Epidermis Muster Burger (1982) by request

I fully forgot about this request until just now I reread an old comment by chance.

The band is well known for its Gentle Giant-like harmony vocals styled prog on the 'monster' album Genius of Original Force, but it made another later album in the early 80s with a more commercial appeal that is accordingly only of interest for completionary purposes-- similar to the case with Germanic ELP band Trilogy, who made the masterpiece of keyboards prog Here It Is and then followed up some years later with a more commercial 80s albums (which still has its moments, and I'll share it later on).  And while I'm at it, let's not forget the 1980 hard prog masterpiece by Ginga Rale Band which was also followed up by an early 80s commercial album called Information (much more listenable than this one though).

The best entree on this fast food outing, the most progressive one for us, is the last one which sounds a little like this:




On the other hand while exhaustively searching through my backup files including four external hard drives none of which have yet crashed luckily I came across another rarity, the unreleased collection from 1975 which has a major, major 20-minute long masterpiece called A Speck, A Dream and if you haven't heard that one, you need to, it's absolute genius.  It is Pure Gold for the prog-thirsty.  So I've included that album down below as well.

Timna Brauer & Elias Meiri in Orient Live, 1987, by request

Despite the (to me) very unpromising title of this 2-LP album due to the fact I don't have a taste for ethnic pounding with simplistic chanting nor live and poorly-recorded songs (at least it wasn't solo piano), this turned out to have some exceptional compositions on it and surprisingly not just a little.

There is a shockingly large bio, perhaps too large, on discogs:

Timna Brauer born in Vienna, she grew up in Israel, France and Austria with an Israeli mother from Yemen and an Austrian father, the painter ARIK BRAUER. 

Education: Conservatory of Vienna (piano and singing) / Sorbonne-Paris, graduated with a masters degree in musicology, „vocals in jazz“ / Summer Academy Salzburg, Elisabeth Grümmer / master courses in Indian singing, München, Prof. Javheri / CIM-Paris (jazz-singing and composition) /masterclass Simon Baddi-Vienna (opera). 

In 1985 she and her husband, the pianist Elias Meiri, established an ensemble, with which they have been touring all over the world and recording CDs, with the emphasis being on jazz, ethno and chansons. 
In 1986, she represented Austria at the Eurovision Song Contest. 
Since 1993 the Ensemble has also performed various concerts for children. 
In 1995 Timna Brauer taught master classes for jazz improvisation at the Academy of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna. 
From 1998 - 2000 she has performed with the Ensemble Modern, Frankfurt, the „Threepennyopera“, directed by H. K. Gruber (recordings for BMG, concerts: Musiktriennale Köln, Schleswig-Holstein Festival in Germany etc.) 
2001 she played the role of EVITA at the musical summerstage of Klagenfurt, Austria. 
2002-2004 Big Tour through Europe with “Voices for Peace” (Palestinian and Israeli). 
2004 World premiere of “Percussion” on behalf of the “Wiener-Musikverein”, production of the musical fairy tale “ The enthusiastic drums” for the “Kinderklangwolke” in Linz (Austria) on behalf of the “Brucknerhaus”. 
From 2005 intensive work with the edition Ueberreuter: “Children Songs from Europe”, “Little Mozart”. 

Eliasd Meiri began to take piano lessons at the age of five. Mostly due to his absolute pitch, he mastered the art of improvisation at an early age. He attended the Talma-Yalin Conservatory in Tel-Aviv, and completed his studies at the Berkeley College of Music in Boston. In New York he played with jazz stars like Dizzie Gillespie, In addition to numerous performances with Timna Brauer, he plays with his jazz trio, teaches piano and jazz-improvisation, dedicates himself to composition, the production of CDs and sound-technique. 

In 1985, he won the first prize at the international jazz competition in Hoilaart, Belgium and the second prize at the international jazz competitions in Leverkusen, Germany. 
In 1987, he won the first prize at the international jazz competition for pianists in Kalicz, Poland. 
1998 Production of the CD “Piano Forte”. 
2005 European tour with his jazz trio.


Of course, there is a great deal of filler in here, I mean consider the fact that the last track is twenty minutes long.  I'm also not too crazy about her 80s lounge singer cliched style of breathy silly-jazz-scatting.  And thank god that exaggerated, overstylistic & mannered jazz singing is dead now along with the 80s (think Diane Schuur for example). But they really threw a whole lot of ideas into this kitchen sink.  On the track called Bad Trees the (modern) classical composition education shines through quite clearly with a piece that, minus the utterly unnecessary vocals, could've appeared on a French zeuhl album like "Les Cycles de Thanatos:"





Interesting that she also felt the need to show off her perfect French on that track (reciting a poem by Jacques Prevert, I take it).  Yes it's hard to tolerate the alternated tikitiki-scatting, screeching, squealing and sometimes super-soprano squeaking, as on her rendition of the spiritual folk song Motherless Child in which the orphan seems to have been adopted by a click-speaking African tribeswoman with multiple personalities including one that regressed to infancy and another that channels Muddy Waters, but in a scaldingly hot shower.  A bit less showing off would have been so much more appreciated, as on a track called Nova wherein she admirably restrains herself:





As for the final track, it's truly a mess but with occasional flashes of light, marred by a total lack of cohesion from beginning to end in its attempt to cover the whole of human musical history from the classical days to Art Tatum to the scatty 80s in different passages.

