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For the life of me, I can’t remember how I came across the first U.S. release from the U.K. prog rock group, Nektar, Remember The Future. I was definitely too young in 1974 to have been hip to heavy concept records. I did go through a phase in the 10 to 15 years after that where I helped friends liquidate their record collections for quick cash and it’s likely to have come into my possession during this time. But it does stand out in my collection amidst the more mainstream prog releases as one band’s best shot at stardom that unfortunately fell short.

Nektar was formed in Germany in the late ‘60s by four Englishmen who had ended up on the continent via gigs with different ensembles. Through a shared love of The Beatles and a desire to take rock music to a more challenging level, guitarist Roye Albrighton, keyboardist Allan Freeman, drummer Ron Howden, and bassist Derek Moore became Nektar and began treading similar ground to that trod by Yes and Genesis. Though veterans of the recording studio, Remember The Future became their first to see the American market through a contract with the relatively small Passport Records. Passport’s splendidly designed gatefold cover, inside of which shows the band at a creepy live moment with a jarring light show behind them, showed the effort put into cracking into a more lucrative fan base. It’s considered by many to be the group’s high point, but I’m not familiar enough with their catalog to say if I concur.

Remember The Future tells one story stretched across two sides of an album. A tale unfolds describing an extraterrestrial being’s attempts at establishing contact with a largely uninterested Earth’s population. The alien, “Bluebird,” named so because of his blue skin and feathers, eventually finds success with a blind boy and shares with him visions of both humanity’s past and future. Though left confused as to Bluebird’s message at the end of side two, the boy is given new eyes by Bluebird on the flipside and the boy receives Bluebird’s ancient wisdom as a result. The story concept, though weak by comparison to themes dominant on records released by Nektar’s contemporaries, does hold together throughout and provides framework for the more impressive jam workouts from the band.

While all four of Nektar’s members could sing, it’s guitarist Albrighton that handles lead vocal chores on the entire album. Albrighton is also responsible for controlling the textures and timbres of the band, from the funky shuffle, doo wop harmonies, and phrase-opening distortion of Track 1, “Images Of The Past,” to the repetition of the “Remember The Future” theme, to the alternating 6/8 and 5/8 measures beneath Freeman’s tripped-out organ noodlings and Albrighton’s best impression of David Gilmour guesting with Blue Cheer during “Confusion”.

Some quiet guitar picking giving way to an almost Motown-esque arrangement ushers in Side 2 with “Returning Light.” The vocals continue to shine in the hushed moments, and the funk returns while the intensity builds during the fable’s close. While there are elements that draw comparison to better known prog rock outfits, Nektar’s sound remains singular and identifiable. The smooth transitions across “Questions And Answers,” “Tomorrow Never Comes,” and “Path Of Light” display the talents of a rock solid rhythm section. The “Remember The Future” theme recurs in Freeman’s keyboard lines and Albrighton adds appropriate filigree in support. Albrighton’s style here remains more approachable than that of the technically precise Steves, Howe and Hackett.

Remember The Future is an album worth seeking out if you’re serious about rounding out your prog rock collection. Fans of the genre will tell you it’s an essential recording helping to tell the full story of the rise of prog in the 1970s. Anyone interested in quality musicianship will also not be disappointed. Vinyl copies, though making for the best package, will be harder to come by and also harder on the pocketbook.

-Mark Polzin

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Lucifer’s Friend – “Ride In The Sky”

by TW on March 8, 2013

“Ride In The Sky” is a killer track from German hard rockers Lucifer’s Friend. Very creative use of French Horn in a hard rock context. And check out a young John Lawton (later of Uriah Heep) on vocals.

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Ike Willis – Should’a Gone Before I Left

by TW on March 8, 2013

If you listened to Frank Zappa during the 1980s, chances are you heard the booming voice of Ike Willis. His first solo album, Should’a Gone Before I Left, was released in 1987. I picked up a cassette copy back in the day and loved Willis’ blending of rock, pop, reggae and humor. Excellent guitar work and an excellent record.

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The Rolling Stones – Charlie Is My Darling box set

by TW on March 6, 2013

The Rolling Stones – Charlie Is My Darling box set

Amidst the hoopla surrounding the 50th anniversary of the existence of The Rolling Stones, with a new best of set and celebration tour, a very fascinating box set was released with minor fanfare. Charlie Is My Darling, a film by Peter Whitehead chronicling the Stones’ two-date, four-gig run in Ireland during September of 1965, is now available in an expanded version after being hidden from view for decades. The box set, including both DVD and Blu-Ray versions of the original film, the director’s cut, and the producer’s (Andrew Loog Oldham) cut; a CD featuring Stones originals, interstitial music and dialogue from the film; a CD and 10-inch vinyl version of the Stones live in England in 1965; a spiffy, little book discussing the making of the film; a groovy replica poster announcing the Belfast dates; and a numbered, limited edition enlarged film cell (mine’s #54, Mick shaking his maracas), is probably one of the most endearing pieces of nostalgia that you’ll ever encounter concerning the band.

