Jane Stanley

The Stanley Brothers - An Evening Long Ago (1956) {Columbia Legacy CK 86747 rel 2004}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 135 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 96 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 12 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1956, 2004 Columbia / Legacy / Sony Music | CK 86747
Bluegrass / Country / Traditional Bluegrass / Bluegrass-Gospel / Traditional Country

Larry Ehrlich was at end of a long day in a studio in Bristol, VA. Carter and Ralph Stanley as well as Ralph Mayo and Curley Lambert entered the studio in front of one microphone, and Ehrlich, after seeing them play hog callings, a couple of radio shows, and a barn dance, asked the band to sing some of the traditional songs they had been recording for the past 16 years. The results, completely unearthed until now, are no less than stunning. This is the Stanleys as listeners have never heard them: laid-back, relaxed, and full of recollection and goodwill, singing and playing songs as familiar to them as their upbringing.

1989 had been a long hot summer, but 1990 felt longer and hotter. Since the house music explosion of 1987, Britain had had a whistle in its mouth, and it needed a lie down. February 1990 brought two records that were made to accompany the sunrise and would shape the immediate future: The KLF’s Chill Out was a continuous journey, a woozy, reverb-laden mix; and Andrew Weatherall’s drastic remix of a Primal Scream album track – ‘Loaded’ – slowed down the pace on the dancefloor itself, right down to 98 beats per minute.

The Pacific North West and the English North West are damp, mossy, riddled with steep, unexpected valleys, dotted with abandoned mills, and frequently cloaked in mist. Most of the year you’d be wise to wear waterproofs. David Lynch set Twin Peaks in the former; it’s not a great leap to imagine it being re-cast and set in the latter. Paddy Considine would probably be involved; Yorkshire Tea, too. As for the soundtrack? Well, that’s what this album is about.

For many their first encounter with classical music will be through its use in films and this collection makes a fantastic entry point to this rich and diverse world. Helpfully all tracks list the films alongside the music, so there will be no doubt as to where the music is familiar from. Classical music has been used to memorable effect in films many times from Ride of the Valkyries in Apocalypse Now to Barber s Adagio in Platoon and from Also sprach Zarathustra in 2001: A Space Odyssey to Beethoven s Ninth in A Clockwork Orange. Occasionally, as in the case of Mozart s Piano Concerto No.21 used in Elvira Madigan, the film title has provided a lasting nickname for the music. All these favourites are included here.