Jazz Archives

In 1982, a one-off version of The Work went to Japan for a series of concerts - in the absence of regulars Rick Wilson and Mick Hobbs, Chris Cutler and L. Voag (as he was then known) filled in alongside regulars Tim Hodgkinson and Bill Gilonis. This recording was made at the last concert in Osaka, and the LP assembled from it came out later the same year, only in Japan, soon to go out of print and to remain so until now. This is a different and extremely in your face version of The Work, made more so by the recording, which brings everything forward and accentuates every punch and roar. Tim is in screaming form and the band take extreme liberties, somehow staying inside the songs they are systematically splitting them open and spitting them out. There's a lot going on here, in rapid succession, and yet somehow it remains uncluttered. Best taken loud (though, technically it sounds loud even when it's quiet), this recording is a nice example of what I like about certain live recordings - they have an energy and directedness (thanks to a lively public) that is quite impossible to capture in a studio. This CD Includes one piece never recorded by the official Euro Work, laconic spoken comments from Amos/Voag and the rare red flexi-disc version of 'I Hate America' by the same band from the same concert.

:::Review by RéR Megacorp:::

The Work - Live in Japan (1982)

1. State Room 3:40
2. Like This 3:01
3. Fingers & Toes 3:02
4. Pop 4:40
5. Crabs 4:29
6. Duty 2:10
7. Cain & Abel 3:50
8. Do It 2:16
9. Tuning 0:43
10. Flies 0:58
11. Benidorm 1:42
12. Night By The Sea 4:54

Credits
Artwork By - Chris Cutler
Bass Guitar, Voice - Amos
Drums, Drums [Electric] - Chris Cutler
Guitar [Hawaian], Saxophone, Organ, Voice - Tim Hodgkinson
Guitar, Backing Vocals - Bill Gilonis
Performer [Live Mix] - C.D. Gray
Recorded By - Masae Nishimura
Saxophone [Tenor] - Bill Gilonis (tracks: 12)

Notes
Recorded at a concert at the Osaka Koseikenkin Kaikan Middle Hall, Jun 29, 1982 with a cassette recorder 1/2 way back the hall and later reprocessed through a graphic equaliser & a DBX expander.

Art Bears' second album is their masterpiece, a beautifully focussed and concentrated piece of work that was recorded in just 2 weeks. Amazingly, the music was all written during the recording period - Chris Cutler arrived with the texts, Fred Frith set them to music and the arrangements evolved in the studio.
On this album there were no guest musicians, although special mention should be made of engineer Etienne Conod's contribution to their use of the studio as a compositional instrument.
Where their debut album explored several different themes, the lyrics for Winter Songs are informed mostly by Chris Cutler's fascination with the Middle Ages and are based on stone carvings in Amiens cathedral (except for two songs that refer to similar carvings in other cathedrals from the same era and area). The words are always poetic and sometimes oblique, although Cutler's political leanings can be inferred from Gold: "Owned men mined me/And out of their lives all my value derived/And out of their deaths/My authority". The music has some of folk influences first heard on 'Hopes and Fears' (Frith began his musical career in folk clubs and some of his solo albums feature his unique take on various folk traditions), but also ventures into dense, dark RIO style chamber rock and even into Residents- influenced studio wizardry. With Frith playing everything except drums, the arrangements are precise and uncluttered. Bass guitar is only heard on a few tracks, most notably on The Summer Wheel and 3 Figures, and like all the other elements in the sonic palette it is only used when necessary. There are some splendid passages featuring violin and piano, as well as Frith's ever inventive guitar. Chris Cutler's drumming is likewise a model of clarity and concision - rather than trying to fill all the available space, he knows when to drive the tempo forward, when to play softly to complement Frith or Dagmar and - most crucially - when not to play at all. Dagmar's interpretation of this material features some of her best vocal performances - The Hermit is sung with a clear, bell like tone, on The Skeleton she is at her most strident and the frantically uptempo Rats and Monkeys (a counterpart to the rock out on In Two Minds from Hopes and Fears) shows the uniqueness of her talent. A particularly powerful moment comes at the opening of First Things First, where the vocal is played backwards as an introduction to the song, mirroring the the theme of the lyrics (two dead trees pulling apart in opposite directions). Lyrics, melody, rhythm, arrangement and production are all informed by a singular vision, and there is nothing extraneous anywhere in these 12 songs.
Despite the possibly forbidding avant garde credentials of the writers and performers, this often a melodic and accessible album. Dagmar's voice is something of an acquired taste, but it is worth persevering with; few albums released under the 'rock' banner have such a coherent and fully realised artistic vision.
This album is on a par with Robert Wyatt's Rock Bottom, Christian Vander's Wurdah Itah or Captain Beefheart's Lick My Decals Off, Baby. Uneasy listening, but highly rewarding and strongly recommended.

