Musical ephemera from Australia and beyond. Jazz, soundtracks, field recordings, vaguely ethnic, folk, pop and whatever else I may find in the second-hand shops of Victoria.
Here's a lesser known release from the later career of Urban Bowerbird patron saint, John Sangster. This is one of a handful of releases on Sangster's own 'Rain Forest Records' imprint, put out in the early eighties - Peaceful being another. Expect more of Sangster's idiosyncratic, mischievous, trad-influenced jazz played by the likes of Tony Gould, Ian Bloxsom, Errol Buddle, Graeme Lyall, Len Barnard and Bob Barnard. Mediafire.
I picked up this gem at the Winchelsea op-shop a couple of years ago. In the past I may have skipped past a release like this, but I had recently heard and very much enjoyed RareCollections' 'Australounge' podcast, featuring music from the house bands of Australian establishments of the sixties and seventies. The Trio Orfeo were a group of Greek musicians who had relocated to Australia and during the sixties were enjoying a residency at Sydney Restaurant, La Taverne. As is described in some detail in the aforementioned podcast, these stints as a house band often resulted in the pressing of records so the group could make a little extra money and the diners could have a souvenir of their experience. The playing and harmonies on this LP are excellent and the song choices are generally fantastic, incorporating Greek folk tunes and some nice surprises such as the exotica standard Adventures In Paradise. Inevitably there is a version of Zorba The Greek and for some reason the trio plays The Mexican Hat Dance - which I'm sure says something about Australia's difficult relationship with racism although I have no idea what.
I love the sound of The Trio Orfeo and the feeling of being in a 1960s Sydney restaurant, however a contemporary critic said that one of their later LPs made them want to turn their record player off and described the group as "play[ing] inoffensive nightclub music"! No accounting for taste, I suppose. Mediafire.
I love conceptual synth albums from the seventies and eighties, particularly those which attempt to evoke or soundtrack the natural world. In recent years I have been inspired by Vangelis's L'Apocalypse des animaux and Soil Festivities, Joël Fajerman's botanical soundtrack L’Aventure des plantes and of course, Andrew Richardson's conceptual flute and synth oddity Expanse. These days my focus is increasingly on my homeland of Australia. Apart from that last record, where are the conceptual synth experiments from the seventies and eighties celebrating the unique Australian environment? There are a few examples. Rob Thomsett's legendary Yaraandoo comes close, but is light on the synths and more of a prog rock freak out. The didjeridu-lead impressionism of Gondwanaland is closer to the mark - creating native Australian soundscapes with didj, synths and field recordings. But beyond these few, there's not much out there in the way of Antipodean, synth-washed nature concept albums from the seventies and eighties. So, I decided to make one myself! Aurora Australis is the debut album by Bronzewing, combining synthesizers, a little guitar and field recordings that I have recorded myself during my naturalist wanderings in Victoria and Queensland. There are also hints of oud, soprano saxophone and one composition written for and played by the Federation Bells - an automated carillon on the banks of the Yarra River in Melbourne.
This Rugged Coast was an Australian documentary series that followed Ben Cropp and his team as they traveled around Queensland's Coral Sea in the 1970s - like a cross between The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau and Ron & Val Taylor's Inner Space. I discovered it by accident a few years ago while watching late night tv and got so excited by it, I wrote a number of blog articles remarking on its amusing anachronisms and my genuine fondness for the show. As I described the program at the time:
The crew is lead by Cropp perpetually standing alert at the helm in nothing but skimpy bathers and a beard, smoking a pipe and continually lifting his binoculars skyward and scanning the horizon for anything film-worthy. The watery, blue depths are his domain and he presides over them like a tanned Antipodean Neptune. He is joined by Hal the fearless sea-snake expert with a perplexing accent and thick-rimmed glasses, a crew that seems to consist mainly of beach-belles in bikinis (it wasn't clear at first what their capacity on-board was, but Lynn was credited with 'sound' so I can only assume the other girls are equally technically equipped), guys with beards who look like they know a thing or two about boats and of course the ship's cat, Skipper. In tonight's episode, our crew are venturing around a treacherous maze of coral reefs called 'The Coral Labyrinth' (the name is repeated at every opportunity by the voice-over guy who pronounces it 'Lab-ee-rinth' with a faintly rolled 'r'.)
Like all good underwater documentary shows, the drama on This Rugged Coast is constantly underscored by music. I asked James Pianta of Votary Records, about the source of this music back in 2011 and he said; "I actually spoke to Ben Cropp a few years back about releasing his soundtrack music, he was less than interested. Although he did tell me that he uses library music. This is problematic as unless the original cue sheets exist (they never do) it becomes really hard to source all the tracks let alone licensing." So, I took it upon myself to piece together a soundtrack by ripping the audio from the DVDs. Most of the audio comes from The Coral Labyrinth episode mentioned above. There is the unavoidable presence of narration and dialogue from the program over the music that, at first bothered me as being 'messy' but which I now rather like as it truly recreates the atmosphere and the ambience of the show.