The legal, business and criminal reasons for the film’s absence will bore the pants off of you. Yet painstaking restoration of the material was completed in 2012, allowing ABKCO (holder of the rights to the early Stones work) to cash in. As a historical document, you won’t encounter anything else that shows the Stones as they were about to explode worldwide. After all, “Satisfaction” had just been released in the summer of ’65, and the band, as well as the rest of the planet, hadn’t quite figured out if they were a flash in the pan or truly here to stay. Each band member is interviewed at various times in the film, and they’re given an opportunity to discuss their goals and their opinion on the maelstrom building around them. Heck, they’re still just kids! And it’s no surprise that both drummer Charlie Watts (who doesn’t even consider himself a musician or someone creating original music) and bassist Bill Wyman (who feels like he woke up one day and was suddenly living his dream life as a professional musician) are as dumbfounded as non-fans regarding the band’s success. They expected this Rolling Stones thing to go on for about a year or two.

Director Peter Whitehead movingly captures the band in action on stage and kicking back in their hotel rooms while goofing on Elvis, Fats Domino, and The Beatles (Mick’s impression of the opening guitar buzz from “I Feel Fine” is rather memorable). But his images of the cityscapes of Ireland and the ridiculous mobs of ravening fans are equally riveting. Whitehead tries to show that the world is captivated by this unruly group of Brits, and the editing showing everyday people, who are obviously craning their necks to see what’s going on, helps prove his point. When fans, including a 40-year old mother who wishes she could “start a little group” of her own, to the clergy member present at the gig (the screaming teenagers ruined his total enjoyment), to the wannabe rocker explaining why he grew his hair out (“Because I like long hair”, duh!) add their two cents, we see that this isn’t hype, but an actual phenomenon touching people in all walks of life. And so it remains today.

If you’re looking for the music alone, there are easier and less expensive ways to acquire older Stones material. You’ll buy Charlie Is My Darling because you want a glimpse into how the band was evolving. It’s remarkable how Whitehead was able to display Brian Jones’ unspoken unease with where things were headed. He’s very much the odd man out, which is rather strange since he’s the one that formed the band just a few years prior. “Satisfaction,” and the power Jagger and Keith Richards now wielded due to their successful songwriting partnership, quickly made Jones’ goal of mastering American blues and R&B numbers irrelevant. He never says this explicitly, but his eyes and physical proximity to the rest of the band tell the tale. Further, the camaraderie of Jagger and Richards is evident, especially when Richards sits down to the piano and starts banging out ditties. Jagger jumps right in and the duo are instantly creating something new and original.

While Richards has, hurtfully, been the butt of jokes over the years due to his excesses and lax appearance, he’s clearly shown to be the mastermind behind the band’s changing direction. Funny, intelligent, charming, and entertaining, Richards is a joy to behold here. Mick’s ego, which he admits to enhancing on stage, is also apparent. But he’s not full of himself; he’s merely playing a character that’s partly based on a guy named Mick Jagger. His dreams for the future are more coherent than those of Jones, and centered on the realities of the business side of the music business. Thus Whitehead, like all great filmmakers, was able to capture a moment in time that predicted what was soon to come while using pure images and accompanying sound to tell a richer story.

The music? Well, what’s not to like? This is The Rolling Stones, gang! They could play the covers, like “Little Red Rooster,” “I’m Moving On,” and “Everybody Needs Somebody To Love,” in their sleep by now. But their delivery on these, as well as originals such as “Time Is On My Side” and “The Last Time,” display a band that’s both hungry and accomplished, while putting a shoulder to their characteristic garage grind. And you can actually hear Keith’s harmony vocals quite clearly. The man can sing! His willingness to add rhythm or lead guitar lines as is necessary, and either the main vocal part on a song’s chorus or a high harmony to compliment Jagger proves his worth repeatedly.

Classic Rock Music Blog gives Charlie Is My Darling our highest recommendation. It’s not an item for the casual fan to seek out, but it’s something for which devotees to the field of rock music history or The Rolling Stones in general will want to save their pennies.

