Guitar Solos / Fifty | ||||
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Studio album by | ||||
Released | 16 February 2024 | |||
Recorded |
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Studio |
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Genre | Free improvisation [1] avant-garde [2] | |||
Length | 75:31 | |||
Label | Week-End Records | |||
Producer | Fred Frith | |||
Fred Frith chronology | ||||
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Guitar Solos series chronology | ||||
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Additional cover | ||||
Guitar Solos / Fifty is a 2024 solo double LP by English guitarist,composer and improviser Fred Frith. It was released on vinyl in Germany by Week-End Records to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the release of Frith's 1974 debut solo album, Guitar Solos . The first disc of the double album is a reissue of his original 1974 solo album remastered,and the second disc is a new solo album of 13 guitar tracks Frith recorded in 2023. Just as the original Guitar Solos was recorded without any overdubbing,Fifty also had no overdubs. [3]
Frith recorded the original Guitar Solos in July 1974 while he was a member of English experimental rock group Henry Cow. The album has eight tracks of unaccompanied and improvised music played by Frith on prepared guitars without any overdubbing. [1] Guitar Solos was well received by critics at the time, [1] [2] [4] and resulted in two follow-up albums, Guitar Solos 2 (1976) and Guitar Solos 3 (1979),featuring additional tracks by Frith,plus several other improvising guitarists,including Derek Bailey and Hans Reichel. [5] [6]
To mark the upcoming fiftieth anniversary of Guitar Solos in 2024,Jan Lankisch of Week-End Records in Cologne,Germany suggested to Frith in 2023 that they reissue Guitar Solos as a double-LP with a second disc of new material. [7] Frith began selecting unreleased recordings he had made over the previous fifty years,but Lankisch proposed that Frith record the new material. Frith liked the idea and decided to reproduce the same recording environment that was used in 1974 as much as possible. [5] [7] He used the same guitar he had used on the original album,the 1936 Gibson K-11,and created multiple sound sources from pickups on the guitar,and microphones positioned on his seat and around the room. [7] Frith said they managed to reproduce the original studio environment quite closely,but noted that "it became apparent that a lot of it was not really relevant anymore." [7] Reflecting on the recording of Guitar Solos fifty years ago,Frith noted how "naïve" he was at the time. [3] He said he knew very little of the London improvisation scene,and had he known what other musicians were doing,"I probably wouldn't have made the record!" [8]
Just as no overdubbing was used on the original Guitar Solos,the new recordings for Fifty had no overdubs. Frith played his guitar held in the "conventional position" on all of Fifty's tracks,as was the case on all but one of the tracks on Guitar Solos –on "No Birds" he played two guitars flat on a table. [3] Week-End Records released Guitar Solos / Fifty on vinyl in February 2024 in a limited edition of 1,000 copies. [9] The double-LP's sleeves are illustrated with the photograph from the original 1974 album showing Frith playing a guitar on a cricket field in front of a sight screen,and a similarly posed photograph of Frith taken in 2023. [5]
In a review of Guitar Solos / Fifty in The Wire ,Clive Bell called the album "a clever,confident record by an old master". [10] He described the newly recorded tracks on the second disc as varying between "pretty and melodic" and "gritty or microtonal". [10] In contrast to Frith's loud "rocky" Fred Frith Trio,Bell said "Fifty is surprisingly delicate and understated." [3] Throughout the album,Bell wondered whether the multilayered sound was created with overdubbing,"but of course there is none". He stated that Frith "foregrounds the physically of playing a guitar",which "is to be treasured" in an era of effects pedals and synthesisers. [3] Bell said Frith "confronts his younger self and the sheer nerve of what he was attempting back then." [10]
Jennifer Lucy Allan wrote in The Quietus that the music on Guitar Solos "embraces texture and resonance",and the repetitions,sounds and noise "make me go fizzy". [11] She said that the way "No Birds" opens and closes "is burned into my synapses". [11] Allan was pleased that on Fifty,"Frith has ... not softened,nor suffered calcification,and the playing is as energetically nimble as ever." She added,"The palette remains fresh;the creative insistence in the playing remains. Sonic ideas that might otherwise seep into the earth are caught and excavated". [11]
