Nels Cline and Eric von Essen commiserating on Elegies (1981) -- by request

This was requested by the prognotfrog group, who have posted the first three Quartet Music albums, which featured Cline and von Essen.  I'm happy to help them out with this first request taken "from the vaults", my personal album collection.  Very laid-back and meditative acoustic guitar duetting with bass,  I'd go so far as to say it's as good as a sleeping pill if it's past your bedtime.  It starts relatively inauspiciously with some strumming and loitering around and in the second track, with Nels playing a bass recorder, you feel like you're stuck in an ashram with some smelly aging hippies watching carnivorous turtles eating dead bodies in the ever-so-polluted Ganges. But as you delve deeper into the two sides you'll find much more wonder and beauty when you enter into this little world these two master virtuosos have created here.

First, check out the blurb on the back of the sleeve from Mark Weber, CODA Magazine:
    "The 70s were an exciting time to be coming of age and to be developing an aesthetic in the art of jazz.  The new musics of the avant garde were refining and solidifying what was roughly charted in the 60s.  Those of us with a desire for new sounds found all manner of expression taking place.  We indulged out minds and sensibilities in the arts of the world and through that a natural and healthy eclecticism is manifesting.  This music addresses itself to that eventuality; of a world together in life and love.
An elegy is a poetic lament, either in sorrow or in praise or both.  With Nels and Eric it is transcendent, radiant and compassionate."
So you get an idea of how serious these guys were with this.  Of course back then it was commonplace to be really really serious about music-- especially jazz, but also rock.

From discogs:

Credits

• Acoustic Guitar [6 String], Acoustic Guitar [12 String], Recorder [Bass], Voice – Nels Cline
• Bass – Eric Von Essen
• Cover [Etching] – Jacob Samuel
• Design [Album] – Alex Cline, Nels Cline, Vinny Golia
• Engineer [Recording] – Bruce Bidlack
• Mastered By [Mastering] – Geoff Sykes, Kevin Gray
• Mixed By [Mixing] – Bruce Bidlack, Eric Von Essen, Nels Cline
• Photography By [Cover] – Susan Einstein
• Photography By [Liner] – Harry Zeitlin
• Producer – Vinny Golia
• Sleeve Notes – Mark Weber (5)

                                   

Recorded September 13 & 14, 1980, at Intermix, Inc., Los Angeles, CA.
Mastering: The Cutting System, Inc.

Sample track, Cline's "Love Song" which is the second part of the first track on side two. You will notice that Neil indulges in some Robert Wyatt-like wordless singing over the melody giving it a really ethereally transcendent, plaintive sound to borrow phraseology Mark Weber might have employed, especially when coupled in unison with the acoustic bass played with a bow which is always so heartrending.

In honour of the prognotfrog group (thanks for the plug) I'll post both lossless (for a limited time only) and mp3 this time.