The Pink Floyd In 1967

Sooner or later I knew I would have posted something about the early Pink Floyd.
It's very dufficult to talk about Syd Barrett without saying something which hasn't been already said many times, about his talent, his visions, his mental illness, his disappearance from the musical scene. I'd just like to beg all Syd's fans not to try to go in Cambridge to meet him and talk to him. Please respect his choice to live a quiet and retired life. Roger Keith Barrett is now a 60 years old man who doesn't like to remember about his days as a rock musician in London. Let's all remember about Syd for the few marvellous songs he gave to us.
This live version of Astronomy Domine is probably well known by most fans, here it is for the few ones who haven't seen it yet. It is maybe the best early Pink Floyd's footage, along with the London '66-'67 DVD. The video is part of the Look Of The Week program, broadcasted by BBC-2 in May '67. The quality is excellent, it's just a pity that the Floyd had not the possibility to improvise much as they used to do in that period, but it attests anyway the visionary strenght of this music.

Pink Floyd - Astronomy Domine (1967)

Password: musicforyoureyes

Note: To the people who still reports downloading problems: this link will lead you to a very small file...open and unzip it, then you'll know how to download. It's just a little trick not to have my videos deleted from Rapidshare again.

Thank you

Mirco

The Pretty Things At The Beat Club

I've been requested to post some videos by The Pretty Things at the Beat Club, and it's a pleasure for me to propose one the most underrated british bands of the sixties and early seventies. They are often compared to The Rolling Stones because the guitar player Dick Taylor was in the early Stones' line-up. They shared with them the same passion for R 'n' B, but in fact they were even rawer than the Stones, too raw for success (and you can see that the singer Phil May was the guy with the longest hair in '66!)
In 1967 they joined the psychedelic wave with the single Defecting Grey and, in '68, the album S.F. Sorrow. These are two forgotten gems of visionary music, S.F. Sorrow has been the first rock-opera ever, anticipating The Who's Tommy, a much more popular work (but also much less inspired in my opinion...). Despite the defection of Dick Taylor the following album Parachute, that includes the song Cries From A Midnight Circus, is still a masterpiece of late psychedelia/early hard rock.
So here are The Pretty Things, from different periods of their existence, but always great!

Pretty Things - Raining In My Heart (1966)
Pretty Things - Cries From A Midnight Circus (1970)

Password: musicforyoureyes

For more Pretty Things' clips take a look at the Sonic Pollutions blog.

Bye

Mirco

Tim Buckley

Tim will always be remembered as a marvellous singer and a sensitive composer. He emerged from the late-sixties californian folk-rock scene with a unique approach, and his restless talent lead him to arrange his touching songs in a very peculiar way, maybe closer to avantgarde jazz.
He died in the summer of '75 and he is probably more famous now, after that his son Jeff, also very talented singer, skimmed the great success that he never reached. As everybody knows Jeff too died sadly at a very young age. It might seem rethorical, but it's easy to imagine that they are both still singing somewhere, with their angelic voices.
These footages where both shooted for the BBC, in different phases of Tim's career: the first in '68 for the Late Night Late Up program, and the second, a performance of the beautiful Fred Neil's song Dolphins, at the Grey Old Whistle Test on '74.

Tim Buckley - I'm Coming Home Again (1968)
Tim Buckley - Dolphins (1974)

The password to unzip all files is: musicforyoureyes

Comments are always much apprecieted.

See you

Mirco

Monk Time

The Monks were certainly one of the rawest garage-punk bands of the sixties. Five texan soldiers living in Germany, they were crazy enough to shave their heads and dress like real monks.
They opened their perfomance at the Beat Club on '66 with a really noisy instrumental track: tribal beats, an heavy fuzz bass guitar riff, hysterical howls, people torturing the electric guitar...and the audience trying to dance at it! Then came the wild song Oh How To Do Now, with their typical use of the banjo as a percussive instrument, to obtain an even more obsessive sound.
Of course they failed to reach a big success, but became more famous for their outrageous look.
It's worth checking out their only album Black Monk Time, if you haven't done it yet. You'll be surely curious to hear it after seeing this video.

Added on january 24: as Kindly notified by Kurt, the title of the instrumental track is Monk Chant. Thank you!