Reviewing the album in the Spanish music magazine, Rockdelux Jesús Rodríguez Lenin wrote that while Fifty was recorded using similar techniques and in a similar environment that was used for Guitar Solos,the new recordings do not have the same impact that the original album had. [5] In the 1970s,listeners must have been "astonished" (atónito) by what Frith had done,but today,free improvisation and "radical avant-garde" (vanguardias radicales) is quite common. [5] Nevertheless,Lenin stated that there is still much to appreciate on Fifty –the music is more "delicate" (delicado),"even beautiful" (incluso bonito) and "almost melodic" (casi melódico). As with Guitar Solos,Lenin said Fifty has noise,but because there are no overdubs,it makes the listener more appreciative of what Frith is doing with his guitar. [5]
All tracks are written by Fred Frith
No. | Title | Length |
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1. | "Hello Music" | 1:31 |
2. | "Glass c/w Steel" | 5:36 |
3. | "Ghosts" | 3:11 |
4. | "Out of Their Heads (On Locoweed)" | 8:31 |
Total length: | 18:49 |
No. | Title | Length |
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5. | "Not Forgotten" | 1:55 |
6. | "Hollow Music" | 2:44 |
7. | "Heat c/w Moment" | 1:42 |
8. | "No Birds" | 12:42 |
Total length: | 19:03 |
No. | Title | Length |
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1. | "Dawns" | 3:30 |
2. | "Outer Order" | 4:28 |
3. | "Tempus Fugit" | 2:41 |
4. | "Quicksilver (for Simone)" | 2:04 |
5. | "Unterwegs (for Roman)" | 3:52 |
6. | "Phalaropes" | 1:33 |
Total length: | 18:08 |
No. | Title | Length |
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7. | "Jack's Neap Tide" | 2:08 |
8. | "Schlechte Gewissen" | 2:24 |
9. | "Move Indigo" | 3:54 |
10. | "To Do" | 1:39 |
11. | "The Map of Dreams" | 3:28 |
12. | "Locomoting" | 4:07 |
13. | "Dusks" | 1:51 |
Total length: | 19:31 |
Source: Liner notes [9]
Source: Liner notes [9]
Guitar Solos is the debut solo album of English guitarist, composer, and improviser Fred Frith. It was recorded while Frith was still a member of the English experimental rock group Henry Cow and was released in the United Kingdom on LP record by Caroline Records in October 1974. The album comprises eight tracks of unaccompanied and improvised music played on prepared guitars by Frith without any overdubbing.
That House We Lived In is a double live album by American experimental rock band Keep the Dog. It comprises material from their final European tour in 1991 and was released by Fred Frith on his own Fred Records in 2003.
Gravity is a 1980 solo album by English guitarist and composer Fred Frith. It was Frith's second solo album, and his first since Henry Cow disbanded in 1978. It was originally released in the United States on the Residents' Ralph Records, as the first of three solo albums Frith would record for the label. Gravity has been described as an avant-garde "dance" record that draws on rhythm and dance from folk music across the world.
Speechless is a 1981 solo album by English guitarist, composer and improviser Fred Frith of the group Henry Cow. It was Frith's third solo album, and was originally released in the United States on LP record on the Residents' Ralph record label. It was the second of three solo albums Frith made for the label.
Cheap at Half the Price is a 1983 solo album by English guitarist, composer and improviser Fred Frith. It was Frith's fifth solo album, and was originally released in the United States on LP record on the Residents' Ralph record label. It was the third of three solo albums Frith made for the label.
Clearing is a guitar solo album by English guitarist, composer and improvisor Fred Frith. It was Frith's first solo guitar recording since Live in Japan (1982) and his first solo guitar studio recording since his landmark 1974 album Guitar Solos.
Eye to Ear II is a studio album by English guitarist, composer and improvisor Fred Frith. It is a collection of film music composed and performed by Frith, and is the second of three Eye to Ear albums dedicated to his work for short films. It was recorded in Germany and the United States between 1997 and 2003.
Nowhere, Sideshow, Thin Air is a studio album by English guitarist, composer and improvisor Fred Frith, and is the sixth of a series of Music for Dance albums he made.
What Leave Behind is a 2004 studio album by Oakland, California-based experimental music group Toychestra and English experimental guitarist Fred Frith. It was recorded in May 2003 and January 2004, and was released in 2004 on the French label, S.K. Records. It is a concerto for electric guitar and toy orchestra composed by Dan Plonsey for Toychestra and Frith to perform.
