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The Last Poets – Chastisement (1973)

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The Last Poets – Chastisment
1972 Blue Thumb Records – BTS 39
This reissue, Celluloid Records, 1992

Tribute To Obabi (Ogun) 10:16
Jazzoetry 3:46
Black Soldier 5:56
E Pluribus Unum 4:38
Hands Off 4:05
The Lone Ranger 0:28
Before The White Man Came 3:43
Bird’s Word 6:10

   Artwork By – Jim Dyson
Bass – Jon Hart (tracks: A1, A2, B5)
Congas – Obabi, Omiyinka (tracks: A1, A2, B5), Omonide (tracks: A1)
Cowbell – Alafia Pudim (tracks: A1)
Engineer – Tony Bongiovi
Other [Undefined] – Last Poets, The* (tracks: B3)
Photography – Edmund Watkins
Producer – Last Poets, The, Stefan Bright
Saxophone [Alto] – Sam Harkness (tracks: A1, B5)
Saxophone [Tenor] – Sam Harkness (tracks: A1, A2, B5)
Shaker – Bessermer Taylor (tracks: A1)
Vocals – Monjile (tracks: A1), Okantomi (tracks: A1), Olubiji (tracks: A1)
Voice [Poet] – Alafia Pudim (tracks: A2, B, B5), Suliaman El-Hadi (tracks: A3, B2, B4)
Written-By – Alafia Pudim (tracks: A2, B1, B5), Suliaman El-Hadi (tracks: A3, B2, B4)

Produced by The Last Poets and Stefan Bright for True Sound Communications, Inc.
Recorded at Media Sound Studios, New York City
Manager for The Last Poets: Obawole Akinwole
All Selections: Spoet Publishing Corporation

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I had a request to repost this one, so here it is.  The early work of the Last Poets, like Leroi Jones/Amiri
Baraka, or Gil Scott-Heron, has to be contextualized in the Vietnam era
of post-MLK, post-Malcom X Afrocentricity, anger and indignation, or else any
interpretations you make are going to be as clueless as the kind of stuff they publish on, let’s say, the All Music Guide…  Anyway, the Poets records are ones I listen to
occasionally rather than frequently (in contrast,for example, to Gil’s work), not
so much because of its intensity but because they are more interesting
poetically than musically most of the time.  This record has a lot more
variety than their first two, however, although not as much as the next one, “At Last” which is probably the most compelling to my ears.  The jazz elements in the instrumentation that are only occasionally present here are given pride of place on “At Last” so that also probably explains my predilection for it.   (Unfortunately for “Chastisement” one of those tracks here is “Bird’s Word” which is a bit tediously didactic.)  The opening cut plays like a
long candomblé or santeria invocation, drawing down the blessing of the
Orixás on the rest of the music that follows.  It goes without saying that The Poets didn’t shy away from polemic.  The track Black Soldier questions the priorities of Black men going to fight in a foreign land in the name of a country that was also making war on their own people in the streets, “helping your oppressor oppress another man.”  Jalaluddin Mansur Nuriddin served as a paratrooper but was discharged for not saluting the flag; he’s sympathetic towards soldiers but thinks their skills could be put to better use at home.  The track is so tightly written, packed with excoriating critique, that it’s unjust to single out single lines.  But when they end the cut by warning that the violence in Newark and Detroit “wasn’t a riot, it was a dress rehearsal for things to come”, it’s chilling enough to make it clear why these guys were in the sights of COINTELPRO.     This album is also
impressive in that, given how much this music is tied in with a
particular place and time, it still sounds refreshingly relevant,
sometimes unnervingly and depressingly so:  listen to E Pluribis Unim
and you might think you’re hearing an anthem written for the Occupy
movement.  A classic, solid record all the way – I just wish they would get around to reissuing “At Last” already.