-Mark Polzin

The Rolling Stones Charlie Is My Darling box set

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Fripp & Eno – Evening Star

by TW on February 27, 2013

Fripp & Eno – Evening Star

Evening Star is the second album guitarist Robert Fripp and keyboardist Brian Eno recorded together. In this and the duo’s previous release, No Pussyfooting, we hear the further development of Eno’s ambient music, which would play a much bigger role in his future recordings. Fripp would follow a similar path, often breaking away from the thorny arrangements of King Crimson and into his self-created aural world of Frippertronics.

The five instrumental pieces comprising Evening Star are mesmerizing landscapes of sound built from the slightest strands of musical DNA. Minimalism, ambient and New Age are tags that come to mind listening to these compositions. I hear the tracks as tone poems; for me, the music reflects or evokes the subject of the song name. They are thoughtfully conceived and magnificently realized. The mood of the album is also perfectly reflected by the cover art courtesy of Peter Schmidt.

Side 1 contains four works: “Wind on Water,” “Evening Star,” “Evensong” and “Wind on Wind.” Each is a meditative study with Fripp and Eno playing over and manipulating tape loops, adding subtle sound colorings as the music unfolds. The title track is my favorite. A six-note pattern repeats in hypnotic rhythm before Fripp pierces the reverie with the buzzing of his heavily distorted guitar. The buzzing spins into a gorgeous melody that twists upward like a root breaking the soil’s surface and arcing toward the sun.

Side 2 is occupied entirely by the 28-plus-minute work, “An Index of Metals.” Less pastoral than its Side 1 siblings, “Index” incorporates an evolving guitar loop that becomes progressively more aggressive in tone and texture. Lines blur between melody, rhythm and time. Somehow, the music convincingly conveys the essence of a shimmering metallic substance being slowly transformed again and again by aural cold welding into something similar but new.

Existing on a metaphysical plane of its own, this landmark recording deserves a spot in your collection.

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Negativland – Escape From Noise

by TW on February 19, 2013

Negativland – Escape From Noise

Long weekends mean extra time to dig through the stacks of dusty vinyl and teetering CD columns here at Chez Polzin. I’ve unearthed an LP that seriously blew my mind and the minds of my fellow volunteer DJs at our local college radio station some 26 years ago (yes, my peeps, it’s really been that long). While including a review of this record on our website is certainly pushing the boundaries of what we call “Classic Rock,” that’s because it’s rather hard to call the contents “rock music.” That Negativland’s Escape From Noise is a classic recording is indisputable.

Negativland began in Northern California in 1979 while members Richard Lyons (singing, lyrics, voice) and Mark Hosler (just about anything else, musical and non-musical, that makes noise) were still in high school. Over the next eight years, the duo expanded their lineup to include Don Joyce (all the other stuff that Hosler wasn’t using to make noise), Chris Grigg (mainly drums, but also early computer software and even field recordings), and David Wills (invented instruments, and other noisemakers overlooked by Hosler and Joyce). The combo had a big love of the German ensemble Neu!, taking not only the band’s name and also the name of their record label, Seeland, from that group, but also stealing their esthetic. What followed were a series of recordings on the Seeland label that were only marginally musical, but incredibly inventive and thought-provoking. And then came Escape From Noise.

Any college radio station worth its salt was all over the venerable indie label SST Records. Aside from being the label that unleashed Black Flag, The Minutemen, Meat Puppets and Hüsker Dü on the masses, SST was now home to Dinosaur Jr., Sonic Youth, Bad Brains (and soon to be home for fIREHOSE, Screaming Trees and Descendents). In 1987, SST was white-hot!! The label began to experiment by releasing jazz-related recordings, very off-kilter pop, and other detritus avoided by the majors. Falling in line with these experiments was the new record from Negativland. We couldn’t have been less prepared.

Escape From Noise is a rough concept album which documents the sources of the noises that we’d all like to escape from, not the actual ways to make the escape. Humor permeates the album, but it’s not strictly a comedy record. Guest stars are abundant, so much so that I originally questioned whether all of these guests had actually contributed, or whether Negativland was just messing with us. I now feel that the truth lies somewhere in-between – some of the “famous” musicians’ contributions were not made with the intention of collaborating on anything specific. Negativland merely had tapes rolling and then added pieces of the recordings to other material created by the group (mostly true for noises). Yet some of the music was created by “famous” people with the specific purpose of broadening the sound beds beneath the tracks (generally this is true with more traditional musical performances, not with noises). The laundry list of contributors includes Dead Kennedys vocalist Jello Biafra, producer/engineer Steve Fisk, former Henry Cow guitarist, Fred Frith, Grateful Dead members Jerry Garcia and Mickey Hart, Einsturzende Neubauten’s Alexander Hacke, guitarist/composer Henry Kaiser, Devo’s Mark Mothersbaugh, The Residents, and even The Church Of The SubGenius leader Reverend Ivan Stang. Yes, really.

