Back to an earlier Sadao Watanabe with 1969's Pastoral [FLAC limited time only]

 

This one is very light listening, especially given the pared-down simplicity of the band, please refer to information databased here.  

I've posted a lot from him before, here in one big package, and here (Birds of Passage) and he's definitely a perennial favorite given the number of times I've reuploaded the package.  I guess he only got into fusion later in the seventies and definitely after this album.

I thought the Tokyo Suite would've been a huge standout given the excitement, variety, and massiveness of the city but it's surprisingly indolent and somniferous in sound.  It could've used a fusionary treatment with more a fleshed-out orchestral arrangement, for sure.  The most beautiful composition is definitely 

Someday in Suburbs:

A note regarding the record:

Recorded June 24 and July 9, 1969 at Toshi Center Hall, Akasaka, Tokyo, Japan.

Mad Sheer Khan's Talisman 1996 by request, FLAC limited time

 

The guitarist and composer for well known one-off French prog band Rahmann, an absolute genius mixed fusion/zeuhl work, is name is Mahamad Hadi.  Under the alias Mad Sheer Kahn:

Born in Algiers in 1955, of mixed Persian and Arabic origin, resides in France. Formed his first group in 1975. In 1981, he formed a duo and adopted an image that was quite rare for the time: he spent the 1980s swathed in a turban, deliberately going against what was then the normal practice. His unconventional appearance did not deter the critics, who responded enthusiastically to his playings.

In 1982 the well-known English magazine New Musical Express listed him among the ten best guitarists in the world. During this period he was in fact living in London, where he worked with Velvet Underground's muse, Nico, on the albums Drama of Exile 1 &2, and was acclaimed for his virtuosity.

You can also see on that page, as well as under Hadi, he has quite a discography.

This album is a mixture of ethnic folk with electronic and a lot of sitars.  Very little info on the database page here.

Sample, Angel in the Bath:

Osamu Shoji's Jataka from 1978 [FLACs]

 

Osamu Shoji:

Japanese composer, arranger and synthesizer player. Born September 6, 1932. Died April 30, 2018.

Related entity: Shoji Studio.

With regards to Jataka released in 1978 you can observe from this page it seems to be all composed and played by him, similar to artists like Wendy Carlos.  So far as I can tell it's also different from the remainder of his output in that it's not made up of cover songs.

Overall it's similar to my beloved Fumitaka Anzai work posted back here, but not as creative and progressive, more of the standard electronic synthesizer fiddling.  Title track gives you an idea:

British Riff Raff in 3

 

It's so rare for me to not have heard something really genuinely prog rock at this late stage in the game, but here's a band I was completely unaware of, so far as I know.  Of course, I'm old enough that memory is starting to become a problem (starting? my wife would say).

Info here.

Riff Raff was a British progressive rock band formed by keyboardist Tommy Eyre in 1972. The band was a continuation on the back of drummers (and Harrow School of Art friends) Rod Coombes and Joe Czarnecki's (aka Joe Peter)'s project originally called 'Crikey' which started in 1969 and completed in 1970, when Coombes had to accept growing tour commitments with Juicy Lucy. These sessions comprised half of the Riff Raff album Outside Looking In, in which Coombes wrote half the songs.

Riff Raff later went on to release two albums to lukewarm response; however, their use of jazz and hard-edged rock garnered them a large underground following. Riff Raff also released the single "Copper Kettle".

PS I'm missing Copper Kettle, if anyone has it to share?  Also not available on youtube, surprisingly.

From the first ST album, Dreaming with its unusual chords as might be expected from the title:

The magically beautiful and mysterious Tom's Song from Original Man, which reminds me a lot of the utterly ethereal weirdness of Fred Israel's Fashions of the Moon:

It absolutely shocked me the way he mixes the piano chords on their own not so strange with the keyboard strings playing completely inappropriate chords in the background-- completely bizarre, but compellingly beautiful in that typically intellectually advanced progressive way.

The other compelling thing about this album, released 1974, is that it's strong from beginning to end, there is no filler, no pandering to commercial tastes, everything purely progressive.  I love the standard description above 'released to lukewarm response...' when in reality the creative spirit for me is so compelling here.

As usual I have to mention the gorgeous cover painting of the Original Man album.  Wow!!  The artwork is from Dick Whitbread, who I note made a bunch of other beautiful covers, like Julie Tippetts Sunset Glow and Elton Dean Ninesense Oh for the edge which you can see here.

German Odin with new (old) material [flacs limited time]

 

I've always loved this band who sadly only put out one great prog album full of wonderful compositions and a marvelous cover, in 1972.  It was nice to see there is more to listen to, though it's the typical 'unreleased' live material with a lot of cover songs (Neil Young's Ohio, Peaches en Regalia, 20th c. Schizoid) and poor quality recordings.  Nonetheless, well worth exploring I think, with flacs available for us, to boot.

From SWF Sessions, [Frank Zappa's] Oh No: