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harmonyharmony
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« on: 16:24:37, 08-06-2007 » |
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I'm listening to the Tom Waits version of Gavin Bryars' Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet and I'm quite frankly shocked.
I had the Obscure release which is really rather restrained and I've avoided listening to this one for such a long time because I had been warned off it. Waits hasn't started yodelling yet (not my word - a very dear late friend described it thus) and already I'm feeling a bit nauseous.
I remember reading Bryars saying that from his first experience of running the material on a loop, he realised that he was going to have to deal with it carefully. What happened here then? I find it bathetic and cloying.
Convince me I'm wrong, I'd really like to like this recording.
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'is this all we can do?' anonymous student of the University of Berkeley, California quoted in H. Draper, 'The new student revolt' (New York: Grove Press, 1965) http://www.myspace.com/itensemble |
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BobbyZ
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« Reply #1 on: 17:00:01, 08-06-2007 » |
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Sorry hh, I can't convince you that you are wrong. I have the 25 minute version which is coupled with the Sinking of the Titanic and that is blissfully Waits free. I also have a sort of "Best of Bryars" double cd on Philips ( think they call it "a portrait" ) which has "the single" and "the single remix" both of which have Tom Waits but both of which are mercifully short and also the last tracks on each cd so easy to avoid. TW's contribution is unnecessary and it doesn't work. To be honest, I think he is one of those performers like Elvis Costello who sound a great idea in principle ( eclectic, open minded, adventurous ) but when you actually listen to the reality it's all a bit tedious.
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Dreams, schemes and themes
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richard barrett
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« Reply #2 on: 15:07:31, 09-06-2007 » |
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I'm listening to the Tom Waits version of Gavin Bryars' Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet Horrible! Horrible! Throw it away and never listen to it again. How GB could have countenanced such a thing beggars belief. |
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pim_derks
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« Reply #3 on: 15:27:06, 09-06-2007 » |
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Horrible! Horrible! Throw it away and never listen to it again. How GB could have countenanced such a thing beggars belief. You're absolutely right, Richard. That recording is a disgrace. I paid a lot of money for it but I was glad to get rid of it soon after. Horrible indeed!  |
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"People hate anything well made. It gives them a guilty conscience." John Betjeman
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MT Wessel
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« Reply #4 on: 21:14:19, 09-06-2007 » |
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The Sinking Of The Titanic / Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet. CDVE 938 7243 8 45970 2 3. This is the CD re-issue of the 1975 Obscure Records release produced by Brian Eno. I think it is far superior to some (other) stuff you (might unwittingly) purchase.  |
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« Last Edit: 01:13:08, 12-06-2007 by MT Wessel »
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lignum crucis arbour scientiae
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Morticia
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« Reply #5 on: 12:48:05, 10-06-2007 » |
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Bit late to this, but I wholeheartedly agree with the above. Ghastly, ghastly. TW should never have been let near it. Truly horrible. Richard is right, chuck it in the bin.
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harmonyharmony
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« Reply #6 on: 12:56:58, 10-06-2007 » |
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I might get in trouble with the library if I do that.