So there you have it, a mixed bag for sure, like those 'third world-made' stalls in every marketplace of every tourist destination everywhere in the world from Europe through Asia to the Americas where you can buy exactly the same 'local artisan-made' carved wooden animals, cloth bags, or bongs or whatever to give to your friends back home who are sure to throw it out the minute your back is turned.

Francois "Faton" Cahen in Piano Concerts, 1975, by request

I referenced Francois Cahen earlier with the album he made with Didier Lockwood called Thank You Friends, which was just delightful, but most know him anyways as the keyboardist and leader of the great Zeuhl group Zao who made a string of gorgeous fusion albums in the seventies.  This album was missing, it was his first and unfortunately was recorded live and therefore the sound suffers, as you can see with a track called "Belette Bleu:"





Note the Zao-like tendencies in the lyrical phrasing and harmonies.  Since I don't have a taste for solo piano albums, nor for the inferior recording quality found in live albums, for me this is a venn diagram shaded intersection of sets of utter unexcitingness.

I'll included some of the other stuff I have from him including 1978 Tendre Piano Solo, 1979 Great Winds, 1986 Piano Reves, 1989 Couleur Rubis, and 1986 Faton Bloom.
The material he recorded with Malherbe is superb, bringing out the best in both worlds. As well the Malherbe 'solo' album from 1979 Bloom is outstanding.
Some of the tracks in the first two are recycled Zao songs for solo piano, disappointingly.

Back with Jun Fukamachi's OST Mishione from 1980 and probably the last from him here

Oh boy do I love Jun Fukamachi.

This past spring and summer I listened to all his records again over and over and explored every hidden crevice and nuance in his works.  So it was important to me to collect all the tangential materials from this period, such as the early lyrical albums I posted, and more importantly the undigitized elements, such as this album, that were always far away in hard to reach places (like Japan).  The sound sample from the discogs database page for this record, in particular, sounded really attractive, you can hear it for yourself here.

Unfortunately, because the tracks are side-long for both a and b, I still haven't yet identified where that theme song type passage appears on the record, and that is partly due to my lack of patience made much worse by advancing age and loss of the ability to multitask.  The movie itself you can watch, and enjoy, if you are able to understand Japanese on-- where do you think? youtube.  But this must be one of the few times where a movie cannot be found, even in synopsis form, on imdb.

Listening to Fukamachi in detail, so to speak, only convinced me what an unrecognized genius he was, especially in this period of the early 80s when Daisy Chain and Woman with Red Hat came out, and on to Alien (which I included in one of those big packages earlier).  He was at least as inventive a composer and magnificent as keyboardist in the progressive fusion genre as the better known German Joachim Kuhn and Dutch Jasper Van't Hof and that sure ain't fair.  In particular, unlike the North American artists of a similar caliber like Herbie Hancock or Chick Corea, he had that flair for very emotional expression, dramatic musical movements, and symphonic-style (classical) composition (and you can find all these components in the soundtrack to Mishione) which as I've said repeatedly are usually European hallmarks.

Anyways, with this I think we can finally close the big musical book on the brilliant Jun Fukamachi's discography.  At least for now.

1946-2010, RIP Jun Fukamachi.

Eje Thelin in Club Jazz 8 (1973) and his Group's Hypothesis (1979)

Given the expected unpopularity of that last post I won't let you suffer long before going back to more progressive music.  And if it's original, never before heard music that you want, then you've got it made here with this rip because we're dealing with the dreaded free jazz style on this early album from Eje Thelin, a Swedish trombonist and composer, who passed away at a relatively young age (1938-1990).

I wasn't aware of the Swedish Club Jazz series until now and it seems they are underrepresented in the digital sphere (perhaps for good reason).  Some out there know a lot more than I do and it would be nice to get some more information from those who might have heard the records in question.  They all seem quite rare and it's interesting to me that our old post Wallgrens appears in a 1974 release of the series.

To give you an idea, I'll post the shortest of the four long tracks that make up this album, Club Jazz 8.





Desperately turning our attention now to the more fusionary Eje Thelin Group who put out a few great albums in the 70s, I am given permission to share what's surely his best work, the 1979 album Hypothesis.  First of all notice that like Peter Wolf all their album covers were black and white.

On the title track instantly you can see what a mellowed-out man Eje became some six years following the Club experience, reminding me of the great Freddie Hubbard in the 70s:





Note how that laidback intro leads to the more uptempo and intense body of the song. This is a Thelin composition btw.

The track called Curved Space was written by Arne Lothman, the pianist.  Starting with a simple B flat minor 6 arpeggio with enhancements from both acoustic piano and electric guitar, the track very very slowly builds to the oddest chords supplemented by a synth soloing above.  It's a rare song where the notes played above a persistent chord (80% of the song consists of B♭m6) add so much interest.





Truly a lost treasure I'd say.  I don't know though why there are not one but two versions of the tired old Jimmy van Heusen standard Here's that rainy day on here.