LIVE '75

While the "enjoyment factor" plays the biggest part in my rating of an album there are many Avant albums that I own that I have given 4 stars to that I really have had difficulty with, yet I can't deny being so impressed with the compositions they came up with. "Live '75" is a great example of this. Under Electronics here and most sites but under Avant in my house. This is electronic sounding for sure but man you'd be hard pressed to find a more "out there" album and it's live! Led by Italy's leading Avant composer Franco Battiato he picked five other like minded performers and took the show on the road in the south of Italy for a couple of months then they were gone, just like that. Of the six we get two singers male and female who are very adventerous and really use wordless melodies for the most part. A ton of echo in this vocals at times to the point it's scary, like in a psychedelic nightmare.

These are dense and abstract soundscapes where vocals often lead the way with Battiato on electronics, a former I GIGANTI member on farfisa organ, an AKTUALA musician on vibes, percussion, cymbals and tablas, an unknown on oboe and soprano sax and the two singers who often steal the show. A supergroup for sure.

It's hard for me a non-musician to fathom what went into these live shows. As I said before I'm just blown away at the compositions even though they are so difficult to digest. I kept thinking there's probably one poor soul who took LSD having no clue what he was about to experience. This is dark and frightening at times while at others it feels like they are just trying to get on my nerves with the soprano sax and oboe blasting away in the dense music with electronics and farfisa adding layers. Just a crazy sounding album and I believe quite unique.

Again I keep going back to what it must have been like to have been their in person. I can't imagine though I've tried. This wasn't released until 20 years after it was recorded. 42 minutes of music divided into five sections. Kind of samey in that it's pretty much adventerous soundscape music with a similar vibe on each part. An awesome example of those insane vocals is the latter part of "Part II", I mean just bonkers. What I love about music like this is that each listen is a new discovery. So much going on within each track and it is the ultimate headphone album. We do get some crowd noise but almost always in the form of applause to end some of these sections. Other than the guy on cid screaming as he runs out of the back of the building.

This might be worthy of being in my top Avant albums list. The more I listen the more I'm thinking so. Again just shaking my head as I listen right now to this powerful recording.