Monks - Monk Chant/Oh How To Do Now (1966)

Password: musicforyoureyes

See you next time.

Mirco

The Soft Machine In 1967

Another Canterbury tale. In fact we're almost at the beginning of the story, The Soft Machine were the first group that came out of that scene. They have been one of the main protagonists of the undeground scene in the crazy days of the Swinging London, playing regularly in clubs like the legendary UFO, with bands like The Pink Floyd, Tomorrow, Crazy World Of Arthur Brown...
The Canterbury kids Robert Wyatt, Kevin Ayers and Mike Ratledge had been joined by the australian beatnick Daevid Allen, who certainly helped them to bring their music into most adventurous directions.
By the time of this footage for the Dutch TV, in late '67, Allen had already left them, he was in Paris planning a new musical adventure called Gong, but the trio proves to be able to continue on the crazy paths of an exciting surrealistic/dadaistic psychedelic pop. These clips are here to show it, in the same way as the first albums, before they became, in the '70s, a more straight, but still talented, jazz-rock band. The keyboard players Ratledge will stay as the leader of the band, while Ayers (that we've already met...) and later also Wyatt (that we'll meet soon...) will begin two very important solo careers.

Soft Machine - I Should've Known (1967)
Soft Machine - Soon, Soon, Soon (1967)

The password to unzip all the files is: musicforyoureyes

Don't forget to leave a comment if you enjoy these videos.

See you soon

Mirco

Sixties' Covers

Two great rock bands play their personal and overwhelming versions of classic sixties' songs.
Patti Smith has certainly been influenced by the rawest sixties' sound, like her friend Tom Verlaine, and let's not forget that her guitar player was Lenny Kaye, the musical journalist behind the original Nuggets compilation. Here the group performs Gloria at the Saturday Night Live Show on '76. Is Gloria the most covered song ever? Maybe, or maybe it's Hey Joe...
The "post-hardcore-punk" band Hűsker Dű started the most exciting phase of their career with a single in 1983 containing a cover of The Byrds' Eight Miles High. We can see them play this song at the Pink Pop Festival in Holland, on June 1987. In the same month I saw them in concert during their only italian tour. My heart is still beating for the emotion, and my ears still ringing...they were my favourite eightes' band, I'd like to post some other clips in the future, though this blog wasn't created with the intention to propose music videos from that era...

Patti Smith Group - Gloria (1976)
Hűsker Dű - Eight Miles High (1987)

The password to unzip all files is: musicforyoureyes

I hope you like these sixties' covers, I'd like to post some other ones...

Ciao

Mirco

Quest TV Show, 1964

This show was recorded in February 1964 for Canadian television, and broadcasted one month later. The footage has never been commercialy released, I know that the audio version has been bootlegged several times, so maybe the same thing happened with the video. Here Dylan performs live with his acouistic guitar and harmonica in a very strange scenography, with silent actors moving around, indifferent to him and his music...
The complete perfomance also included the songs Talking World War III Blues, The Lonesome Death Of Hattie Carroll and Restless Farewell.
These clips should certainly appeal to the many fans of the young Mr. Zimmerman, he plays live and he's as good as you expect him to be. A lot of time has passed but the times has changed enough yet.
These files are in .asf format, but with very high resolution.

Bob Dylan - The Times They Are A-Changin' (1964)
Bob Dylan - Girl From The North Country (1964)
Bob Dylan - A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall (1964)

The password to unzip all files is: musicforyoureyes

If you like Dylan in his early years I might post some other videos in the future...

Bye

Mirco

Detroit Rocks

Here are the leaders of the Detroit's late sixties heavy rock/proto-punk scene. These excerpt from the concert at the Cincinnati pop festival in June 1970 is, as far as I know, the only Stooges' video available (not considering the recent reunion...), the only time Iggy and his band have been shooted for television (they were not the kind of guys you would expect to see as guests on a TV show...). Despite the not perfect quality, it is an unique chance to see the young and angry Iguana on stage. His memorable perfomance has been reviewed on Julian Cope's site at this page, and also Lester Bangs was impressed enough to describe it in an article.
The MC5 bring their high-energy-revolutionary rock 'n' roll on television in 1970 too. Here they mime this song from the Back In The USA album. Though there are others MC5' s clips available among file-sharing people (they also perfomed live at the Beat Club in '72), I think this one is a little more rare, and gives the chance to look at their typical action on stage anyway.