What ends up on Escape From Noise are a series of (mostly) two to three minute tracks that feel like small plays or films which border on the edge of unreality. It’s rather difficult to document all of the outstanding moments on the album in the space I’ve allotted here, but let’s shine some light on a few of them. One track illustrative of the paths taken by Negativland to detail noise is found on a cut called “Michael Jackson.” Now, remember, Thriller had been released just a few years before Noise, so the late Mr. Jackson was well known by everyone on the planet. As the track begins, we hear a girl and a young Jackson discussing the fact that he’d just got dirt all over her new dress while buzzing around her on his bike (if someone can find the source material for this, I’d love to know the details). After she yells out “Michael Jackson!”, things get dark quickly. A character coming across as some sort of techno-priest begins listing all of the top pop performers of the day, starting with Jackson. After the list, he names their crimes against humanity and the judgment that has been brought on them for those crimes (all to spooky backing music from Fisk and Frith). Then things get even weirder.

How about the brief tale of the man who can’t enjoy the content delivered by The Playboy Channel because of all the distracting noise around him? The musical backing here is courtesy of Mothersbaugh and a variety of instruments. He’s ably assisted by Biafra, “playing” a flushing toilet. Then there’s the story of “Sycamore,” a planned community whose members are plagued by the presence of firearms. Gunfire punctuates the proceedings.

Side 1 ends with perhaps the album’s best cut, “Car Bomb,” a two-minute, rapid-fire, lunatic rant chronicle of nearly every part of the automobile, including a bumper sticker that says “Car Bomb.” Said sticker was included in vinyl editions of the album released through SST, and I still own that unmolested sticker! Expect explosions galore to interrupt the rundown of the auto parts. Another uneasy moment is heard during “Backstage Pass,” where Jerry Garcia describes San Francisco from an outsider’s point of view, while Mickey Hart provides percussion and “processed animals.” This is easily the most obscure appearance of Garcia and Hart in the history of recorded music.

Fans of Escape From Noise will also remember “Time Zones” (explaining the vastness of the Soviet Union in comparison to the land mass of the United States), “Christianity Is Stupid” (where a born again preacher takes the point of view of his religion’s detractors during a bitter sermon), “Nesbitt’s Lime Soda Song” (an odd folk song about how stinging insects and sweet confections don’t mix), and “Over The Hiccups” (where a little girl sings the Judy Garland classic to cute and hilarious results). The brilliance of Negativland is best revealed during this record, though the combo continues making unsettling and highly original recordings to this day. Longtime fans of the group will encourage you to purchase Noise through Seeland Records, though it’s also still in print on SST. An ugly bout of legal ensnarement occurred shortly after Noise’s release, which set SST and Negativland at odds and left SST looking less than heroic.

When you need a break from all the classic rock you’re listening to, track down Escape From Noise. You won’t be disappointed. Then you, Negativland, and a sampled Grinch can ask the question together: “Is there any escape from all the noise, noise, noise?”

-Mark Polzin

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Neil Young and Crazy Horse – Live at the Fillmore East 1970

by TW on February 12, 2013

Neil Young & Crazy Horse – Live At The Fillmore East

What material still lies in Neil Young’s vaults may never be known, except by Young himself. When he does finally make the effort to release some of the recordings, it can sometimes accelerate the frustrations of his fans, creating more questions than answers. To dodge these head-scratching moments, we’re best off focusing on what’s included in the package than lamenting that the release should have been in a different format, or should have included this or that missing song. Fitting right into Young’s puzzling reissue scheme is Live At The Fillmore East, a 2006 release on Reprise Records documenting a highlight of Young and Crazy Horse’s 1969-1970 tour supporting Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere, the combo’s debut. Although the tapes are savaged by the wear of time itself, Young did rescue enough material from a two night stint on March 6 and 7 at Bill Graham’s legendary venue to hold us over for a bit. Again, we’re accentuating the positive here, which is very easy to do, and not bitching to Neil that high quality digital recordings of Crazy Horse do not exist in abundance. Some things just can’t be helped; why blame the artist?

So we’re treated to six songs, which will always leave us wanting more, but are still enough to prove why we want more in the first place. The original incarnation of Crazy Horse was incredible and cannot be duplicated. The wounds from the tragedy of guitarist/vocalist Danny Whitten’s death, coming not long after these dates were played, were surely opened once more when Young supervised Fillmore East’s release. I don’t know how he, like the listener, wouldn’t be moved by hearing the rare chemistry shared by Young and Whitten trading licks and sharing harmonies. Something just clicked with this combo and, in some ways, Young’s been trying to recapture this magic ever since Whitten left us.