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Gonzaguinha – Luiz Gonzaga Jr.. (1974)

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Gonazaguinha
“Luiz Gonzaga Jr.”
Released 1974

01 É preciso
02 Piada infeliz
03 Meu coração é um pandeiro
04 Uma família qualquer
05 Pois é, seu Zé
06 Rabisco n’areia
07 Assum preto
08 Amanhã ou depois
09 Galope
10 Desesperadamente

Sidney Matos – acoustic and electric guitars, organ, electric piano, bass
Arnaldo Luis – bass, acoustic guitar
João Cortez – drums, percussion
Gonzaga Jr. – acoustic guitar, percussion, vocals

Produced by Milton Miranda
Musical direction / arrangements – Maestro Gaya
Production assistant: Renato Corrêa
Technical director – Z.J. Merky
Recording technician – Toninho / Nivaldo
Remix engineer – Nivaldo Duarte

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For the last few days I have been thinking of Egypt, how distant it all seems, and how the people around me seem largely unconscious, somnambulantly disinterested of the historical importance of what is going on there, and how it effects all of us. I’m sure I could have chosen to upload any number of more ‘appropriate’ albums but I have been listening to this one a lot lately and it was sitting here waiting for an upload.

Luiz Gonzaga Jr., o “Gonzaguinha”, did not make music for throwing a good party. He could have made a career just off the simple fact that he was the son of the King of Baião, Luiz Gonzaga, and been a mediocre forró singer and still sold tons of albums just by that association. Instead, he chose a different path, that of a deeply-poetic composer more in the mold of the singer-songwriter archetype that became more common in the 1970s seemingly everywhere in the world, but in Brazil often had a directly proportional relationship to the political repression happening in the country. By the early 70s, the ‘movimento estudantil’ was in tatters, the UNE (the universities’ student unions) officially dissolved by the military dicatorship, their meetings resulting in persecution, harassment, disappearances. As the 60s came to a close, the rather heavy-handed and preachy protest music of “música engajada” from the likes of Geraldo Vandre became more a thing of the past, as the optimism that protest music could change the situation and mobilize people faded, and Tropicália’s confrontational iconoclasm challenged its musical and ontological premises. The increased censorship after ‘Institutional Act 5″ of 1968 shut down the Brazilian Congress and gave absolute power to the military resulted in a change of tactics for the socially-conscious activist-oriented songwriter. The usual example is Chico Buarque, who is famous for having his material censored during this period and would perfect the use of the quotidian metaphor as a vehicle for expressions of social unrest, creating more elusive, complex works that were consequently more difficult to challenge by the censorship boards.

But, obviously, there were other wordsmiths besides Chico that were adepts at this. Gonzaguinha is part of a post-68 generation of singer-songwriters that would also include Belchior and Fagner. These latter two were both from the northeastern state of Ceará; Gonzaguinha was born in Rio, but his father was basically a walking-talking-singing symbol of northeastern-ness, and born in Pernambuco. I always think of all three of them together for some reason, but Gonzaguinha’s musical output precedes the other two slightly. They all their own styles of writing and performance, but shared a certain atmospheric vibe and themes in their early music.

This album is pretty much all down-beat, heavy, somber material. The album opens with the mind-blowing song “É preciso” which has become probably my favorite composition of his. Lyrically framing a scenario of (under-valued) domestic labor of a mother and the child by her side who accompanies her at home, in the streets, in the open street markets, the words seem to recount the memories of the singer/narrator of his own growing up and a remembered or imagined dialog with his mother as he reflects on his life. The couplet that is repeated and slightly rephrased throughout the song, “Labutar é preciso; lutar é preciso” (hard work/labor is necessary; to struggle is necessary) is sung first as wisdom imparted from mother to son while she works at washing laundry. Later it is sung back from son to mother as the son struggles to get by on his own as a young man. The parallels with the political oppression, the crushing of the labor and student movements, the clandestine groups working to overthrow or at least undermine the military dictatorship … All of this runs like a subterranean undercurrent beneath the words sung in the plaintive voice of Luiz that grows more urgent and pleading as the song moves along.

The fastest tempo on the album is the song ‘Galope’ which is still manages to be dissonant and dark. All of the songs are originals except “Assum Preto” which is from Gonzagão (his dad) and Humberto Teixeira, and which Gonzaguinha makes almost unrecognizable from its original version, slowing it down and somewhat pulling it apart. The instrumentation and performances are all wonderful, impeccable musicianship that shines precisely because the musicians know when to hold back and let the song carry *them*, embellishing the music with occasional twists of avant garde post-psychedelic dissonance. The album is consistently great – “Piada infeliz”, “Meu coração é um pandeiro”, “Uma família qualquer”, “Desesperadamente” – there is cinematic majesty and power in these songs, the key to which is their understatement and lack of histrionics.