Eye to Ear III is a studio album by English guitarist, composer, and improvisor Fred Frith. The album is a collection of film music composed and performed by Frith, and is the third of three Eye to Ear albums dedicated to his work for short films. It was recorded in Germany and the United States in 2003 and 2004.
The Sugar Factory is a 2007 collaborative album by English experimental musician Fred Frith and Scottish percussionist Evelyn Glennie. It comprises material drawn from improvisations by Frith and Glennie recorded during the making of the 2004 documentary film Touch the Sound about Glennie, who is profoundly deaf. The album was released in 2007 in the United States by Tzadik Records as part of their "Key Series".
Field Days (The Amanda Loops) is a studio album by English guitarist, composer and improvisor Fred Frith. It comprises 14 pieces for dance written by Frith for choreographer Amanda Miller and the Nederland Dans Theater. The album was released by Fred Records in November 2015.
Propaganda is a studio album by English guitarist, composer and improvisor Fred Frith. It comprises 21 pieces for dance written by Frith and commissioned by Matthew Maguire for the Creation Production Company. It was first performed at La Mama ETC in New York City in May 1987. The suite was recorded by Kramer at Noise New York in April 1987 and released on Side 4 of the LP release of Frith's 1988 solo album, The Technology of Tears. It was omitted from the CD releases of the album.
The Compass, Log and Lead is a 2006 studio album of improvised acoustic experimental music by Fred Frith, Carla Kihlstedt and Stevie Wishart. It was recorded in October 2003 in Oakland, California, and released by Intakt Records in 2006.
Dalaba Frith Glick Rieman Kihlstedt, also stylized as DalabaFrithGlickRiemanKihlstedt, is a 2003 studio album of improvised experimental music by Lesli Dalaba, Fred Frith, Eric Glick Rieman and Carla Kihlstedt. It was recorded at Guerrilla Recording in Oakland, California, and was released by Accretions Records in San Diego, California in 2003.
Closer to the Ground is a 2018 studio album by the Fred Frith Trio, a San Francisco Bay Area based experimental music and free improvising group featuring Fred Frith, Jason Hoopes and Jordan Glenn. It is their second album and was recorded in Oakland, California in January 2018, and released in September 2018 by Intakt Records in Switzerland. It follows on from their first album, Another Day in Fucking Paradise that was released in June 2016.
French Gigs is a 1983 live collaborative album of improvised experimental music by Lol Coxhill and Fred Frith. It was recorded live in France in Limoges and Poitiers in October 1978, and in Reims in 1981. The album was released on LP by AAA in 1983, on CD by AYAA in 1991, and again on CD by Klanggalerie in 2020. The 1991 release includes a new track recorded via correspondence in 1991–92 by Coxhill in London and Frith in Munich, while the 2020 release includes the extra 1991 track, plus another new track recorded in Aubervilliers, France in 1999, the last performance by Coxhill and Frith. The 2020 release was re-mastered by Myles Boison.
Woodwork: Live at Ateliers Claus is a 2019 live album by English guitarist Fred Frith. It features a live solo guitar performance by Frith on 20 November 2018 at the Ateliers Claus in Brussels, Belgium, during his November 2018 European tour. The album was released by Klanggalerie in Austria on 23 August 2019. Woodwork is an "[u]naccompanied single-take album", and is Frith's first live solo guitar album since his 1982 album, Live in Japan.
Still Urban is a 2009 avant-garde jazz studio album by English guitarist and composer Fred Frith and the Swiss-based ARTE Quartett. It was recorded in January 2008 at Swiss Radio DRS2 in Zürich, Switzerland, and was released in 2009 by Intakt Records, together with Frith and the ARTE Quartett's second collaborative album, The Big Picture, which was also recorded in January 2008 at Swiss Radio DRS2.
The Big Picture is a 2009 avant-garde jazz studio album by English guitarist and composer Fred Frith and the Swiss-based ARTE Quartett. It was recorded in January 2008 at Swiss Radio DRS2 in Zürich, Switzerland, and was released in 2009 by Intakt Records, together with Frith and the ARTE Quartett's first collaborative album, Still Urban, which was also recorded in January 2008 at Swiss Radio DRS2.