Stooges - TV Eye/1970 (1970)
MC5 - Looking At You (1970)

The password to unzip all the files is: musicforyoureyes

So, there is a chance to see more MC5's videos in the future.

See you next time.

Mirco

Tropicália

I started feeling interest for Brazilian music after I had the chance to visit Brazil several times, and I fell in love with the places, the people, the culture...
Tropicalia is the name of a cultural movement that renewed the brazilian musical scene in the late sixties. Artists like Caetano Veloso and Gilbert Gil were born in the state of Bahia, in north-eastern Brazil, the historical heart of the country, home of the afro-brazilian culture. They started playing bossanova, being devoted fans of masters like Antonio Carlos Jobim and João Gilberto, but soon they felt the urge to bring into their musical traditions the new sounds and topics of international rock music. It was a period of great cultural and social changes and Brazil was passing trough a militar dictatorship. Gil and Veloso were considered dangerous and anarchical provokers, and they paid for it with prison and two years of exile in Europe. Right now their are considered ambassadors of Brazilian music in the world, always hovering between tradition and innovation. Veloso is still incredibly creative and Gil is the actual minister of culture.
Os Mutantes, a trio of rockers from São Paulo, represented the most psychedelic side of tropicalia, their first three albums are real masterpieces of eccentric pop, crossing many different musical styles with the support of the genial arrangements by their producer Rogerio Duprat, a musician with classical background.
I think the first video is from a festival at the Paramount Theatre in Rio de Janeiro. You can feel the tension in the social clime of those years, the most conservative part of the audience was protesting because of the hippy clothes and electric guitars used by Os Mutantes. At the same time we can see a musician playing the berimbau, typical instrument of north-eastern Brazil's folklore. Anyway Gil is able to front the situation with his charismatic presence on stage.
The Os Mutantes' clip is part of a concert performed for television in '69. This fine song was also the title of a collective compilation of tropicalia artists. You can see one of them on the clip, Tom Zé, another innovative and talented songwriter, appears among the audience, with the acoustic guitar in his hands.

Gilberto Gil And Os Mutantes - Domingo No Parque (1967)
Os Mutantes - Panis Et Circenses (1969)

I have two more clips from the Os Mutantes' concert, I hope you'll like to see them.

The password to unzip all files is: musicforyoureyes

See you

Mirco

Re-posted Again...

The clips that were "hardly available" on Sendspace have been re-posted on Rapidshare, here are the new links:

Captain Beefheart - She's Too Much For My Mirror/My Human Gets Me Blues (1969)
Captain Beefheart - Hothead/Ashtray Heart (1980)
Nick Drake - River Man (1969)
Leonard Cohen -Suzanne (1967)

See posts below for the infos.

Password: musicforyoureyes

See you tomorrow

Progressive Rock

Well, it looks like the files uploaded on Sendspace are still unavailable, for me and most of the visitors of this blog...there's been a very few downloads in the last day, while the Beefheart's video has been downloaded almost a hundred times only on the first 24 hours!
If the problem continues I might consider to re-upload the Beefheart's clips, because they had a lot of success and have been available for a very short time, in the meantime I return on Rapidshare to offer another couple of videos.

It's hard to believe how successful have been in my country, Italy, the british progressive-rock of the '70's, including bands like King Crimson or Van Der Graaf Generator, whose intense and dramatic music where certainly not very easy and catchy. But they reached the top of the charts.
Both of these great live performances are from the old Beat Club. The King Crimson appear in their second incarnation, playing a very complex but also agressive music, that used to leave much space for improvisations by each one of the five virtuoso instrumentalists. You'll notice the surrealistic look of the french percussionist Jamie Muir, who have been in the line-up for a very short time.
Van Der Graaf Generator offers a good example of their gloomy and powerfull music, that was born when the charismatic singer and "tortured poet" Peter Hammil discovered the expressive possibilities of the electric instruments...and of his own voice.
I dont want to talk too much, I know my English is far from being perfect, so please apologize me and enjoy the music.
Expect for more progressive rock and more Van Der Graaf Generator in the future.

