JOHN STEVENS/EVAN PARKER - The Longest Night Vol 2

 

(OG 420)

 

Track listing: 21:25/21:47/22:18/23:12/23:40

 

John Stevens (percussion, cornet and voice), Evan Parker (soprano sax). Recorded at Riverside Studios, London W4 (says the sleeve) or W6 (says me) on 21 December 1976. Released: August 1978. Produced by John Stevens. Sleeve design: Nicolette Amette.

 

I bought Vol 2 first, in September 1978 I think, from 23^rd Precinct Records in Bath Street, Glasgow. If you were coming in from Uddingston on the bus it was the first record shop you hit after leaving Buchanan Street Bus Station, and 23^rd Precinct were really good at getting in records on Ogun, ECM, Black Saint and FMP. Maybe the owner had good contacts.

 

But yes, I bought the second part of The Longest Night first and didn’t fret about not hearing or getting the first part first, so to speak. That was fine because I was fourteen years old and making up my own semi-random library of music, as most teenagers do; you just pick up what you fancy, on the spur of the moment, then work out to your own liking how it all fits together. I wasn’t particularly aware of any critical canons. I bought music that I liked, rather than sternly-packaged lectures (such things did not exist in the late seventies. Even Lenny Kaye’s notes to Nuggets indicated that this music was supposed to be fun, and were informative without bashing you over the cranium with “knowledge”).

 

I even brought The Longest Night Vol 2 to music class at school. You can (a) imagine the general reaction and (b) assume that was why I never had a girlfriend (that assumption was wrong; I was not actually allowed to have girlfriends when I was at school, not that many came running to apply for the vacancy. A lot of them pretended they were in love with me just to wind me up, and if anything that was more hurtful. The one girl I did like was friendly but not interested. Quite right too).

 

Our music teacher, who was a young woman just out of teacher training college called Miss Muir, declared that the music on this record was the strangest she’d ever heard, with the possible exception of Stockhausen (I occasionally, i.e. every twenty years or so, wonder what became of Miss Muir; she had to put up with a lot of nonsense – nothing dodgy, just standard teenage nonsense - from the BOYS in our music class – yes, these classes were gender-divided). I realised that my musical path was likely to become long and lonely.

 

Anyway, WHAT ABOUT THE MUSIC CARLIN well OK. Listened to in sequence, as I have just done, it’s easy to grasp that throughout Vol 1 of The Longest Night, Stevens and Parker were working at re-establishing a fruitful musical relationship with each other, trying things out, seeing what works and extending the latter. I robotically thought of Vol 2 as comprising “The Shorts” as opposed to “The Longs” but in fact it contains three relatively short improvisations on its first side and two rather longer ones on its second.

 

Having established a common improvisatory language on the first volume, the two musicians then set about honing it on the second, and we do get a clearer idea of their basic template – so much so that my hooting classroom “peers” snickered that all the tracks sounded the same. Even the distinguished Max Harrison (or so I thought at the time – I now find it impossible to read A Jazz Retrospect and not imagine it being narrated in the voice of Alan Green), reviewing this record in Melody Maker, came to a similar conclusion.

 

I’d say that only two of these five tracks – the first two - sound roughly the same. In each, Parker begins with a solemn, wailing, almost bluesy tone on his saxophone, and there is even a rough melodic and harmonic structure. Stevens bides his time ticking behind Parker until he leans on one of his two hi-hats and begins to make the music busier, upon which Parker speeds up and we go into the expected pointillistic ululating.

 

This is all very well and good but, presumably in order to avoid getting stuck in an improvisatory rut (and, given the timings of the tracks – the titles indicate the time when each begins – probably after a refreshing coffee or brandy), the duo then alter their tactics; in “22:18” the pace is initially slower and more contemplative, but the music then naturally gains intensity and, particularly when Stevens lays into his for-kids snare drum, becomes very febrile – Parker’s blowing becomes especially garrulous – to a point where we could almost be listening to a mid-sixties Interstellar Space-style old-school free jazz blowout.

