Thursday, March 31, 2016

Cloudland Blue Quartet - Four Last Things - Music for String Quartet, Guitar, Stretched Spoken Word & Environment

The new CBQ album is released via Bandcamp today...



CLOUDLAND BLUE QUARTET
FOUR LAST THINGS
Music For String Quartet, Electric Guitar, Stretched Spoken Word and Environment

First Movement (44:36)
E3314 I / The Fourth Last Thing / The Magic Mirror / SS SQ XIX I / The Poisoned Apple / E3314 II

Second Movement (44:36)
E3314 III / The Third Last Thing / SS SQ XIX II / The Glass Coffin / E3314 IV

Third Movement (53:02)
E3314 V / The Second Last Thing / The Wedding Invitation / SS SQ XIX III / E3314 VI

Fourth Movement (44:34)
E3314 VII / The Last Last Thing / The Fairest of Them All / SS SQ XIX IV / The Hot Iron Shoes

Total Time : 3 hrs 6 mins 48 secs

The Four Last Things Are:-
I. Stretched Spoken word (SS SQ XIX) recorded, stretched and treated by David Reilly, 12 January 2014, with thanks to Sid Smith

II. Environment (E3314) recorded by David Reilly, 6:15 to 7:00 am, 3 March 2014

III. Electric Guitar (Schneewittchen) composed and recorded by David Reilly, 7 March 2015

IV. String Quartet (Four Last Things) arranged and constructed by David Reilly, 2 August 2015
Infinite String Quartet Fragments composed by  and © Úlfur Eldjárn 2015
Performed by Una Sveinbjarnardóttir (violin), Pálína Árnadóttir (violin)
Guðrún Hrund Harðardóttir (viola), Hrafnkell Orri Egilsson (cello)
Fragments recorded and mixed by Styrmir Hauksson at Guðríðarkirkja, Reykjavík Iceland. 2013-2015

Portrait by Kitty Gourlay, 13 November, 2015

Produced by David Reilly for Crispycat Recordings
Recorded at Crispycat Studio, Edinburgh, UK, January 2014 to December 2015 (except as noted)
(p) 2016 Crispycat Recordings © David Reilly 2014, 2015, 2016 (except as noted)
Executive Producer : Anne Reilly

Crispycat Recordings 1601

Bonus Material (Download Only)

Elements - Discs V-VIII
SS SQ XIX (12 January 2014) (43:20)
E3314 AM (3 March 2014) (44:37)
Schneewittchen (7 March 2015) (62:56)
The Four Last Things for String Quartet (2 August 2015) (42:29)

Alternatives - Discs IX-XIII
Four Last Things (Single Disc Mix) (28 August 2015) (59:37)
Four Last Things, 1st Movement (Drum Mix) (24 August 2015) (44:38)
E3314 PM (3 March 2014) (65:56)
Betonmusik 2015 Part I (1-18 January 2015) (55:58)
Betonmusik 2015 Part II (19-31 January 2015) (60:07)

Extras - Discs XIV-XX
Early Morning Coffee Pot (11 January 2015) (3:00)
Blitzstein, Marc 1905 (9 & 10 August 2015) (2:38)
55° 57' N: Edinburgh, Scotland - Corstorphine Hill (22 December 2015) (5:17)
The Leonard Cohen EP (22 & 26 September 2015) (26:19)
The Dakota Starman EP (3 October 2015) (9:33)
Acoustic Eno Covers (7 October 2015) (40:30)
Here Again (Acoustic Demo - Mono) (27 July 2014) (3:27)

Bonus Discs : 9 hrs 30 mins 19 secs
Total Time : 12 hrs 37 mins 07 secs


Notes

Four Last Things - Music For String Quartet, Guitar, Stretched Spoken Word & Environments is the 15th soundscapes album from Cloudland Blue Quartet
(Crispycat 1601 - 01 April 2016)




This album is designed as a three hour, four disc set, available to stream or download (the download contains a further sixteen discs of elements, alternatives and extras, the fifteen pieces of cover artwork and a collage of the fifteen covers).


