Moving Cities

The Fixx had a banner year in 1983, as their second album, Reach the Beach, broke down doors and gave the band a huge hit with "One Thing Leads to Another." Phantoms wasn't as good, not just because Reach the Beach had that hit but also because it was simply a really good mainstream new wave record. Phantoms was a little more serious, a little more lugubrious, a little directionless, but it still is a pretty good record, all the same. The reason why? The Fixx were a good band. They had an original sound, thanks to the echoing synths, clean-processed guitars, cavernous drums, and Cy Curnin's soaring voice, which soared over the precise arrangements to make it sound human. The wondrous thing about this combination is that it sounded appealing even when the material wasn't the equal of the sound, which is often the case on Phantoms. That's not to say it's a disaster, because it hardly is – the band sounds good, and the record is a shining example of post-new wave production.

Released in late 1986, "Think Visual" is the first album the Kinks did for MCA Records. Arista Records seemingly sensed that the Kinks period of commercial renaissance was over following the dropoff in sales of 1984's "Word Of Mouth". Indeed, the sales dropoff continued with "Think Visual", but don't let that fool you. "Think Visual" is an engaging, spirited rock record that no Kinks fan should be without.

Recorded in 1988 during the European tour for The Fixx's sixth album CALM ANIMALS (for some reason not released until 1996), REAL TIME STOOD STILL is a well-played, crisply-recorded, well-chosen set that shows The Fixx at a critical stage in their career. After 1986's "Secret Separation," The Fixx never had another US hit, and the English group refocused their energies on their continuing European success. Judging by the sound of the audience, The Fixx were big in Germany at this time. Only about a third of these 17 tracks were US hits, including of course "One Thing Leads to Another" and "Stand or Fall," and most of the rest of the disc is devoted to the less commercially successful WALKABOUT and CALM ANIMALS discs. REAL TIME STOOD STILL is an interesting curio for American fans.

City Music is an airplane descending over frozen lakes into Chicago. City Music is riding the Q Train out to Coney Island to smell the ocean and a morning in Philadelphia where greats cranes reconfigure the buildings like an endless puzzle. City Music is a quiet afternoon moment on a bench in Baltimore, a highway in Seattle at night where the distant houses look like tiny flames and a bottle of red wine being drained on a bridge in Paris. City Music is a bus pulling into St. Louis at dawn where the arch looks like a metal rainbow reflecting the days early sunlight…. City Music is also the new album by Kevin Morby. Full of listless wanderlust, it’s a collection inspired by and devoted to the metropolitan experience across America and beyond by a songwriter cast from his own mould. As he puts it: “It is a mix-tape, a fever dream, a love letter dedicated to those cities that I cannot get rid of, to those cities that are all inside of me.”

The piano may not be the ideal medium for capturing the expressive possibilities of Glass' style of minimalism, but pianist Bruce Brubaker selects pieces that work well on the instrument. Part of the problem with hearing Glass on the piano is forgetting the sound of his ensemble, and the variety of colors (and volume) they have imparted to similar music. Brubaker begins his recital of works by Glass and Alvin Curran with his transcription of "Knee Play 4" from Einstein on the Beach. It is in fact a lovely piece on the piano if one can put the spectacular power and tonal range of the instrumental version out of one's mind. "Opening" from Glassworks, originally scored for piano, works beautifully on the instrument, and flows as naturally as the C major Prelude from Book I of The Well Tempered Clavier. The two pieces by Curran, Hope Street Tunnel Blues III and Inner Cities II, use a syntax similar to Glass, with a more dissonant tonal vocabulary. Hope Street Tunnel Blues III has ample kinetic energy that gives it an exhilarating momentum.

Phish - Ventura (2013) {6CD Box Set + Bonus CD, JEMP Records CD49769 rec 1997-1998}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 2.75 Gb | MP3 @320 -> 995 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 66 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1997-98, 2013 JEMP Records / Phish | CD 49769
Rock / Jam Bands / Alternative / Neo-Psychedelia

A six-disc archival set, Ventura chronicles summer concerts Phish gave at the Ventura County Fairgrounds in the back half of the '90s, by which time their status as the titans of jam was well-established. The first show here is from July of 1997, the second performed a year later, which means both arrived during the two-year gap separating 1996's Billy Breathes and 1998's The Story of the Ghost – two years where the band's popularity was on the rise and it certainly seemed like a crossover was perhaps within their sites.