:::Review by Syzygy:::

Art Bears - Winter Songs (1979)

1. The Bath of Stars (1:45)
2. First Things First (2:41)
3. Gold (1:40)
4. The Summer Wheel (2:47)
5. The Slave (3:38)
6. The Hermit (2:59)
7. Rats and Monkeys (3:14)
8. The Skeleton (3:11)
9. The Winter Wheel (3:06)
10. Man and Boy (3:22)
11. Winter/War/Force/Three Figures (5:51)
12. Three Wheels (3:38)

Credits
- Fred Frith / guitars, violin, keyboards
- Chris Cutler / drums, percussion
- Dagmar Krause / vocals
+ Etienne Conod / engineering, mixing

By this point Henry Cow consisted of guitarist Fred Frith, drummer Chris Cutler, bassist John Greaves, keyboardist Tim Hodgkinson, and, of particular importance to the band's sound at this point, bassoonist Lindsay Cooper. As is so often the case with avant-garde rock & roll, it's the composed pieces that work best, and the fact that Frith is responsible for the majority of them is significant. "Bittern Storm Over Ulm" is an absolutely brilliant demolition of the Yardbirds' "Got to Hurry," while the brief but lovely "Solemn Music" unfolds in a stately manner with atonal but pretty counterpoint between Frith and Cooper. The improvised material succeeds in a more spotty way. "Upon Entering the Hotel Adlon" demonstrates how fine the line can be between bracing free atonality and mindless cacophony. The unsettling but eventually gorgeous "Deluge," on the other hand, shows how well Henry Cow could walk that line when they tried; in this piece, random guitar skitterings, scattershot drum clatter, and pointillistic reed grunts are eventually snuck up on and overtaken by softly massed chords and Cooper's gently hooting bassoon. The effect is startlingly moving. Overall, this is one of Henry Cow's better efforts.

:::Review by Rick Anderson:::

Henry Cow - Unrest (1974)

1. Bitter Storm Over Ulm (2:44)
2. Half Asleep; Half Awake (7:39)
3. Ruins (12:00)
4. Solemn Music (1:09)
5. Linquaphonie (5:58)
6. Upon Entering The Hotel Adlon (2:56)
7. Arcades (1:50)
8. Deluge (5:52)

Musicians
- John Greaves / bass, piano, vocals
- Chris Cutler / piano, trumpet, drums, vocals
- Lindsay Cooper / bassoon, oboe, recorder, vocals
- George Born / bass
- Fred Frith / guitar, piano, violin, keyboards, xylophone
- Charles Fletcher / vocals
- Tim Hodgkinson / organ, clarinet, piano, keyboards, saxophones, vocals

Western Culture was Henry Cow's farewell album, recorded after a protracted break during which they had become independent from Virgin Records, Chris Cutler had laid the foundations for what were to become Rock In Opposition and Recommended Records and they'd already decided to split. Much of the material which was to become the first Art Bears album had already been recorded before the band decided that the material wasn't 'Henry Cow', although the closing track 'Half The Sky' came from these sessions. With all this turmoil it's surprising that an album was made at all, and in a way it's ironic that this least showbizzy of bands should have followed the old showbiz maxim 'save the best till last'.
Western Culture is Henry Cow's most coherent album - the only one to feature only composed pieces, the only purely instumental album and the album on which Lindsay Cooper emerged as a talented composer in her own right, as well as a great musician. In creative terms, the album is a 50/50 split between Tim Hodgkinson, who wrote tracks 1 - 3 (side 1 of the vinyl original) and Lindsay Cooper (who wrote or co-wrote the remainder).
Hodgkinson's pieces on side 1 really blend into a seamless whole - brass and reeds play a prominent part here, with relatively little electric guitar but with acoustic guitar featuring prominently for the first time on a Henry Cow album. Special mention should be made of guest musician Anne Marie Roelofs, a Dutch musician who had played with them on stage, and who added some warm, blurry trombone lines to complement Cooper's bassoon - her playing is particularly effective on 'Industry' and 'The Decay Of Cities'. These compositions are a continuation of the compositional style first heard on 'Living In The Heart Of The Beast', with more of a jazz element (perhaps as a result of HC's work with the Mike Westbrook Orchestra and the Art Ensemble Of Chicago). They evoke a decaying urban landscape, with the closing piece 'On The Raft' giving a more optimistic tone with huge brass/reed chords played over a lazy tempo, the whole never quite settling into the comfortable orthodoxy that seems to be promised.
Lindsay Cooper's compositions are a more diverse selection, drawing on contemporary classical and avant garde influences. 'Falling Away' is probably the track that is closest to the avant rock style normally associated with Henry Cow. 'Gretel's Tale' features an astonishing piano contribution by Irene Schweizer, almost like John Cage plying free jazz. 'Half The Sky' takes its title from a famous quotation from Chairman Mao, also cited by John Lennon on 'Woman' a couple of years later - appropriate for a musician who would go on to be a key player in the Feminis Improvising Group.
The key players in Henry Cow continued to work together in various configurations over the years, and released a lot of fine music and exerted a massive influence on the more left field aspects of progressive rock. Odd tracks have since emerged on compilations, but there have been no reunion tours and no 'greatest hits'. Their final press release said that they would not be trapped into reproducing their past in order to secure their future, and they have been as good as third word. Western Culture is a fitting end to a remarkable career, and is an essential album of its genre.

:::By Chris Gleeson::: 

Henry Cow - Western Culture (1979)

History and Prospects

1. Industry 6:57

2. The Decay of Cities 6:55

3. On the Raft 4:01

Day by Day

4. Falling Away 7:38

5. Gretels Tale 3:57

6. Look Back 1:19

7. 1/2 the Sky 5:07

8. blank track 1:29

Additional Tracks

9. Viva Pa Ubu 4:28

10. Look Back (alt) 1:21

11. Slice 0:36

Credits

Acoustic Guitar, Guitar [Electric], Bass - Fred Frith

Bassoon, Oboe, Saxophone [Soprano, Sopranino], Tape - Lindsay Cooper

Drums, Electronic Drums, Noises, Artwork By - Chris Cutler

Organ, Clarinet, Saxophone [Alto] - Tim Hodgkinson

Recorded By, Mixed By - Etienne Conod , Henry Cow

Trombone, Violin - Annemarie Roelofs