Now, here's a challenge. All of the music on this soundtrack is sourced from library records - does anyone recognise any of these pieces and can you identify them?
This post has been written by guest blogger, Roger Close. Demand for album-length recordings of field sounds is not
what it once was. In the mid-twentieth century, though, long before smartphones
could summon up any bird-call in seconds, there seems to have been a thriving
market. This suite of five EPs from the 1960s and ‘70s (packaged with slim
hardback volumes by The Jacaranda Press) brings together a splendid range of
field recordings from the Australian natural environment. The earliest two
records, Australian Bird Songs (1964) and Australian Bush Sounds
(1966), were recorded by Danish couple Carl and Lise Weismann during a
ten-month traversal of the continent in 1957. Zoologist Carl Weismann was one
of the pioneers of ornithological field recordings, having collecting bird
calls for Danish radio as early as the 1930s. However, it was the popularity of
their ‘Singing Dogs’ novelty records that financed
their Australian tour. Vocalisations on these two albums are presented without
a narrator: the interested listener can follow ornithologist Alan
Keast’s extensive written commentary. However, the calls are
sufficiently distinctive that it’s easy to keep in step with the track listing.
The later three recordings, ‘Menura—The Lyrebird’ (1967), Bird and
Animal Calls of Australia (1968) and Voices of the Australian Bush
(1970) are the end-result of thirteen years of outback travel by of one of
Australia’s leading wildlife photographers at the time, Harold J. Pollock.
Although these recordings also contain extensive notes, the subject of each
track is also announced by Mr Pollock in a delightfully old-fashioned tone.
Nineteen species are included on Australian Bird Songs,
all of which are captured clearly and with minimal background noise—perhaps
attributable to the gigantic three-foot parabolic microphone reflector dish
pictured on the back of the EP (wielded by Carl; his wife (“at this stage a new
bride”) operates the portable reel-to-reel tape recorded slung over her
shoulder). Recordings were made in a wide variety of remote environments. Both
sides of this EP contain a mix of common and lesser-known (and more
unusual-sounding) species, although they are frequently referred to by obsolete
names, which might confuse modern listeners a little. Accompanying the black
and white photographs, Alan Keast provides lively and poetic descriptions of
each species’ calls, which are preceded by an informative discussion of the biological
roles of bird song.
Additional material recorded during the Wiesmanns’
Australian expedition was released the next year on Australian Bush Sounds.
Unlike their previous recording, this EP is not limited to birds, and features
several mammals, amphibians (the Weismanns professed to be overawed by the
incredible variety of frog calls on offer in this country) and even insects, a
greater variety of calls that makes for more pleasant background listening. In
particular, the far-off howling of a pack of dingos is very evocative, and one
can only imagine how the two Scandinavian globetrotters felt as they captured
this soundscape.
‘Menura—The Lyrebird’ is the only EP to focus on a
single taxon. Most of the recordings are of two Superb Lyrebird individuals: a
male, ‘Wanderer,’ in Sherbrooke Forest in Victoria, and a female, ‘Theresa,’
living near Sydney; the text gives detailed biographies, along with accounts of
the natural history of the lyrebird. An anonymous Albert Lyrebird from Southern
Queensland also makes an appearance. It seems this release was a tie-in with a
now-forgotten documentary film of the same name, during the
making of which Mr Pollock lived alongside his subjects for six months.
(Pollock also made short documentaries about pelicans, brolgas, red kangaroos and koalas, all financed by the State Bank of New
South Wales). The EP gives a terrific impression of the variety of calls and
imitations that these peculiar birds are capable of—particularly mimicry of
other bird species, although ‘Theresa’ does produce a fine imitation of a dog’s
bark.
Bird and Animal Calls of Australia (‘animals’ here
being synonymous with ‘mammals’) is the first instalment in this Jacaranda
series to be printed in full-colour. The first side of the EP presents calls
from a range of fairly common bird species, including the melodious Pied
Butcher Bird, the curious but familiar Pied Currawong, and the
less-commonly-heard calls of the Cassowary and Brolga. Side two is perhaps more
interesting, focussing on mammal species. The male and female koala calls
provide an amusing contrast, particularly the ‘courting’ vocalisations; we’re
also treated to the sound of koalas fighting and to a baby koala, which is
rather cute. More obscure ‘animal’ calls include the Squirrel Glider, Tasmanian
Devils (which sound remarkably like feral cats) and Flying Foxes. The natural
history of each species in included in the booklet, along with an extensive
description of the technical hurdles of recording field sounds, should you wish
to attempt your own. If you wish to go down the reel-to-reel tape route, the
German-made Uher 4000 Report S is a “lightweight masterpiece of electronic
engineering” (only 7 lb. complete with battery); this will no doubt make it
easier to lug around your parabolic reflector and AKG microphone.
The final EP, Voices of the Australian Bush
doesn’t include Mr Pollock’s announcements, but does cover 29 species of bird,
both rare and common, accompanied by colourful descriptions and photographs. In
addition to an updated guide to making field recordings, there is a portrait
showing Mr Pollock brandishing his equipment. Download - Mediafire.
