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Peter Stampfel :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview

Peter Stampfel The AD InterviewPosted on

Peter Stampfel's Song Shards features a whopping 46 songs. Despite struggles with dysphonia, it's clear the 87-year-old artist, Holy Modal Rounders founder, one-time Fugs member, and solo artist has no trouble gathering up material. He joined us to discuss the record, his spiritual practice, and reflect on artists like Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, Smith, and Irving Berlin . . .

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Joe Zawinul :: Zawinul

Jazz Joe ZawinulPosted on

Recorded between his brief tenure as Miles’ early electric co-conspirator and the formation of Weather Report, Joe Zawinul’s 1971 self-titled LP arrived as a quiet statement in the first wave of fusion excess. If Weather Report would later showcase Zawinul as a dominant bandleader and sonic architect, Zawinul offers something more revealing: quiet evidence of a singular vision reaching full bloom. A document of what might have been had the electric revolution taken a more measured, orchestrated path, and a testament to the composer who, even in the shadows, was already shaping its future . . .

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Posted on Jazz Joe Zawinul

Clifton Chenier :: Keep on Scratching

Clifton ChenierPosted on

Writing about Clifton Chenier in Smithsonian Folkways' Clifton Chenier: King of Louisiana Blues and Zydeco, American Routes host Nick Spitzer describes Chenier's road to fame on the '70s concert circuit, as his "funky hand-painted van" loaded up with gear and musicians gave way to the King riding solo in a vehicle fit for royalty, "a sparkling 1974 Cadillac de Ville in Persian lime fire-mist...his shining gold teeth and lavender suit accenting the ride as he grew evermore into a regal Creole style . . .

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Music from Saharan WhatsApp

Compilation Sahel SoundsPosted on

A spiritual successor to 2011’s Music from Saharan Cellphones, 2022’s Music from Saharan WhatsApp feels less like a sequel than a signal flare from the dunes. Where the first compilation culled music from the memory cards of thumb-worn Nokias, this latest dispatch taps the communication du jour, gathering eleven obscurities as they flicker and forward across the digital ether . . .

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Posted on Compilation Sahel Sounds

Roots Radics Meet Mighty Revolutionaires :: Outernational Riddim

Reggae/Dub Roots RadicsPosted on

All mouths will be fed. Refracted through the looking glass of Scientist and Crucial Bunny, Outernational Riddim is a classic 1980 Channel One–era meeting of the minds: Roots Radics and Sly & Robbie. Alchemical reverb, space, and low-end manipulation transform monolithic rhythms into outré, immersive soundscapes, capturing the tension between the Revolutionaries’ foundational grooves and the Radics’ stripped-down pulse . . .

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Posted on Reggae/Dub Roots Radics

Lou Reed :: Imperial College, London, England, October 21, 1972

Live Upload Series Lou ReedPosted on

Cause for celebration — another terrific Lou Reed & the Tots recording has been freshly unearthed from the collection of Bill Allerton, who attended multiple Lou gigs in the UK throughout 1972. This previously uncirculated gem is not only one of the best-sounding Tots tapes — startlingly crisp and clear compared to others from around the same time — it’s also a downright wonderful performance that spotlights the substantial chemistry between Lou, Vinnie Laporta (guitar), Eddie Reynolds (guitar), Bobby Resigno (bass), Scottie Clark (drums . . .

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Posted on Live Upload Series Lou Reed

Naujawanan Baidar :: Volume 1

Naujawanan BaidarPosted on

Like a ’67 Velvets drone crackling from a battery-powered transistor radio beneath the Afghan sky, Naujawanan Baidar’s debut cassette evokes a world unto itself. Isolated, resonant, and strangely infinite. Recorded straight to 4-track and released in 2018 via the Netherlands-based label Radio Khiyaban, the 40-minute transmission unfolds like a sub rosa broadcast from another time, as its lo-fi textures and meditative pacing draw the listener into a furtive, half-remembered landscape where the past and present blur into one . . .

