Search - Area :: Event 76

Adventurous Area +++

Lord Chimp | Monkey World | 09/20/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Ok, so you like Area. You think Demetrio Stratos is a great singer. _Crac!_ was a pretty catchy CD. Hmm, _Event '76_ is a live album with the some of the guest players from _Maledetti_. You may be thinking that it's like _Are(A)zione_ (their first live album) but with some _Maledetti_ songs on it. Right?WRONG.This BY FAR the weirdest album in Area's catalogue. _Event 76_ is a live performance that I think was recorded *before* _Maledetti_. It only features about half of the standard Area lineup: vocalist Demetrio Stratos, pianist Patrizio Fariselli, and guitarist Paolo Tofani (guitar) are joined by Steve Laci (saxophone) and Paul Lytton (percussion) for a live avant-garde improv meltdown. The musicians have a jazzy rapport but the music is mostly very unjazzy. The two songs here ("Caos II" and "Event '76") are very avant-sounding: metallic and clamorous percussion, scratchy guitar noises, bizarre synths, angular piano lines, sporadic honking sax, and Stratos' weird-as-always vocal sounds. Because of how totally strange it is, this can only be recommended to the most adventurous Area fans. It shatters the idea that they were limited by any style and demonstrates that they were by far one of the most resourceful progressive acts of the 70s. This is the ultimate bridge of their experimental jazz-rock and avant-jazz, and a worthy item for anyone with such interests.Area was an awesome band. I love them even if they were a bunch of communists."

Totally avant garde live album

BENJAMIN MILER | Veneta, Oregon | 03/11/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"OK, so this is going to be a party clearing album on the lines of Vangelis' Beaubourg, Frank Zappa's Lumpy Gravy, the studio half of Pink Floyd's Ummagumma, or Captain Beefheart's Trout Mask Replica. Event '76 was released in 1979 on Cramps when the band was no longer recording for that label. This was a 1976 live recording in Milan, which is basically "Caos Part II" from Maledetti taken to it's extreme logical conclusion. If you dig Arbeit Macht Frei, Caution: Radiation Area, Crac!, Are(a)zione, and Maledetti, you might be in for a real shock here. They tend to leave the fusion behind on this album, going for extreme avant garde, lots of percussion, wind instruments played in a more abstract manner. More Stockhausen here than say, Weather Report. You get immediately reminded of a certain well-known American and Greek recording for RCA doing avant garde albums (or noise depending on your point of view) to purposely get themselves kicked off that label. I'm referring to Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music and Vangelis' Beaubourg. Given this was the Cramps label, the label wasn't too concerned about the commercial or chart potential of the product they were selling, so they had no problem in releasing this live footage. I can say this has a lot more going on than Metal Machine Music (in my opinion, after ten minutes of listening to Metal Machine Music, you pretty much get the picture, as it pretty much remains the same throughout the two discs), and of course you get treated with all sorts of instruments (percussion, wind instruments, keyboards, and of course the twisted voice of Demetrio Stratos). It's a bit like Frank Zappa's Lumpy Gravy but without those humorous dialogs found on that album, or the orchestra. For fusion fans, you might want to stay away from Event '76, but for adventurous fans of the band, or fans of avant garde in general, get this album!"

Dissonance

Jeffrey J.Park | Massachusetts, USA | 06/14/2009

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Recorded at the Universita Statale di Milano in 1976 (and released later in 1979), this is a dense, uncompromising recording that fully explores the avant-garde inclinations of this Italian jazz-rock group. Admittedly, while I found the incorporation of the avant-garde into their jazz rock compositions interesting on their more conventional albums, this stuff is completely over the top. In fact, it took me three days to listen to the entire recording (it is only 39 minutes long but is very intense).



The lineup includes Patrizio Fariselli (acoustic piano), Steve Lacy (soprano saxophone), Paul Litton (percussion), Demetrios Stratos (vocals) and Paolo Tofani (electric guitar, synthesizers). The guys are very accomplished musicians and despite the unconventional nature of the music, actually pull it off.



In terms of the music itself, it is nearly entirely atonal and there is no rhythmic center - it is all over the place. Evidently, the players borrowed techniques developed by influential avant-garde composer John Cage - chance/whim of the performer plays a role in how the piece evolves. In spite of it all, there is actually some underlying structure: they take turns "soloing" just as any straight jazz ensemble would. Of course, while there are some vague semblances of jazz chords here and there, the solo sections largely consist of shrill sounds on the saxophone and solos on the piano that utilize a 12 tone scale. Surrounding it all is an impenetrable mixture of percussion and bursts of furious electric guitar playing. In short, this is the single most challenging recording I have in my collection and recalls the most "out there" moments of Henry Cow.



All in all, I have to congratulate these guys on their willingness to explore the avant-garde as fully as they did on this recording. While I do not think I will ever have the energy (or time) to listen to this again, I consider it a very important part of the Area catalog and it should not be dismissed on the basis of being dissonant. For the adventurous listener only."