What are you listening to and WHY might anyone be interested? (Vol. XIII)

Posted by: Richard Dane on 01 January 2017

2017 has arrived today, so time to start this thread afresh.

Last year's thread can be found here;

https://forums.naimaudio.com/to...e-interested-vol-xii

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by Christopher_M

Springsteen - Born to Run

With its hairs sticking up on the back of the neck chorus on the title track, this is the kind of album that gives a bloke hope again, albeit a record from more than forty years ago. Seems (seemed?) the authentic voice of America. Or at least, that's what I want it to be.

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by Yetizone

A superb album and his masterpiece, although "Darkness on the edge of Town" still my fav I think. "Jungleland" is just astonishing. Think he was roughly twenty five or so when he recorded it. What an achievement.

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by Filipe

The Chieftains - Bonapart’s Retreat - Vinyl from Oxfam £4. 49

An Irish folk band without the electronics! Very traditional instruments including Irish harp, Uillean pipes, tin whistle, bodhran, fiddle, flute, concertina, oboe, and tiompan. Very beautiful music. Well worth a listen.

Strangely or perhaps not, to fully appreciate the instruments your system’s timing needs to be spot on. I have recently achieved this by doubling the spacing between power supplies and between brain boxes. Lacked impact before the change. Good test of your system.

Phil

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by seakayaker

Now Playing....

Gidon Kremer - Arvo Part: Tabula Rasa

Exploration of the ECM catalogue continues - Streaming TIDAL

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by Haim Ronen

On vinyl:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTb7FkYuvfc

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by dav301

On CD:-

Lizz Wright - Salt

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by Jeroen20

Dick de Graaf & Tony Lakatos - New York Straight Ahead.

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by seakayaker

Now Playing......

KEITH JARRETT - THE KÖLN CONCERT

Keith Jarrett - The Koln Concert

Exploration of the ECM catalogue continues, Streaming from TIDAL

ECM Review found here.......

Notes from TIDAL:

Recorded in 1975 at the Köln Opera House and released the same year, this disc has, along with its revelatory music, some attendant cultural baggage that is unfair in one sense: Every pot-smoking and dazed and confused college kid -- and a few of the more sophisticated ones in high school -- owned this as one of the truly classic jazz records, along with Bitches Brew, Kind of Blue, Take Five, A Love Supreme, and something by Grover Washington, Jr. Such is cultural miscegenation. It also gets unfairly blamed for creating George Winston, but that's another story. What Keith Jarrett had begun a year before on the Solo Concerts album and brought to such gorgeous flowering here was nothing short of a miracle. With all the tedium surrounding jazz-rock fusion, the complete absence on these shores of neo-trad anything, and the hopelessly angry gyrations of the avant-garde, Jarrett brought quiet and lyricism to revolutionary improvisation. Nothing on this program was considered before he sat down to play. All of the gestures, intricate droning harmonies, skittering and shimmering melodic lines, and whoops and sighs from the man are spontaneous. Although it was one continuous concert, the piece is divided into four sections, largely because it had to be divided for double LP. But from the moment Jarrett blushes his opening chords and begins meditating on harmonic invention, melodic figure construction, glissando combinations, and occasional ostinato phrasing, music changed. For some listeners it changed forever in that moment. For others it was a momentary flush of excitement, but it was change, something so sorely needed and begged for by the record-buying public. Jarrett's intimate meditation on the inner workings of not only his pianism, but also the instrument itself and the nature of sound and how it stacks up against silence, involved listeners in its search for beauty, truth, and meaning. The concert swings with liberation from cynicism or the need to prove anything to anyone ever again. With this album, Jarrett put himself in his own league, and you can feel the inspiration coming off him in waves. This may have been the album every stoner wanted in his collection "because the chicks dug it." Yet it speaks volumes about a musician and a music that opened up the world of jazz to so many who had been excluded, and offered the possibility -- if only briefly -- of a cultural, aesthetic optimism, no matter how brief that interval actually was. This is a true and lasting masterpiece of melodic, spontaneous composition and improvisation that set the standard. ~ Thom Jurek

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by Christopher_M

Arabic Chillout - A supermarket triple from a few years ago. Might have been seven quid. Stonking value and stonking sound now that I've tightened my nuts. (On the speaker's spikes).

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by Stevee_S

(1993)

A lovely way to start the music this evening.

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by dave marshall

Field Music - Commontime.

Saw these live last year, so thought I'd dig the album out for a play.

Hints of XTC, Devo, Talking Heads ..................... it's on Tidal, so give it a listen, it's a cracking album.

Looking forward to their new one early next year.

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by Kevin-W

New Order Technique (1989). Their finest album, on UK first pressing on the late lamented Factory Records, played LOUD. A masterpiece (despite some awful lyrics).

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by dave marshall

Gorillaz - Human.

My first proper listen, on Tidal, to this one from Damon & Co. ....................... bonkers, but strangely compelling.

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by Gianluigi Mazzorana

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by Stevee_S

(2013)

This bandcamp release was the forerunner of what was to become The Ghosts of Pripyat. Steve Rothery was asked to go to the guitar festival in Plovdiv and came up with some new material, worked on it then released Ghost of Pripyat the following year. Good stuff that has a nice vibe and feel for the evening there which in many ways is a match for the eventual album. I got it on bandcamp a few years ago.

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by Gianluigi Mazzorana

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by Tony2011

2017 - UNKLE - The Road ..

Double limited edition vinyl...

Growing on me with every new listen. It hasn’t got the immediacy of Psyence Fiction or War Stories but it is a more involving experience altogether where the album songs are much more cohesive. Even ESKA (Naim Label) makes a guest appearance among other illustrious contributors.

There is no Rabbit In Your Headlights here but it is still a very captivating album.

Posted on: 20 November 2017 by Haim Ronen

Another case of first album turning out to be the best. Highly recommended: