Is there a worse producer in the universe than Bill Laswell?

Speaking of which, did he ever come out with those Tony Williams Lifetime remasters?

I'm sure there's *a* record of his that I really like, but I'm wore out and can't momentarily recall it.

Material! Sounds great, doesn't it? Whitney Houston featuring Archie Shepp sings Robert Wyatt (yeah, OK, Hugh Hopper). But, X, it's dull. Dated even in 1981. "Rhythm Killers" by Sly & Robbie. By God Bill killed the rhythm there. OK, there was Last Exit. One absolute mindfuck of a debut album - Brotzmann, Sharrock, Shannon Jackson. But that bass? It don't 'arf let it down. Wouldn't it have been better to have Melvin Gibbs and/or Jah Wobble down there? By the time they got to their third album - a duff photocopy of Crimson's "Red." PiL's "Album"! How can any record with Tony Williams AND Ginger Baker on drums sound so drumless? (See CSM's pertinent point in today's Guardian Friday Review vis-a-vis Pet Shop Boys, i.e. what dates pop music the most is the drumming/drum machining). Aargh! I've diverted this thread into a B-road again. Mark S! Get me outta here!

Another possible Laswell triumph: Herbie Hancock's "Rockit".

The only dud-ish thing I can think of is the Swans album and that wasn't Laswell's fault, I don't think. I like the way he throws 80s gloss on his bass sound on improv records and then lets noise rip into it.

Strike that, reverse it = just how I feel, man.

As a bassist he's one of those guys that plays an interesting bassline here and there but never really holds a bottom, and also uses way too many effects, rendering his tone flat and robofarty.

You know what's funny about this thread? Everybody on it is like, "Bill Laswell is awful, terrible and hideous...but I like Record X by Brilliant Artist Y" -- and invariably that record sucks, too!

I do not hold myself harmless here.

lately anything Visconti touched turns to crap.

Laswell's recording of the Master Musicians of Jajouka's "Apocalypse Across the Sky" is pretty amazing.

^^^^this

http://i.walmart.com/i/p/00/07/56/78/25/0007567825532_500X500.jpg

is Mick going through her purse on that cover?

I would be shocked if it didn't sound like every other dub record Laswell's ever produced — and he's produced a TON, most of which are virtually interchangeable, despite the revolving cast of characters ("This one has Wobble!" "OMG, Haruomi Hosono's on this!"). The result is the same, every single time: lots of wet, facelessly digital, phasey atmospherics, tons of delay and—oddly for dub—almost no sense of space whatsoever.

Honestly, it's incredible how little Laswell has accomplished with all the studio time he's logged.

he's kept this thread going for 7 years, surely that's got to count for something

I should also add: about 15 years ago, I bought a ton of this guy's stuff — all those Axiom comps, the Material records, etc. I seriously couldn't get enough of it — the guy was just working with every hero I could imagine, from virtually every surviving member of P-Funk to all sorts of world musicians with names I couldn't pronounce who played instruments I'd never heard of.

Then it sort of hit me: everything this guy did was all kind of the same. The ludicrous liner notes to much of these records notwithstanding, there wasn't really any concept or "driving force" behind it at all -- just this sense that because modern recording technology allowed you to have the Master Musicians of Jajouka jam with Sly and Robbie, you should.

I mean, seriously, look at some of these collaborations on paper:

Slavemaster: Michael Hampton and Gary "Mudbone" Cooper tearing it behind frontman Islam Shabazz shouting Muslim propaganda.

Bachir Attar: Jajouka musician playing with a percussionist and Maceo Parker

Bahia Black: Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter with a Brazilian drum troupe.

Jah Wobble's Heaven and Earth: PiL bass god playing with Pharaoh Sanders, Bernie Worrell and various DJ's

Dark Side of the Moog: Multiple synthfests with the likes of Klaus Schulze and Pete Namlook

Dub Meltdown: Laswell and Dub Syndicate rhythm supremo, Style Scott

Third Rail: Blood Ulmer, Bernie Worrell, Meters drummer, Zigaboo Modeliste

Radioaxiom w/ Jah Wobble, Nils Petter Molvær, Hamid Drake, Amina Claudine Myers, Sly Dunbar, Aiyb Deng, Nicky Skopelitis, Graham Haynes, Karsh Kale, and vocalist Gigi Shibabbaw

Every one of these things sounds like they should be incredible -- and virtually none of them are. Very few of the players are given any space to really stretch out or, if they are, the support or context they need to shine. It's just soup.

