This week’s aural stimulants:
Paul Weller ‘Will Of The People’ - Weller’s given his fans a real seasonal treat with this box of rarities, featuring outtakes of consistently high invention alongside revelatory remixes;
John Martyn ‘Grace And Danger’ - the album that should have made Martyn a star: radio friendly with just enough edge to appeal to his long term fanbase. Sadly - or perhaps thankfully - it didn’t;
Jimi Hendrix ‘Band Of Gypsys’ - far funkier than the Experience, I often wonder how this combo would have developed had Hendrix lived longer. This is one of the most blistering live albums in the entire rock canon and, to my ears at least, the finest album released in the man’s lifetime;
Aztec Camera ‘Stray’ - where Roddy went rocky. He’d made - and was still to make - much better records;
The Smile ‘A Light For Attracting Attention’ - another year with no new Radiohead album is partially rescued by this. In fact, had it been released under the R name I think I’d have been none the wiser, and I mean that as a compliment to its creators;
Anti-Pasti ‘Four Sore Points’ EP - I’m increasingly of the opinion that punk’s second wave was at least as radical as its first. Imagine grunge without this. Raw as owt;
Brian Eno ‘Foreverandevernomore’ - not bowled over on first hearing, though to be honest I’ve always struggled with Eno’s nasal voice, maturer though it sounds now. I’ll need more time with this;
Marillion ‘An Hour Before It’s Dark’ - although there’s still a bit of December left, this is odds-on favourite to be my album of 2022;
Peter Hammill ‘Fool’s Mate’ - some of Hammill’s early songs sound a bit twee compared with what was to follow, but his ability to write catchy tunes might surprise those only familiar with his VdGG excesses. I really enjoyed hearing this again after several years;
Gong ‘Camembert Electrique’ - one of those records that seems to yield new delights every time I hear it and, in my case, that’s hundreds of times, having first purchased it in 1974 for 59p. The latest Charly remaster (at a somewhat higher price) brings its weird joys into pure daylight;
John Illsley ‘VIII’ - Illsley’s albums sound more like (make that JUST like) Dire Straits these days but, being a fan (yeah, I know), I’m not complaining;
Barre Phillips & Gyorgy Kurtag Jr ‘Face a Face’ - short but sweet collection of abstract, double bass-treated atmospherics; one of those records that, as Julian says about ‘Zeit’, becomes the room it’s being played in;
Bernstein: West Side Story (Bernstein) - using opera singers in principal roles makes this sound a little arty-farty in places, but having the composer himself on the rostrum more than compensates, and the ensemble players rock;
Mahler: Symphony no.9 (VPO/Rattle) - Rattle’s first recording of this sublime work only really comes to life in the third movement. After that it’s first rate, the finale’s coda gossamer still;
Beethoven: Symphony no.6 (Cologne CO/Mueller-Bruehl) - satisfying, straight down the middle interpretation from a cheapo Naxos download;
Wagner: Siegfried Idyll/Haydn: Symphony no.93/Ravel: Daphis et Chloe Suite no.2/Tchaikovsky: Romeo & Juliet Fantasy Overture/Brahms: Symphony no.3 (all cond. Guido Cantelli) - despite being mostly mono, the clarity and precision of these masterly readings is quite astonishing. Cantelli’s tragic early death in 1956 robbed us of a supreme talent almost comparable to that of his mentor Toscanini;
Haydn: String Quartet in G minor, Op.20 no.3 (Salomon Quartet) - featuring a slow movement as poignant as anything the composer wrote in later life, this is one of Haydn’s earliest chamber masterpieces. Period strings add real bite to this reading;
Schubert: Piano Sonatas in D, D 664 & D 850 (Alfred Brendel) - “engrossing” is the word here, for both the music and the playing.
The angels of this world are not on the walls of churches.
Dib dib
Dave x
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