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Posted on Naujawanan Baidar

Zal Yanovsky :: Alive And Well In Argentina

Zal YanovskyPosted on

Following his departure as lead guitarist of The Lovin' Spoonful, Alive And Well In Argentina is the curious one-off solo offering from Canadian folk-rock musician Zal Yanovsky. Released in 1968, the record is dripping with sardonic irony from the title and artwork to the ingrained comedy of the originals and covers scattered throughout. Such a novelty hodgepodge (think Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band or the Firesign Theatre) nonetheless includes admirable takes on country and western classics from the likes of Floyd Cramer and George Jones, while other originals present an obtusely frenzied psychedelia with Yanovsky's unmistakably charismatic . . .

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The Aquarium Drunkard Show: SIRIUS/XMU (7pm PST, Channel 35)

SIRIUSPosted on

Pacífico Nocturno. Via satellite, transmitting from northeast Los Angeles — the Aquarium Drunkard Show on SIRIUS/XMU, channel 35. 7pm California time, Wednesdays.

34.1090° N, 118.2334° W . . .

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Posted on SIRIUS

SOYUZ :: KROK

SOYUZPosted on

Tracked live to tape at Sessa and Biel Basile’s São Paulo studio, Krok captures the Belarusian outfit in a moment of transition, stretching the sinewy tendrils of their earlier work into something more expansive and self-possessed. Where their previous LP steeped itself in the gentle saudade of Brazil’s Clube da Esquina, Krok pulls the lens back as the palette broadens and horizons turn transcontinental . . .

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Самцы Дронта :: Самцы Дронта

Самцы ДронтаPosted on

Hailing from Izhevsk, Russia, Samsti Dronta (English translation: Male Dodos) played their first live gig in that fateful year 1991. By all accounts they inhaled contemporary Western influences like Cocteau Twins, This Mortal Coil, and Dead Can Dance. They excavated sounds from industrial materials such as sheet metal and glass. The output from these experiments could have resulted in something harsh, but the sharp edges are balanced with gauzy and beautiful moments . . .

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Bill Fay :: From The Bottom Of An Old Grandfather Clock (A Collection Of Demos And Outtakes 1966-1970)

Bill FayPosted on

If you blinked, you might have missed it. Dead Oceans quietly re-released From the Bottom of an Old Grandfather Clock last December—a twenty-five-track journey through Bill Fay’s back pages, loaded with demos and long-forgotten outtakes. Having largely disappeared from public life after the release of 1971’s Time of the Last Persecution, only to reemerge in a quietly triumphant late-career renaissance in 2012, the collection stands as a worthy and necessary addition to the English singer-songwriter and pianist’s enduring oeuvre . . .

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Posted on Bill Fay

Stephen McCraven :: Wooley The Newt

Jazz Stephen McCravenPosted on

Originally released on Marion Brown's Sweet Earth imprint in 1979, Wooley The Newt is a true lost spiritual jazz relic from percussionist and composer Stephen McCraven. Resurrected in a limited capacity by British reissue label Moved-By-Sound at the tail end of last year, the record was sampled by Stephen's son Makaya on his 2020's reimaging of Gil Scott-Heron's I'm New Here. Recorded in Paris and more than long overdue, it's a fascinating relic of seventies avant-jazz and a lost bandleader debut of the utmost artistic craft . . .

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Posted on Jazz Stephen McCraven

Lala Lala :: Heaven 2

LaLa LaLaPosted on

Heaven 2 is a road album of sorts, where the Chicago songwriter breaks out for fresh territories. Whether toward or away from something is anybody’s guess. What keeps things real, what keeps them compelling, is the cigarette-ash astringency of LaLa LaLa’s central melodies. No matter how far she drives from the big city, her songs will, perhaps, always have a tough urban grit to them . . .

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Posted on LaLa LaLa

John Renbourn :: Live In Kyoto 1978

John RenbournPosted on

Recorded during the second of two nights John Renbourn played at Kyoto’s Jittoku Coffeehouse, Live in Kyoto 1978 captures the guitarist in a moment of intimacy and precision. Poised and unhurried, the set finds Renbourn relaxed, patiently threading his repertoire before a hushed, attentive room. A baker’s dozen, these recordings were captured on site by audio archivist Satoro Fujii and unearthed forty years later in 2018 via Drag City . . .

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Posted on John Renbourn