BARRY GUY: Statements V-XI for Double Bass and Violone

MEGA RARE BRIT-IMPROV on INCUS ( AND SIGNED!)

LABEL INFO: INCUS Records

CATALOGUE NUMBER: INCUS 22

YEAR: 1977

COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: UK

TRACKLIST: Statement V/ Statement VI/ Statement VII/ Statement VIII/ Statement IX/ Statement X/ Statement XI

This is the highly sought after solo improv LP from master Barry Guy on INCUS records. Along with cohorts Derek Bailey, Evan Parker et al, Guy was a major player in shaping European improv music. At the this point in his career, Guy had already played with John Stevens in the Spontaneous Music Ensemble, Howard Riley and Tony Oxley. Though not as famous as Bailey or Parker, Statements V-XI was Guy's third (or fourth?) solo LP and certainly one of his purest.

FROM THE SLEEVE: "'The music on this record has been selected from the tapes of an afternoon's playing in the studio. I felt that over a period of several hours improvising, each successive piece might (or might not) influence the next, whereas a pre-arranged plan might have led me to multi-tracking and other artificial procedures which I wished to avoid. For this record I approached the music as I would for a live concert.'

Any Jazz or Experimental collector will know how difficult it is to find these records now. The time has long passed when you can stumble upon them in Record shops for under £40!! 'Statements V-XI' was pressed in a limited run and vanished somewhat soon thereafter. As far as I'm aware this has NOT been reissued on CD, and thus this is the only legal way to obtain this music!! ALSO, as a little bonus, there is a small inscription on the bottom right hand corner which reads:

"To Lorraine, with love from an old school pal. X"

Now, in keeping with the understated improv aesthetic, Guy hasn't done anything as vulgar as signing his name a la Rock Star, but I believe it is a genuine inscription from him. Of course, you're quite welcome to take this with a pinch of salt ; I'm merely informing you that it is there... I'll start this relatively LOW and without a reserve, as per usual.

CONDITION OF VINYL: EXCELLENT. Both playing surfaces are a joy to behold. The vinyl has retained the shiny, sleek sheen of a NEW record. There are no spindlemarks on the labels, indicating that this record has been scarcely played! There is are a couple of imperceptible paper scuffs, which DONOT SOUND on playback. It is pretty laughable how small and ineffectual these paper scuff are: most sellers would completely overlook it! There are NO other blemishes of any kind on the two sides. PLAYBACK is superb... of course there are one or two static pops (common even on NEW records!) but the sparse music is reproduced very cleanly. The sound is startling: most of Guy's playing on this record is complex and furious, but the quiet 'small' sounds are perfectly clear and untarnished by static or surface noise on my deck. YOU WON'T BE DISAPPOINTED!

CONDITION OF SLEEVE: EXCELLENT. Funnily enough, the sleeve matches the disc perfectly. It is very much AS NEW: all the edges are smooth and unscuffed, there are no marks or rips or blemishes on either the front or rear sleeves, and the spine is stiff and completely legible. It retains that 'pinched' effect common on 60s and 70s sleeves where the information on the spine is framed by pinched sides. There are a couple of lines on the front which I believe are from the printing process, they are certainly not raised or depressed as would denote a surface mark. All in all, what you see is what you get: a fabulously RARE LP in LOVELY condition.

I am an avid collector of many, many genres and keep my records in IMMACULATE condition. I grade according to the Record Collector Price Guide 'Ready Reckoner' and almost NEVER sell anything which is below EXCELLENT condition. Rest assured that my EXCELLENT is bloody EXCELLENT! Oh yeah and I NEVER GRADE ANYTHING MINT THAT IS NOT SEALED!! Near Mint is the highest grading I use for unsealed records.

All records will be sent within two days MAXIMUM of receipt of payment (usually within 4/5 hours of payment received). Your record will be expertly packed in a professional brown mailer, using one or two stiffeners and housed in a PVC 12" sleeve with the record in a paper inner placed outside the sleeve as is standard practice. I've almost always been lucky when buying records from ebay (save the odd occasion) and would like all buyers of my records to be 100% SATISFIED!

DO NOT HESITATE TO ASK QUESTIONS!!!