Joni Mitchell ‘Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter’ - as indefinable an album as ‘Astral Weeks’ and every bit as unique, this is a magnificent album that hasn’t dated a day since its release in 1977. And why does Paul Simon get all the kudos for bringing African rhythms to western pop when Joni had done it a decade earlier?
Mike Oldfield ‘Hergest Ridge’ - despite (or maybe because) of his fragile state of mind when producing this, I’ve always felt Oldfield’s sophomore album to be a superior work than ‘Tubular Bells’, both melodically and emotionally. In fact, I now rate it higher than ‘Ommadawn’ as his finest creation. I’d love to hear an orchestrated version;
Paul Weller ‘Cosmic Fringes’ (PSB remix) - I’m no great lover of dance music but I can’t keep my feet still to this;
Peter Frampton ‘Frampton’s Camel’ - Frampton’s second solo effort from 1973 isn’t bad, if a little too balled oriented. The original studio take on ‘Do You Feel Like We Do’ is much more appealing, shawn of the annoying crowd pleasing crap included in the live version;
David Crosby ‘For Free’ - I stand by what I said last week. It’s almost obscene that someone nearly eighty years old can make an album as good as this, never mind someone as hedonistic as Croz has been. His voice remains plaintively soulful and eminently listenable;
Matching Mole S/T - after forty-odd years I’ve finally come to appreciate ‘Part Of The Dance’ and the more band-oriented second side as the essence of this record, much as I love Wyatt’s heartstruck paeans on side one. Phil Miller RIP;
Alice Cooper ‘From The Inside’ - Vince’s detox concept LP has aged quite well, even if the rawness of his old band is missed;
Depeche Mode ‘Speak and Spell’ - still Vince Clarke’s finest hour for me. And the band’s for that matter, ‘Violator’ excepted;
ZZ Top ‘Eliminator’ - sure, not their purest album but, my, innit fun. And I tell you this much, there aren’t many albums from 1983 that’ve dated as well as this one. This one’s for you, Dusty: one half of the tightest rhythm section in rock;
Waylon Jennings ‘It’s Only Rock & Roll’ - nothing to do with the Stones, this is a typical Waylon album from the early 80s with his gruff, wonderful vocals belying the man’s coke abuse of the time;
Waylon Jennings ‘Never Could Toe The Mark’ - another 80’s LP from Waylon, including an intriguing take on Dire Straits’ ‘Setting Me Up’ that sounds more like what its composer is putting out now. Talking of whom:
Mark Knopfler ‘Down The Road Forever’ - Knopfler has settled into a gentle Americana groove in recent years that some may find bland but I find gently rewarding. Maybe it’s my age;
Little Feat ‘The Last Record Album’ - the real Americana groove this time. Nobody does it better;
Poco ‘Seven’ - my fave country rock band, in their least lauded phase. Rusty Young RIP;
Jethro Tull ‘This Was’ (mono mix) - every time I play this I think what a wonderful band the original lineup of Tull was. Sounds so much more, er, bluesy in mono too;
Beethoven: Piano Concertos 1 & 2 (Krystian Zimerman/LSO/Simon Rattle) - I reiterate my comments regarding Concertos 3-5 last week. This is a fine set, immaculately recorded last December despite lockdown conditions;
Bruckner: Symphony no.8 (VPO/Carlo Maria Giulini) - this 1984 recording is measured but still the most revealing reading of this symphony I’ve ever heard, at least where the Novak version is concerned. One of those records so involving you have to have a five minute break afterwards;
Haydn: Symphony no.86 (Orch of 18th Century/Frans Bruggen) - original instruments played with a romantic temperament under this late Dutch master;
Brahms: Symphonies 1 - 4, Tragic Overture & Haydn Variations (Philharmonia/Arturo Toscanini) - awesomely intense performances caught over two autumn evenings in 1952. Crumbly mono sound, but so what: my brain quickly filtered it out;
Sibelius: Symphonies 3 & 5 (LSO/Sir Colin Davis) - from Davis’ masterly second Sibelius cycle, these are ideally paced readings with all the icyness, portent and grandeur that this great music demands;
Glinka: Overture ‘Russlan & Ludmilla’ (Nat PO/Douglas Gamley); Tchaikovsky: Waltz from Serenade for Strings; Borodin: Polovtsian Dances from ‘Prince Igor’ (Nat PO/Charles Gerhardt) - superbly engineered, high energy performances from one of those big Readers Digest box sets our dads used to like;
Andreas Jost ‘Great European Organs no.92’ - mesmerising recital from the Grossmunster, Zurich organ of works by Bach, Buxtehude, Vollenweider and Schoenberg, the last named’s Variations on a Recitative (Op.40) being particularly memorable.
Have a good week, all
Dave x
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