 

On side two, “23:12” develops these same dynamics with greater patience but, finally, far severer attack and purpose, though manages to retain a fairly advanced but constant harmonic structure. This performance demonstrates just how good free improvisation can be when it’s done by people who know what they’re doing and have learned all the rules so they know when and how to break them. It climaxes, after a cyclical soprano atop sinister ride cymbal hiss, when Stevens switches to cornet and the two enjoy a good, cathartic howl, culminating in a slightly ironic and melancholy fanfare.

 

Yet the most sublime of these five performances is the fifth and last one. “23:40” is quite different from the other four and is the one that leads you to think that Stevens and Parker have now devised a new way of improvising. It commences with a two-part drone, or possibly pibroch, as Parker’s nagging circular-breathing two-note refrain hovers over Stevens’ very low cornet grunt like a bee getting caught in a pair of bagpipes. As this breaks, Parker’s soprano reaches higher than it has done elsewhere on the record – here is where his playing really begins to resemble birdsong (which makes him a link, missing or overlooked, between Coltrane and Messiaen). At so many points does this improvisation, as Harrison put it, hover deliciously on the verge of non-existence (I think that’s what old Max said, anyway). This is all about atoms, crystallisation and pointillistic peripheries. Once again the improvising works up towards a moderately dynamic climax until, with a final and abrupt unison upward reel of soprano and snare drum, that’s quite enough, our new musical language has now been established, and it’s now the 22^nd of December, after midnight and Christ Evan I’m knackered, think I’ll ring for a cab back to South Ealing. It’s just tremendous listening; those were my thoughts in 1978, and so they remain today.

 

Current availability: Reissued on the 2-CD compilation, Corner To Corner + The Longest Night, incorporating the contents of OG 120, OG 420 and OGCD 005, in 2007, and which was released on download in May 2021.

RADU MALFATTI/HARRY MILLER* - Bracknell Breakdown

 

(OG 320)

 

Track listing: The Audient Stood On Its Foot/Friendly Duck

 

(*Note: On its labels and spine, the album is credited to “Twice.” This was the duo’s working name.)

 

Radu Malfatti (trombone, etc.), Harry Miller (bass). Recorded at South Hill Park, Bracknell, on 29 July 1977. Released: February 1978. Produced by Ron Barron. Sleeve design: Liz Walton. Photography: Tony Foster.

 

I don’t quite grasp the concept of musical “reductionism” but in essence and practice it seems to involve improvising as little as possible, as softly and quietly as possible and as unconventionally as possible while allowing plenty of space for silence. Oh, and microtonality; can’t forget that either. Very Zen, very John Cage; work through the presumed tedium (a.k.a. “ultraminimalism”) and you break through to another, deeper self. You listen to what else isn’t happening and suddenly it’s a hive of surprising microbial activity. Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaan.

 

Radu Malfatti, originally from Innsbruck in Austria, turned up in early seventies London, mainly to escape the draft, and quickly established himself as one of the most exuberant trombonists on the improvising scene. Look at what he does here with the Brotherhood of Breath – he’s red in the face from his hardcore blowing, and Nick Evans can only shake his head in wonder at what he’s doing.

 

But he wasn’t really that happy. He wanted to improvise freely, but the very familiar paradox reasserted itself – there were “rules” to free improvisation, he had to improvise in a certain way, or possibly in one certain improviser’s way (I wonder who that was). Well, yes, and some of my recent Ogun writing examines the possibility that the scene might have painted itself into a rather dusty corner.

 

Disillusioned, Malfatti set about moving in the opposite direction. Quiet tones, not loud blowing. Slowness, not hyperactivity. Minimalist gestures, not maximalist freakouts. Over the last thirty-five years or so he has done an excellent job at erasing himself from music altogether. There exist endless CDs or even box sets of his wherein the point is: not a lot happens, and it happens as quietly and infrequently as possible. I have only so much time left on this planet.

 

I suppose that the improvising on Bracknell Breakdown was Malfatti’s initial step towards enforced quietude. Through its studied cloisters there are lengthy moments where nothing much sounds as though it is occurring. At times one has to strain one’s ears at full volume to detect any activity.