I'll be the first to point out that the records he's done that have worked are often amazing: PiL's Album, the 80s Hancock records. And there aren't that many people who have the Rolodex Bill Laswell clearly does. It's just kind of a shame he hasn't done more worthwhile stuff with it.

I second Freeman's endorsement of Orgasmatron. Great fucking record. That thick, dubby production is the last think you'd expect on a Motorhead record. But it makes sense, considering Lemmy's bass powers the ship.

uh. okay. always sounded really thin to me, rather like a better version of his godawful production on white zombie's make them die slowly. like a guy who doesn't know rock, doesn't like rock, but goddamit he's gonna produce some rock. orgasmatron ain't a bad album but the production really hinders it excepting the title track.

There's a certain absurdity to the record that I dig. Lemmy even sounds as if he's rapping or something on the title track. For me, this is what nu metal SHOULD"VE sounded like!

I guess Laswell produced Massacre - Killing Time? Don't like the sound on that one. Plus the cd version is an annoying compilation with bonus tracks and live cuts added in the middle of the album. Stupid idea

i still listen to this album after all these years and there are times when i think it sounds great and other times when i am just baffled by the muffled weirdness of some tracks soundwise:

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/147/374535428_476f52fb90.jpg?v=0

John Zorn is arguably as bad, in a different way. Laswell makes everything sound the same, Zorn manages to consistently pull subpar performances out of pretty much whoever he works with on Tzadik, with very few exceptions.

I love Massacre's Killing Time! Best thing the guy ever did imho. Will also rep for Material up to and including Memory Serves.

Odd. I usually find that the Tzadik release/s are the keeper/s for me with many artists.

xpost

Material 1980 w/Sonny Sharrock & Fred Frirth

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h78HoFFGWiU

I didn't realize until that 1984 poll that Laswell had produced Time Zone's "World Destruction".

i miss dave q

he's kept this thread going for 7 years, surely that's got to count for something

― Edward III, Thursday, August 14, 2008 10:49 AM (3 years ago)

Also enjoyed NTI's elaboration of his "soup" stance in the following post.

I don't miss the 2001 me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3CZPNT9GSs...pertinent...

Speaking of Laswell on the Whitney Houston RIP thread, somebody says Nona Hendryx is better suited to Laswell's purposes. I liked Nona with Proproganda, especially live, but she always seemed too compressed on (my already ancient stereo's impression of) the first pressing of One Down. Maybe Laswell as more suitably rank-n-filem than Whitney. Here's the way Alfred and I discussed "Memories":

Only things wrong with "Memories": Shepp, struggling with his lip for years, overplays the very first note of his solo, a little "ethereal" breathiness/brain fart, but then redeems himself (thing of no wrong notes if you can come up with the right context); also, do we really need kitchen percussion to show how real this is? But the song, the singer the feeling merge perfectly.

Gamble & Huff also recalled Ms. Houston’s strong Philly connection:
- A then-unknown Whitney Houston recorded “Hold Me,” a duet with Gamble & Huff recording artist Teddy Pendergrass for his 1984 Elektra album, “Love Language,” his first following the automobile accident that left him paralyzed.

― dow, Sunday, February 12, 2012 3:14 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Only things wrong with "Memories": Shepp, struggling with his lip for years, overplays the very first note of his solo

I wondered about this! I agree. At any rate it's too loud for a few seconds.

― Exile in lolville (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, February 12, 2012 3:17 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Kind of a "Hahhh", quietly overwrought stage whisper--not just the lip, maybe also the perils of what the young Shepp mocked as "my Stan Getz shit", talking to Leroi Jones. But when they were on it, Getz and Shepp made a lot of good records fueled by that shit (among other things).

missed cutting the beginning of the Gamble & Huff press release, sorry

Also clipped "Maybe Laswell heard Nona as more rank-n-file than Whitney" (so maybe deliberately compressed her)

more of a starship trooper

more ship than stars, except to us fans of the in-crowd

I adore the Whitney track...soooooo downtown NY '81

i'm still p fond of the early laswell, right up to last exit i guess -- it was VERY patchy, but i think that was part of the point (free improvisation is patchy!)

Happy birthday, Bill Laswell.

http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=nona+hendryx+ghost+love&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CDEQtwIwAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DuYNEuOHeL1o&ei=xUE4T5ylJcf38QO1hc2dBA&usg=AFQjCNFYsRdX1yBTesBXSfDjvTHrKad5Hg

haha i was actually planning a "laswell: where is the LOVE" thread, so i searched to check it wasn't a repeat and found tarden-as-was (from 11 years ago!)