So give this record a listen. While pockets of resistance in the Arab world try and reclaim their rights after decades of oligarchical tyranny and dictatorships sponsored by powerful allies in the United States and the European community, remember that these struggles have taken place elsewhere and will continue to take place until every last human is free from repression and political violence. Until that unlikely utopia comes about, “LUTAR É PRECISO.”

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Bama, The Village Poet – Ghettos of the Mind (1972)

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Bama, The Village Poet
Ghettos of the Mind”
1972 on Chess Records (CH-50032)
Reissue on Aware Records
A1 I Got Soul 4:46
A2 Welfare Slave 5:47
A3 Nothingness 2:26
A4 Thanksgiving 3:52
A5 Ghettos Of The Mind 0:31
B1 The Right To Be Wrong 4:17
B2 Blessed Marie 3:55
B3 Justice Isn’t Blind 2:35
B4 Social Narcotics 5:08
B5 Blackman, My Brother 5:35
B6 Drunken Sister 2:49

Poetry written and performed by- George McCord. aka “Bama”

Music composed and arranged by Jimmy “Wiz” Wizner
Featuring: Bernard `Pretty` Purdie , Cornell Dupree , Gordon Edwards , Richard Tee
Produced by Billy Jackson, Bacon Fat Music and ‘Those who believe Blacks deserve something better’.

TRANSCRIPTION INFO

Vinyl -> Pro-Ject RM-5SE turntable (with Sumiko Blue Point 2 cartridge, Speedbox power supply) > Creek Audio OBH-15 -> M-Audio Audiophile 2496 Soundcard -> Adobe Audition 3.0 at 24-bits 96khz -> Click Repair light settings, additional clicks and pops removed in Audition -> dithered and resampled using iZotope RX Advanced -> ID Tags done in foobar2000 v.1.0.1 and Tag & Rename. No EQ or compression.

Confession, by the end of this vinyl transfer, I kind of stopped paying attention. The last two tracks have some clicks and pops I missed. Oh well, you can borrow my copy and do your own rip if you like, I don`t mind.

Album jacket photos and labels are from both the discogs archive and from my own repress copy. I used the original LP photo (which appears more of a cream color) above because I had trouble photographing my blindingly-white repress without it reflecting the sea-green paint of the walls in my house.

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———————————-
Flabber review

Okay. Let me start off by quoting the blurb from my favorite record shop in the universe, “A lost classic in the funky poetry mode of the 70s – and right up there with the best work from the time by the Last Poets, Jim Ingram, or Gil Scott Heron! Bama’s got a rough-edged voice that works very well with the funkier backings of the set – handled by a team that includes Bernard Purdie on drums, Richard Tee on keyboards, and Cornell Dupree on guitar – and this rough vocal style also fits the themes of the tunes, which are still as political and righteous as other work in the genre, but a bit more down to earth as well. ..”

Now, I realize that Dusty Groove exists to sell records, aside from their pedagogical function of turning the people of the world onto righteous music. And they sometimes are guilty of a wee bit of over-hyping the rarities in their own stock in order to generate enthusiasm. Enthusiasm is a good thing. I rarely post about an album I am not enthusiastic about.

But let’s get something straight right here and now. Bama (George McCord) was no Gil Scott Heron or Leroi Jones (Amiri Baraka), and can’t hold a candle to the flames of The Last Poets or the likes of Jayne Cortez. In my opinion, if it wasn`t for the players on this album like Bernard `Pretty Purdie` and Cornell Dupree, nobody would care at all about it at this point.