How to describe Danny Whitten’s music and contribution to Crazy Horse has been attempted by so many writers before me, but none of us will quite get it right. I thought long and hard about how to describe Whitten’s voice to someone that hadn’t heard it before and was really stumped. I don’t mean this as an insult to either artist, but he really reminds me of Cat Stevens, if Cat had grown up in the rural Southern U.S. There’s a nasal beauty and wide-mouthed fullness to the sound of Whitten’s voice that liberally digs deep for the country twang which perfectly echoes and rounds out Neil Young’s voice. Whitten’s guitar playing, while falling shy of Young’s abilities, again brilliantly complements what Young delivers. You’ve heard it said by many a lead guitarist, from Jerry Garcia, to Metallica’s Kirk Hammett, to Eric Clapton, the key to being able to solo unrestrained is in having a solid bedrock of sound put in place by your rhythm guitarist. Fillmore East is Exhibit A in support of this notion.

If you get what Neil Young is trying to do when he plays with Crazy Horse, and this is important because not everyone understands this, then you know that he’s attempting to perfect a ramshackle groove – to stay rough around the edges…and do it without fail on each take. The key to the success lies not with Neil, but with Crazy Horse’s rhythm section, drummer Ralph Molina, and bassist Billy Talbot. They’re joined on this tour by longtime Young collaborator, Jack Nitzsche, on electric piano, but his input into the sound is not fully established. Although he’d work with Young in the future, he was never considered a member of Crazy Horse again following this tour.

With all the elements of the performance described, let’s take a closer listen to the material. The country shuffle title track, “Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere,” introduces us to the band and showcases the Whitten/Young guitar and vocal interplay. Whitten had a beautiful falsetto, as does Young, so there’s no issues when they decorate their songs with Beach Boys-style high harmonies even in a live setting. Rolling on into “Winterlong,” an outtake which would only see a studio version released on Young’s Decade collection years later, we hear that the band had quite a bit of material rehearsed that was held in reserve and not intended for studio recordings.

One of two lengthy jams on Fillmore East, “Down By The River,” stretching over nearly 12 and a half minutes, puts the studio version on Nowhere to shame, and demonstrates how any good artist’s material will only improve through continued live performance. Several months after recording Nowhere, the band knew “Down By The River” inside and out and could probably have blown the studio version away when playing in their sleep! Both Young’s and Whitten’s guitars have an aggressive edge that only heightens the already edgy lyrics dealing with murder and love gone wrong.

A moment that’ll make hardcore Young fans smile is found on “Wonderin’”, presented here as a barroom weeper, rather than the twisted doo-wop version which Young released on Everybody’s Rockin’ over a decade later. In comparison, this is the stronger arrangement, but it hinges on Whitten’s vocal counter-melody, proving why Young needed to resurrect the tune in a different configuration with Whitten long gone. Another song which really requires Whitten’s playing to show the purest version is his own composition, “Come On Baby Let’s Go Downtown.” Here Whitten sings lead with a remarkable hillbilly quaver, while Young backs him with sweet vocal harmonies and wicked guitar fills. It’s weird product from a conference of Southern Californians and a Canadian, but that’s also what helps make it so engrossing.

The CD’s closing jam is the always incredible “Cowgirl In The Sand,” which ramps up over 16 minutes and provides any aspiring musicians in the crowd with instruction on how to keep an audience’s attention occupied by steering clear of wankery and crafting a song in the same way as a novel – with beginning, middle, and end. The middle is the jam, of course, but jams are only successful when inserted into the framework of a coherent start and finish to the piece.

So, quit your crying, Neil Young fans, and be thankful that we’re at least getting to hear some of these recordings. Neil knows what sounds like crap and also what stuff he’s proud to put his name on. He’s a perfectionist with complete control over his archived recordings. I trust him to release only the best, and, while he’s still among the living, it’s his call to make. Although Fillmore does not include a complete night’s set, nor does it include the acoustic set with which Young opened his shows, nor does it include a version of Nowhere’s best-known song, “Cinnamon Girl,” it’s still the most complete document we have of the genius power held by Crazy Horse when they first put their music out there for the world to hear.