Comedy is one of the most ephemeral art forms there is. What people find funny is very specific to a time and place and it dates almost immediately. While this can make comedy from only a couple of years ago seem stale and boring, that same effect can make comedy from decades or centuries ago incredibly illuminating in terms of understanding that culture and getting a feel for the real world of the bourgeoisie.
Alan Rowe was a very family-friendly comedian who did impressions, sang songs and performed bits about the suburban experience in Melbourne around the early sixties. His was an old-fashioned, one-man show in the vaudeville tradition. To a modern listener, this kind of performance can sound a bit Arthur Atkinson from The Fast Show, but there’s no question that Alan was a consummate performer with original material and a good rapport with his audience. One of my favourite bits, and one that illustrates the timelessness of certain Melbourne institutions, is the one where Alan calls the running of a train on the Frankston line in the style of a horse racing announcer. With a few minimal updates, you could probably perform this routine today and still get laughs in Melbourne. Rowe's songs Living In A Flat and Dad’s Lost Weekend likewise reflect an early celebration of Australian suburban-ness that is still recognisable today.
Rowe’s final bit relates a story of a booking for a show in which all the other acts cancel, leaving Alan to take their place via his impressions. He replicates a female soprano, a bass baritone (“Michael Row The Boat Ashore), a countrified harmonica (“Home On The Range”), a banjo-mandolin player and finally as Graeme Bell’s six-piece Dixieland Jazz Band. I was pleasantly surprised to see that at the time Graeme Bell was such a well-known fixture in Australian pop culture as to be an instantly familiar reference.
To round out this little sonic window into lost Melbourne, here’s a 10” 78RPM record by Graeme Bell & His Dixieland Jazz Band that I found in a Reservoir op-shop. Ever the skilled showman, even with only his voice and a piano Alan does a pretty good impression of the band.
EDIT 11/01/2015: When I posted this a month ago, I uploaded the wrong song. I had accidentally uploaded The Settlement; an original Libaek soundtrack composition which can be found on the I Love Australian Movies LP. A nice track to be sure, but not of the quality of White Midnight, which has now been uploaded to the player below.
Sven Libaek produced so much wonderful music during his career, but at some point in the late seventies his output suddenly became very schmaltzy and unremarkable. Gone are the exciting, idiosyncratic soundtracks, replaced with easy listening orchestral cheese. I see these late-career records regularly in my travels and sometimes I can’t resist buying them, despite knowing full well they’re going to be terrible, due to my deeply ingrained love of Libaek. Every now and again, I find that these records harbour a song worth listening to or even, in this case, a flat-out excellent example of the Libaek genre. 1983’s Love Is In The Air is a collection of pedestrian covers played by the Sven Libaek Orchestra and is unlikely to be included in the Libaek classic canon. However, buried in the middle of the second side is White Midnight, a song written by Sven and originally recorded in 1965 by The Saints (not the well-known Australian punk rock band) on their obscure Australian skiing record, Ski With The Saints, which Libaek produced for CBS. This track, despite bearing sonic hallmarks that make it clear it was recorded in the eighties, is pure golden-era Libaek, sounding like it could be a condensed section from Australian Suite or an excerpt from one of Sven’s soundtracks. Have a listen and be the judge: is this a lost Libaek gem, or what?
When
discussing The Hobbit Suite record two years ago, I offhandedly described John Sangster’s Lord of the Rings LPs as too ‘trad-jazzy’ for my tastes. I have
been revisiting a few of these albums of late – prompted in part from reading Sangster’s
autobiography Seeing The Rafters
(1988) – and I’ve gotten new insights into the man’s work that have caused a
revision in my thinking on these albums.
Sangster’s
Tolkien-themed series of albums comprised, The
Hobbit Suite (1973), Lord of the
Rings (1975), Lord of the Rings Vol.
2 (1976), Double Vibes: Hobbit
(1977), Lord of the Rings Vol 3.
(1977) and Landscapes of Middle Earth
(1978). All of these were double LPs released on EMI apart from the two hobbit
records which were single LPs released on local jazz label Swaggie. The EMI
records have all been excellently remastered and re-released on CD by Move Records. Swaggie have remastered and re-released The Hobbit Suite and selections from Double Vibes which features the
aforementioned album plus four songs from the latter title. (Given the paucity
of reissues of Australian jazz recordings from the sixties and seventies, this
may provide some indication of the esteem in which these records are still held
by people in the local music industry.)
The Hobbit Suite was apparently quite a spontaneous
recording with a small ensemble and most of the tracks are first takes. After
the success of this record Sangster was emboldened to try more ambitious
arrangements for the new music he was writing and went to a major label that
could support his vision. These records feature expanded brass and string
sections in addition to the core jazz band.
For
the past year or so I have been thoroughly listening to the first two LOTR albums and The Hobbit Suite which preceded them. (I haven’t heard LOTR Vol 3. or Landscapes of Middle Earth at all – and I won’t do for quite some
time. Sangster died in 1995, his musical output was finite and I’ve got to make
this stuff last.)