McCord has his moments, but its mostly the musical arrangements that keep you listening. The opening track “I Got Soul,” has integrity, dealing as it does with how suffering – even suffering the horrors of state-sponsored racial discrimination – can make an individual who he is, leaving him to say that if he had his life to live all over again he would still “do it black.” It’s a cool poem with great instrumental backing, that shows Bama in a light of a no-frills, sincere, and rough-around-the-edges street poet. So far so good. “Welfare Slaves” is another decent tune, a cynical slow rap over a suitably slow blues, and observations that should be required listening for those lost souls of the American Right-Wing who still go around thinking and saying that people actually *want* to be on welfare. So far so good. The next track, “Nothingness” is when things start to get a little shakey. Two and a half minutes of Bama philosophizing about nothingness over a spacey electric piano chord sequence, wherein he concludes “that after many years of nothingness, I have found nothingness to be something. But compared to something, it was still nothing. Nothing.” Deep, man. Deep.

Alright so one clunker doesn’t make me give up on a record. However, the next one was almost the final nail in the coffin-lid of my first experience with Bama. The next track, “Thanksgiving” is just Pretty Purdie giving a tom-tom-heavy drum solo while Bama recites his poem. Wherein Bama makes profound observations like, “Them pilgrims was a bunch of phonies.” He then goes on to give his counter-narrative to the white American vision of Thanksigiving, while simultaneously getting in some paternalistic condescending remarks about “the Indians were too slow to learn,” and some bitter critiques about the invasion of North America being an `indepedence` for some. Once again, Bama is sincere and means every word of it. But it’s just hard for me not to bust out laughing when he lets loose with poetic stanzas like:

“You give thanks for destroying an innocent people who weclomed you in when your own deprived you of a right to pray.
You give thanks for taking the land of a people who gave you a place to stay.

God have Mercy.
Eat your turkey.”

All of this delivered in his gravel-gargling voice that is very reminiscent of Red Foxx. Immediately on first hearing this track, the following image was born inside my mind`s eye:

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Side two of the album. Surprisingly, given everything I`ve written above, is that one of the best things on the record is the relatively unaccompanied “The Right to be Wrong” (which has only a heart-beat thumb of a drum machine accompanying it). A reflection on non-judging of our fellow humans that would be worthy of a Buddhist monk if it wasn’t for some latent homophobia (…”this would even give the homo a right to be wrong”). Next track – Blessed Marie, rather unremarkable and trite paen to falling in love with (and having married) a prostitute. Followed by “Justice Isn’t Blind,” which is by far the grooviest track here, both musicially and lyrically sharp, with the band laying down a latin-fringed funk of low-key atmosphere. But then when in the final eight-bars or so the band just works the groove with no restraint, I start wishing this was just an all-instrumental LP.. “Social Narcotics”… I can`t really comment on critiques so sophmoric as those on this track. It`s just kind of embarassing to listen to. “Blackman, My Brother,” is intense, however. Backed again only by Bernard Purdie, its a relentless rejection of white culture and its white-washing of American history, of its underbelly of violence, rape, and subjegation, and also shatteres any rose-colored glasses looking at a utopic, romantic vision of the Civil Rights movement, and an angry recuperation of self-respect and pride in blackenss. It’s delivered with the same directness and sincerity as the rest of the stuff on this album, but its got a sophistication that is lacking in a lot of the other poems.

The final track, `The Drunken Sister`… just kind of fizzles out compared to the previous track. Not much to say here, really. Nothing bad, but nothing too great.

So if you haven`t deduced it already I am ambivalent or perhaps just indifferent to this record. It has historical value but more for the people who played on it than for the poetry contained in it, although it might reflect a bit more realistically the spectrum of black urban poetry in the early seventies (I mean, it couldn`t ALL be brilliant, right?). But the next time I decide to reorganize my LP collection, I am going to have a tough time deciding whether this album belongs in the section with Gil Scott-Heron and The Last Poets, or is maybe better suited to the section with Richord Pryor and Red Foxx…

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Townes Van Zandt – For The Sake Of The Song (1968)

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Townes Van Zandt
For The Sake Of The Song
1968 Poppy Records (PYS-40.001)

Reissued 1993 on Tomato Records (598.1091.29)

1 For The Sake Of The Song 4:45
2 Tecumseh Valley 2:40
3 Many A Fine Lady 3:52
4 Quick Silver Daydreams Of Maria 3:41
5 Waitin’ Around To Die 2:22
6 I’ll Be Here In The Morning 2:42
7 Sad Cinderella 4:40
8 The Velvet Voices 3:12
9 Talkin’ Karate Blues 3:01
10 All Your Young Servants 3:04
11 Sixteen Summers, Fifteen Falls 2:36

Produced by Jack Clement and Jim Malloy

It’s a new year. I am short of words. Barely hanging on here really. Where did everybody go?

