专辑简介

Joe McPhee专辑介绍：by Brian OlewnickJoe McPhee, ever the intrepid musical adventurer, commonly traveled to obscure, out of the way places to perform with local musicians of interest, well-known and otherwise. In 1978, he ventured to Minnesota to record this live set with multi-instrumentalist Milo Fine (also a critic for Cadence magazine) and avant guitarist Steve Gnitka. One of the dangers in such associations when dealing with a musician of McPhee's caliber, however, is that his companions won't quite measure up, which is often the case here. The effort is certainly there and the results aren't "bad" by any means, but there is a certain lackluster quality where one gets the sense that any forward progress is being provided by McPhee, with the others straining to keep up. Gnitka actually has an interesting solo feature, though his playing on this derives clearly from Fred Frith's work; elsewhere he's of the Derek Bailey scratch 'n' claw school but, at this point in his career, not nearly at Bailey's level as an improviser. Fine switches among piano (sometimes prepared), clarinet, and drums, largely to no great effect, though on the former he bears some interesting comparison to Sergei Kuriokhin. But neither has the blues base so essential to the success of McPhee's music, resulting in an aimlessness with little center around which to gel. McPhee himself does some nice playing, particularly on tenor saxophone on "Part II C," and completists will certainly want this record, but general listeners will be happier with either different works from around this time (Graphics, for example) or his later releases on hatOLOGY.