The set comprises an amalgam of four separate projects, "SS SQ XIX" (Music for Stretched Spoken Word), "E3314" (Music for Environments), "Schneewittchen" (Music for Guitar Soundscapes) and "Four Last Things" (Music for String Quartet). 

The original intention was to release each of the four source albums separately. Now each is available as one of the sixteen bonus discs in the download version of "Four Last Things". 

The first project, "SS SQ XIX" (tracks 4, 9, 14 & 20), was recorded as part of an exercise instigated by writer Sid Smith to sonically illustrate twenty quartets of photographs which he dubbed "string quartets". Cloudland Blue Quartet was chosen to create the soundtrack for set XIX in January 2014.


The second project (tracks 1, 6, 7, 11, 12, 16 &17) features recordings of the environment around the Crispycat Studio on the morning and evening of 3 March 2014. Only the morning recording was used on the main album but the evening recording is available too as one of the bonus discs.


Third (tracks 3, 5, 10, 15, 19 & 21)  is a set of guitar soundscapes which was to be released as the album "Schneewittchen". Each piece has a title which references the Brothers Grimm fairytale "Snow White". These were recorded in March 2015.


The last of the projects is a string quartet (tracks 2, 8, 13 & 18) created by Cloudland Blue Quartet using the Infinite String Quartet, an online programme containing fragments of music lasting from a few seconds to around a minute and available to create original works. The four movements were created in early August 2015.


In late August, the four projects were brought together to form the basis of what is presented here. 

Editing and mixing took place until the end of 2015. By March 2016, after much listening and consideration of possible further work, it was decided the album was "finished" and should, at last, be released. 

The download version comes with the following bonus material, which takes the total track count to 108. 

Elements

Discs five to eight contain the original albums "SS SQ XIX" (tracks 22-30 - including the original spoken word texts describing Sid Smith's photographs, some text out-takes and the input of the much missed Meg the Black Cat), "E3314 am" (tracks 31 & 32), "Schneewittchen" (tracks 33-38) and "Four Last Things for String Quartet" (tracks 39-42). 

 

  

Alternatives

Disc nine (tracks 43-45), from August 2015, is a shorter, single disc length mix of "Four Last Things", with the inclusion of drums.

Disc ten (tracks 46 & 47) comprises the finished version of the first movement of "Four Last Things" with additional drums.  This was also created in late August 2015,


Disc eleven (tracks 48-50) contains "E3314 pm", the evening environment from 3 March 2014. 


Discs twelve and thirteen (tracks 51-81) contain a fifth, unused project which, by way of Musique Concrète, documents the first 31 days of 2015.


Extras

Discs fourteen to sixteen contain three other projects recorded in 2015, "Early Morning Coffee Pot" (track 82), created for an exhibition in Manchester, "Blitzstein, Marc 1905" (track 83), created for an exhibition in New York and "55° 57' N: Edinburgh, Scotland - Corstorphine Hill" (track 84) recorded for "Solstice Sounds Project December 2015" curated in Arizona. 




Disc seventeen (tracks 85-89) contains the first of two EPs released in the Autumn of 2015, "The Leonard Cohen EP" (with two added soundscapes).


Disc eighteen is "The Dakota Starman" EP (tracks 90 & 91), dedicated to Jamie Frain.


Disc nineteen, "Acoustic Eno Covers" presents acoustic demo recordings of sixteen Brian Eno songs (tracks 92-107), learned and recorded on a single day in October 2015.



Finally, disc twenty has the final piece of the project (track 108) a rough acoustic demo in mono, the only existing recording of the last Cloudland Blue Song to date, "Here Again", recorded 27 July 2014. 


In all then, we present over twelve and a half hours of Cloudland Blue Quartet recordings for download.

Another six hours required...

Playlist
Cloudland Blue Quartet - Rubinmusik 1977-2016
Donna Lewis - Now In A Minute
Hindemith - Music for Bass Clarinet and Piano
Wheelock - The Ciompi Quartet Plays Donald Wheelock

March away...



