Sonny Sharrock: Ask The Ages (1991) Hive Mind (2019)

Selection: Who Does She Hope To Be?

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Track List

Promises Kept                       9:43
Who Does She Hope to Be? 4:41
Little Rock                             7:12
As We Used to Sing              7:45
Many Mansions                     9:31
Once Upon a Time                6:26

Artists

Sonny Sharrock, electric guitar;  Pharoah Sanders, tenor saxophone, soprano saxophone; Charnett Moffett, acoustic bass; Elvin Jones, drums 

Many hands make light work. Recorded at Sorcerer Sound by Jason Corsaro, Oz Fritz, Robert Musso; mixed at Platinum Island Studios by Jason Corsaro, assistant Wes Naprstek; mastered by Howie Weinberg at Masterdisk; produced by Bill Laswell, originally released 1991 on Laswell’s Axiom label. Remastered at Church Road Studios, Hove, UK by Julian Tardo.

It claims to be stereo, mixed as a Wall Of Sound with just a tad of of instrument positioning. It’s also firmly in the digital era, 1991, transistor microphones, solid state multitrack mixing, whatever. I wonder what those six guys listed in the engineering credits were doing all day in the studio apart from modelling Ray-Bans? Van Gelder did it all by himself, and I think better.

Music

Ask The Ages was among Sharrock’s last recorded works. – he passed away just three years later, at the age of only 53.

A Wiki writer described Ask the Ages as “hands down, Sharrock’s finest hour, and the ideal album to play for those who claim to hate jazz guitar.” Whilst I am not a fan of every instrument, I don’t think I actually hate any, though a question mark hangs over the bagpipes, French horn, update! and arco-bass). What I do hate is vacuous statements, like that one. 

“Who Does She Hope to Be?”, Wiki continues, is “a lyrical piece harkening back to the Coltrane/Davis Kind of Blue sessions that had inspired him to play in the first place”. Is this generated by ChatGPT? Who Does She.. is certainly the stand out track: lyrical, quite emotional, I enjoy the suspense as it slowly unfolds, nesting Charnett Moffett’s articulate bass. But I can’t hear Kind Of Blue in there, a quite different aesthetic. It is multi-tracked electric guitar, with double-tracked fuzzy chordal counterpoint, in a misty sonic background, and a generous hat-tip to Carlos Santana in the solo lines.

Sharrock’s guitar signature tone is distortion, and he is known for his “heavily chorded attack, highly amplified bursts of feedback, and use of aggressive sustain“. In a world saturated with guitar players, of every imaginable style, amplifier overload was nothing new. (I say that as a former guitarist, Les Paul solid body/Marshall stack, no effects pedal required). I’m not sure I would even describe it as jazz guitar, the improvisation, chording and fretwork isn’t there. It belongs more in the collision genre that combined avant-garde jazz rock and hip-hop punk, add a generous helping of NY faux-nihilism. Nineties Neo-Brutalism. 

Charnett Moffett was a prominent figure in the fusion genre, I have some LPs in the loft,  his adept finger-work here on upright bass is a delight. Pharoah is in there too somewhere, though I think not on this track, whilst Elvin is everywhere, if possibly a little restrained. 

Vinyl: Hive Mind Records HMRLP005 (UK 2019) 45rpm 2xLP

Vinyl reissue of 1991 recording, cut for vinyl presumably from a digital PCM source, mastered at low gain/narrow groove width. Sleeve note invites you to play loud, I guess to compensate for the low gain, pity the neighbours. Pressed on 2 x 45rpm LPs, when it will fit on one LP,  no indication of the source, or where pressed, all very “Brighton DJ“.

Harry’s Place

Finger on the shutter button, Harry seizes the moment, Sonny Sharrock, Montreux 1970, and Elvin Jones,  Jazz Expo 1970  .

 

 

 

 

 

 

Photo Credits © Harry M

Collector’s Corner

Original Axiom CD from the Bill Laswell stable.

The original cover art was at least true to the title “Ask The Ages“,  symbolic figures of ancient wisdom. The inclusion of a crucifix was brave but perhaps a bridge too far for modern times. Touchy business, religion, as opposed to archaeology. This is what the LP might have looked like based on the CD Insert.

The reissue’s purely typographic design was undoubtedly a safer choice, though it illustrates the limitations of Bill Laswell’s  dictum: “music as art and art as a weapon”. A weapon best aimed at people who don’t shoot back.

Oh oh, I spoke too soon. “Mr Laswell, I have a Mr. Tutankhamun’s lawyer on the phone. A Mr Ptah would like a word.” 

This recording was recommended to me. I tried it, with an open mind, but it is not really my thing. I am not criticising the music, all music is good, but this is not to my taste. However, past experience suggest there will be Sonny Sharrock devotees out there. No reason why they should not get some airtime at LJC, they have put up with my tastes, jazz is a broad church, have your say.

Feel free to educate me if you think I am missing out.  The search for good music should never stop at the boundary of what you already know you like. If it did, a dozen years ago I would have missed out jazz altogether. 

On the other hand, if you are not into this Laswell-inspired Nineties genre, a bus to your preferred destination will be along shortly.  Back to the mainstream next week.

UPDATE  Exceleration Candid reissue (2022) verdict

Based on this one record, not good. It takes some talent to manufacture a warped 180gm LP, but Exceleration’s chosen manufacturing plant managed it.  I watched the tone arm ride up and down, cart just tracking. No name credited, and I’m not surprised. Unforgivable. 

We know Bernie Grundman re-mastered it, as his initials are in the run out. From what?

Sonics? Shallow, lacking any body or presence you might expect from a quality transfer from original tapes. Missing sonic detail, attack, bass-floor, air, nothing. I took it off the turntable after a few minutes, unlistenable. Whatever the quality on the original tapes, it was lost in translation.

Exceleration may be marketing whizzkids, and Bernie Grundman is a big engineering name, but sonically, it sounds weak to me, like a digital transfer. I know it claims to be mastered from original tapes (none shown)  and it doesn’t sound like it to me. There is something wrong in the chain, I don’t know what, but it’s not right.

I hoped it might at least be decent listen, but I had to take it off after a few minutes.  Maybe too cheaply made, quality sacrificed to make the low price-point. The debacle of Blue Note 75, also involved Mr Grundman, multiple errors in trying to manufacture at a low unit price, is this a repeat performance? My advice, give Exceleration Candid reissues a miss. If you can’t run to an original, seek out a decent Barnaby reissue.

If anyone else has taken a punt on other titles in this Candid reissue series, give us a shout. I still think the “original tapes” story looks shaky, initials in the runout prove nothing, and we have defective pressing quality. I hope the Directors of Exceleration feel some financial pain from the return rate, and reputation damage – teach them something about proper vinyl manufacture business, and quality control. They need an engineering champion on board, and it’s not BG. I can’t return it, but will find a use for it, a nice retro dinner plate coaster, or plant stand.

Not been a very good week all in all: check in airport  two hours before flight then three hours delay to take off, and it’s bloody cold here in the UK! Arrive home, pop on Booker’s That’s It!, and it’s pants.  Some days are just not meant to be.

LJC