Firstly,
despite the aesthetics of the cover art and the song titles being allusions to
Tolkien at face value, Sangster’s autobiography makes clear that these records
too, are autobiographies. His life, in musical form. For example, the ‘Knockabout
Trolls’ from The Hobbit Suite? Those ‘trolls’
are Sango and Sluggsy AKA his mate, drummer Len Barnard, doubling on washboard out
the front of the band! And as for the stoned laughter and banter in the
background of Longbottom Leaf from LOTR Vol 2. well, let’s just say that they
may well have been method-acting. Legolas et
al may hail from Middle Earth, but the bird calls in the field recordings
on these albums are clearly from natives of the New South Wales temperate
forests, near Sangster’s home of Sydney.
In
addition to these coded titles, the music itself represents the myriad of
styles that Sangster has played in, beginning in the burgeoning Australian jazz
scene of the forties. From his book: “If you want a musical autobiography, it's
all there in the Lord of the Rings albums. A crazed montage of all the jazz
(and other) idioms I've been involved with during my life. All the musics I
love are in there; some plainly stated, some distorted and disguised a little
bit the way memories sometimes go."
My
dismissive description of the LOTR
records as merely ‘trad jazz’ is just plain wrong; these records encompass a
ridiculous range of music from within and without the jazz scene, such as old-style
trad, ragtime, be-bop, big-band/swing, blues, film music, avant garde and musique
concrète. The fact that the first LOTR record
has a track like Uncle Gandalf Needs You
followed immediately by Ents And Entwives
is a feat of juxtaposition that shows how ballsy Sangster really was. Sangster
worshipped old greats like Bix Beiderbecke and Ellington, but he was equally a
fan of experimental icons like Sun Ra, Moondog and Xenakis and all these influences
coexist on these discs.
I’m
glad I persevered with these records as these are superb examples of Sangster’s
work and are significant albums, not just for Australian jazz, but Australian
music in general. Is it too much to hope that one day Sangster’s music will see
a resurgence amongst the hipsters and the Oz music bourgeois alike, and Sango
himself celebrated as an unheralded genius? I really hope so. Australians are
famously unwilling to revere their own as cultural figures worth praising, but
a talent like John Sangster must transcend this and take a rightful place in
the antipodean cultural canon alongside the likes of Barry Humphries or Charles
Blackman. On yer Sango.
This is the second single from The Cambrian Explosion's album release Marine Theology. Yes, this is a song from my own band and I'd very much like you to hear it. On this one, we grind out some garage gospel with an arsenal of vintage and modern instrumentation, including flute and cümbüş.
The lyrics recount a lament from a protagonist attempting to reconcile the existence of fossils, dinosaurs and other natural phenomena with a fundamentalist belief system. Lord, why'd you leave the shells on the mountaintop?
A Wave In The Ocean is lovely vocal pop number with an overall middle-eastern fusion style, accented by the Turkish oud. (To be more precise, a cümbüş.) It's the first single from Marine Theology, an oceanic theme album from my band, The Cambrian Explosion. I realise this is a little outside of my usual brief for this blog, but this is music of which I am extremely proud and would like to share with as many people as possible. Let me know what you think, and please pass this on to musical fellow travelers if this is your kind of thing.
Although I was brought up in Victoria - Australia's southernmost mainland state and a long way from tropical Queensland - this record of environmentally themed children's tunes reminds me of my childhood. My family's particular jam was the classic Feathers, Fur or Fin by Don Spencer, but there must be a whole world of Australian ecological kid's music out there to discover. Due to the incredible natural heritage we've inherited, environmental education is often given a high priority in Australian schools, even at the earliest levels. And as all educators know, there's no more effective route to data retention than singing along to a catchy, upbeat tune strummed on a guitar.
Although a lot of these tracks are folky, three chord guitar-based numbers, there is plenty of inventiveness in the execution of these Nature Songs. I'm The Spider is rendered as a weird, glammy stomp with a delay pedal guitar solo. Marsupial's instructive lyrics about our unique native mammals are delivered via kind-of-rapping backed by indigenous didgeridoo and rhythm sticks.
The lyrical content is occasionally a little ham-fisted, but overall fun and informative and not afraid to touch on environmental issues that might seem too obscure for kids. What songwriter today would have the balls to write an entire song about decomposition for a children's audience with lines like: I decided to look closer, I bent down on my knee, I saw some fruiting bodies of the bracket fungi. Looking even closer, I saw some fibrous threads, fungi have no roots so use hyphae instead? Or an entire song about coral polyps or epiphytes?
The record is divided by the two sides; side one is the dry side featuring songs about life on land, side two is the wet side (from The Polyp Song onward), featuring songs about life in the water.