Eclectic Selection 13 uploaded and out into the ether...

On Saturday, I'd noticed a sign in a shop near the "Saturday parking place" advising "CDs for £1, buy one get one half price"..

I took the bus up...

A long annoying journey...

I looked through every single CD - man there was some shite released in the 1990's....

Was about to leave empty handed, when I noticed a stand with a few more CDS - it seemed just more of the same old shite...

However, the very last CD of the hundreds I'd looked through was the debut album by Donna Lewis, whom, you may recall, recorded an album with The Bad Plus last year...

And so, I left the shop with £1 less in my pocket and this in my hand...


And, even though it's from 1995, it's really rather good - and has some mellotron on it and features then future David Bowie guitarist Gerry Leonard too...

Meanwhile, in Verona...


Some tasks this evening, with Anne out with chum Debbie, enjoying an Indain meal followed by modern ballet re "1984" (reported to be extremely good indeed)...

This behind the door, first of all...


I do like a bass clarinet...

Then, along to the neighbours' place to feed Rory Custard...


What a wee cutie he is...


Then, soundtracked by bass clarinet, out to the post depot to pick up a package containing 4 more (brand new) CDs of classical music, purchased for a pittance on that internet...


The view from the office this evening...


Back home via Tesco, bearing a Quorn Lasagne that was reasonably tasty but with an unreasonable after-taste - damn you garlic purée...

"Agents of Shield" - two episodes enjoyed, bringing matters up to date in what is turning out to be an excellent season...

Did not have time to listen to any of these...




...although this was in the cans as I hit the sack...


And so, March is indeed, away...

Highlight of the Day : New music...

Wednesday, March 30, 2016

How many copies is too many copies...

Playlist
Various - Cloudland Blue Eclectic Selection 2016 Vol 13
Various - Funk 1: Original Masters
The Nice - Five Bridges
Grand Funk Railroad - Survival
Nucleus - Roots
The Osmonds - The Plan
Petula Clark - Downtown: The Pye Anthology
Floratone - Floratone

Completed the recording of this week's podcast first thing...

Nothing much else to report, other than the Gourlays are enjoying their stay in Venezia


..and another CD has popped through the door...


I have all but two of the tracks already - in fact it contains my 7th copy of LaBelle's "Lady Marmalade"...

However, it also has the theme to "Brooklyn Nine Nine" and was less than £2...

So, kind of, worth it (or not if you consider that's my 3rd copy of Kool & the Gang's "Jungle Boogie")...

Not to worry...

Lights out...

Highlight of the Day : Podcasting...

Tuesday, March 29, 2016

So much work, so little achievement...

Playlist
Cloudland Blue Quartet - CBQ Live Set 2016 (Backing Tracks)
David Reilly - Rubinmusik 1977-2016
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Blood Sugar Sex Magik
Golden Earring - Fully Naked
Berliner Philharmoniker - 50 Best Berliner Philharmoniker
Golden Earring - Switch
Sarah MacDougall - Across the Atlantic
Camel - Lunar Sea -An Anthology 1973-1985
Bobby Womack - Everything's Gonna Be Alright - The American Singles 1967-76
Fehlfarben - Über... Menschen
Laura Pausini - Laura Live: World Tour 09
Klaus Schulze - La Vie Électronique 6
Kansas - In The Spirit Of Things

In the last three days, I've put out an album containing up to 12.5 hours of "music", created a probably never to be released 40 year spanning collection of my work and worked on a most probably never to be played prospective live set list...

Idiot...

Soundtracked today by the backing tracks for said setlist...

Cloudy...


Later, rainy...


...yet sunny...


In the evening, recording the links for this week's podcast...


...and then putting together the first hour or so, before retiring downstairs for this week's "Holby City" - how can the scriptwriters be so cruel to Diggers?

Lights out with Kansas and Bob Ezrin...

Highlight of the Day : Holby...

Monday, March 28, 2016

Thinking about a return but probably not...