Majestic.

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*note: the track titles for numbers 9 & 10 are reversed, sorry about that but that is how they apppeared via the all-knowing cddbase
This one will be cross-listed at the long-defunct FLABBERGASTED FOLK page

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Cartola – O mundo é um moinho (1976)

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Cartola
O mundo é um moinho
1976 Discos Marcus Pereira

1. O Mundo É Um Moinho
2. Minha
3. Sala De Recepção
4. Não Posso Viver Sem Ela
5. Preciso Me Encontrar
6. Peito Vazio
7. Aconteceu
8. As Rosas Não Falam
9. Sei Chorar
10. Ensaboa Mulata
11. Senhora Tentação
12. Cordas De Aço

The opening title track was written for Cartola’s daughter who left their home in Mangueira at 16 and (in the story I’ve heard, anyway) ended up working as a prostitute. It’s a classic, as is all of this record and especially ‘Sala de recepção’, ‘Aconteceu’, ‘Preciso me encontrar’, ‘As rosas não falam’… So many great songs!! Although Cartola had been instrumental to the development of samba during the 1930s and ran the most famous samba club in Rio with his wife Zica beginning in the early 60s, he did not record any material until the age of 66. This is his second album. You can read more about Cartola in a brief article at Wikipedia here, which is also where I grabbed the lyrics and a decent translation of the above mentioned track. I don’t think I really understood samba until I heard Cartola’s first two records. Ever since then, I’ve been in love with the art form. This is samba at it’s best, period.

O mundo é um moinho

Ainda é cedo, amor.
Mal começaste a conhecer a vida,
Já anuncias a hora de partida
Sem saber mesmo o rumo que irás tomar.

Preste atenção, querida,
Embora eu saiba que estás resolvida.
Em cada esquina cai um pouco tua vida.
Em pouco tempo não serás mais o que és.

Ouça-me bem, amor.
Preste atenção, o mundo é um moinho.
Vai triturar teus sonhos tão mesquinhos,
Vai reduzir as ilusões a pó.

Preste atenção, querida.
De cada amor tu herdarás só o cinismo.
Quando notares estás à beira do abismo.
Abismo que cavaste com teus pés.

Translation:

It’s still early, love.
You’ve barely started to know life,
You already announce the hour of departure
Without even knowing the direction you’ll take.

Pay attention, dear,
Although I know that you made up your mind
In each corner falls a little your life
Soon you’ll no longer be what you are.

Listen carefully, love.
Pay attention, the world is a mill.
It will grind your paltry dreams,
It will reduce your illusions to dust.

Pay attention, dear.
From each love, you’ll inherit only cynicism.
When you notice, you’re at the edge of the abyss.
Abyss you dug with your own feet.

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Linton Kwesi Johnson – LKJ , A Capella Live (1996)

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I wasn’t sure if I should share this here without first sharing some of LKJ’s musical records first. But I decided it’s worth it. For one, this record is a bit harder to find than his landmark late 70s dub/reggae albums. But also because in many ways it makes a perfect introduction to his work, since he began his career as a published poet rather than a recording artist. For anyone interested in reggae, Caribbean cultural history, in poetry – Linton is a crucial figure. His literary output recently gained him recognition as one of the only living writers to be considered a ‘Twentieth Century master’ or something like that by Penguin Books, in a recent collection. I saw LKJ speak last year and left hoping that these accolades, however hard-earned, would not change him. It seemed he felt compelled to give a more academic presentation along the lines of a lecture on the poetics of Jamaican dub toasters, and only read a few of his own poems. This was a shame, as hearing him read his own work is infinitely more powerful than hearing him situate it intellectually in some kind of canon. In that spirit, I share this record. If you don’t get it after hearing this, you probably never will, no matter how many intellectual gymnastics you do.

Linton Kwesi Johnson – LKJ A capella Live (1996) – HERE!

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