Hawkwind - Warriors at the Edge of Time

I’ve always been an appreciator of almost anything space rock, so it’s been somewhat puzzingly that one of the genre’s prime exponents have generally been lost on me through the years, and to be honest I’m going to lay the blame for most of this on really bad (or thrashed) UA pressings, all of which tended to add more murk to what was an already very heavy and swirly sound. Warriors at the Edge of Time, to some extent, lies in between eras, the original Hawkwind and the modernized sound that started with Quark Strangeness and Charm. It could be the Hawkwind that appeals to the progressive rock fan with its hoards of mellotron strings and for a good part of this album I was pretty mesmerized by what I was hearing. Of course one thing this band did at the time, which always throws me out of my reverie, is the occasional Chuck Berry-riff which turns the band instantly into a rather weak rock n roll band. These parts will always weigh pretty heavily on my Hawkwind ratings, although for the most part I was more impressed with this than I had remembered (thank the CD age for this) and bumped it up to a 10.

Tim Berne/Caos Totale - Pace Yourself

I find Tim Berne’s endless and prolific bands and manifestations to be endlessly fascinating, whether it’s his albums or plethora of fantastic live shows. Surely this is one of the finest musicians and composers of the New York out jazz scene. While some of the albums, including this one, fill out the CD format to its limit and by doing so almost overstay its welcome, one can’t say the same thing on a more microscopic level. For one thing, his bands always have tremendous chemistry, you always get a sense everyone’s listening and that effect on the progress of an improvisation. Caos Totale, as the name might imply, has Berne close to his freeist and noisiest so this isn’t likely to appeal to the consonantly melodic, but for those who like steely sharp edges, this does the trick. In fact it might be a little more inside than other live Caos Totale performances.

Freddie Hubbard - “Onkel Po’s Carnegie Hall,” “Hamburg, 10/29/79

I always get a certain sense of trepidation when listening to a musician’s work after their classic years and had that sense approaching this Hubbard 79 show. Every live Hubbard show I’ve heard from the early 70s backwards has been utterly incredible, whether it’s the man’s hardbop years or the CTI period, the guy could be one of the finest trumpet chopsters to pick up the instrument. This Hamburg 79 show is pretty sprawling and also features a vocalist and electric piano, making this almost an amalgam of eras, starting (mostly) with earlier vocal jazz music, funking it up a little with the rhythms and e-piano and really never catching the sort of fire you’d expect with Hubbard, in fact he’s awful restrained at times. Was pretty good overall although the vocal pieces weren’t as much to my tastes.