 

This is not to say that the record is neither interesting nor exciting. In the other corner we have Harry Miller, who, though a participant in many memorable edge-of-hardcore free jazz collective conclaves, was I gather never entirely sold on the concept of unfettered free improvisation, and for most of the two extended sidelong improvisations here seems primarily intent on setting up some kind of a structure for the trombonist’s adventures.

 

In true Fluxus style, or more likely true AACM style, the musicians used, according to the brief and uncredited liner note, whatever else was lying around in the great hall of South Hill Park that Friday summer afternoon, including a cup, a balloon and from the photographic evidence a wine glass, a recorder and other assorted paraphernalia. Or at least Malfatti used all these things, since Miller appears to stick to his bass all the way through. I hear no aural evidence of the pictured piano being played.

 

It’s good dead end stuff. “The Audient (that rare singular!) Stood On Its Foot” begins like an Alban Berg string quartet with Miller’s solemn bowing and Malfatti’s high-register drones. The piece veers between Viennese School classicism and pseudo-electronica; at times the sounds that the two men conjure resemble quarrelling walkie-talkies. There are a couple of straight free trombone/bass rave-ups but Miller sounds far more comfortable bowing than plucking in this context. The work concludes, inevitably, with the sound of one hand clapping; metaphor for apathetic society, yeah, right? Actually people were probably busy pogoing away to the Adverts and X-Ray Spex at the time, but whatever…

 

“Friendly Duck” is shorter and more purposeful. Malfatti makes the requisite duck calls and Miller responds with a churning arco bass riff that sounds like a heavy metal guitarist warming up. Then they get very high (MUSICALLY, I mean). The trombonist conjures up some remarkable effects from whatever he is using to enhance his playing. The way Malfatti manipulates his multiple mutes in “Audient” is, well, clever. Ingenious, even. I’m not sure that it thrills or moves me in any way, but it’s a bit like watching one of those acrobats in Covent Garden of a Saturday lunchtime – hmmm, how do they do that, fancy a bite at Joe Allen’s (tip re. the latter; don’t. Went there one Sunday afternoon and that’s 75 quid I’ll never see again, wasted on very dull and taste-free food, and no actors of any degree of fame or obscurity turned up. Well, it was a Sunday…)? His technique is impeccable.

 

Anyway, the “Duck” piece works its way up towards a natural climax; Miller takes a considered plucked bass solo while Malfatti eats his lunch in the background, and then we arrive at that confounding moment when the improvisers have run out of ideas. There follow an arid 4-5 minutes where practically nothing happens at all – there’s your prototype ultraminimalism – before the two summon up renewed strength and have a good old-fashioned blowout as they would do in the context of the Brotherhood or Ninesense on a nice evening. Some bluesy wailing and something approximating a thematic motif conclude the work, and the record. Well, there you are. When the 3-CD Harry Miller box set The Collection was released, many people claimed they skipped this one and proceeded straight to OG 525, and I can’t blame  them. It isn’t austere, this music, but neither is it very involving. The duo released a further album on FMP in 1981 entitled Zwecknagel which perhaps demonstrated how much more compelling and powerful this music was when performed in front of a live audience; they certainly did not hold anything back on that particular recital. Why you would wish to slide away into studied, extended silence is something which only a reductionist could understand. I’m in the fatalist Rechabite camp myself; enjoy yourself and live it up when there’s only so much more life available to be lived. Innit.

 

Current availability: Reissued on CD as part of the abovementioned The Collection box set of Harry Miller’s Ogun (and associated) work in 1999; subsequently reissued in its own right on download in April 2021.

THE BLUE NOTES – Blue Notes In Concert: Volume 1

 

(OG 220)

 

Track listing: Ilizwi/Abelusi (African Folk Song)/Amadoda/Nomsenge/Magweza/Ithi-Gqi/Mhegebe (African Folk Song)/Manje/We Nduna (African Folk Song)*

 

(*Note: This is the track listing as given on the original L.P. release. The track listing given on the CD and download reissues is quite different, but apart from two bonus tracks added on at the end, the music is identical.)

