However - Sudden Dusk

Year of Release: 1993
Label: Kinesis
Catalog Number: KDCD 1011
Format: CD
Total Time: 49:38:00

It's strange to see how the Canterbury scene has infected Zappa, or the other way around. The same technical perfection is to be found on both sides of the Atlantic with a larger percentage of jazz/fusion available on the American side.

What you get here is the re-release of the However album from 1981 plus one bonus track. Music-wise it's a marriage between Gentle Giant (because of the sax) and Happy the Man.

Like with Weather Report, Return to Forever, Sun Ra and Maha-vishnu Orchestra, the band has written less accessible music but which sometimes offers some great tunes. Take the instru-mental "Louise Sitting In A Chair" with a perfect counterpoint between soprano sax and piano. Title track "Sudden Dusk" is the most experimental of them all featuring delayed piano, flanged guitar, fretless bass, bassoon and others. The end result is very dark and gloomy. Contrast to this song is the rather dreamy "In The Midst Of Making." Bonustrack "No Cows" has bassoon, C melody sax, violin and some singing that goes back to the better days of Italian prog outfit PFM. In situating However, one has to name both Happy the Man and the Muffins as the bands which come closest to their sound.

Compared to the other Kinesis releases this one's way out of line. In fact it would've been more in line with Cuneiform Records' catalog. Sudden Dusk is by no means a disc which you put on to enjoy yourself. It's a get-together of superb technically skilled musicians who try to go as far as possible at their own peril. Getting through the entire duration of this disc in one go is pure torture. Be my guest!

Originally released in 1981 by Random Radar Records

Tracklisting:
It's Good Fun (3:41) / Hardt (2:18) / In The Aisles (2:13) / Louise Sitting In A Chair (4:17) / Beese (7:08) / Sudden Dusk (3:59) / Lamplight (3:14) / Grandfather Was The Driver (3:20) / Trees For The Forest (6:33) / In The Midst Of Making (5:18) / No Cows (7:05)

Musicians:
Bill Kotapish - electric guitar, cymbals, bass, vocals
Peter Mark Prince - vocals, keyboards, fretless bass, piano, clavinet, guitar, bass pedals, kalimba, autoharp, manjeerbells, violin
Bobby Read - vocals, saxophones, log drums, bells, xylomarimba, piano, glockenspiel, ocarina, clarinet, synths
Joe 'Stellar' Prince - drums, percussion, duck call, whistle, bells, chimes, tube bells, trash can lid

Guests:

Don 'Whitz' Berkemeyer - tenor and soprano recorder, whistling, gong, bassoon
Tim Valdes - marimba, xylophone
Gary McAleer - violin
Harold Howland - vibraphone
Annie Gadbois - cello

Discography:
Sudden Dusk (1981/1993)
Calling (1985)

Genre: RIO

Origin US

Added: May 22nd 2001
Reviewer: John "Bobo" Bollenberg

Hits: 2267
Language: english