Label: Private Released: 1978
Players:Brian Mackness - words and music. Sandy Pollard - lead vocals and harmony, six and twelve string acoustic guitar, electric guitar, bass guitar, flute, descant recorder, alto recorder, sopranino recorder, autoharp, glockenspiel, percussion and sound production. Laurie Stone - mandolin, technical advice, sound mixing and production. Steve Errey - sound recording. Jacky Nisbet - vocals and harmonies. Keth Ross - banjo. Mick Walker - blues harp. Darryl Boyd, Jason Boyd and Leanne Mash - narration, vocals. Sam Bun'tarrawuy - didgeridoo. John Guillot, Robyn Kreis - percussion. Brian Mackness - sound production. Peter Ogilvie - bird call recordings. Amanda Hadley, Melinda (Lindy) Hadley, Gregory Hadley, Gregory Mash, Tony Rasmussen, Stuart Mash, Kathryn Mash - vocals. Engineered by Laurie Stone at Multi Media Studios, Spring Hill, Brisbane.
Bruce Clarke was an Australian jazz guitarist, composer and founder of legendary label Cumquat Records. He was one of those diverse hired-guns of the Australian scene, active from the late fifties until the seventies when he started teaching. In 1957 he set up The Jingle Workshop, a studio and production company responsible for countless pieces of television music and soundtracks.
On this record Bruce teams up with Maryan Kenyon, a classical pianist from the Melbourne Conservatorium who worked at The Jingle Workshop. Bruce was a big fan of the Moog synth and Maryan ‘used her spare time to learn and master the equipment at hand’, so the liner notes inform us. ‘Maryan is not just a very pretty face’. The notes, after having reassured us that the classically trained pianist featured on the album is good-looking (what about Bruce?), mostly wax lyrical about how unusual and eclectic this album is; a combination of bold, unique flavours, just like vichyssoise - a vegetable based French soup - which helps to explain why Clarke and Kenyon are posing in front of a giant leek on the cover. There is a wonderful and unexpected array of sounds to be found on this disc, mainly from the various Moogs and other electronics featuring in most songs.
The feel of the album is dominated by white-Australian jazz funk with a hint of exotica, exemplified by the brilliant Djerba. Djerba opens with a slow, middle-eastern section scored by tom drums and a back and forth interplay between Clarke’s classical guitar and Kenyon’s wah-wah synth. The song then segues into an upbeat funk riff, allowing Kenyon some space to noodle around a bit with the synth and for Clarke to bring on some fuzz guitar.
Vichyssoise is a consistently good listen throughout due to well-chosen songs (about half originals by Clarke or Kenyon, the rest covers) and the extremely high quality of playing from the two stars and their band. Also, the very well-executed and constant presence of Moog and early synths on the tracks always keeps me entertained, setting it apart from other albums of it’s oeuvre.
Postscript: As inexplicable as it sounds, Howard Moon and Vince Noir appear to be members of Bruce and Maryan's band. Howard has a well documented love of jazz, but I'm surprised to see Vince involved. I'm pretty sure this proves the existence of parallel fiction realities.
Label: Cumquat
Released: 1973 Players: Bruce Clarke - composer/arranger/conductor, classic and electric guitars, Fender bass, Moog synthesiser, vocals Maryan Kenyon - composer/arranger, Fender-Rhodes, acoustic pianos, harpsichord, Moog synthesiser, vocals Brian Czempinski - percussion and special effects Ted White - woodwinds (sax) Llloyd Knapp - woodwinds Barry Veith - woodwinds Fred Hosking - woodwinds Ron Anderson - woodwinds Bill Harrower - woodwinds Eddie Oxley - woodwinds Keith Stirling - trumpets and/or flugelhorns Bruce Gardiner - trumpets and/or flugelhorns Reg Walsh - trumpets and/or flugelhorns John Hughes - trumpets and/or flugelhorns Ron Webb - trumpets and/or flugelhorns Orme Stewart - trombones Clive Webber - trombones Jack Glenn - trombones Col Williams - trombones John Kennedy - cello Judy Grieve - cor anglais Maurice Sheldon - tuba
More cigarette advertising songs! This is a promotional 7" I found at the always awesome 3MBS record fair. Braddock are a brand of cigarettes that no longer exist, but who were clearly aiming for a very manly, conservative image with this campaign. I found it very difficult to get any details about this record at all until I found the website of what turned out to be the producer: Brian King. There are a lot of Brian Kings out there, and it wasn't until he replied that I knew he was the right man. Here is an excerpt of his email: For about 10 years starting in the 70's I was in partnership with Larry King (no relation). We had a company which produced advertising jingles and film music. When "Braddock" came our way it was right in the middle of the "Women's Lib" movement and the brief was to create a campaign which celebrated the differences between men and women. Larry King was a good looking guy, kind of like the "Marlborough Man" and as well as our company producing the music Larry also got the gig as "The Braddock Man". This involved a short live tour to Melbourne which was the place they decided to test market the brand. The slogan for the campaign was "Braddock....Not Mild".
It was all good fun but to this day I've still never smoked a cigarette!
