Paul Zukofsky - A Mitzvah For The Dead/Lyric Variations

This album was released on Vanguard's Cardinal imprint, which was their classical division. I can't find an exact date on it, but I make it out to be around '68 or maybe '69. It features violinist Paul Zukofsky performing two pieces for violin and electronics/tapes, one by Michael Sahl, and one by J.K. Randall. Some sections feature the violin electronically altered and playing off of itself via tapes and effects, some incorporate music concrete, and on some the violin interacts with pure electronic tones, all well deployed and effective. Among many other things, Zukofsky (whose father was the renowned writer Louis Zukofsky) went on to play on Phillip Glass's Einstein On The Beach.

I was just listening to a mix CD I'd made a while back, and a song by Elyse, with the unwieldy title "Last Ditch Protocol Sir John Velveteen" came on and transfixed me. Elyse (Weinberg), who I believe may have been Canadian, put out one album in the late '60s and sang roughly (no pun intended) like a cross between Melanie and latter-day Marianne Faithfull, but with excellent songwriting acumen. The mournful beauty of this track (not to mention the whole damn album) is truly a thing to hear. It churns up (at least for me) the kind of gut-level emotional response that's supposed to be the ultimate goal of all (or most) great art. Not only can't I find the proper words to describe this process, I'm quite glad I can't.

Der Plan - Normalette Surprise

The usual line on this NDW outfit (Neu Deutsche Wave, or German New Wave) is that they were the German version of San Francisco weirdos the Residents. While Der Plan's creepy musical absurdity and twisted humor certainly support that assertion, there's also a considerable Kraftwerk influence as well, contributing to that classic early-'80s minimal synth vibe. This was their second album, released in 1981, and in typical dada fashion, one side played at 33 and the other at 45. These guys had the market cornered on that most overused of rock-crit buzzwords, "quirky."

The Gordian Knot - Tones

Like most of the great U.S. sunshine pop groups, the Gordian Knot operated out of California, but in fact they were all southerners who originally got together at the University of Mississippi. One of the Knot's vocalists, Clark Burroughs, had sung with the influential '50s/'60s vocal group the Hi-Lo's, but perhaps even more interesting was the subsequent career of singer/guitarist Jim Weatherly, who went on to write some of Gladys Knight's biggest hits ("You're the Best Thing That Ever Happened To Me," "Midnight Train to Georgia") in addition to penning hits for others and recording as a solo artist. Tones, released in '68, was the band's only album, and it's a harmony-pop classic, with top-notch songwriting and singing and truly excellent production. At times, the sound even teeters towards the heights acheived by soft-pop kings the Association.

Trolling the late-night TV dial in search of unintentional humor, I happened upon the Ovation channel, where for some reason, the singer from Def Leppard was being interviewed as a serious artist. Funny enough in and of itself, but the best part is that at one point, he namechecks every psych-folk fan's favorite obscure British hippie-era Incredible String Band imitators, Dr. Strangely Strange! Surely the apocalypse is nigh, no?