Never thunk this would get reissued
Allan MacInnis | Vancouver | 01/24/2003
(4 out of 5 stars)
"Hm. I wish my MU review were still on Amazon.com somewhere, it really like sets up this HISTORY, this foundation for understanding where Cherry's music was at this point, y'know? But MU goes in and out print, depending on folding Charlys and so forth, and my reviews of it go with it... Anyhow, by my theory, Cherry, having been thru free jazz, having arrived at chaos, having, with Ornette mostly, dispensed with ANY order extraneous to musical expression qua itself, needed eventually (like the whole free jazz movement) to find a place to rebuild -- an organizing principle to take us beyond chaos into a new order, bereft of falsity and Western canonical baggage. While most of the free jazz world, following Albert Ayler and I-must-stay-relevant-at-all-costs Miles Davis, ended up bringing in elements of funk, blues, and rock, delivering freedom unto the marketplace (and making some fine music doing so, don't get me wrong) Cherry chose a very different route, a more ascetic and romantically bohemian one, seeking roots of an "organic music" (the name of another long out of print disc of his) in neoprimitivism and world musics. MU is his master-statement of that, I think; it's the turning point, with he and Ed Blackwell FINDING IT, finding that primitive, rhythmic, spirtually rich place from whence the musical impulse comes. It CHANGED THINGS; it found tribal music as a way up from noise, recreating the birth of music itself, and it (when Cherry would later deign to recognize rock, funk, fusion, and so forth) laid the basis for another of his masterpieces, BROWN RICE, in that this neotribalism/primitivism opened the door to exploring and incorporating basically any sacred, ancient, "folk" musical tradition or instrument Cherry found interesting, in the name of making something completely new. The next step in this process (in terms of what's available out there) was ORIENT, which is most notable to me for having a truly fine record cover (yes, that's an ant on that egg yolk; good to see it again after all these years) but is definitley interesting to listen to. Here's where Cherry, to my knowledge, began incorporating influences as diverse as Tibetan and Indian chant and African percussion into his music. It's STILL JAZZ, but it freely draws on any number of influences. Cherry began to really SING a lot on this release, too, which he'd done a little on MU. He also plays piano; he's not so present at times on trumpet, which doesn't matter at all to me, tho' I guess it could for some... For people who've been making due with COOL, which incorporates some of this material, it is still very much worth picking up, and is more interesting than the also-reissued BLUE LAKE; and my copy of it, at least - not got thru this site - comes with a lovely LP-style gatefold cover, incorporating even the original Japanese liner notes. Thing is: as cool as this stuff is to listen to, as lovely as it is at times, the sound quaility on the original live recording was lacking, and it remains so. Han Bennink's drums on the opening cut, for example, begin as just a murky rumble in the distance, like something happening on your roof while the record plays. "Are those the drums?" is not a question one should have to ask about a recording. The music is engaging enough that it draws me past this, ultimately, and the long stretches where Bennink is on percussion OTHER than drums sound pretty okay; it's just anything in the lower register that ends up getting kinda murkified. I can never listen to this album, thus, without wishing it had been better documented; the music has a magic to it, and deserves a better presentation. Never to be, alas. Still, it's exciting to hear these guys taking jazz in such a new, unique, and still-mostly-unexplored direction, where small furry things living in the trees rouse themselves and look out with enormous eyes at the strange new form that's passing by, probably never to be seen again. How many records REALLY would merit such an image? This one does. PS, BLUE LAKE is pretty murky, too, and I think there's MORE of it on COOL. It's also shorter than ORIENT."
EGGcellent live document
J. Holmes | yokohama, japan | 09/19/2005
(4 out of 5 stars)
"i had heard alot about how great this album was and i was happy to finally find a copy and have the chance to wrap my ears around it. since i've bought this cd, it has spent considerable amount of time in my stereo. recorded in France on August 1971, Don cherry is joined by wild man percussionist Hans Bennink. they both put on quite a spectacle on this magical night. there is a strange and magical chemistry evident on these recordings among all the players. i was under the impression that this was going to be a free-jazz skronkathon, but most of the music flows quite smoothly with alot of carribean influence and cool percussion and simple melodic piano lines. Don Cherry tries to sing on alot of these numbers and at first i hated it. but it grew on me. there is a certain childlike quality about it that is appealing. hmmm..an aquired taste, i think. the sound here is on an average bootleg quality. but i'm not too picky about those sort of things, because that murky sound just adds to the unique feeling of "Orient." there is alot of different styles being played around with here and it takes some time to appreciate everything that was going on. but once you get adjusted to these factors, you may find yourself pleasantly surprised. i know that i did."
Track Listings (4) - Disc #1