- Mark Polzin

Neil Young and Crazy Horse Live at the Fillmore East 1970

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Zweiton – Form

by TW on February 9, 2013

Zweiton Form Zweiton Form

Zweiton – Form

A gem that we’d regrettably overlooked here at classicrockmusicblog.com was released in May 2012 on the outstanding Unsung Records label. Touch guitarist Alexander Dowerk and percussionist Alexis Paulus unite as Zweiton and they unleashed their debut album, Form, to the growing legion of fans of the U8 Touch Guitar. The U8 allows Dowerk to employ not only traditional touch guitar tapping techniques, but also to deliver sounds via plucking, strumming, and slapping for a full range of guitar and bass textures. Zweiton is nurtured by fellow touch guitar aficionados Adrian Benavides and Markus Reuter, who teamed up for mixing and production duties on the album. Both Dowerk and Paulus also enjoy the use of electronics and programming when broadening their sound, allowing them to record instrumental compositions with a distinctive, dark, mechanized precision.

The six songs included on Form, averaging over seven minutes in length, each head off in different directions and avoid the trap to which the music of similar combos falls prey. The tunes, therefore, have singular identities, amazing the listener in different ways from track to track. This is evident within the first few seconds of opening track, “Sand.” At just over two minutes in length, it’s easily the shortest cut on the CD, but it reveals its own intriguing elements without procrastination. Emerging as a noodly, Pink Floyd-styled piece, it’s quickly transformed with the introduction of gongs, metallic guitars, and thunderous drums. In stark contrast, the beginning of Track 2, “Triebwerk,” displays an abrupt about face in its intertwining guitar lines, complex polyrhythms, and surging bass guitar counter-melody. Dowerk’s U8 allows him to show off his Tony Levin influence in the bass line on a piece very reminiscent of early ‘80s, twin-guitar King Crimson. It’s bright and buoyant, yet has this evil genius menace lurking just beneath the waves.

“ 9 Days Of Tripping” (video below) expands on “Triebwerk”’s direction by playing up the creep factor with wobbly, squiggly background noises that, at times, duplicate the work of a fine, scratching turntablist. Over its 10 and a half minutes, the emotions build, while dropping back at times for jazzier interludes and near Isaac Hayes/Gordon Parks moments sans the blaxploitation. Inch by inch, “Tripping” moves into Nine Inch Nails territory, dropping heavily distorted guitars, somber reflection, and explosive drums as necessary. Two cuts later, “Fehlfunktion” maneuvers through what could be the soundtrack to the prelude and white-knuckle main event of a cinematic car chase. Paulus’ rhythms are either straight-forward with a funky backbeat, or purposefully derailed to throw us off course, but we’re never truly prepared to anticipate where the song will head next.

Closing with “Licht,” the duo invite co-conspirators along to play tuba and acoustic guitar. The cascading melody of Dowerk’s guitar line will stay with you long after the CD has ended. Dowerk and Paulus are really in lockstep as the drum and bass sounds anchor the piece beneath clever explorations. Time signatures are selected and then disposed of measures later in what sounds like a gigantic, malfunctioning clock. At no time does Zweiton’s music aim over the heads of the listener, however. The songs are by intelligent design, but delivered for mass appeal.

Unsung Records has been consistently releasing thought-provoking material, largely under the direction of Markus Reuter, as it seeks new outlets for the array of sounds capable through the touch guitar. With the discovery of Dowerk and Zweiton, it’s easy to see his reasoning for such devotion to the instrument and its proponents. The sky’s really the limit for the U8 and its cousins and we’ve just begun to splinter our bows on the tip of this musical iceberg. Reuter knows he’s dabbling in the future of music and he’s blazing a trail for what he believes will be de rigueur down the road. With releases as remarkable as Form for evidence, it’s difficult to dispute his opinion.

-Mark Polzin

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Yes – 90125

by TW on January 30, 2013

Yes - 90125

In the early 1980s I spent a lot of time listening to Yes, poring through the band’s entire back studio catalog along with any live recordings I could find. If I wasn’t listening to the six LP sides of Yessongs at my friend Chuck Wood’s house, I was likely trying to learn Bill Bruford’s drum parts from “Heart of the Sunrise” or was falling asleep with my trusty Koss headphones wrapped around my head as Tales from Topographic Oceans played in my ears. Yes became one of my favorite bands, so when they were apart during this time I kept hoping for a reunion of some sort. Then rumors started flying that bassist Chris Squire and drummer Alan White were working on a new project called Cinema. There was talk that Jimmy Page might be in the mix, too, with a possible band name of XYZ (ex-Yes/Zeppelin). Whatever was to be, I just wanted Yes—or some musical semblance of Yes—to return and start recording songs again.