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'is this all we can do?' anonymous student of the University of Berkeley, California quoted in H. Draper, 'The new student revolt' (New York: Grove Press, 1965) http://www.myspace.com/itensemble |
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MT Wessel
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« Reply #7 on: 21:17:19, 10-06-2007 » |
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hh. It would be very public spirited of you to buy the original version and stealthily substitute it for the (other) version in the library. |
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lignum crucis arbour scientiae
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harmonyharmony
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« Reply #8 on: 00:52:42, 11-06-2007 » |
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Yes, but it wouldn't be a lot of fun. I prefer the situation where I have the original version and they have the 'new and improved' version.  I will probably put the reissue of the Obscure release on the list of recordings that I'm recommending that they purchase next year (part of my goodbye package to the department which will also include frank criticisms of modules, suggestions for improvements and fairly damning feedback regarding the way that research and postgraduate teaching is managed in the department). That's about as far as my feeling for public service to this place extends. |
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'is this all we can do?' anonymous student of the University of Berkeley, California quoted in H. Draper, 'The new student revolt' (New York: Grove Press, 1965) http://www.myspace.com/itensemble |
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time_is_now
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« Reply #9 on: 12:38:39, 11-06-2007 » |
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Sorry hh, I can't convince you that you are wrong. I have the 25 minute version which is coupled with the Sinking of the Titanic and that is blissfully Waits free. I also have a sort of "Best of Bryars" double cd on Philips ( think they call it "a portrait" ) which has "the single" and "the single remix" both of which have Tom Waits but both of which are mercifully short and also the last tracks on each cd so easy to avoid. TW's contribution is unnecessary and it doesn't work. To be honest, I think he is one of those performers like Elvis Costello who sound a great idea in principle ( eclectic, open minded, adventurous ) but when you actually listen to the reality it's all a bit tedious.
Um ... I haven't heard this version of Jesus' Blood, but I like Tom Waits.  Then again, I like Elvis Costello too. At least up till about 1998. He went off a bit with that Burt Bacharach thing and then the ballet. I blame Shostakovich, oddly enough: The Juliet Letters was fine but it did have rather a lot of Shosta's 8th Quartet in it, as does almost everything EC has written since. |
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The city is a process which always veers away from the form envisaged and desired, ... whose revenge upon its architects and planners undoes every dream of mastery. It is [also] one of the sites where Dasein is assigned the impossible task of putting right what can never be put right. - Rob Lapsley
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marbleflugel
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« Reply #10 on: 20:54:26, 11-06-2007 » |
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Presumably Waits was dubbed on with a view to u.s. sales,by way of translation. Inits own terms TW's
portrayal of washed-up Edward Hopperdom-a generic American urban melancholy other than the blues-
is a rich seam,but the overdub imposes a foreign feel on the simple majesty of the gentlemanof the roads'
vocal. I have tosay Iwish Bryars had devised a bit of harmonic vinegar, just enough,to create somesense
of musical journey or suggest the harshness of the world against which the spiritual certainty sits- it seems abit unintentionally patronising to me. I am for Costello without reservation- a renaissance man with more adventurous stuff yet aheadof him.
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'...A celebrity is someone who didn't get the attention they needed as an adult'
Arnold Brown
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time_is_now
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« Reply #11 on: 21:02:31, 11-06-2007 » |
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I am for Costello without reservation- a renaissance man with more adventurous stuff yet aheadof him.
I'm beginning to fear not, though I've spent more money on CDs than I care to admit in hoping to be proved wrong. Actually, come to think of it, it's been steep downhill ever since he dumped Cate O'Riordan and shacked up with Diana Krall. PS Love the phrase 'harmonic vinegar'. Can I buy that in Sainsbury's? |
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The city is a process which always veers away from the form envisaged and desired, ... whose revenge upon its architects and planners undoes every dream of mastery. It is [also] one of the sites where Dasein is assigned the impossible task of putting right what can never be put right. - Rob Lapsley
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marbleflugel
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« Reply #12 on: 21:06:15, 11-06-2007 » |
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Be cool wouldnt it? First written by either trumpeter Ray Allen in defunct journal Sounding Brass or Hugh
Ottoway in Shosta BBC pocket guide, can't remember which.
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'...A celebrity is someone who didn't get the attention they needed as an adult'
Arnold Brown
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Aitch
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« Reply #13 on: 20:12:11, 29-09-2007 » |
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Just checked my collection and discovered I have the CD Single version of the Bryars piece - two tracks: Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet (The Single) Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet (Single Remix). Both are 3:57 (probably wouldn't be a 'single' otherwise); the second track has Tom Waits. I don't think it ever made the Top 20 |
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oliver sudden
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« Reply #14 on: 20:31:09, 29-09-2007 » |
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To me 4 minutes is a bit short...
...and yes, any version with Waits is just plain wrong.
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