Playlist
Klavierduo Huber/Thomet - Monolithen : Debussy, Zimmermann & Strawinsky
Graham Bond Organization - I Met The Blues At Klook´s Kleek
Dutilleux - The Centenary Edition
Igor Levitt - Bach, Beethoven, Rzewski
2raumwohnung - Melancholisch Schön
Various Composers - 50 Best Berliner Philharmoniker
Ginger Baker Trio - Falling Off The Roof
Al Green - Greatest Hits: The Best of Al Green
Rick James - Dancing In The Street
Cozy Powell - The Best Of Cozy Powell
Beck, Bogert & Appice - Live
Bobby Womack - Everything's Gonna Be Alright - The American Singles 1967-76
Jeff Beck - Wired
Pete Brown & Piblokto - Things May Come Things may Go But The Art School Dance Goes On For Ever
Jack Bruce - Live On The Old Grey Whistle Test
Pallas - Mythopoeia
Liszt - Piano Concertos 1 & 2; Totentanz
Elton John - Don't Shoot Me I'm Only The Piano Player
David Reilly - Rubinmusik 1977-2016
Clementi - Complete Sonatas For Fortepiano Vol 6 : The Late Sonatas
Richard Anthony - The Best Of Hallyday, Rivers, Mitchell, Anthony & Vartan
Various Composers - Pour Deux Clavecins
Gál - Hans Gál: The Complete String Quartets Vol 2
Riff Raff - Outside Looking In - Unreleased Debut Album
Matthew Florianz - Wasteland Signals
Graham Bond - Holy Magick
John Mayall - Blues Breakers with Eric Clapton
Moondog - Moondog 2
Golden Earring - Fully Naked
Blind Faith - Blind Faith
Ted Nugent - The Ultimate Ted Nugent
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Greatest Hits
Derek And The Dominos - Layla And Other Assorted Love Songs
Charlie Mariano - Helen 12 Trees
Red Hot Chili Peppers - By The Way
Roy Harper - In Concert 1975 - The BBC Tapes - Volume 4
Corelli - La Folia
Pete Brown And His Battered Ornaments - A Meal You Can Shake Hands With In The Dark
Field Music - Write Your Own History
Michiel Borstlap - Gramercy Park
The Mickey Finn - Paint It Black (Mojo Presents)
The Who - Who's Next
Chris Rea - Shamrock Diaries
Cloudland Blue Quartet - CBQ Live Set 2016 (Backing Tracks)

Mostly soundtracked by recent as yet unlistened to acquisitions again...

Also compiled a possible set list for a return to live music making by CBQ - over four years now since the last CBQ gig...

Home in the low sun, the clocks having moved forward early yesterday morning...


The tower always reminds me of Venice...

...where Jane and her family are right now...


Lucky lady...

Back here, more "Person of Interest" (probably) and much listening - fine tuning the line up for this week's podcast...

Lights out...

Highlight of the Day : Compiling a setlist...

Sunday, March 27, 2016

Forty years of fun, kind of...

Playlist
David Reilly - Anthology 1977-2007
The Dancers of San Martino - The Dancers of San Martino
The Dancers of San Martino - Adagio
Love Parade - Half the Civilised World
Cloudland Blue Quartet & Peri Urban - 18.VIII.98 26.VIII.98 6.X.98 10.X.98
Cloudland Blue Quartet - Fifty Five Songs
Cloudland Blue Quartet - Concrete
Cloudland Blue Quartet - Blend EP
Cloudland Blue Quartet - Soundingfall
Cloudland Blue Quartet - Splinterheart
Cloudland Blue Quartet - The Vendôme EP
Cloudland Blue Quartet - Starlightnight
Cloudland Blue Quartet - Riverleaves
Cloudland Blue Quartet - Morphinecodex
DDHR - The Drone Effect
Cloudland Blue Quartet - Four Last Things
George Benson - Good King Bad
George Benson - The George Benson Collection
David Reilly - Rubinmusik 1977-2016
Leclair - Leclair: Le tombeau
Don Ellis Orchestra - Electric Bath
Grand National - Kicking The National Habit
Jean-Michel Jarre - En Concert: Houston/Lyon
Al Green - Greatest Hits: The Best of Al Green
Berliner Philharmoniker - 50 Best Berliner Philharmoniker
Various - Island Presents: Roots
Klavierduo Huber/Thomet - Monolithen : Debussy, Zimmermann & Strawinsky
Field Music - Write Your Own History
Planyavsky - Pour Deux Clavecins
Field Music - Tones Of Town
Various - The Best Of Hallyday, Rivers, Mitchell, Anthony & Vartan

