Review: CAPTAIN BEEFHEART REVIEW
THE LOST BROADCASTS: CAPTAIN BEEFHEART & HIS MAGIC BAND (Gonzo Multimedia, HST112DVD)
Track list: Mascara Snake (Bass Solo)/Click Clack 1/Click Clack 2/Golden Birdies/Band Intros/I’m Gonna Booglarize You Baby 1/I’m Gonna Booglarize You Baby 2/Steal Softly Thru The Snow/I’m Gonna Booglarize You Baby 3.
Recorded in a TV studio in Bremen (for the Beat-Club, with no audience) in 1972, mid-tour between The Spotlight Kid andClear Spot albums. The Mascara Snake (aka Hair Pie) bass solo starts with a blue screen before Rockette Morton (aka Mark Boston, looking like Dr. Jacoby from Twin Peaks) appears - or rather, primarily it’s his hands and bass we see. A portly Captain then strolls on to impishly announce, “And this is the mascara fake!” Once the solo ends, the camera switches to a monocled Ed Marimba (Art Tripp), who appears to be wearing a small pair of psychedelic underpants on his head, with a very animated and behatted Boston now on six string and Roy Estrada out on parole. I mean bass. Click Clack 1 is largely focussed on the Captain, his taped together mics and harp. And it seems we’re getting everything that was filmed here, so a bit of a second stab of that one too - which collapses shortly after the harp solo. Golden Birdies signals some visual effects so beloved of 70s TV producers whereby Zoot Horn Rollo (Bill Harkleroad) is superimposed on the rest of the band, etc. Tripp appears to emit a short fart during Band Intros, as the lens fails to actually capture exactly who’s who. Never mind. There’s a fair bit of feedback during I’m Gonna Booglarize You Baby 1, and Beefheart seems a little distracted by a studio technician. So he stops the song and walks off. The band start version 2 without him, but he returns in time to warble as only he (and Howlin’ Wolf, and possibly some others) can. Or could. Steal Softly Thru The Snow is played as an instrumental (with two basses), and sees Tripp and Beefheart - on soprano sax - duetting for the song’s thrilling denouement. I’m Gonna Booglarize You Baby 3 signals some more FX and is the only part of this performance that was actually shown on the Beat-Club. Now, thanks to Gonzo and Voiceprint, it’s readily available for all to marvel at. And well worth the wait it was too. Great sound and picture quality throughout. Oh, and by the way: the hirsute other former Mother, Winged Eel Fingerling (Elliot Ingber), is fairly anonymous behind his shades, with the camera really only dwelling on him occasionally, and most notably when he’s not actually playing (when the miffed Beefheart walks off).
Review: Captain Beefheart Greek review
Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band - The Lost Broadcasts
Fri, 09/07/2012 - 01:22 | thanos
Capt. Beefheart & his Magic Band
The Lost Broadcasts
Gonzo Multimedia
2012
https://www.beefheart.com
Music was moving in weird paths back in the late 60s/early 70s. Blame it on the LSD and in general, the “free” drugs of that era, blame it on the freedom people were enjoying, the mystification & lack of restrictions the artists/musicians had, the creativity/imagination of all the arts and specially of the music… you can actually go anywhere from there… so these are some reasons why this era will always be considered as a bizarre & odd one.
Captain Beefheart belongs to that specific era. Influenced by another great personality/musician of that time, the weird and remarkable Frank Zappa, he did form his own music vehicle under the name of Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band, and presented his avant-garde, blues, rock, experimental, psychedelic and jazz music. Captain Beefheart also had the chance to work with Zappa, as he produced “Trout Mask Replica” and they both released “Bongo Fury” in 1975.
During his European tour in 1972, Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band stopped off at the Beat Club studios in Bremen, Germany to film a session for later transmission. The band’s line-up was: Captain Beefheart (Don Van Vliet) on vocals, harp; Rockette Morton (Mark Boston) on guitar and bass, Zoot Horn Rollo (Bill Harkleroad) on guitar, Orejon (Roy Estrada) on bass, Ed Marimba (Art Tripp) on drums, and Winged Eel Fingerling (Elliot Ingber) on guitar. Weirdly enough out of the four songs that were filmed that day only one track has ever been broadcast.
Now after almost 40 years, the UK label Gonzo MultiMedia, finally released these momentous Beat Club sessions on DVD. This video has not been seen in over 4 decades and here you have the complete sessions from April 12, 1972… and all the takes they did for some songs as well. This DVDcontains the whole material filmed during the band’s live sessions at the Beat Club studios. Should you feel nostalgic for that era & for its “weird/psycho-like” music, then you’ll have a nice time watching it.
Review: Captain Beefheart in Record Collector
CAPTAIN BEEFHEART & HIS MAGIC BAND - THE LOST BROADCASTS
Dancing with the Captain
By the time the German TV show Beat Club was winding down in 1972, the beat in question had been all but supplanted by altogether edgier rhythms. Among the unlikeliest luminaries to grace the show’s soundstage were Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band.
The Lost Broadcasts presents everything the Captain and crew performed on that epochal day, in pin-sharp focus and startling fidelity. Frustratingly, this makes for a DVD that’s barely half an hour long: once you’ve had two takes of Click Clack and three of I’m Gonna Booglarize You Baby, all that remains is Golden Birdies, an instrumental reading of Steal Softly Thru Snow and Rockette Morton’s unfeasibly violent introductory bass solo.
But what there is of this music nears a strange perfection. The riveting spectacle of this most magic of bands in constant, snakey, criss-cross motion – driven lopsidedly by monocled drummer Ed Marimba, deploying a pair of paisley Y-fronts as a bandana – is more than matched by the dirty locomotion they generate as an ensemble. Top everything off with the rogueish Captain executing his finest bull-moose field holler, and you remember just why they were in a different league to every other band in the known universe.
By the time the German TV show Beat Club was winding down in 1972, the beat in question had been all but supplanted by altogether edgier rhythms. Among the unlikeliest luminaries to grace the show’s soundstage were Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band.