punk, etc. Sounds good to me whatever you call it. I love how they aren't bound by any templates. They use the violin, the accordian, the tuba, mandolin, and other non *rock* instruments, just cause they seemed to like the sound. Well, I do too.


Tracklist:

1 Round Up 3:18
2 Half Past France 4:04
3 Everytime She Walks In The Room 3:00
4 It Says Here 3:31
5 Junk Barge 3:45
6 King Ludwig 3:49
7 No More Rides 3:56
8 Homburg 2:55
9 Painted Girl 2:52
10 Longing, Madness & Lust 4:02
11 Deep 3:20

(320 kbps, cover art included)

Dienstag, 25. Juli 2023

Juan & José - Streik! (¡A La Calle! Qui A Dit Que L'Espagne Est Morte?) (Pläne, 1969)

Juan & José aka Joan & José was a Spanish duo consisting on Joan Esteller (b. Alcanar, Tarragona) and José Suarez (b. Cedeira, La Coruña). They sang politcal songs and exiled to Germany in the middle 60s, where they released two albums:

- "Wir werden siegen; Guanyarem; Ganaremos” (Pläne, 1967), with songs composed by themselves and also with poems from Salvador Espriu.

- "Streik! ¡A la calle! Qui a dit que l’espagne est morte?" (Pläne serie Sieg 3, 1969) they also wrote some songs and set music to poems from Antonio Aparicio, Victoriano Crémer, Rafael Alberti, Miguel Hernández and Chicho Sánchez Ferlosio, singing also songs from the Guerra Civil Española times from the songbook "Colección de canciones de lucha". The album was released with an 8-page booklet with lyrics in German, Spanish and French and with liner notes in German, Spanish and French on the back of sleeve.


Tracklist:

A1 El Éjército Del Ebro / Los Campesinos
A2 En España Las Flores
A3 Cala De Martorell, Playa De La Solidaridad
A4 En La Plaza De Mi Pueblo
A5 A Las Brigadas Internationales
A6 Viento Del Pueblo
B1 A La Calle
B2 Canción Para Dormir A Un Niño Pobre
B3 A La Huelga
B4 Para Una Amiga Y Compañera
B5 Para Los Indiferentes
B6 Quien Decia Que España Estaba Muerta?


German and French track titles:
A1: Das Heer Am Ebro/Die Landarbeiter - L'Armée De L'Ebre/Les Paysans
A2: Die Blumen In Spanien - En Espagne Les Fleurs
A3: Bucht Von Martorell, Strand Der Solidarität - Baie De Martorell, Plage De La Solidarite
A4: Auf dem Marktplatz Meines Dorfes - Sur La Place De Mon Village
A5: An Die Internationalen Brigaden - Aux Brigades Internationales
A6: Sturm Des Volkes - Vent Du Peuple
B1: Auf Die Straße! - Dans La Rue
B2: Schlaflied Für Ein Armes Kind - Berceuse Pour Un Enfant Pauvre
B3: Auf Zum Streik! - En Greve
B4: An Die Freundin, Die Genossin - Pour Une Amie Et Camarade
B5: An Die Gleichgültigen - Pour Les Indifferents
B6: Wer Sagt, Dass Spanien Gestorben Ist? - Qui A Dit Que L'Espagne Est Morte?

(320 kbps, cover art included)

Ostzonensuppenwürfelmachenkrebs - Absolut nicht frei (1992)

Having formed in 1986, the band with that absurd sounding name – borrowed from the headline of a German tabloid ("East German Stock Cubes Give You Cancer") – released their “Für Zuhause” LP on L´AGE D´OR in 1990 which still is considered as one of the most important German releases of the 90’s.

On their first two releases, the formation around singer, songwriter and guitarist Carsten Hellberg sang in English, then they stopped singing altogether, and in the end in German. The usual process of finding the right language and its implementation as regards the lyrics likewise applied to the music of this band – affectionately also known as the SuWüs (short for "Suppenwürfel"). At the beginning it was something like offbeat, non-classifiable folk core rock (from A as in Amon Düül to Z as in Zappa, there seemed to be a bit of everything in it) which, despite the vast range of styles, depicted incredible homogeneity.

On their last triumphant release, “Leichte Teile, kleiner Rock” (1998), the SuWüs discover groove and continue to impress with their intellectual and also very private lyrics without coming across as smart-arses. It’s so easy: regaining speech. Organizing the vocals and instrumentation more compactly. Formulating more succinctly. Bringing on an indie prog rock smasher as if one were half nuts, and picking up anything from King Crimson to Built to Spill or whatever you happen to find along the way. History speaks.

Here´s their 1992 album, called "Absolut nicht frei" (L'Age D'Or).



Tracklist:

1 To The Singer Of Supertramp
2 My Life In The Ghost Of Bush
3 Blues
4 Bodymind
5 Dandruff Zone
6 Thunder In My Ass
7 Freak Show
8 Gelb gefleckt
9 Nakroleptiker


Ostzonensuppenwürfel - Absolut nicht frei
(320 kbps, cover art included)

Manfred Krug - Singt Protestsongs (1968)

Although he is chiefly known as a popular German television actor, Manfred Krug has also had careers as a film actor and as a pop-jazz singer. Born in Duisburg on February 8, 1937, he relocated to East Germany in 1949 at the age of 13, where he worked in a steel factory until he began acting on stage and in films in 1956. 

He recorded several successful pop-jazz albums in the early '70s, often in conjunction with composer Gunther Fischer. He also began a career as a writer under the alias Clemens Kerber.

Frustrated with the political climate in East Germany (he had been forbidden to perform), Krug applied for and was granted permission to move to the West German portion of Berlin in 1977. Once settled there, he continued to act but sang and recorded only occasionally, and through the 1980s and 1990s and into the 21st century he has worked primarily as an actor in various television shows. He died on 21 October 2016 in Berlin

This single was originally released with the book "Protestsongs" at the Eulenspiegel Verlag, Berlin 1968.




Tracklist:

A1 I Ain't Marching Anymore (Phil Ochs)
A2 Franco La Muerte (Léo Ferré)

B1 Porque Los Pobres No Tienen (folk song from Chile)
B2 Vietnam-Song (Manfred Krug, Werner Sellhorn)


Manfred Krug - Singt Protestsongs (1968)
(192 kbps, cover art included)