I emailed Brian back with a few follow-up questions - I was quite curious as to whether there were any photos of 'The Braddock Man', for example - but he didn't reply. There are eight tracks on this record with lyrically consistent themes of women dressing differently to how they used to, bureaucracy and red tape making a man's life difficult and very little mention of tobacco or cigarettes - although every composition ends with Braddock's aforementioned tagline, 'Braddock…not mild'. As Brian alludes to, this was a pitch aimed at the kind of blokes who were threatened or bewildered by the womens' rights movement and there's an amusing lack of subtlety in the lyrics which pretty much all boil down to 'Everything is different to how it used to be (so smoke our cigarettes)'.
Label: Private press Released: 197? Players: Larry King - vocals
The Place I Want To Be - Pat Aulton (1980). Pat Aulton is quite a celebrated musician and producer who was particularly successful in the sixties and seventies, producing hit records for people such as Normie Rowe. I was familiar with Aulton through a fantastic library track called Barrier Reef that he contributed to Standard Music Library ESL 126 alongside John Sangster and Sven Libaek. On The Place I Want To Be he is front of the microphone and singing this somewhat awkward paean to Great Eastland - a chunk of northern New South Wales and south Queensland. Aulton forges ahead with gusto, even (almost) selling artless lines like, ‘We’ve got people peanut picking up in Kingaroy’ or ‘All through the inland and right along the coast, when you look at people’s faces, you can almost see them boast’. I suspect this was the theme song for the regional television network Great Eastland Television as they commissioned the track and the term ‘Great Eastland’ isn’t widely used in a geographical sense. The B-side, Country Nights fares no better lyrically but has some lovely production touches.
It’s Another World - Phillip Merifield (198?).It’s Another World is actually the B-side of this single, but I like it better than the A, so here it is. This is another promotional single either for the Gippsland region in general, or a business called ‘Lakeland Wonderland’ in Lakes Entrance, that rare thing that has basically zero Google presence, so I haven’t the faintest idea. Anyway, the song itself is in the same ‘list as many towns as you can’ school of songwriting as The Place I Want To Be, but feels a little bit more natural. I haven’t found any information at all about Merifield, but the single was produced by John Wallis, a folk muso who has been active since the eighties and is still playing today. (And, to illustrate the incestuousness of the Australian music scene, on his 1984 LP A Singer Of The Bush he was joined on keyboards by Ian Eccles-Smith, whose progressive releases I have previously showcased on Urban Bowerbird.)
The Lights Of Adelaide - Barry Hall At The Conn Organ (1969). Barry Hall is a bit of a star organ player who released a number of LPs in the sixties and seventies and at 77 years old still has new CDs for sale on his website today. This track is off his Choose Your Own LP which was the name of Barry’s radio show on Adelaide’s 5DN. On this show, Barry would ‘spin records, give cheerio calls to listeners, handle competitions and play the organ’. Little wonder that Barry remained a ‘firm favourite with housewives over the years’. One competition that 5DN held in 1968 was an Australia wide songwriting contest for a song about Adelaide. The winner, The Lights Of Adelaide written by Mr. Cliff Johns of Belair, is given Barry’s organ-driven treatment with accompaniment from Kevin Roper on drums and Roy Wooding on guitar. Sure, it’s a daggy and antiquated tune (have you ever been to Adelaide?) but it’s pretty charming and the addition of live guitar lifts it above the general standard of op-shop organ music. All in all, it perfectly sums up Adelaide, or ‘Radelaide’ as it is regularly, sarcastically referred to by Melbournians and Sydneysiders alike.
John Robertson was a classically trained trumpeter, originally from New Zealand, who emigrated to Australia in the fifties or sixties. Despite a strong reputation as an orchestral player, he also cut a few popular LPs such as this exotica/Latin record from the mid-sixties. The reference to ‘multi trumpets’ seems to simply refer to Robertson using multi-tracking of trumpet lines and accompanying himself on most tracks – fairly standard practice, I would have thought, but I guess you’ve got market your instrumental trumpet LP somehow.
Most of the information I’ve been able to find about Robertson has been from a conversation on a trumpet forum from 2005. They’ve got some solid information about Robertson and some good stories such as this one about the musicians who were playing at Sydney’s famous Trocadero jazz venue: One of their numbers had each musician playing some novelty trick... Robbo's gimmick was to hold a high C for 16 bars revolving the trumpet on his lips, while the band played chords underneath. Apparently all the Sydney musicians would crowd in to see him do this act - couldn't believe the lack of mouthpiece pressure. And [trumpeter] George Dobson commented later about these days saying each night he (still seated) would be covered in 'a fine spray of spittle as Robbie (standing) went into act'!
Anyway, John Robertson and his Multi Trumpets is a fine set of instrumental standards played with great skill by Robertson and arranged beautifully by Thomas Tycho. The first track to really make an impression on me was Sugar Plum Cha-cha, an adaptation of Tchaikovsky’s piece of (more or less) the same name. Yes, it’s twee as fuck, but the bass and percussion is swinging and it’s ultimately quite a well executed interpretation.
Label: RCA Released: 196? Players:John Robertson: Trumpet and flugelhorn Thomas Tycho: Musical director and arranger Don Andrews: Guitar soloist on La Spagnola Mediafire.