"laswell: where is the LOVE (ON HIS 57th BIRTHDAY)?"

Material's Memory Serves and One Down have aged v well

yup. 2 really good albums. Was he involved in the Zillatron album? That was the best Bootsy album in the last 25 years.

Ask The Ages, Low-Life, and "Bonzo Goes To Washington" are all killer.

also: Sly & Robbie's Rhythm Killers (though may have co-produced w them), Motorhead's Orgasmatron.

Unfuckwithable: Ronald Shannon Jackson's Texas

and "Bonzo Goes To Washington"

Did Laswell actually had something to do with this? I've never heard that he did. Wasn't it produced by Arthur Russell?

I had a few of Laswell's projects over the years, these three I kept. If you like what he did with the Miles Davis recordings, these things are pretty much in that vein, if perhaps a bit more electronic in nature.

Material - Hallucination Engine
Sacred System Dub - Chapter 1 & Chapter 2

i miss dave q

― mark s, Sunday, 12 February 2012 22:18 (Yesterday) Permalink

You don't even post here any more.

xp You're right, Laswell didn't work on BGTW. Not sure why I thought that, unless I confused him with Jerry Harrison.

he does too sometimes.

x-post

the first Colorcode record smokes with RAW POWER!!

2nd the many mentions of sharrock's ask the ages. one of my very favorite albums. and motorhead's orgasmatron is alright. not the most sympathetic production they've ever had, but far from the worst. remember loving the two sacred system albums earlnash just mentioned, though it's been a while.

also remember digging some of the releases on the "strata" offshoot of laswell's subharmonic imprint, especially halo by azonic. earth-style heavy drones produced by laswell and andy hawkins. cool shit.

I interviewed him last year; we talked about Last Exit, Painkiller, some of his other industrial-metal-dub projects, the John Zorn/Fred Frith/Laswell/Dave Lombardo band, recording Pharoah Sanders in North Africa, and lots of other stuff. Here's a link.

As a producer I think he's done some cool (and terrible!) stuff. As a player, much more hit or miss, but some of those hits hit hard, like Painkiller, Massacre, Last Exit and Peter Gabriel's "This is the Picture."

I don't think his hit/miss ratio is bad at all. He's just done so fucking much. It's easy to point to a lot of good projects if you like the guy and easy to point at a lot of middling to poor stuff if you don't feel like being generous towards him.

ooh for an extended/remastered edition of rhythm killers.

it has to happen soon surely ?

I think some of his misses, like in my opinion the Miles Davis remixes or Bob Marley remixes, are so bad they really offset his frequent high points. At the time I really liked his sort of new age dub he was up to with the later golden palominos records, but I have a feeling they have not aged well.

I need to listen to Panthalassa (the Miles record) again. I listened to Divine Light (his remix of Carlos Santana's Love Devotion Surrender and Illuminations) recently and it's good; kind of an ambient reimagining of those records, but with enough guitar fireworks to keep it from dissolving into a puddle of sugar water.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hev2qx1y2IU

Dude produced "Rockit" so...yes, there is a worse producer out there somewhere. Only know that b/c yesterday I heard a Sly and Robbie album from '85 that Laswell produced called Language Barrier that sounded so much like "Rockit" I had to look it all up. Album had a bunch of the same musicians on it as Future Shock (and Dylan somewhere on it, too, but didn't hear him on the song I heard.

I remember being like downright angry after I bought Panthalassa, like I had literally been ripped off. I just listened to a bit of it and it didn't bother me as much as I remembered. Still not sure what it adds to the picture or why I wouldn't just listen to the miles records.

I just bought three old Axiom releases from Laswell's Bandcamp page - Billy Bang's Outline No. 12 (conducted by Butch Morris), Henry Threadgill's Too Much Sugar for a Dime, and Maleem Mahmoud Ghania and Pharoah Sanders' The Trance of Seven Colors.

I like his Miles remix record

I do too.

I haven't heard all that many Axiom records, and the hit/miss ratio is pretty terrible for what I've heard, but I remember being very captivated by the fold-out catalog that came with one of the cds I got in college. It felt like he was creating a world, throwing together with all these different genres, musicians I'd heard of, and mysterious titles and artwork. That was a bigger influence on me than the music, a lot of which is, like, bad trip-hop and funk jams.