C or D: Robbie Basho, "Basho Sings"

reference points / descriptors ? hmm.. maybe like Tim Buckley at his most yodelriffic except with a much thinner / weedier voice..

"Waiting, in the Warm Golden Rain
The Sweet Silent Reign of the Sun
To come again
Are you ready, My Son
For to ride the Rainbow of His Light?
I am ready, My Father
For to ride this Rainbow of Your Light"

Plus several sections written in Sioux! Actually I love this stuff, but like I say it's for comedy reasons as much as for his amazing playing.

which record of his do you have, ian?

On iTunes there's a Vanguard Digital Vaults release of an unissued album, "Indian II"

Never seen or heard talk of this, but it seems it surfaced 2006. Downloaded and it's pretty solid Basho, though no highlight. I like that the opening track is a piano number. Still, would be worth Vanguard doing at least an actual, physical, limited release.

I've been thinking without listening to this album for a while now. Very beautiful, strange music.

I love how the melodies follow their own tails up surprising directions.

unreleased live album?

http://static.boomkat.com/images/130055/333.jpg

Live at the Kulturforum, Bonn, Germany, November 24, 1980

i remember someone or other on fmu talking about the situation regarding all the live tapes that exist - that they ended up with the, uhh, religious faction that he was involved with towards the end of his life, and that no-one knew where they were, how to get in touch, what was recorded, etc.

haha what religious faction was that? i gave this a listen and it's great. possibly the best album i've heard of his.

listened to basho all day yesterday, it's been a long time since i just played the same records over and over. mostly 'Art of the Acoustic Steel String Guitar 6 & 12' but also some 'Rainbow Thunder'. i like his singing but i do prefer the instrumentals, i feel like his voice overshadows the guitar a bit too much when it comes in

i have all these mislabeled basho mp3s but I've been listening to them over and over that one that's all "on my waaay, Colinda, lord, I'll catch the, westbound train" is slaying me lately.

who is this colinda chick anyway?

i once used a song from 'basho sings' in a skate video and most people really dug it in that context. i suspect most of them really would not have cared for it on its own. maybe basho's ready for the big screen. he'd sure add some intensity to a sequence.

these make a great soundtrack to forrest bess paintings btw

i've grown to like his vocal albums now except for voice of the eagle which is too cheesy

crazy this is the only basho thread! anyone heard this "new" thing?
http://dustedmagazine.com/reviews/7065
sample sounds gorgeous.

anyone see this? only know video footage of basho posted here:
http://robbiebasho.com/Home_Page.html
cool site overall too.

Holy smoke, those videos! They seem to confirm what I thought I heard in the music -- there is very little random in his playing -- when improvising, he might surprise the audience, but he seems to know precisely what he's doing at all times. Also his right hand tonal and dynamic control are phenomenal.

amazing! i knew his right hand wld be crazy but it looks so strange: floppy wrist, hand really far away playing loosely at the bridge. incredible to see.

yeah, the right hand was what was most interesting to me, don't know if i've seen anyone playing like that. hope there's more!

Fuck, this rules! I too like how his right hand kinda curls around the guitar and the way he's almost bent over double so that his ear is right near the sound hole.

Love Basho so much but I've never explored his ouvre much beyond Bashovia and Guitar Soli. Guess I really should buy some more albums! He inspired me to play open tuned exclusively like 10 years ago when I was just starting out on guitar and I'm forever in his debt.

Anyway, I am surprised that no one in this thread about Basho's singing mentioned Antony Hegarty.

Well, if people mostly know his singing from the 60s, it's not that much of a surprise, but he got really good through the 70s, and his best vocal tune -- man, wow:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YYaGChm8RWw&feature=related

holy cats

afterwards, it ask me if i want to listen to 15 minutes of pharoah sanders "the creator has a master plan"

um, yeah

I can't see youtubes at work but I really hope that's "Orphan's Lament".

Nah, it was "Blue Crystal Fire" from one year earlier -- but I do dig Orphan's Lament as well, so here it is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFjkdjb7WNs

Actually, that's from the same record. Best thing Windham Hill ever put out, and it's not Windham Hilly at all.