How you going to swing down there on the ground? This is the question posed by the hip young man who sings The Kangaroo Hop - a groovy new sound which incongruously extolls the virtues of the usually prosaic business of air cargo. The Kangaroo Hop is featured on a transparent red flexi-disc that I found at last year's Kew Record Fair. The A side has The Kangaroo Hop 'single', a rockin' piece of seventies pop with an exciting male vocal punctuated by a horn section and accompanied by some funky drumming. I've no idea who the players are, as the information on the disc indicates that the song was 'invented, arranged and performed by Qantas Air Cargo'. The B side has a few snippets of the aforementioned song but is mainly taken up by a typical old-style Australian announcer - a man, of course, this is business sweetheart - describing the benefits of using Qantas air cargo for your company. (The best part is the very beginning where he awkwardly repeats the first couple of the lines to the song, vaguely in time with the music.) The Kangaroo Hop was featured in Australian newspaper advertisements in 1971 with pretty much the same sort of copy that appears on the record.
I often wonder how these sorts of promotional vinyl releases were meant to be received. Some are obviously intended to be played on radio, but based on the presentation of the disc and the nature of the information on the sleeve and B side, I suspect this one was intended to be played by the businessmen themselves. The language positively screams that using Qantas air cargo is modern, groovy and in tune with the times. Although, this does seem at odds with the graphics they chose for the disc of old fashioned ballroom dancers - perhaps they were just stock pictures from a library.
I love hearing promotional releases from the sixties and seventies of Australia. There's a sort of unintentional honesty to this music which evokes the time they come from with a sincerity and veracity that pop music simply doesn't have. So come on, grab a jet and go with the groovy new sound - it's the Kangaroo Hop! It's the Kangaroo hop!
This time last year I wrote a post on a great album called Expanse written and produced in 1984 by flautist Andrew Richardson and keyboardist Ian Eccles-Smith. Ian actually said hello in the comments of the post (which was a first) and suggested that I check out an album he recorded in 2003 called Apsilene. I only got around to listening to this atmospheric concept album about a month ago and it’s a very well developed, cohesive instrumental set with a wealth of musical textures and range. I had a chat with Ian via the magic of email about this project and some of his other musical endeavours.
UB: Based on the song titles and the intro on your site, there seems to be a fairly dense but unexplained conceptual element to Apsilene. Did you deliberately intend for this to be ambiguous, or am I just missing some background information?
IES: There is definitely a conceptual element to Apsilene in that it’s a tribute to all the concept albums I've ever enjoyed. Extended solos, complex time signatures and a sound mix that emphasizes the technical prowess of the band (more on that later). To really drive the concept I invented a simple and silly storyline that follows the adventures of a Victorian London gent called Professor Goldstemm who uses the new invention of the London tube system to try to find the lost City of Atlantis, gets lost deep in the bowels of the world and along the way goes mad only to realize in the end that his world is in fact ruled by gigantic lizard kings...well, you get the idea. I still have the narration floating around somewhere and if I could just get Jeremy Irons people to call me back, I can get it vocalized by him and I'll re-release.
However, as with so many concept albums, though the concept itself doesn't hold up under any scrutiny, the ideas for the music itself were extremely focused and were something I spent over a year creating and crafting.
UB: How did you record Apsilene? Was it primarily a solo project? Could you give me an idea of any particular artists or albums that were influential on the songs and/or the production techniques?
IES: Apsilene was recorded in London - though much use was made of digital recording and editing techniques, all of the music was played and recorded live. Apart from three or four very small sampled loops, every note was a real performance.
Although I played everything, I first had created an imaginary band with each player having their own stylistic characteristics and as I created the parts, I had to stay true to each of these styles (and had no idea of how the combinations would work.) Drawing on inspiration from people like Steve Howe, Carl Palmer, Chris Squire, Bill Bruford, John Evan, I envisage my own super band playing just as I needed them to - an exercise in power hungry self delusion certainly but one that served a purpose in that it gave me a strong basis on how to craft each musical line. The resulting tracks which all have their own inner logic and hang together as a coherent whole, despite the fragmented steps that I started with.
Parts were recorded in no particular order, in some cases I created the solo first, and had to then work backwards to ensure the backing parts all worked to support the lead. Working to a nine to five schedule, 5 days a week I created around 30 draft compositions, the aim being to then trim these down based on the quality of each and then further refine. Being the only person creating this music meant that I lacked an objective view and so to help keep the project on track, Paul Schutze was drafted in to co-produce with me. As one of the only people I know who could understand the complex styling I was trying to capture he helped steer me through the process so that we were able to keep our 70's prog indulgences firmly under control. After a few months we had all the tracks recorded and mixed and I was able to begin working on the track order and the album edit. Apsilene was designed to be listened to as a seamless experience and our final edit ran for the full length with no gaps. However, as I planned to release this only on the Internet, I then had to slice it up into smaller chunks so that the downloads would be a little more manageable. From there it went onto the Internet, I let a few people know about it and it all grew from there, downloads, interviews and reviews worldwide.