I got my wish in 1983, when the lineup of Squire, White, vocalist Jon Anderson, original keyboardist Tony Kaye and guitarist/vocalist Trevor Rabin released 90125, the band’s first new studio album in three years. That might not seem like a long time, but the future of the band was ever doubtful and time was marching on. Progressive rock’s heyday had past, replaced by MTV, hair metal, new wave and new technology. And the “new” Yes reflected the times. The long flowing guitar and keyboard lines and frequent time and key shifts that characterized the band’s music in the 1970s are largely replaced by straight-ahead rock rhythms and stricter adherence to verse/chorus/verse/bridge/chorus songwriting. Gone also are the multi-part suites that often filled an entire album side; in fact, there are no songs longer than 8 minutes on 90125. The technology of the day makes a firm entry, with frequent use of triggered sound samples, whether from White’s drum kit, Rabin’s guitar effects pedals or Kaye’s keyboards. And the album artwork has zero association with previous Yes albums. Instead of the beautiful and mysterious fantasy imaginings of artist Roger Dean, we get a tricolored “pie chart.” It’s nothing to hang on the wall, but it’s what’s inside that counts.

Several songs from 90125 received substantial radio airplay, with “Owner of a Lonely Heart” getting the lion’s share. This was the first song I heard off 90125, and it sounded very different. Rabin brought a modern sensibility and approach to guitar playing and songwriting, much of it revolving around fixed song structures and sound manipulation. “Owner” is a prime example, being perhaps the most meat-and-potatoes rock song the band has released. The tune is powered by a basic three-chord riff and drumbeat with alternating accents on the hi-hats and bass drum. It’s as simple as it gets, yet it became the band’s signature song of the ‘80s. And Rabin spices the arrangement with a feedback-drenched solo that veers off into a sound world far outside the song’s melody as he plays on top of the rhythm, filling space with squawky noises and overtones.

“Leave It” opens unexpectedly to a cappella chorus, then proceeds to a brief vocal arrangement reminiscent of Bobby McFerrin before shifting into an understated verse. The chorus is then repeated and hammered home with heavily accented electronic drum beats. It’s anything but a typical pop-rock song but another 90125 track that garnered lots of airplay.

“Changes” is another standout track, with a moodier vibe and terrific vocal interplay between Rabin and Anderson. Anderson and Rabin’s voices work very well together—Jon singing sweetly as always and supplying the upper register, while Rabin provides a huskier “rock” sound— but Anderson is still the “voice” of Yes here. And his lyrical influence looms large. On the brisk “Our Song,” Anderson pronounces, “Toledo was just another good stop along the good king’s highway/My fortification took me by surprise and hit me sending me sideways/Spellbound, roundly, good for sunshine/Can’t help thinking .” It’s not Siddhartha, but it ain’t “My Sharona” either. This is probably the song that sounds most like late-70’s Yes and is one of my top three album cuts. The cinematic, street-tough “City of Love” is another. Squire’s lumbering bass and Rabin’s twisting guitar lines pack a wallop, enhancing the charged atmosphere created by Kaye’s synths.

90125 finishes on a very high note, with the beautiful ballad “Hearts.” The track is sprinkled with Far Eastern keyboard flourishes that melt into a chorus of pure melody. I particularly like White’s drumming; his perfect touch on fills heightens the anticipation of each chorus. And Anderson delivers a gorgeous coda that rivals the closing moments from “Awaken.”

Yes guitarist Steve Howe has commented that the Yes music of the 1970s was characterized by melody, while the band’s 1980’s output was driven more by rhythm. That’s a fair assessment, although 90125 has an excellent balance of both. Revisiting this album 30 years after its release I understand why it was so successful commercially. And I like it very much still. The mercurial nature of Yes meant that this lineup would eventually split, but not before becoming firmly entrenched again in the public eye and ear. For critics of the band’s perceived previous musical “excesses,” 90125 must have seemed like a dream. For others, like me, who waited years for a reunion, it was also a dream of sorts. I’m glad I was there and wide awake.

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Nazz – Nazz Nazz

by TW on January 20, 2013

Nazz – Nazz Nazz

When I was in high school, an acquaintance of mine “found God” and decided that all of his rock and roll records needed to be disposed of so as not to corrupt him from his new path in life. Many of the albums that he now offered up for sale (apparently earning money from selling the evil music would not corrupt him) were by artists with which I only had a low level of familiarity. One of these artists was the ridiculously talented Todd Rundgren, and I managed to add a large chunk of the Bearsville Records releases of both the Rundgren solo and early Utopia catalog to my collection. That purchase changed my life, but we’ll see how it affects me in the afterlife.