Excellent! Love "Blue Crystal Fire" too...Visions of the Country just kills me; I think it's probably his best record.

xp liam there have been a few great releases since the comps & Seal of the Blue Lotus reissue. Venus in Cancer has been reissued by tompkins square & is first-class basho imo, features both the tracks in the video footage, a surprisingly amazing piece w/ french horn & some great vocal stuff. bo'weavil also issued a nice live concert from 1980, Bonn ist Supreme, which has lots of good stuff which is otherwise OOP.

i've bitten the bullet and forked out for the reissue of Twilight Peaks which came out earlier this year - http://en.smalltownromanceblog.com/new-robbie-basho-reissue-twilight-peaks/ - some live&unreleased stuff, really good sound & quite a bit slower than versions floating around online, although idk what has gone on w/ the cover art, which imo should have been:

http://www.musikzimmer.ch/pics/covers/albums/20124.jpg

but yeah it's amazing, his technique has improved so much compared to the early recordings & it's an incredibly tender, gentle & calm record, mb my fav basho.

obv all his stuff should be reissued but Basho Sings!, Voice of the Eagle, Visions of the Country, & Rainbow Thunder especially. mb Zarthus too but it seems like his fruitiest record.

something i doubt will be reissued any time soon, at the other end of his career, is this lone track from a takoma comp, The Thousand Incarnations Of The Rose, which is an awesome instance of ambition carrying him through even if the technique is not 100% there & incredibly dramatic

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WFshZQYmLBY

*listens to robbie basho instrumental song*

"OMG this guy is the greatest of all time"

*robbie basho singing song comes up*

"....oh dear god"

^ hahahah otm

the worst is when it's like a sublime 9 minute track that you think is instrumental but then his vocals kick in around the five minute mark

his singing rules fuiud

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJKhHY2OhEQ

i'm afraid i will be fu'd in this case

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YYaGChm8RWw

not loving this does not compute imo

awesome

right now a woman is talking about the rainbow king while robbie "aaaahs" in the background. so good to visit a new bit of bashovia

lol at THE "PERFECT" CHRISTMAS GIFT!
https://40.media.tumblr.com/f826f2f6e864e10e2e959f7947951b53/tumblr_nxzhxkYfUl1rl3uofo1_500.jpg

love badly used quotation marks

this record is sounding pretty solid! had never heard it before.

weirdness! at least they're getting the music out there... kyle and those grasstops guys are super nice, and i'm sure they haven't been doing anything shady with this music. someone must think they're sitting on a Basho goldmine or something.

― tylerw, Tuesday, February 23, 2016 2:17 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah the whole thing is really dumb, grass tops just wants it available

i would say they are making an extremely modest amount if they are making anything doing these projects, they have a put a ton of work into them

yeah, i mean, they're actually putting the work into it all -- getting the best sounding versions they can get, creating nice packages ... i mean, if someone else actually holds the rights to the recordings, they should work something out -- i agree that Basho would probably just want his music heard.

Is "The Entity" the Meher Baba Trust?

i don't think so

Why not?

ha well i *know* it's not -- kyle at grass-tops told me who was behind it all, but I don't think it's my place to put it out there in a public forum.

Fair enough. (I figured you had insider knowledge and understand if you can't spill.)

yeah don't mean to be mysterious, just don't want to potentially make things worse!

Someone shared this on Facebook and for some reason if put me in mind of Basho, something about the voice/guitar combo, only beamed in from a whole other world/tradition. Anyway, ver nice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7ICTX4MwRY

more previously unreleased basho up via grass-tops: https://soundcloud.com/grasstopsrecording/robbie-basho-interview-performance-the-coffeehouse-program-wers-boston-ma-71383

that bonfa is exquisite, much tidier than basho could ever manage but the romance is there

http://www.robbiebasho.com/ the new robbiebasho.com

Anyone know if the documentary will get a DVD release? I'm very eager to see it, but it isn't playing anywhere near here I live.

i bet it'll get on youtube. the fahey one was off-and-on on there for awhile. probably not legal, but could give it a look

Hope so! But would gladly buy a DVD if one became available. I bought the Fahey DVD, and it'd almost have to be better than that.

Anyone see this btw?

Thanks to this wonderful forum, I have discovered the music of Robbie Basho - one of my favourite discoveries of the past few years. I took Visions of the Country to record club the other night.

https://devonrecordclub.com/2016/09/02/robbie-basho-visions-of-the-country-round-94-toms-selection/

Which album(s) should I get next?