UB: I did a post this time last year on Expanse, an album on which you collaborated with flautist Andrew Richardson. Could you tell me about that production and your part in recording that LP?
IES: I co-wrote Expanse with Andrew over the course of a week, in his house in St. Kilda. We created a simple studio in a couple of rooms, had an 8-track tape machine, a couple of keyboards (seem to recall Andrew had a Roland Jupiter 8, whilst I dragged in my Memory Moog and DX7). Some of the music we wrote together, a few tracks were things I'd already written prior and rearranged to include Andrews flute work (i.e. Brolga, Tiddalik) and a few were Andrews compositions that I added the keyboard parts to. The concept was entirely Andrews, I was simply enjoying the writing /arranging on what for me aged 22, was a pretty exciting project. At the time my style wasn't as ambient as Andrews and I recall trying to add in a lot more edgy samples and field recordings, whereas Andrew was after something simpler and more true to his concepts (and quite right he was too).
UB: Are there any other recordings that you have worked on that we should keep an eye out for (particularly vinyl releases)?
My only other work (apart from some film soundtracks) that may be interesting is Clubbed to Death, my first solo album (a selection of dance tracks featuring vocals from the leading serial killers of our time): oddly, and in hindsight, it’s a good companion piece to Apsilene, and certainly worth a listen.
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You can download Apsilene for free on mp3 here or wav here. The other bits of music mentioned in the post can be found at Ian's website.
My never-ending quest for documentary soundtracks, particularly from Australia, continues. Here is a gorgeous short film, The Living Soil, produced by the CSIRO (The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation) in 1982 and scored by Melbourne jazz pianist Tony Gould. You can find the music from the film on Chronicle: Orchestral Music of Tony Gould, available on CD from the excellent local label Move Records or on iTunes.
Here is another recording from Victorian flautist Andrew Richardson, the man responsible for Expanse and the Sally/Dive single. Rainforest is an ambient, fairly free-form piece which couples solo flute performances with Australian field recordings and a few other accompaniments. It’s a very sparse record and I must admit that I would like to have heard more structure and rhythmic flow. On the few occasions on Rainforest where Richardson does augment his solo flute playing it lifts the material considerably, such as the distant rhythmic rumbling percussion on Dense and the unexpected and brief appearance of a choir section in Shady Rill.
I am always interested in Australian recordings which incorporate field recordings and Rainforest uses this technique well - the fusion between these sounds and the flute playing feels very natural. The recordings are predominantly birds calling, the most obvious species being Rufous Whistler (Pachycephala rufiventris), White-throated Treecreeper (Cormobates leucophaea), Grey Fantail (Rhipidura albiscapa) and the Australian Magpie (Cracticus tibicen). This particular combination of species suggests that these recordings were made in dry temperate woodland in the southeast of Australia - which is actually a very different habitat type to the tropical rainforests that Richardson alludes to on the LP cover.
On the back of the sleeve Andrew writes: Australia is blessed with some of the world’s most magnificent rainforests. This recording represents a journey through one of these beautiful rainforests; and an attempt to make people conscious of these areas of rare and fragile beauty. As mankind is propelled into the Twenty-first Century these regions are unique, and must be saved in their entirety - not destroyed for short-term profit. One of Australia’s dedicated rainforest ecologists, CAROLE HELMAN, describes the Daintree Rainforest in north east Queensland as “one of the world’s most important tropical rainforests, because it is the home of the world’s most primitive tropical rainforest plant families.” The distinguished naturalist, DAVID ATTENBOROUGH, described Queensland’s rainforests as “one of the most breathtaking wild areas in the world, unbelievably beautiful, unbelievably interesting. There are birds, mammals and plants there that are unique. Beyond any dispute it is a treasure.”
Postscript: As inexplicable as it sounds, Howard Moon and Vince Noir appear to be members of Bruce and Maryan's band. Howard has a well documented love of jazz, but I'm surprised to see Vince involved. I'm pretty sure this proves the existence of parallel fiction realities.
The Place I Want To Be - Pat Aulton (1980). Pat Aulton is quite a celebrated musician and producer who was particularly successful in the sixties and seventies, producing hit records for people such as Normie Rowe. I was familiar with Aulton through a fantastic library track called Barrier Reef that he contributed to Standard Music Library ESL 126 alongside John Sangster and Sven Libaek. On The Place I Want To Be he is front of the microphone and singing this somewhat awkward paean to Great Eastland - a chunk of northern New South Wales and south Queensland. Aulton forges ahead with gusto, even (almost) selling artless lines like, ‘We’ve got people peanut picking up in Kingaroy’ or ‘All through the inland and right along the coast, when you look at people’s faces, you can almost see them boast’. I suspect this was the theme song for the regional television network Great Eastland Television as they commissioned the track and the term ‘Great Eastland’ isn’t widely used in a geographical sense. The B-side, Country Nights fares no better lyrically but has some lovely production touches.
