Henry Cow - Unrest

£ 21

$ 28

£ 21 Sold For

May 13, 2010 Sold Date

May 6, 2010 Start Date

£ 11 Start price

4 Number Of Bids

Great Britain Country Of Seller

eBay Auctioned at

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Description

Henry Cow - Unrest

Classic album in excellent condition. Original 1974 gatefold issue. LP is in excellent condition, no marks or scratches. Minor surface noise

at the start of side two.

Henry Cow were an English avant-rock group, founded at Cambridge University in 1968 by multi-instrumentalists Fred Frith and Tim Hodgkinson. Henry Cow's personnel fluctuated over their decade together, but drummer Chris Cutler and bassoonist/oboist Lindsay Cooper were important long-term members alongside Frith and Hodgkinson.

An inherent anti-commercial bias kept them at arm's length from the mainstream music business, enabling them to experiment at will. Critic Myles Boisen writes, "their sound was so mercurial and daring that they had few imitators, even though they inspired many on both sides of the Atlantic with a blend of spontaneity, intricate structures, philosophy, and humor that has endured and transcended the 'progressive' tag."

While it was generally thought that Henry Cow took their name from Twentieth century American composer Henry Cowell, this has been repeatedly denied by band members. According to Hodgkinson, the name "Henry Cow" was "in the air" in 1968, and it seemed like a good name for the band. It had no connection to anything.

Unrest was the band's second album, an album and was recorded at Virgin Records's Manor studios in February and March 1974.

The album was dedicated to Robert Wyatt and Uli Trepte. The cover art work was by artist Ray Smith and was the second of three "paint socks" to feature on Henry Cow's albums.

When Henry Cow began recording Unrest, they found they did not have enough composed material to fill the LP. Because of studio time constraints, they were forced to "improvise" and developed a "studio composition" process that involved improvising to tape, tape manipulation, loops, layering and overdubbing. The balance of the LP (tracks 2 to 5 on side 2) were "composed" in this manner. On parts of "Ruins" and "Linguaphonie", the bassoon, alto saxophone, drums and voice were recorded at half or double speed.

The Fred Frith composition "Bittern Storm over Ülm" was a "perversion" of one his favourite Yardbirds songs, "Got To Hurry" (1965) into which he added bars, beats and half-beats. For "Ruins", Frith used Fibonacci numbers to establish beat and harmony, after reading about Hungarian composerBéla Bartók's use of the Fibonacci series. "Solemn Music" was from Henry Cow's music for John Chadwick's play, The Tempest, and is the only piece from that suite to be released.

Side one