The next several years found me scouring used record bins to add even more Rundgren and Utopia albums to my stack. Yet it wasn’t until I was in my 40s that I’d discovered Rundgren’s first recording unit, Nazz. Now, Rundgren has never been ashamed of the Beatles’ influence on his own material. But Nazz, operating out of Philadelphia in the late ‘60s, were contemporaries of The Beatles and it’s fascinating to hear how quickly The Beatles were setting standards for recordings by pop and rock acts immediately after the LIverpudlians churned out a new release. Nazz can be said to reflect a variety of influences from British rock bands of the period – The Yardbirds and Cream chief among them. But Rundgren’s Beatle-isms at times seem to anticipate what the mop tops were cooking up across the pond. Let’s take a closer listen to the album that’s considered by many to be Nazz’s pinnacle, their second album, 1969’s Nazz Nazz for some examples.

What’s most remarkable about Nazz Nazz is that it’s self-produced by the group. Guitarist/vocalist Rundgren, bassist Carson Van Osten, drummer Thom Mooney, and keyboardist/vocalist Robert “Stewkey” Antoni were signed to the tiny, regional SGC Records and were given a great degree of freedom in that contract. Assisting in the transformation from garage rockers to psychedelic composers was Rundgren’s own study of music. He’d taught himself to read music following the release of the band’s debut album, and, like fellow self-taught musician Frank Zappa, Rundgren’s ideas began to explode while in a studio setting. Nazz Nazz was originally conceived as a double album, but the band staged a revolt against Rundgren’s piano-based ballads (a la Laura Nyro), which not only led to the record being scaled back to a single album, but also foreshadowed Rundgren’s departure from the group.

Nazz Nazz consists of eleven songs, most of which are pop-rock and are at about three minutes in duration. The studio experimentation leads the way on the album’s (I own the 1990 CD reissue on Rhino Records) opener, “Forget All About It.” Before the band kicks in, there’s a sound that’s somewhere between a jet flying in the distance and a mallet roll on a crash cymbal. Mooney’s drumming is quite excellent and is accompanied by chimes during the song’s set-up. Once the tune is rolling, we’re treated to a buzzing jangle of guitars and beautiful falsetto vocals from Stewkey. Rungren’s guitar solo is majestic and the song takes many different paths across its short length. This is power pop before the sound even had a name and the Beatles’ influence is writ large.

A somewhat notorious song is included in this collection: “Meridian Leeward,” with lyrics about a pig that’s been transformed into a human. This isn’t sci-fi, but more of an Animal Farm-type of social commentary that’s more tongue in cheek than damning. Derided as being some sort of hippie rainbow fart, the song is actually much more complex than is first evident. Stewkey again handles lead vocals and concentrates on organ instead of piano. Mooney’s complicated polyrhythms are not what you’d expect to hear behind a pop song, and the band does get into some odd tape manipulation on the vocal tracks, but this song is utterly listenable. As Meridian zooms off in his big jet plane, Rungren again employs that bizarre jet engine sound and then blasts straight into the guitar-drum workout, “Under The Ice.” Mooney is again devastating as he stretches out across the entire kit while demonstrating the fine art of the drum roll.

Mr. Rundgren gets all fancy on “Kiddie Boy,” an uptempo jazz-blues number with a killer horn chart. Stewkey’s singing this one too, but Todd’s desire to show everyone the skills he’d recently taught himself, and his blazing guitar lines, steal the show. He pulls out another new trick on “Letters Don’t Count” when he opens the song with glass harmonica (wine glasses filled with liquid to different levels). Mooney steps away from the drum set here and shifts to congas. The song is really an elaborate vocal arrangement with heart-rending chord changes and restrained guitar.

While Rundgren did a fantastic job of keeping everything fresh by using his new songwriting disciplines throughout all of Nazz Nazz, he truly outdoes himself on the record’s closer, “A Beautiful Song.” This 11-minute suite is a test of the theories of Nietzsche, except it both killed the band AND made them stronger. I’d love to see an accounting of the amount of studio time logged for this song alone, with its gorgeous piano, lush vocal layering, and confident string arrangement. It’s an epic that sticks out like Taylor Swift at a Motorhead show amongst the rest of the radio-ready cuts. Rundgren would return to the lengthier pieces on recordings such as his Initiation (where his “Treatise On Cosmic Fire” sprawls across an entire 30-minute album side) and frequently in the early years with Utopia (“The Icon” and “Singring And The Glass Guitar” come to mind). It’s a helluva way to end an album and announce his embarking on a solo career.

So there you go – Nazz Nazz is the place to start for anyone wanting to explore Todd Rundgren’s earliest moments in his career and for one of the best examples of what happens to a garage band once they get serious and study the science behind composition. The record’s flaws are also its selling points, something which is all but unheard of during this digital age of perfection. While it’s not totally heavenly, Nazz Nazz does provide listeners with devilishly good fun. Sinners beware!

-Mark Polzin

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