King Crimson - Larks' Tongues In Aspic Part 1 (1972)
Van Der Graaf Generator - Whatever Would Robert Have Said (1970)

The password to unzip the files is: musicforyoureyes

Bye

Mirco

Downloading Problems Again...

I noticed that the last six videos I uploaded on Sendspace are not available, I hope the problem is only temporary. I saw that my friend BAZ on his brilliant Sonic Pollutions blog (go and check it if you haven't done it yet) is having the same trouble. I ask you to be patient about that. I'm the first one to get a little nervous and frustrated, because I've already seen some files deleted by Rapidshare...I spend a good part of my free time on this blog, and I hope I don't have to be re-uploading the same files over and over...

Your Captain's Speaking

Don Van Vliet, known as Captain Beefheart, is one of the greatest eccentric and surrealistic genius in the history of popular(?) music. Also very debatable, it looks like if you don't love him you hate him. He started playing the blues and ended up upsetting the common musical rules, creating a totally new and alien style. The real Captain's fans love particulary the abstruse and astonishing masterpiece Trout Mask Replica, produced by Frank Zappa in '69. Others just dare to listen to some easier and almost normal (but still brilliant) records of the 70's, like The Spotlight Kid or Unconditionally Guaranteed.
On the first clip we can see the Captain and his Magic Band on their weirdest period (you'll notice their unusual look too...), performing two songs from the "Replica" record, during a concert in Belgium.
The second clip shows a memorable appeareance at the Saturday Night Live show in 1980. Introduced by Malcolm "Clockwork Orange" McDowell, the Magic Band is still able to play with caustic energy. At the end of the performance you can clearly hear someone shouting "shit!". Was it excitement? Disgust? Astonishment?...
A couple of years later he ended up his musical career, sick of the mediocrity in the music business scene. Don Van Vliet still lives as a painter, Captain Beefheart died more than 20 years ago, but his influence is stronger than ever for musicians trying to create somenthing out of the ordinary.

Captain Beefheart - She's Too Much For My Mirror/My Human Gets Me Blues (1969)
Captain Beefheart - Hothead/Ashtray Heart (1980)

More Beefheart's clips in the future, if you wish...

Leave a comment, even just to say: "shit!"
Password: musicforyoureyes

See you

Mirco

Byrds, Nico & The Velvets Re-posted Too

Here they are:

Byrds - Turn! Turn! Turn! (1965)
Nico - I'm Not Saying (1965)
Velvet Underground - Sunday Morning (1967)

See posts below for the infos...

The password to unzip all files is: musicforyoureyes

See you soon with some new/old music videos

Mirco

Pentangle And Kevin Ayers Re-posted

I have re-posted two of the videos that have been kindly removed:

Pentangle - Travelling Song/Let No Man Steal Your Thyme (1968)
Kevin Ayers & The Whole World - May I (1972)

The links on the original posts have been repaired too. I'll re-post the other deleted videos soon.

The password to unzip the files, as usual, is: musicforyoureyes

Poets And Songwriters

Here we are again in 2006, thanks to everyone for the encouragement and the suggestions. You'll see that downloading is a little bit more complicated now, but I want to avoid the little troubles I told about in the previous post. The videos that disappeared might be posted again soon, if you wish...in the meantime let's see if everything works fine with these new ones...

If there are some songwriters that deserve to be called poets too, Nick Drake and Leonard Cohen are certainly among them. Actually Cohen began to write poems even before he started singing. His immortal classic Suzanne was recorded in'67, but I guess this beautiful clip was shooted in the '70's...or 80's maybe. Does anyone knows which is the language of the subtitles? I think it's a northern-european tounge, but i can't recognize it.
Nick Drake still stands as a romantic figure, admired and respected by younger indie-pop fans too. He used to spread his melancholy lyrics in a sweet and tender way, with the clear sound of his voice and his guitar-picking, and, in this case, a perfect string arrangement. This is a very poetic clip too, a mosaic of Nick's pictures and other beautiful black and white images that fit perfectly with the musical atmosphere.
To people wondering why there are no Bob Dylan's videos I say don't worry, we'll soon meet Mr. Zimmerman too.

Nick Drake - River Man (1969)
Leonard Cohen - Suzanne (1967)

The password to unzip all the files is: musicforyoureyes

Please report any dead links, and leave a comment if you like the videos...or even you don't.

See you soon

Mirco