Visions Of The Country is a great one. Basho albums are pretty much divided (somewhat superficially) between vocal albums and instrumental albums. For years the prevailing logic was that the vocal ones were bad and the instrumental ones were good, but I think that consensus has changed a bit in recent years. I was a person who initially couldn't deal with the vocals, but at some point I realized how much a part of Basho's music / imagination / gift his vocals were, and that to truly appreciate him, you had to reckon with the singing (which I now find quite beautiful, though like I said, it took me years to come around). He held nothing back.

If you like Visions of the Country, you'll probably like any other of his vocal albums. Rainbow Thunder is a somewhat obscure one that was recently reissued and iirc this was from the same general period as VFTC.

Not sure you can go wrong with any Basho album though (some here may disagree). Good luck and enjoy the search!

Oh, also, read this! www.elephantjournal.com/2011/07/robbie-basho-was-an-angel-i-dont-believe-he-was-terrestrial-jerome-burdi/

that's a good article, though I think basho was playing steel string before he met fahey (fahey says they were introduced on the basis that they both had 12 strings) and it's worth noting that both his guitar and footage of him playing have turned up since it was published.

you'll probably want to stick to his guitar albums at first (there are some with piano and drumming and so on). the earliest are a bit rough technically but fiery and a lot of fun. I recommend going for his early-mid period where he's marking out his territory and is very much in full bloom, maybe the falconers arm I, venus in cancer or voice of the eagle

Thanks for the info. I'll try to find one of those three on vinyl. The other album that seems to be particularly rated is Zanthus...have you heard this one?

My mistake...Zarthus.

zarthus is very much basho at his celestial fruitiest, lots of piano etc, will revisit it at some point

Shame the Grass-tops label that did the Bouquet reissue seems to have vanished.

Apparently closed up earlier in the year. Glad they put out what they did at least.

Don't have any inside info, but really seemed from afar that this labor of love was cock-blocked at every turn

How would one track done that reissue at this point?

There will be a showing of the movie "Voice of the Eagle: The Enigma of Robbie Basho" at Coe College, Cedar Rapids Iowa, at Sinclair Auditorium where Robbie performed in 1978. Admission is free, and it is open to the general public.

Time and date of the above movie showing:7:30 Sunday March 19th 2017

https://obsoleterecordings.bandcamp.com/album/robbie-basho-live-in-forl-italy-1982

The samples sound great on this one. They're funding a short run vinyl.

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a0098279777_16.jpg

great cover

is he throwing up?

enjoying some fresh rocky mountain creek water

better to drink fresh rocky mountain creek water from your hands than...

Hey everyone--

Just to let you all know, tessaract3 from this thread passed this morning in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. He was 67 years old.

As it happens, he was my wife's birth father. He had a rough go of it for many years, but it was neat to see him connect with people over music he loved over the past several years.

(As for me, I'm a San Francisco-based mostly-lurker who's been here for the fifteen years or so.)

I'm sorry to hear that. I really love the community that built up around Fahey, Basho & Takoma, always seems to be really good, interesting people

anyone heard this new rarities compilation?

i didn't know there was one!

Land of our fathers, released on a swiss label called 'holographic ontological networks'. You think you've seen all the rad basho pics and then they dig this one out:

https://assets.boomkat.com/spree/products/606201/large/R-12025590-1526807186-3343.png.jpg

1000 incarnations of the rose and then a bunch of stuff I don't know.

Oh, I ordered that one in 2018! So not quite brand new. Definitely great though.

huh looks like boomkat have the wrong date! what's it like?

To be honest, I got it right before I moved so it quickly went out of sight and out of mind. Since finding it I've only spun it once so far.

I can't confirm any time soon (traveling), but the youtube list on the discogs page might be accurate?

https://www.discogs.com/Robbie-Basho-Land-Of-Our-Fathers-Rarities-1967-1983/release/12025590

ah, so a lot of the bouquet stuff!

Basho died unexpectedly at the age of 45 due to an accident during a visit to his chiropractor, where an "intentional whiplash" experiment caused blood vessels in his neck to rupture, leading to a fatal stroke.

Yup. Super freaky!

Phew -- new 5 CD set of unreleased Basho due out in December:

http://www.tompkinssquare.com/bashoboxset.html

It's out, and it's spectacular - depending on your tolerance for his voice, which is all over these tracks. (My personal tolerance is sky-high.) Other than some random string-tunings and asides to studio personnel, the tracks are pretty realized, not odds-n'-endsy at all.