Here's something a little out of the ordinary: as the title suggests, a shop window for what was at the time a fledgling enterprise, but now on the verge of entering its fourth decade, Recommended Records. Though 'shop' is not the right word for this post-mercantile enterprise that appears to be driven by personal commitment and the kind of leadership that persuades people to operate outside normal commercial terms. This is from the sleeve notes (evidently written on a typewriter and layed out using good old scissors and paste):
R.R. was set up in 1978 by CHRIS CUTLER & NICK HOBBS, originally as a musical intervention — to bring into the UK a whole range of records by groups & musicians whom we though excellent & yet who were completely unknown here. Then — as now — we were only concerned with the quality of the music & epiphenomenally wtih supporting independents — for many of the most interesting groups could only make their work available by pressing & manufacturing themselves. This remains the case. We are not ever concerned with commercial viability, only with distributing the music we feel close to.
Good word, 'epiphenomenally', and one which I'm glad to see growing in currency these days. Though the endeavour is conceived in terms of art, the politics are never far away. The whole double LP sounds like you're at a Eurocommunist gathering and have stumbled into the fringe workshop on the legacy of Brecht and Gramsci, where everyone looks like they're in a Fassbinder film. It concludes with Robert Wyatt singing The Internationale. Q.E.D.
Nothing dates faster than visions of the future, as I think Robert Hughes once said. And what we have here is a selection of musics that once felt (to me, anyway) like they might map out important future directions, but which turned out to remain forever on the margins or, in some cases, to be cul-de-sacs.
With hindsight we know whose reputations continued to grow, and who still remains in obscurity — in London, 2008, at least. The former group are mostly the Anglo-American acts: This Heat, The Residents. Henry Cow, Art Bears and Wyatt, plus Faust (Germany) and possibly Hector Zazou (France). Of Picchio Dal Pozzo, Conventum, Heiner Goebbels, Joseph Racaille & Patrick Portella, I'm not sure that I've heard of anything beyond this release.
I confess that, once it became clear that the tide of history was not flowing in this direction, these records rarely made it onto my turntable. Side 3 is a favourite, though: several mood-based pieces that work well together.
MusicBrainz entry for disc 1, disc 2
Wikipedia entry for this album
Rate Your Music entry for this album
Recommended Records vinyl discography
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