Suddenly realised today, I've been making music in forty of the last forty years - 1977 to 2016...

Set about compiling a set comprising one track from each year...

This involved creating a new track for 2016 - which ended up utilising "The Drone Effect" from December 1977 and a rejected vocal from last year's Creek sessions - and some drums...

Spent some time too listening to 2016 acquisitions, to which I'd not gotten round to listening yet...

Late afternoon, to Anne's mum's for tea - the kids and Jane and Bobby are off to Venice tomorrow...



However, since we see them only once a fortnight in any case, it will be like they have not been away...

Home for TV, which, once again, I cannot remember...

Highlight of the Day : Compiling...

Saturday, March 26, 2016

Another bridge demolished, time to move on...

Playlist
Various Composers - Your Hundred Best Tunes
Bobby Womack - Everything's Gonna Be Alright : The American Singles 1967-1976
Michiel Borstlap - Gramercy Park
Sleep Research Facility - Stealth
Cloudland Blue Quartet - Four Last Things
The Moody Blues - To Our Children's Children's Children
John McLaughlin - Extrapolation
Various - On The Corner
John Cale - Slow Dazzle
Yes - Yes
The Beatles - Abbey Road
Brian Eno - ENOBOX II / Vocal
Various - A Beginner's Guide to African Funk
Trettioariga Kriget - Krigssang
Uriah Heep - Sweet Freedom
May Blitz - May Blitz
2raumwohnung - Melancholisch Schön
Rorem - Winter Pages/Bright Music
Jean-Michel Jarre - Zoolook
Various - Giant Steps!
Pete Brown & Piblokto - Things May Come Things may Go But The Art School Dance Goes On For Ever
Graham Bond - Holy Magick
Various - Funk Soul Brothers
Headspace - All That You Fear Is Gone
Brett Garsed - Big Sky
Free - Live at Fairfield Halls, Croydon
Various - Strut'n' Get Up: Funky Fat Slices Of Groove Cut From Blue Note
Asheim - Broken Line (Vertavo Quartet)
The Bad Plus - These Are The Vistas (European Edition)
Various - Craig Charles Funk & Soul Classics
Riff Raff - Outside Looking In - Unreleased Debut Album
Rihm - Musik für drei Streicher
Various Composers - Pour Deux Clavecins
Various - The Best Of Hallyday, Rivers, Mitchell, Anthony & Vartan
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Stadium Arcadium
Michael Gibbs - Michael Gibbs

Made the new album "live" this morning - official release is Friday 1st April - not an April Fool...

21 pieces on the finalised free to stream version, plus 87 bonus tracks with the paid download - elements, alternatives and extras...


My music has become a bit weird...

Out for breakfast to West Richmond Street...


Lovely coffee...


The camera was, of course, extreeemely close to the plate for this pic...


A walk to the library, handing stuff back early and taking out a 2CD set of Bobby Womack singles from 1967-76...

Back to the car...


...and home for a short rest...


...before heading out to my mum's - a nice home made Easter card from chums Moira and Lex on the mantelpiece...


It's probably too late now for my mum to give up on KitKats...


Home late afternoon and some listening, ripping, surfing and gogglebox watching, though, writing this up next Wednesday evening, I don't recall what was watched...

Probably a couple of episodes of the excellent "Person of Interest"...

Not to worry...

Highlight of the Day : New album out at last...