 

Louis Moholo-Moholo (credited as Louis Tebugo Moholo) (drums and percussion), Johnny Mbizo Dyani (bass and vocals), Chris McGregor (piano and percussion), Dudu Pukwana (alto saxophone, whistle, percussion and vocals).** Recorded at the 100 Club, 100 Oxford Street, London W1, on 16 April 1977. Produced by Ron Barron with Keith Beal. Sleeve design and photography: George Hallett.

 

(**Another note: the L.P. credits only the first-named instruments, so the rest of who-does-what-and-when is educated guesswork on my part.)

 

What a great back cover this is. One of Ogun’s best. Who are these smiling ladies? Why, it’s the wives of the Blue Notes! Lovely, nicely subversive and overdue (and well ahead of its time), that idea. It gives a good indication of the happiness that emanates from the record itself.

 

 

While it really is a pity that it took the stupid death of one of them to provoke it, the reformation of the Blue Notes as a working band was a major event. Johnny Dyani in particular had carefully kept his distance from his erstwhile colleagues for some time, but it was a delight to witness him back in action. Here they are, back in their natural live environment, and with what sounds like improved recording equipment from the time of OG 900.

 

The return of the Blue Notes also signalled a subtle change in direction for Chris McGregor’s approach to music-making. In fact he had been signalling it with the Brotherhood of Breath for a couple of years beforehand. Gone are the franticness and raging despair of before, to be replaced by incoming lightness and patience. The way in which these four South Africans were now organising their music was more gradual and cumulative, taking their time to play, repeat and elaborate on themes. This approach was more in keeping with the spiritual patterns woven in the course of South African tribal religious practice.

 

What this meant for the Blue Notes of 1977 was a more detailed, and therefore deeper, exploration of (and immersion in) their source material. Listening to “Ilizwi,” there is no rush to superimpose variants on its themes and rhythms; they arise from natural interaction, and the results are hypnotic and compelling. Keen listeners will note that Dudu Pukwana plays the melodies formerly known as “Diamond Express” and shortly to be known as “Kwhalo” (see OG 524) at strategic points. Most of the seven tracks listed side one of the original L.P. segue into each other; it is a near-continuous group meditation.

 

True freedom in music is a condition of development, rather than a perceived necessity. There are very few outwardly “out there” moments on the record, except perhaps when Dyani picks out the melodic line of his own “Ithi-Gqi” (which he will revisit on OG 520) beneath a thunderous Cecil Taylor-style keyboard rampage from McGregor. If anything, the record’s opening moments are heavily reminiscent of Taylor with Jimmy Lyons and Sunny Murray at Zurich’s Café Montmartre, where the younger Blue Notes would also perform just two years later – a primarily percussive approach with fragments of melody darting around like thrilled satellites. “Manje” is terrific hard bop which goes to several other extremely interesting places. Aside from a sudden drum explosion at “Manje”’s end, which leads into a brief solo to introduce “We Nduna,” Louis Moholo-Moholo mostly holds back, just concentrating on keeping the rhythm nailed down but simultaneously fluid.

 

And there are, of course, vocal chants of old Xhosa songs and plenty of percussion, all summed up in the closing and really quite moving “We Nduna” where you feel the surviving Blue Notes have located and secured a closure of sorts on the past. The pain of their homeland, needless to say, remained bleakly relevant; at this point, Steve Biko had less than five months to live. But what the Blue Notes were now offering was not so much fury (although that was still palpable) as hope. Moving on towards a better future which I am sorry to say only one of these four musicians lived to see fully. There never was a Volume 2, but maybe enough had already been said here.

 

Current availability: Now this is slightly complicated. A revised and expanded CD edition, now solely entitled Blue Notes In Concert, was released in 2008 as one-fifth of the five-CD Blue Notes box set The Ogun Collection. It was then reissued, on both CD and download, in its own right, in March 2021. The revised track listing can be seen on Bandcamp – a note for Nick Evans and Gary Windo’s “Funky Boots March,” a popular Brotherhood of Breath set-closer, which makes two cameo appearances here. There are two extra tracks; the powerful swinging kwela waltz of “Kudala (Long Ago),” and the exceptionally poignant chants-and-percussion finale of “Mama Ndoluse/Abalimanga.” And a chapeau grand to whoever did the band announcements.