This is a Recording

The Colorblind James Experience , that is, the debut album by the band of the same name, was the first record I bought via ebay. I'd resisted the allure of on-line auctions until about 2007, but afterwards became a frequent bidder and buyer. I ordered the record as I really wanted to hear my favourite song from it again, namely 'A Different Bob', and, at that time, I couldn't find it anywhere on-line. I bought it on vinyl as that was all I could find for sale. This was plainly a low-budget production, as the LP cover and the quality of the recording both testify. According to Wikipedia "the band scraped together enough money to press 1000 copies of its debut self-titled LP in 1987 [and] sent one copy abroad, specifically to BBC Radio's John Peel." It was via Peel (or his colleague Andy Kershaw) that I first heard the song 'Considering a Move to Memphis', which delighted me, as it still does now. I bought a copy of the album on cassette the follow...

Naxos' CD packaging nearly always looks more utilitarian than appealing, though there is certainly something to be said for spelling out all the pertinent details in prominent high-contrast text on the cover. This one is a relatively recent aquisition, bought last year from on-line classical specialists Europadisc. On it are Paul Hindemith's second and third string quartets - written in 1918 and '20 respectively - performed by the Amar Quartet, a Zürich-based group whose name comes from the Quartet of which Hindemith himself was a member from 1921. Hindemith was by all accounts an extraordinarlly versatile multi-instrumentalist, and accomplished enough as a violinist and violist that he could have elected to follow a career as a concert soloist had he so desired. As a composer he was likewise versatile in the instrumentation he wrote for. And he wrote a great deal: it's too bad that most of what I've heard of it leaves me cold. I fell for his 'Viola Sonata no. 4...

I would have heard 'Louie Louie' as a child: certainly I was familar with The Kinks' version of it from an early age. At which point it became clear to me that The Kingsmen's version was the definitive one, I don't recall. I wouldn't have spared the song much thought until reading Lester Bangs' remarks about it in one of the pieces included in the book Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung , ca. 1987. A year or two after that, while still at university, I bought a compilation album on cassette called Frat Rock which began with the irresistible one-two combination of 'Woolly Bully' and 'Louie Louie'. I ended up giving that tape away to a friend of my mother's who was enamoured of it and had asked if I might copy for her. Last year I found it on 7" vinyl in a charity shop: it cost me a pound. The Old Gold reissue label had first re-released it in 1980, with this a later-'80s example, judging by the barcode on the label. The back...

I first encountered Oliver Nelson's name when I began more systematically exploring '50s & '60s jazz about 10-12 years ago. His album The Blues and the Abstract Truth was frequently mentioned as among the best of that era, and it is undoubtedly an excellent record, as are the other albums he recorded with Eric Dolphy I discovered soon afterwards: Screamin' The Blues and Straight Ahead . I had, however, unknowingly heard his handiwork long before that, in his capacity as composer of the theme to the '70s TV sensation The Six Million Dollar Man . More recently I looked up some of his later albums on YouTube and very much enjoyed what I heard, though it was disheartening that most of them seemed difficult or expensive to obtain. Being particularly keen to get hold of his 1966 album Sound Pieces , I paid up something approaching £20 (a high price for a CD by my miserly standards) for a copy from an ebay seller. It's a recording that showcases several of Nelson...

This CD's title refers not to the year 1700 itself, but to the settecento - the eighteenth century - in general. It brings together instrumental works by eight different composers from the various Italian nations and from different parts of that century. The composers range from the famous (Vivaldi) through the less well-known (Geminiani, Locatelli, Galuppi) to the obscure (Mascitti, Pugnani). With that period not having been a prosperous one in Italy, many of them had travelled or emigrated elsewhere in Europe, introducing a variety of un-Italian influences to their music. Rinaldo Alessandrini's Concerto Italiano here comprises seven musicians, including Alessandrini himself at the harpsichord. The disc is a sequel to a similarly-conceived album 1600 by the same group, which, alas, I haven't heard. Some of the pieces are sonatas which originally would have been intended for small groups; while others (such as Vivaldi's 'Concerto In D major: op.12 no.3') are...

If the prices on Discogs are anything to go by, 'New Rose' by The Damned is by far the most valuable record I own, with their median selling price currently at £250. Presumably this must be due to its being a first pressing of the first British punk rock release. It was one of a batch of six singles I bought at the local charity shop last summer for £2, the others being 'Lucky Number' by Lene Lovich, 'Denis' by Blondie, Talking Heads' 'Love Goes To Building On Fire', Stiff Little Fingers' 'Alternative Ulster' and 'United' by Throbbing Gristle. That was a lucky day's shopping, but it could have been luckier still had I decided to also buy the copy of the 'Capital Radio' EP by The Clash they had, for which the Discogs median value is £165. "Who wants to listen to a record with band interview clips on it?" I thought. Having belatedly realised what I'd missed out on, I returned to the shop a couple of hours l...

George Onslow was an odd-man-out among 19th-century French composers. Born into wealth and privilege, the grandson of an English Earl, he had no need to follow the operatic gravy train, with string quartets (of which he wrote 36) and string quintets (there are another 32 of those) forming the bulk of his compositional output. The present disc contains his 28th, 29th and 30th quartets, in compelling performances by the Quatuor Diotima. These quartets were written toward the end of a prolifically-creative period for Onslow in the years 1829-35. Viviane Niaux, in her informative booklet notes, ascribes this to the composer's having heard performances of two of Beethoven's late quartets for the first time in 1828, at their Paris première. Like many of his contemporaries, Onslow was at once "fascinated and disconcerted", and, although he considered them "extravagant", they seem to have been powerfully inspirational. A further spur to creativity may have been his ...